*accepting surfers during the pandemic*

Hey I'm Elmar and I am an Electrical Engineer from the Netherlands but now living in Berlin. I enjoy exploring ways to make the world more sustainable and now work on this with my own startup as well :)

When traveling I like being spontanious, couchsurfing and hitchhiking are my favourite ways of traveling because of the adventures you get into and interesting people you meet. During the pandemic I’ve been mostly at home in my appartment though, I’d like to have visitors over though!

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

I use couchurfing for both hosting, surfing and going to the events. I like getting to know other couchsurfers and hearing everyones stories.

I've used couch surfing in Australia and Ghana to meet the most awesome hosts and travel mates.

My first couchsurf experience was in the middle of Ghana together with a friend. We were working on a project that would make clean drinking water more accessible by connecting working installations to the internet so quality can be monitored/maintained, something that is usually quite difficult as maintenance is done by outsiders and communication with locals is usually quite limited. Often parts of installations are " borrowed" to fix a broken bike or whatever :p surprising things happen all the time, we hope to bring some awareness / responsibility to locals with this system https://www.susteq.nl/about/

After crossing the Australian desert with a solar powered car I worked on for over a year I used couch surfing while traveling Australia, I stayed at several hosts and we formed a group of 12 travelers from all over the world and we did an epic roadtrip!

When I lived in San Fransisco and Rotterdam I hosted many travelers and had lots of fun hanging out with them!

Interests

travelling, building solar powered cars, couchsurfing, hithchiking, sailing, projects, eating pizza, random adventures, listening to music, couch-surfing, cooking and eating nice vegetarian food, biking, cheese, hagelslag, vegemite, sustainable energy

• burningman
• yoga
• meditation
• electronics
• technology
• sailing
• hitchhiking
• vegetarian food
• techno

Music, Movies, and Books

music:
Grimes, Nobu, Moby, glass candy, Tame impala, metronomy, krezip, amy whinehouse, astroids galaxy tour, feist, foo fighters, Jason Mraz, killers,

books:
The Circle, de engelenmaker, Harry Potter, The Rosie project, why we sleep

series:
Silicon valley, Dexter, Lost, Prison-break, halt and catch fire

movies:
Yes man, 500 days of summer, The happening, Toy story, The social network, The internship, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

When I was sitting in the back of a truck transporting peanuts, for hours, traveling to some remote village in northern Ghana, sitting between large bags filled with peanuts and with a view on a big hole in the floor with big spinning wheels underneath it.

Getting out of this truck was like stepping out of a time-machine. People in the village were living in houses made out of mud and didn't realy know about the rest of the world. They must have though I was some kind of alien because most of them had never seen a white man before, this was really special.

Also, working long days and nights for a year long to make a solar powered car and going to Australia to participate in a 3000km long race, all on solar energy, was one of the most incredible experience I've ever had.

Teach, Learn, Share

I'm really into electronics. If you want your plants to post a message on twitter when they are thirsty or wanna hook up some solar panels I can help with that !

We could go on a sailing trip and i will teach you how to sail!

What I Can Share with Hosts

getting lost in a city or in nature together, cooking, working on a project, having nice conversations,

Countries I’ve Visited

Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ghana, Hong Kong, Iceland, Indonesia, Ireland, Kenya, Malaysia, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Peru, Portugal, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, United Kingdom, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

Australia, China, Hong Kong, Netherlands, Sweden, United States

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