CURRENT MISSION

Keep doing what we love: travel and write.

Right now we are in Southeast Asia, doing research for a book about culture :)

Our biggest travel achievement was to complete a trip overland from The Philippines to Turkey, hitchhiking, camping and meeting couchsurfers on the way. After finishing that trip, we published our second book: "Eliminando fronteras"
(You can watch a sum up of the trip in this 10 min video: https://vimeo.com/150356535 )

ABOUT ME

We are a couple that love travelling and meeting people from different walks of life, to open our minds to new concepts and leave the confort zone. A trip to a country is not complete if we don't share our experience with the locals, that's why CS is our number one travel resource!

We believe that the only way to put an end to prejudices is by learning, experiencing and trying to understand other people's culture.

We are simple people that with hard work and a lot of passion made a lifestyle of travelling. We want to see the world through our own eyes, and discover the less touristed spots on earth.

We left Argentina in December 2008, destination New Zealand. We went with the Working Holiday programme, and we had a hell of a time there. We have worked and travelled throughout the country for more than one year, during which we met awesome people and had unforgettable experiences.
Looking at the map was impossible not to feel tempted by the vicinity of Australia, so we got another Working Holiday visa and off we went. We stayed there for 2 years, experiencing the bright and dark from a country that isn't only picture perfect beaches.
In between we spent 10 months in Asia, continent that fascinates us. We learnt how to eat rice with chopsticks in China; how to travel with constant diarrhoea in India; how to deal with a "celebrity" status in Bangladesh; we slept every night on million-star hotels (that is, our tent) during our trip to Mongolia and met the most hospitable people imaginable in Iran... among countless fascinating experiences.

We have been on the road for the last 10 years. On January 2013 we started a project called "Eliminando fronteras" ("Without Borders"), in wich we hitchhiked from The Philippines to Turkey, crossing all over Asia to show that hospitality exists in every single corner of the planet, and that there's much more in the world that what mass media shows us.

On our travel blog http://marcandoelpolo.com/ (only in Spanish, though) we share our experiences, tips and the willingness of inspiring people to travel.

After 10 years on the road, we can say that we are full-time travelers, or as some people call us "digital nomads". Not that we are very "digital", not at all, but mainly through our online writing is how we can keep traveling.

PHILOSOPHY

"We travel not to escape life, but for life not to escape us".

For us human attractions are more important than tourist attractions.

We can be inspired by reading Mahatma Gandhi in solitude or by talking to a truck driver while hitchhiking. Never subestimate, every individual is a potential teacher.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

We heard about CS while traveling in New Zealand, so now we are experiencing it as guests, but we'll be pleased to host travellers in Argentina once we are back home!

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

We have had Couch Surfing experiences in more than 30 countries, and all were very positive!! We try to experience Couchsurfing in every single country we visit.

Interests

Well, it's a bit obvious to say, but we enjoy traveling and meeting people from different backgrounds. It is really valuable for us knowing the world where we live.

Every single place in the world has its reasons for us to visit it and meeting the locals is on top of the list.

We are passionate writers and of course we love reading too, specially on the travel topic. We enjoy photography as well and like trying (and learning how to cook) local specialities.

We aren't really into sightseeing, but prefer to spend a day in a new place visiting a market, sitting somwhere to see the life go by and wandering around without any set destination.

• culture
• writing
• photography
• cooking
• vegetarian
• reading
• traveling
• socializing
• blogging
• camping
• teaching
• hitchhiking

Music, Movies, and Books

We love literature, movies and documentaries related to travels. We try to get informed as much as we can about the places we will visit... some books that we read and liked a lot:

- "1984" and "Animal Farm", George Orwell.
- "The Story of my experiments with truth", Mahatma Gandhi.
- "A thousand splendid suns", Khaled Hosseini.
- "The white tiger", Aravind Adiga.
- "Lajja", Taslima Nasrin.
- "Lost Horizon", James Hilton.
- "Video Night in Kathmandu", Pico Iyer
- "First they killed my father", Loung Ung
- "The happy isles of Oceania" and "The great railway bazaar", Paul Theroux
- "Playing with water", James Hamilton
- "Getting stone with savages", Maarten Troost.
- "The Beach", Alex Garland (Yes, we know, the movie is pretty bad, but the book rocks!)

And soooo on... recommendations about good books are more than welcome!

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Start traveling and decide not to stop, which has led to love our lives so much.

Teach, Learn, Share

We believe that we all have something to learn from each other.

Countries I’ve Visited

Andorra, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Brazil, Brunei Darussalam, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Chile, China, Cyprus, England, Fiji, France, Georgia, Gibraltar, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Iran, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Macao, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mexico, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Netherlands, Peru, Philippines, Samoa, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkey, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vatican City State, Viet Nam

Countries I’ve Lived In

Argentina, Australia, New Zealand

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