CURRENT MISSION

to have a mission !!

ABOUT ME
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R-E-A-D C-A-R-E-F-U-L-L-Y BEFORE YOU WRITE ME A REQUEST:

My home isn't a free hostel, neither a NGO. Requests like "i need a host for two days" or "hey, we are 3 girls from..(whatever)...we need a place to stay" are totally away from the Couchsurfing concept. For that you have www.airbnb.com, www.hostelsclub.com; www.hostelsworld.com. If you send me an impersonal "copy-paste" mail or scruffy simple mails in the same way you would book a room in a hotel, without any sign or clue that you read my profile and you write me because you really want to connect with us, i won't even be kind to answer. I will just automaticaly decline your request. So don't waste your time and don't waste mine, if you won't be able to seduce us making us understand that having you will worth. I receive daily around 10-20 requests, usually i'm so busy with studies, works, projects, and it takes lot of time to answer your requests. Generally, i don't host more than two days, and more than two persons, but at least if you try, add a link to their profile. I don't host people i cann't have an idea about.

I know CS is an innovative concept of low budget traveling, and it's cool, but it is also -and most important- a way to share and connect souls, build friendships and experience sensations through people's contact. I want every experience from CS to be special. For f*** Sake : ))

UKRAINIAN REFUGEES / TRAVELERS, LASKAVO PROSIMO U MOJE DOM, and SLAVA UKRAINI ! I will be willing to host you and help you according to my possibilities.

DISCLAIMER FOR RUSSIANS or "Russo-methastasis countries": I have no problems with Russians unless they are Putin lovers, or are into Sovky-Vatnik mambo jambo, and in general Soviet Nostalgia. If you approve this war, or come bitching about how Ukrainians, Poles or the West hate Russia and some sort of Kremlin propaganda you aren't welcome at my home. I admire Russian culture and Russians who are genuine good and hospitable ( i met many), my son is half Russian, but of course i have my red lines which i won't tolerate, and specially after this war, i lost my patience. I am done.

I got the same disaproval for Religious fundamentalist freaks, Too much extreme right/left wingers, woke people, bitter feminists, macho men, nationalists, identity politics lovers and Social Justice Warriors.

PLEASE, I DON'T NEED TOUR GUIDES ! Don't send a request for hosting me if you are pretending to offer your services as a tour guide. I rarely use guides, in very exceptional cases, but almost never. I find it to be quite boring and claustrophobic to have someone next to me avoiding my chances to having my own experience of things in a city. Totally different thing is that a local or my host are spending time together and guide me a bit around. But that's a whole different story.

EMPTY PROFILES: If you send me a request for being hosted or hosting me, with an empty profile, no photos, is most likely that i won't take you seriously. How can i know if you are interesting, fun or trustable to me if i cannot read information from your images, words and what underlines in them?

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Weeell ! My name is Leandro (Not Leonardo, Leanadro, Alejandro, Aleanadro, etc... like usually people write me here by mistake...don't know why) If you are curious, It's a greek name which comes from Greek Mythology (The myth of Leandros and Hero).

I was born in Cuba but i moved to Barcelona when i was a teenager, where i grew up, so i dont feel myself as something specific: Cuban, Spanish, or Catalan, but a mix of all of them, plus all those places where i have been traveling and living, which made a strong influence on my life, like Turkey and Russia. Although, i would say, Catalan feeling is the one it has more protagonism in me. : )

I'm photographer, and I use this way as a vehicle of expression for my ideas through personal projects, traveling, crossing my life with other people's life, etc. But for surviving, i work as a freelance-photographer. Also, i'm teaching photography to young people on cultural center sometimes, which i really enjoy.
Here you can check my works: www.leandro-garcia.com , hope you like it ; )

I studied by wrong personal decision International Comerce and Marketing, finances and logistics but after some reflections and frustrations i tried to return to my real passion (arts), and studied Photography, then Art History at Barcelona University. Now i am studying a Master in Music as Interdisciplinary Art ! Yeah ! Music is also very important in my life !

I also have a son from my previous marriage, born in July 2020, and his name is Dàrek, half Russian, half me. He is a baddass kid, very funny, vivid and so talkative for his early age. Sometimes he will be around playing, or spending the night with me. Accepting guests with kids would be fun, the same if i would be hosted by families as soon as i get the chance to travel with him !

PHILOSOPHY

If problems does have solution, don't be worried, and if it doesnt', the same. Day by day i'm trying to don't make a big deal of things and problems, althought sometimes is so difficult, but yeah, i'm tying to keep a more relaxed way of life (without stopping the rythm, and the hungry for knowledge, for sure)

"I don't want to belong to any club that accepts me as it's member" Groucho Marx.

By the way, more connections on the social media:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Leandrogarciahdez
Vkontakte: https://vk.com/leandrogarciafoto
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/leandro_garcia_photography/

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I take this experience as a way to enjoy and share with people good energies, knowledge, curiosities, laughs, adventures, languages, culture, understand how people lives and thinks, learn about history, put some faces and places on the things i learnt that only traveling helps to fix it on your mind and not forget it, also enjoy culinary world, and of course, make our soul richer.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I had amazing and funny experiences being hosted in Istanbul, there was where everything started. I remember it with so much love, so after it, this fueled the aim to become a host, and keep on exploring the world through other hosts. That brought me formidable chances to meet people that had become what i call treasure-friends.

Interests

I'm interested in everything about arts, music, literature, culture in general, and history. I love discussing about history and politics, but well, being sincere, it depends with whom and where : ))

About music, i try to be us much eclectic as possible, i try to fill my soul with every kind of music creation, but i have to say it: i love metal !!! F**K Yeah !!! But also, Jazz, Electronic music, and all sorts of style fusions projects, world music, etc.

I love riding bike and skating with my longboard, also playing guitar, but damn, i realized that i haven't took it for a big while. Anyway, in different ways i always try to keep myself busy, or sometimes, just the circunstances keeps you reeeeaaallly busy. Days should have almost 26 hours, i guess !

I also love travelling, specially when i feel so estressed or i just wanna breath a different air, so then i need to run away and dedicate time to myself thinking, walking just watching things, taking photos and sharing with the people i find on the way.

• arts
• culture
• books
• literature
• photography
• traveling
• socializing
• music
• jazz
• guitar
• metal music
• cycling
• art history
• history
• languages
• tourism
• budget travel

Music, Movies, and Books

About music, i try to be as eclectic as possible, if the music is good, i like it. Examples are: Jazz, Funk, Blues, Country, Reggae, Electronic, Fusion, Ethnic/World Music, Balkans, etc. But i have to confess that i have 3 favorite styles, organized in the following order: Metal, Jazz, and electronic music.
About metal, i can resume my preferences in bands like Metallica, Megadeth, Pantera, Exodus, Anthrax, and other thrash, death, technical, and classic Heavy stuff.

From Jazz: Dexter Gordon, Chick Corea, Pat Metheny, Return to Forever, George Benson, Miles Davis, Coltrane, Dave Brubeck, etc. When it comes to the mix of Metal & Jazz, then i get really crazy: Atheist, Death, Beyond Creation, Cynic, etc.

About Electronic: Chemical Brothers, The Prodigy, Orbital, Massive Attack, Bjork, Moby, Infected Mushroom, Apolo 4.40, etc.

Just to mention things that easily comes to my mind right now: 5'nizza (From Ukraine) and his solo project, Sunsay (i saw him twice on live in Russia, how cool), Erkan Ogur (Turkey), Tom Waits, Nick Cave, Ben Harper, Mark Lanegan, and a long etc.

About cinema, is one of my passions, maybe because of my interest for image. As visual poetry and deep concepts (although sometimes difficult) i like Andrey Tarkovsky films and Ingmar Bergman's. Specially, from this last one, his photographer director (wow), Sven Nykvist. Also, the classic Eisenstein creations: October, Alexander Nevsky and Potyomkin, then Dziga Vertov. On fact, i love russian avangard artists, is mind blowing, so much talent and crazyness.

Then i like Marx Brothers, Woody Allen films, although sometimes becomes predictable. Also Kieslowski, Kusturica, Coen brothers, Tarantino, Jarmush, Lynch, Tim Burton, etc. I have a huge list of movies and directors that i like, movies that i have been impressed and enjoyed so much. Generally i like european cinema (French and the slavics), and also from other countries we aren't used to, like Iran (Abbas Kiarostami and others), Turkey (Nuri Bilge Ceylan, also amazing photographer, by the way!), etc, etc.

About literature: Milan Kundera, Enrique Jardiel Poncela, Nikolay Gogol, Alexandr Pushkin, Mikhail Bulgakov, Gabriel García Márquez, José Martí, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Franz Kafka, Oscar Wilde, John Kennedy Toole, Italo Calvino, Roberto Fontanarrosa, etc.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

*Taking pics to my favourite band (METALLICA) ouyeahhhhh, and being on the backstage with Megadeth and Slayer !!!! (I still cant belive it)

*Doing volunteering in Ukraine due the war, at a kitchen for refugees and also helping local villagers in rebuilding destroyed houses from the war at Chernihiv oblast, in a local small village.

*Hitchhike near to Marselle, and being asked if i do prefer to continue the way on the highway or allong the coast, then choose the right answer and have an amazing beautiful tour surrounding the Côte d'Azur for 4 hours until Nice. So much beauty and great conversations!

*Hitchhike in Budva (Montenegro), being lift to Shkodër (Albania) by an austrian man living in Munich, who was going to Black Sea, but he joined us to spend time in Albania for a while. We wanted to go to the lake of the city to swim a bit, we got lost but found a golden Mercedes-Benz on the way, which we want to believe was a sign. When we asked for the beach of the lake, we received instructions and for some missunderstanding, we ended up on the Adriatic Sea, and also, and also sleeping on the same house from our host, all together. Ouyeah ! Dat ist Fantastisch !!!

*Visit the refugee district of Chatila, in Beirut (Lebanon), meet the NGO working there and their lovely children. Also, visiting twice Shutka, the biggest Roma community in Europe, located in Skopje (Macedonia), and interact with their people, playing, shaking hands, taking photos. So much energy exchange!

*Hitchhike all over Europe, from Barcelona to Munich, then Poland, Kaliningrad, Lithuania, Ukraine and then come back the same way to Barcelona. Lot of amazing experiences, people's stories are for making a film or writing a book. I really enjoyed and learnt from that experience.

* I tried to find Nergal, Behemoth's leader, one of my idols, on his barbershop in Warsaw with no success, until just by coincidence, i found the Behemoth's bass player on Warsaw airport. so we had a nice chat there and he signed the album i already bought on the city! Really interesting and kind guy !

Teach, Learn, Share

Ok, lets stop talking about myself, coz then it can make me look like the perfect "me" wich i'm not. :)

Hey people, i'm so evil, NIAJ NIAJ NIAJ

Countries I’ve Visited

Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cuba, Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, England, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, Morocco, Netherlands, Palestine, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russian Federation, San Marino, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Uzbekistan

Countries I’ve Lived In

Cuba, France, Russian Federation, Spain, Turkey, Ukraine

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