Hello! My name is Matteo, I love to take pictures of people. I live in London but I call many places home. A palm reader in Rome once told me I will live the life of a magical gipsy and that it's important for the world that I tell the stories of the many people I encounter on my journey s. That's what I am doing.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

There is anything better than giving away our time or help for the benefit of others. I love Couchsurfing for that.

The biggest advantage of Couchsurfing is to meet locals. By inviting you for free into their home, they are generally expecting more than just exchanging a few words at your arrival. Talking with your hosts, getting to know them will teach you more about the country you travelled to than any tour you might join. If I hadn’t met my hosts, chances are that my knowledge about their country would have stuck to its initial level: quite superficial. Our conversations opened my eyes and helped me get a better understanding of the place I was in.

Staying with people who live a completely different lifestyle also forces you to put into perspective the existence you’ve been accustomed to. It makes you question your own choices and leads you to understand that not a lot of things are either good or bad, ok or not, in this world: it’s just a matter of perspective. On this journey, I stayed with singles, couples, families, old and young hosts, religious (all kinds) and atheists, very poor and wealthy individuals… The diversity in CS members who accepted to host me was crazy. And I would have probably never talked to or met many of them by chance, if it hadn’t been through Couchsurfing. It widened my horizon tremendously, and helped me go beyond meeting like-minded backpackers in yet another hostel. It challenged me daily (in a good way) and took me way outside of my comfort zone, which is, in my opinion, the main goal when you travel.

Though meeting and staying with your hosts will certainly be great, you’ll soon realize that the benefits of Couchsurfing go far beyond that. Adapting to different lifestyles, homes, cultures and traditions will make you both more sociable and flexible in your travels. This experience also will give you a completely different outlook on any country.

Couchsurfing will give you the memories of a lifetime.

Interests

• photography
• food
• travelling

Music, Movies, and Books

I love all types of music, I love to sing Italian songs and go to concerts.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

And my last reason is this one: Couchsurfing will give you the memories of a lifetime. When I got home in July, I realized that I had just lived in about sixty households, in more than twenty countries, over the past six months. Talk about an intense experience… But each one of the individuals I met through Couchsurfing was unique, and so was my stay with any of them. I remember riding motorbikes with my hosts in Slovenia, Thailand and Vietnam; cooking for them in Indonesia, Singapore or Malaysia; discovering their favourite spots in Montenegro or Croatia and talking for hours with them in Armenia or Georgia. I believe strongly in the fact that you can learn something from every person you meet along the way. Couchsurfing just speeded up this process tremendously, sometimes in the most unexpected ways and that makes me feel incredibly lucky.

Countries I’ve Visited

Austria, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Mexico, Morocco, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Spain, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

Italy, United Kingdom, United States