CURRENT MISSION

transform, create, connect with people - the community project, because this is important!

ABOUT ME

I'm a 30 year old woman who has been living in Brussels for the last three years. I grew up in Bruges, the little Venice of the North, which soon became too small for me, so I mooved to Gent to study French and Spanish literature and language. In my third year, I did an Erasmus-exchange of one year in Aix-en-Provence (I love the south of France since I'm a child - with my parents, we spent every holiday in France, especially in the south; I am born in Belgium but I feel much closer to the French culture (except from Brussels...) and when I went to live there, I had the impression I came home...), and this was a wonderful experience. After my literature studies in Gent (Flanders), I went back to Aix-en-Provence and to Marseille, where I spent three more years taking literature courses at University and participating to writing projects (I love to write; in fact, since I remember (bon, since I learned how to write...), I have always been writing, it is like breathing to me, or thinking, or cycling in Brussels...). After these three years of sun, walks in the Calanques, parties in the parks of Aix with people from everywhere in the world, I returned to Belgium, and I taught French in secundary schools in Flanders during two years... and I hated it... I really think that if you are doing something which is not the thing you want to do, you have to stop it. This is what I did. I went to work for a cultural organization in Bruges, where I wrote several texts for children and where I participated also to some writing projects. Three years ago, I felt I had to leave Bruges, and I went to live in Brussels. I think if there is one city in the world with which I feel really connected, it is Brussels. In the three years during which I have been living here, I really got to know this city very well. It's a very creative, mooving city, with a lot of young people who are in art schools or live as artists. I learned to know the city by walking around with my photo camera (besides writing, i love to make photos, and I develop them in my bathroom!) and talking to people I met during my walks and during the evenings which I spent in the bars of my neighbourhood. I think Brussels is a very human city, where people are very open, and as I am concerned, I didn't have any problems with integrating in this city. You meet people very easily, and if you are used to travelling, you know that this isn't true for every capital in the world... It's a big village, in fact, and in the south of Brussels (Saint-Gilles, XL, les Marolles), it is very difficult walking around without meeting people you know... When I arrived in Brussels, I started to teach French and Dutch to foreign people who arrive in Belgium. My classes are very international and I also learn a lot of things about the cultures of my students (kitchen, religion, beauty advises of Morrocan mothers(...), music,... when I have holidays, I am travelling, and when I am teaching, I'm also travelling, in my classes!). Besides the teaching, I am dancing a lot (contemporary dance - Brussels is the perfect city for this!), I'm writing (short texts and carnets - for me, the visual aspect of a text is as important as the content, so I spend a lot of time making collages or paying attention to the support of my texts - but this is difficult to explain without showing you, so it's better to show you if one day we meet!), I'm doing photography, I'm reading a lot and... of course, I'm travelling whenever I can! Two summers ago, I went to do a dance course in Budapest, from Budapest I travelled to Georgia where I have friends, we travelled together during one month in Georgia (an amazingly interesting and crazy country, where I certainly will return to!) and from there, I flew to Greece to travel on the islands for one more month, with a Greek friend of mine. I'm very interested in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Last year, I travelled through Armenia with my boyfriend, and last summer, we discovered Azerbaidjan and spent some time in Georgia at the end of the trip. I have several friends who have "un pied à terre" in Romania and Russia, and I love to go there. Here in Brussels, I have a lot of friends who are musicians of gipsy music, and I often go to their concerts. Some months ago, I started to learn Russian, with a book and cd's, and I'm waiting impatiently for the next occasion to head east!!
About myself (if I haven't said enough already...), I'm a very open person, who love to talk with people I meet to learn about their lives, their cultures, their ways of seeing life. Bon... we still have to keep the surprise of meeting each other and discover the other person, so if I tell too much about myself, there won't be anything left to discover... and anyway, it's always strange talking about ourselves, about how we are and so on, so I propose to keep this for the moment we meet!

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

Great experiences**

Interests

travelling, dancing (contemporary dance, a lot of contact and impro), going to theater and dance performances, reading, photography (black and white, analogue), writing, meeting people, making collages, seeing moovies, going to flea markets, learning things I'm interested in

• arts
• culture
• writing
• books
• literature
• theater
• photography
• beauty
• concerts
• dancing
• walking
• partying
• reading
• traveling
• socializing
• music
• cycling
• religion
• study abroad
• parks

Music, Movies, and Books

Writers: Nicolas Bouvier, Carson Mc Cullers, Bruce Chatwin, Ella Maillart, Marguerite Duras, Henri Michaux, Kawabata, Tanuzaki, Proust, Céline, Panaït Istrati, Sôseki, William Saroyan (L'Audacieux Jeune Homme au Trapèze Volant), Agota Kristof (Le Grand Cahier), Joseph Conrad
Music: gipsy music, jazz manouche, jazz, Coco Rosie, Hanne Hukkelberg, Beirut, Feist, Nouvelle Vague, Brassens, Ferré, Brel, Les Ogres de Barback, La Rue Ketanou, Stina Nordenstam, Chet Baker, Django Reinhardt
Movies: (I worked for a Cinema Festival (called Cinema Novo, in Bruges) during 10 years, so I love cinema!!)three continent moovies (Africa, South America, Asia), small European films

Countries I’ve Visited

Australia, Czech Republic, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, Réunion, Slovenia, Spain, Turkey

Countries I’ve Lived In

Belgium, France

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