CURRENT MISSION

See as much of the world as possible!

ABOUT ME

I get along well with most people because of my open-minded nature and the fact that I take an interest in everyone (regardless of their past, interests or character). I'm friendly (though a tad introverted at times), cheerful, fun-loving and thrill-seeking.

PHILOSOPHY

I believe in 3 things:
1) Happiness is just a state of mind (i.e. you can almost always choose to be happy or sad at any time, it's just now you perceive things).
2) Life is a journey of discovery (when you travel, explore, probe, and ask, you will learn a lot more about yourself and others. That is essentially the purpose of life for me.)
3) Bad things happen so that you can appreciate the good things in life (i.e. a sort of yin and the yang thing, where there is always a balance of everything and anything.)

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

For a start, just surfing couches in the countries that I'll be traveling to.
Because I'm not in my home country (Singapore) right now, I can't host people. However, I hope that through my surfing experiences, I will learn something about hosting people back in my home in Singapore (which I'm looking forward to!)

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I joined Couchsurfing fairly recently (August 2011), but have since surfed in a number of countries such as France, Switzerland, the Netherlands and so on. It's pretty amazing, but all of the experiences had been overwhelmingly positive. To me, the exchange of culture, knowledge and perspective is the more enriching part of a couchsurfing experience.

Interests

I have a keen interest in traveling, meeting new people and experiencing new cultures. Outdoor activities such as hiking, biking and skiing are my favorites while traveling.
In my free time, I usually read, surf the web for interesting stuff or just lounge around. I've recently taken an interest in investing, and I'm trying to get my hands dirty in that.

• culture
• traveling
• investing
• outdoor activities
• cycling
• hiking
• surfing
• skiing

Music, Movies, and Books

I watch movies of all genres EXCEPT horror (don't ask why). My favorites are anime movies because they let the imagination truly run wild.
I used to listen to English pop music, then switched to Chinese pop. Now I listen exclusively to Japanese music.
I enjoy non-fiction books (geeky books, self-help books, I read them all). I also like to read about investing and finance.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Hiking up (alone) a mountain in Yakushima, Japan, and sleeping overnight on a piece of exposed rock with a 1000m vertical drop down below, with rain and strong winds blowing all night, and no way to get down in the darkness. Right now I still can't believe I did that (it was pretty darn scary at the time), but I guess that's just my (too) adventurous side showing.

Teach, Learn, Share

I don't really have any special skills, but perhaps if you need a primer on investments or on the Chinese language, you could ask me. I'm not very good at either one though, but we could always learn together :)

Countries I’ve Visited

Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, China, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Japan, Malaysia, Netherlands, Peru, Poland, Romania, South Korea, Switzerland, Thailand, United Kingdom, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

Canada, France, Singapore, United States

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