I am currently residing in Ha Noi, Viet Nam after being inspired by a book called 500 Things You Can Do To Change The World to come here & teach English. I'm planning to stay here for maybe two years & continue teaching and doing art in Europe or South America. It depends. Let's see.

Err more about me: I am a Filipino visual artist with an indie band called Leo & the Tolstoys. If you are interested to hear what we have recorded and released so far as a band, here is a link where our music can be found: soundcloud.com/leoandthetolstoys

I am currently still doing a page where I can post my drawings, paintings, digital art, and travel photographs, but as of now I got a not so updated Facebook page for it, it's called A Room Full of Tables. I only recently joined Instagram and I usually post my cats and dogs in there, along with my travels, & my art, it's @anumalei

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

I can't really remember how I first heard of Couchsurfing; the reason may have been lost in my long-term memories, but the possibility of meeting new people and eventually calling them "friends" is exciting, so here I am hosting & couchsurfing. Hoping to do more of the latter this 2018 when I start backpacking again!

Interests

I looove everything interesting from cats, dogs, to videogames, to books, films, art, indie music, & even gardening.

Music, Movies, and Books

There needs to be a separate tab to discuss each music, movies, & books. Those are three things that I can be really talkatively nerdy (or is it nerdily talkative?) about, but I guess I have to keep it short & concise for now, eh?

I listen to almost every genre possible from rock's Tori Amos, Death Cab for Cutie, Florence + the Machine, Daughter, Alanis Morisette, The Shins, Michelle Branch,to trip-hop's Portishead, Dido, to sadcore's Lana del Rey, Cigarettes After Sex, Cat Power, to neo-soul/soul's Joss Stone, Erykah Badu, to some really obscure music's The Cocteau Twin, Bodies of Water, Beach House, Hooverphonic, St. Vincent, Polica, Low Leaf, Bon Iver, FKA Twigs, & of course, many many more. The list goes on. I have a very cool playlist and I will judge you based on yours haha kidding (or maybe half-kidding). If you got a cool taste in music, I wouldn't mind having you add some more to my playlist. I listen to metal, hip-hop, pop, electronic, punk, too, yaknow?

Well, as for books, I typically read really obscure books that I pick up in second hand bookshops. I read mostly sci-fi, dystopian, apocalyptic, autobiographical, memoirs, and weirdly plotted novels. Margaret Atwood, Paul Auster, Haruki Murakami are the authors who I read the most. If you have read any Atwood books, watch out, I am about to get really nerdy especially if it's her trilogy! & if you have read more than three Auster books, have you noticed what he has done? Some simple fuckery under our noses all this time haha!

As for films, I love the works of Sofia Coppola, Gaspar Noe, Lars von Trier, and Charlie Kaufman. As a cinephile who has a lot of cinephile and filmmaker friends, I am always caught in a discussion about having a favorite film. And when you have seen How to Lose Friends & Alienate People, Kirsten Dunst's character gave La Dolce Vita right away as her answer when asked what she thinks as the best film. I wanted to be like that; be able to name my favorite movie when asked. So, I decided during one fateful day that it is, and has to be Lost in Translation. Possible runner-ups would be Enter the Void, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, all Kar-Wai Wong films, & all LVT films.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Rescuing cats & finding new homes for them? Does that qualify? Travel alone to different countries, maybe? Leave my jobs over and over again whenever I get bored? Surviving some near-death experiences? Leave my home country to live in a foreign land?

Teach, Learn, Share

Teach? I can teach you some words/phrases from languages I have learned/been trying to learn. Recently, I have decided to teach myself to speak French. I am not doing very well in it, yet lol! I would also be interested to learn other languages in the future. The possibility of speaking a foreign language fascinates me, so I'd want to learn and teach more languages in the future.

I also recently got into the habit of gardening, but it is not also going so well, but at least I get to grow my own food every now and then, and learn from my mistakes, especially when a plant I love withers and dies. I know some tricks that I can teach you to fertilize your soil organically, yeah?

Learn? I would love to learn some interesting phrases from your native language & maybe learn to converse in it &, if possible maybe fluently speak it, eventually.

Share? My books & play list & film recommendations too. Don't got much to share lol!

What I Can Share with Hosts

My stories and music.

Countries I’ve Visited

Cambodia, India, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Taiwan, Thailand

Countries I’ve Lived In

Philippines, Viet Nam