CURRENT MISSION

To see more of my own country

ABOUT ME

Instead of going to college, I went backpacking around the world! I saw a lot of interesting places. I ended up living in Europe for 4 years. I had the time of my life. I decided on a career path. I developed psychologically. And I'd love to tell you about all or any of it.

I was in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.

PHILOSOPHY

Y la vida es misterio; la luz ciega
y la verdad inaccesible asombra;
la adusta perfección jamás se entrega,
y el secreto Ideal duerme en la sombra.
--And life is mystery; light blinds
And inaccessible truth astounds;
Dry perfection is never brought forth,
And the secret Ideal sleeps in the shade.
Rubén Darío

My friend, blood shaking in my heart
The awful daring of a moment's surrender
Which an age of prudence can never retract
By this, and this only, we have existed
Which is not to be found in our obituaries
T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

If I am able to, I invite people to come stay. My girlfriend and I share a small apartment, but we love meeting new people, and we have a couch!

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

Patrick Gonyi recommmended CS to me. He was riding his bicycle literally around the world from Spain, and made extensive use of CS during his travels. (This is his website: http://patrickgoni.wix.com/imagineonbike)

Interests

I am fascinated by dreams -- the kind you have when you fall asleep at night. I have meticulously recorded my own dreams for the past decade or so, which makes over a thousand recorded dreams.

I used to write poetry.

I like looking at art. I could spend all day looking at paintings and not get bored.

I wish I knew the names of more wild plants. I can only identify a few, like mugwort, yarrow and nettle.

I like history.

I like biology, biochemistry, bioinformatics, and pretty much anything to do with the genetic code.

I like talking about graduate-level mathematics and physics. I have a certain naive level of understanding.

• arts
• poetry
• painting
• coding
• backpacking
• biology
• history
• mathematics
• physics

Music, Movies, and Books

Authors:
Agota Kristof
Thomas Pynchon
Philip Pullman
Haruki Murakami

Music:
Chopin
Bach

Directors:
Daren Aaronofsky
Andrei Tarkovsky

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

The full moon over the monastery of St. Anthony in Egypt's eastern Sahara was a sight to behold. There was something so eerie about those rocks, those shadows. It literally looked like we were on another planet. Several feet away from us, a Coptic monk sang alhan -- haunting, drawn out Coptic hymns that have their roots in the incantations of Ancient Egyptian priests. The whole experience was utterly magical. Even seeing the ancient Yemeni city of Ma'rib, the capital of the Queen of Sheba, did not compare to that experience. The Great Wall of China did not compare to that experience. Very few of my experiences abroad did compare to it, and every single one of those was much more personal, subjective, and ultimately much harder to communicate in words than the Monastery of St. Anthony.

Teach, Learn, Share

Things I can teach people:

Everything about Linux
Arabic grammar
Spanish grammar
Chinese character stroke order
Jungian interpretation of dreams
Basic oil painting technique

All about:
China
Egypt
England
Cyprus

Some stuff about:
Yemen
Mexico

Countries I’ve Visited

Ireland, Israel

Countries I’ve Lived In

China, Cyprus, Egypt, Mexico, United Kingdom, United States