On the solo pilgrimage to the unknown.

Mostly a wanderer in espresso, books, statistics, and jazz.

Sometimes a pathetic philosopher at night.

I can play three instruments but no, I don’t wake my downstairs neighbors up at 3 in the morning.

Grew up in China, came to the US a while ago, and spent a lovely semester in Paris imagining what Hemmingway would do on Rue Saint Germain.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

Each unique combination of time and space is what makes each moment on the trip memorable. Yet our memories fade as we age, so we resort to external mechanisms, such as photography and blogging, to record those moments precisely.

However, it is theoretically impossible to replicate the precise moment to its full extent. The noise of the crowd in the downtown market, the kaleidoscopic sky during sunset, the sharp jab on your left arm when a man late for his interview pushes against you on the subway, the awkward "hey" you utter to the person next to you in an excruciatingly long queue--all these fractioned segments interweave with one another to create a continuous spectrum of memory.

I tend to recall the people I encounter on my trips better than the trips themselves. After all, it is the moments we banter with and laugh at each other that makes our true "selves" complete.

The world is too big of a place to meet every single individual, and thus, most people remain strangers whose thoughts and emotions completely unknown to us. The law of probability is really in our odds whenever two minds can tangle with each other so beautifully.

CS is thus a place for us to witness such breathtaking magic.

Interests

• books
• photography
• cooking
• running
• politics
• jazz
• opera
• cycling
• languages
• statistics
• solo travel
• cuisine
• metro
• public transit

Music, Movies, and Books

Music:
Yo-yo Ma, Chris Botti
Serge Gainsbourg, Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, Francesco Gabani
Ennio Morricone, Alexandre Desplat
Purcell, Charpentier, Handel, Puccini

Movies:
Cinema Paradiso, The Great Beauty, La Notte, In the Mood for Love, The Secrets in Their Eyes

Books:
Calvino, Capote, Camus, Carver, Orwell, Didion, Sartre, Foucault, Hardy, Huxley, Vargas Llosa

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Stood in awe for 15 minutes at a deli store in Moscow before figuring out the proper way to get a ticket, order food, and pay.

Teach, Learn, Share

Teach:
Healthy cooking and eating, languages, smart living and traveling

Share:
Some immature thoughts about the world and human interaction

What I Can Share with Hosts

Travel stories around the world.
If you’re interested in politics, I can tell you a story or two about the CCP and Mao ;)

Countries I’ve Visited

Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Macao, Malaysia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Philippines, Portugal, Russian Federation, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom

Countries I’ve Lived In

China, France, United States