CURRENT MISSION

To be like Matt, in "Where the Hell is Matt?" on YouTube

ABOUT ME

I'm passionate about international development, social justice, and traveling in general. Latin America and Africa hold special places in my heart. I love salsa dancing and swimming in rivers and water holes, going on hikes, and playing soccer. Rope swings are about the coolest thing in the world.

I think Deep Thoughts with Jack Handey are hilarious and Stephen Colbert is a genius. Languages and international hip hop fascinate me. If you can speak Spanish with me, you will have instantly won my heart. Since moving to DC, I have found a passion for biking (I ride my bike everywhere!), urban planning, and going to house concerts. I love craft beer, am a news junkie and love listening to fascinating podcasts like This American Life. I've tried homebrewing but haven't gotten too good at it.

One time in Italy, I got pick-pocketted and I later caught the thieves in the street and argued with then for an hour until I annoyed then so much that they finally gave me back my credit cards and 40 of the 50 euro they stole (I think the other 10 they spent at McDonalds). I was quite proud after that feat.

I have an insatiable love for reading. I have more books on my Kindle and bookshelf than I will ever read in my life, and at the end of every day my internet browser is full of tabs of articles that I still didn't get a chance to read. I once read this NPR article that put into perspective the vast majority of great books written and being written in the world that we will never read, simply because of the impossibility of reading so many books in one lifetime. And that doesn't include all the great music, movies, plays, photographs, and other pieces of art in the world or even just keeping up with the daily news. And then there's all the beautiful places in the world to visit, amazing people to meet and adventures to have. My response to this sobering fact is that I just have to try to experience as much of it as I possibly can! It's a sad thought to ponder that there's so much great stuff I'll never experience- but it's also exciting to know that I'll never run out of things to be excited about!

visited 21 states (9.33%)Create your own visited map of The World or Like this? try: Google Battle

PHILOSOPHY

Too complex to put in a paragraph.

I try to take life simultaneously as lightly and as seriously as I can. Both are important.

My philosophy on travel is summed up by two quotes:

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness...broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one corner of the earth all one's lifetime."
-Mark Twain

"The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page." - St. Augustine

我为什么加入 Couchsurfing

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I've done it once so far in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. I loved it!

兴趣

hospitality, photography, countries, languages, hymns, community, foreign affairs, urban issues, learning, guitar, Latin America, Africa, The Colbert Report, theology, rope swings, Settlers of Catan, people and their stories, salsa dancing, indie films, brewing my own beer, Telephone Pictionary, reading, This American Life, traveling, cultures, politics, bodies of water, hip-hop in other languages, mountains, DC, scat-singing, foreign films, things to climb, maps, NPR.

• arts
• books
• singing
• photography
• concerts
• dancing
• salsa dancing
• beer
• running
• politics
• news
• movies
• reading
• traveling
• homebrewing
• podcasts
• music
• guitar
• cycling
• hiking
• bungee jumping
• soccer
• swimming
• cartography
• divinity
• languages
• rivers
• mountains

音乐、电影和书籍

Movies: Motorcycle Diaries, City of God, Goodbye Lenin!, Life is Beautiful, Reign Over Me, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Fall, Everything is Illuminated, Once, Crash, Juno, 500 Days of Summer, Tree of Life, Hotel Rwanda

Music: Iron and Wine, Rocky Votolato, The Vespers, Derek Webb, Sufjan Stevens, Jack Johnson, Damien Rice, Denison Witmer, Ingrid Michaelson, Jens Carelius, Kings of Convenience, Mason Jennings, Pete Yorn, Sondre Lerche, Xavier Rudd, Coldplay, Andrew Belle, Jason Mraz, Weezer, Fountains of Wayne, Travis, Radiohead, Ari Hest, Beck, Elizabeth and the Catapult, Mat Kearney, Mika, Mike Doughty, Oasis, Orishas, Talib Kweli, Mos Def, The Narcicyst, K'naan, Nach Scratch, Blitz the Ambassador, G-DO and Xception, Omar Offendum.

Books:
-Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer
-Lord of the Rings trilogy by JRR Tolkien
-Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis
-Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
-History of Love by Nicole Krauss
-Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand
-Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster
-Secrets in the Dark: A Life in Sermons by Frederick Buechner
-How Soccer Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization by Franklin Foer

我做过的一件不可思议的事情

I've bungee jumped into the Nile, canoed in the Amazon, boxed in a muay thai ring in Thailand, to name a few.

The most beautiful places I've ever been are:
1) Halong Bay, Vietnam
2) Kibuye, Rwanda (on Lake Kivu)
3) Perast, Montenegro
4) Dubrovnik, Croatia
5) Cinque Terre, Italy

I've seen the Colosseum in Rome (although I liked the Roman ampitheatre in Pula, Croatia more!) and Angkor Wat in Cambodia. I've hiked through western Uganda and northern Rwanda, rode a motorbike to the highest point in Thailand, and in Italy I chased down a guy who pick-pocketed me on the bus. An hour later of arguing, I convinced him and his girlfriend to give me my wallet back.

My dream places to go are:
-Macchu Picchu
-Havana
-Rio de Janeiro
-Buenos Aires
-Lake Titicaca

我游览过的国家

Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cambodia, Croatia, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Hungary, Kenya, Mexico, Montenegro, Peru, Rwanda, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Thailand, Uganda, Viet Nam

我居住过的国家

Rwanda, Uganda, United States

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