CURRENT MISSION

Get back to travelling!

ABOUT ME

Hi everyone!

In November 2010 I finished a 48 week interferon-based chemotherapy treatment for hepatitis C which kicked my ass. I learned a lot from being sick and even more from being sicker from the treatment. Life is too short not to enjoy because, seriously, you never know when it can end.

Not that it should matter, but in case it does, I'm gay and of course host gay and straight guests! =)

If you love horror movies we will have TONS to talk about but of course that's not necessary. I'm open to many kinds of film.

PHILOSOPHY

If you see someone without a smile, give them yours. =D

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

While doing my treatment I was hosting people and now that it's done I'm travelling and surfing couches.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

It's as good as you make it and so far I've met some great people through this.

Interests

Horror movies, dodgeball, reading, music, foreign films, Muay Thai, sushi, meeting people, playing tour guide to surfers, listening to travel stories, Mexican food, dancing, and of course travelling.

• dogs
• dancing
• dining
• mexican food
• drinking
• movies
• reading
• traveling
• socializing
• music
• surfing
• tourism
• volunteering

Music, Movies, and Books

TV: Doctor Who, The IT Crowd, Survivors (the BBC show, not to be confused with the reality show Survivor), The Munsters, I Love Lucy, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Golden Girls

Film: Repo! The Genetic Opera, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, 28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later, The Exorcist, The Royal Tenenbaums, Funny Games (German and American versions), The Orphanage, Blindness, Hostel, The Motorcycle Diaries, Mean Girls, Poltergeist, Dawn of the Dead, Auntie Mame, High Lane, Mutants, Boogie Nights, The Others, Fargo

Books: The Stand, Blindness, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, The Shining, anything by Sylvia Browne, Shakespeare comedies, personal finance books, in an Urban Book Club and we read non-mainstream books (A Brief History of Death, 13 Bullets, etc.)

Music: Cazwell, Black Eyed Peas, Robyn, The Ting Tings, Lady GaGa, Cyndi Lauper, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Kylie Minogue, Weezer, Cher, Sarah Brightman, Johnny Cash, Bette Midler, The Mamas and the Papas, Blondie, Dimitri from Paris, Patsy Cline

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Volunteering with rescue dogs, I've helped save a couple of our four-legged friends' lives. =D

Teach, Learn, Share

Introduce me to your favorite music. I really enjoy discovering new artists!

What's a good horror movie from your country?

I can teach you the correct way to fold the forever-challenging fitted sheet thanks to a past CSer. =D

I can also teach you a zillion things about hepatitis C that I bet you didn't know. Such as:

Hep C is a virus which attacks the liver with intent to destroy it. It is called "the silent killer" because there are rarely side effects and most people find out they have it after it has caused considerable amounts of damage to the liver.

It is spread only by blood which means it is NOT sexually transmitted (in UNprotected sex, the chance of passing it to a partner is less than 2% and that's only possible if both partners have sores or are bleeding).

How can you get it? Here are SOME ways, but of course not all.
1. sharing a razor or toothbrush with someone who has the virus (don't share!)
2. improperly sterilized dentist tools
3. improperly sterilized manicure/pedicure tools
4. blood transfusions prior to 1991
5. sharing IV drug needles
*Anything that allows infected blood into your bloodstream.

It is safe to share a bathroom with someone who has it (shower, toilet, etc.). It is safe to share eating utensils, it is safe to share a drinking glass, it is safe to kiss and it is safe to have sex (use condoms to prevent other bad things!). It is NOT present in body fluids other than blood (saliva, sweat, and sexual fluids do not cause any threat of hepatitis C. Yay!).

The only "cure" is a brutal combination of weekly shots of interferon (you inject yourself) and a set of pills. This goes on for 48 weeks (or 24 weeks if you have an "easy" genotype or longer if you are a "slow responder" to the meds). The side effects are awful so you hope for an "easy" genotype. The "cure" doesn't always work. I had a 52% chance of it working and I acknowledge how lucky I am that it worked for me. Hooray!

Love your liver, people. Transplants are not easy to get and you need your liver to live! It never hurts to get tested. The sooner one finds out they have it, the better the chances of success. For every person with HIV, there are 4 with hepatitis C. Scary! Take care of yourselves! :*

Countries I’ve Visited

France, Germany, Mexico, Romania, United Kingdom

Countries I’ve Lived In

United States

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