I'm a travelling tradesman who's thumbing his way through Australia at all speed. I'm more of a pub man than a club man, and much prefer to have a night around the table with some friends and some beers as opposed to going to swanky places that have dress codes and door men and where absolutely nobody wants to talk about lug nuts and the finer points of thread cutting. I'm into very simple living, and will quite happily live out of a suitcase for years at a time.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

There's something we do in norther Europe called the Waltz. The english term is journeyman, although that isn't used much any more. When you want to become a tradesman, you start out as an apprentice, and these days move on immediately to become a worker. But back in the old days, and still in a few places, there's an intermediary step called a journeyman. The idea is that you're supposed to travel away from home with your skills, learning tricks of the trade abroad and using every possible permutation of your trade until you reach the lofty heights of "competent," at which point you go home, eventually take an apprentice, and teach them everything you're learned on your trip. The practice still exists, mostly in Germany, but also in France for carpenters, and in Denmark, where I'm from. The trip lasts a year and a day, and during that time I travel from town to town working in machine shops across all of Australia and New Zealand and anywhere else that will have me. I move around too much for an apartment to be a realistic prospect, and my salary isn't good enough that getting hotels all the time makes any sense, so here I am.

Interests

I have a wide range of interests that I pursue with some enthusiasm, so I can be a bit of a chatter box, but I promise I usually have the good grace to dial it back a bit when I notice.

• arts
• writing
• singing
• folk music
• hiking
• engineering
• craft beer
• mysticism
• driving
• jewelry making
• engraving
• fantasy books
• hurdy gurdy
• machinery
• rambling
• history and culture

Music, Movies, and Books

Favourite music: folk of various different kinds, especially fusion genres where they mix it up some. I also have a fondness for acapella. Favourite movie: I haven't watched it in years, but I loved the Bellringer of Noutre Dame, the Disney one. Frollo was amazing. I like animated movies in general. And for books, it muct be Taltos, by Steven Brust. It's a cheesy fantasy novel, but Brust's prose never fails to make me chuckle, and Taltos was especially clever.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

One time when I was in Dublin, me and some friends had waited for the tide to lower enough for us to wade into an old grate in the side of the canal. It was castle-gate sized and overgrown with seaweed, and completely invivible when the tide was high. Crawling in, we started exploring the underbelly of Dublin, seeing the city develop from bluestone to redbrick to concrete like rings in a tree. It was part dungeon delving, part time travel.

Teach, Learn, Share

I can teach a good deal about how to work metal, especially if you're willing to teach a few tricks back. I also know quite a lot about editing - I used to be a journalist, we'd edit for a living. I wouldn't mind going over an assignment or something to catch errors and make it look snazzy.

What I Can Share with Hosts

Good company, music and enthusiasm. I own very little else, but it often proves enough.

Countries I’ve Visited

Australia, Belgium, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Hungary, Italy, Norway, Poland, Spain, Sweden

Countries I’ve Lived In

Australia, China, Denmark, Ireland