CURRENT MISSION

To travel the world and meet interesting people.

ABOUT ME

Brexit-exile happily living in New Zealand after six years in London. Citizen of the Commonwealth, originally from Johannesburg, grew up in UK and have also worked in France and Canada. I work as an urban designer at the Auckland Design Office and am keenly interested in successful city-making.

And aside from all this...well, I look a bit like a Viking, but am much nicer than that, really. I'm quite outdoorsy. I appreciate art, I LOVE my bicycle, enjoy sailing, skiing and riding. That's enough about me.

PHILOSOPHY

It's a good idea to be close to people who make you feel good about being who you are.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I am returning after a rather long hiatus. I can't host at the moment but if you want a tour of Auckland give me a shout.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I'm friends with a C-S ambassador, through whom I have CSed in the Czech Republic, have CSed in UK and Germany and have been to various shindigs connected with Bristol CS. I used to host a lot when I had an enormous flat in Glasgow (and three spare rooms!)

Interests

Most of the above is self-explanatory. I've sailed almost my entire life and am always happy on/near water. Learning to ride horses has been the challenge of the past 12 months and I've only fallen off once.

The list is not exhaustive. In any case, pretty much anything is interesting if it is articulated properly.

• books
• literature
• architecture
• pub crawls
• movies
• reading
• cars
• cycling
• hiking
• camping
• surfing
• sailing
• skiing
• wild camping
• riding
• cycle touring
• wild swimming

Music, Movies, and Books

***MOVIES***

Goodbye Lenin, Dr. Strangelove, American Beauty, The Queen, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Saturday Night Fever, Trainspotting, Bullitt, Dune, The Blues Brothers, Monty Python, Back to the Future, Airplane, Top Secret, Top Gun, Hot Shots, Four Weddings & a Funeral, Not Another Teen Movie, Catch Me if you Can, The Day of the Jackal, Goodfellas, Phantasm II, Clueless, Thank You For Smoking, Easy Rider, First Blood, etc. etc.

I have a visceral dislike for "Elf".

***MUSIC***

Predominantly rock, hard rock, metal, punk, electronica and indie. E.g:

Billy Talent, Art Brut, ELO, The Apples in Stereo, Metric, Beseech, The Arcade Fire, C.S.S., Super Furry Animals, The Pixies, Nirvana, Pitchshifter, The Killers, DJ Yoda, Nine Black Alps, The Clash, Big Country, Biffy Clyro, Depeche Mode, Catherine Wheel, Manu Chao, Iggy Pop, Madness, Frank Black and the Catholics, Tom Lehrer, The Doors, Idlewild, Blondie, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, Black Sabbath, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles; (esp. later albums), The Buzzcocks, Neil Young, James, Gene, Belle and Sebastian, Muse, Foo Fighters, Rammstein, Metallica, The Offspring, Rage Against the Machine, Pulp, Oasis, Garbage, No Doubt, Franz Ferdinand, Ben Folds Five, Supergrass, The Music, Hot Hot Heat, Manic Street Preachers, The Cranberries, The Hives, Justice, Scooter, Pendulum, The Vines, Do Me Bad Things, Soulwax, The Automatic, David Bowie, to name but a few

***BOOKS***

Swallows and Amazons, The Death & Life of Great American Cities, The Architecture of Happiness, Sahara Overland, Lolita, A Town Like Alice, Adrian Mole, The Queen & I, Around the World in 80 Days (both Verne and Palin), Alice in Wonderland, Bill Bryson, Asterix, The Day of the Jackal, Tom's Midnight Garden, Tintin, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, 1984, Just So Stories, Just William, Three Men in a Boat, James Herriot, Roald Dahl, Asterix in Switzerland (this in particular is a work of pure genius), Flight 714, Melvin Burgess, Private Eye Annuals, Northern Lights, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass, Escape from Pretoria, The Proving Ground

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Taken part in a six week stand up comedy course in London, culminating in my writing and performing a five minute comedy set on stage in abasement in London. Great fun and I recommend you try it.

Received my MA degree from Prince Charles (seriously!!)

Driven from the UK to the Gambia through the Sahara Desert in a banger that cost me £200, in the process dealing with dodgy Mauritanian guides, pidgin French, soft sand and the worst Saharan dust storm in years :S

Driven from the UK to Ukraine in a Volvo 740 GLE that I got for free (and sold in extremely dodgy circumstances to a hotel receptionist).

Teach, Learn, Share

I'm an urban designer. I design buildings, public spaces, cityscapes and other aspects of the human environment. For a better idea of what I am on about, watch the film "Urbanized" by Gary Hustwit. It is SUPERB.

The best book to read on this subject BY FAR is Jane Jacobs' (1961) "The Death & Life of Great American Cities". It is quite slim, completely non-technical and is more insightful than pretty much anything that went before it and an inspiration for much subsequent literature. Terrific!

I'd love to learn more about environmental psychology.

If you're making tea, it is almost always better if you use a teapot. Cups just aren't the same.

What I Can Share with Hosts

I can share my wit and easygoing company.

Countries I’ve Visited

Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, Estonia, Finland, France, Gambia, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mauritania, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Portugal, Senegal, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

Canada, France, New Zealand, South Africa, United Kingdom

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