I was born & lived most of my life in the US (Chicago, Arkansas, Washington DC), along with some travelling in between & some brief stints living in Tunisia & Jordan. In 2015 I moved to Germany and now my home is in Hamburg. However, I am currently living in Madrid, Spain for a few months.

There's a good quote from Guy Debord that explains pretty well what I'm about:

"We need to flood the market with a mass of desires whose fulfillment is not beyond the capacity of humanity’s present means of action on the material world, but only beyond the capacity of the old social organization."

To me, this means that the capitalist system has convinced us that our desires should be bought with money, and it's our job to actively find pleasures, desires, and meaning outside of that system. I'm not perfect in this respect: I can tell you all about my favorite fancy coffee, and I bought myself a nice bicycle. But I think it's a good goal to live by.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

CouchSurfing for me is the anti-AirBnB. In an age where everything has a price on it, sharing and giving is one of the simplest radical acts we can take.

Interests

Spicy food, bicycles (and cycling), garage rock, Middle Eastern politics & development, coffee, narrative nonfiction, Fleetwood Mac.

• dining
• coffee
• politics
• traveling
• cycling

Music, Movies, and Books

Bruce Springsteen, Willis Earl Beal, Kate Bush, Kraftwerk, Mitski, Townes Van Zandt, Julie Byrne, The War on Drugs, William Onyeabor

Metropolis, Fitzcarraldo, Alphaville, Blade Runner, Dead Man, The Great Silence, La Jetée, The Color of Pomegranates

Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid
The Bridge on the Drina
Pale Fire
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
White Noise
The Idiot

Teach, Learn, Share

I would love to practice Arabic with someone! I studied it pretty intensively for two years but I need a refresher. تهحي العربية؟

What I Can Share with Hosts

If you read my profile and want to message me, please include the word "pineapple" in your message.

Countries I’ve Visited

Austria, Canada, Denmark, France, Hungary, India, Italy, Netherlands, Palestine, Slovakia, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom

Countries I’ve Lived In

Croatia, Germany, Jordan, Tunisia, United States

•