Jonathan Melhuish's Photo

Verified Profile

  • Payment verified
  • Phone verified
  • Government ID not verified
  • Address Verified

Not Accepting Guests

  • Last login about 2 months ago

Join Couchsurfing to see Jonathan’s full profile.

Overview

  • 118 references 67 Confirmed & Positive
  • Fluent in English, French; learning Polish, Romanian
  • 39, Male
  • Member since 2005
  • Climate change activist, social entrepeneur and flâneur d...
  • University Graduate (BSc Artificial Intelligence and Comp...
  • No hometown listed
  • Profile 100% complete

About Me

BEFORE YOU WRITE TO ME...

Please note I don't host people with zero references, but, like most Couchsurfers, I'd be happy to meet you and write you your first reference. I also prefer to host people who are travelling in ways that don't produce masses of carbon pollution and destabilise our climate. Mention if you're on a "Flight Free Adventure" and I will almost certainly host you!

CURRENT MISSION

working towards a one planet lifestyle

ABOUT ME

My main mission in life is to solve climate change - and have fun doing it. Professionally, I'm a User Experience Designer - I fuse psychology and design to create pleasurable experiences :)

PHILOSOPHY

Yes, but do you expect me to explain my entire life philosophy inside this little box? Let's talk about it instead, until the early hours, preferably over a glass of dry red wine

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

Meet people, stay with people, host people, go to parties and tell everyone I meet how amazing CS is. Generally, spreading the love

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I've been a member of HospitalityClub.org (same username) for over 8 years now. In all that time, I've never had a negative experience, and many positive ones I would never have got any other way. CouchSurfing is the best way to travel at any price - you meet such great, interesting friendly people and get a glimpse into their world. And just sometimes, you connect in a magical way

Interests

Photography, cycling, climbing, music, speaking French, travel, environment, sustainability, climate change, psychology, massage, crazy dancing, cooking, ironing shirts, recording voicemails, public speaking, the improvisational art of kissing..

  • arts
  • design
  • photography
  • dancing
  • environment
  • cooking
  • wine
  • red wine
  • vegan
  • partying
  • traveling
  • socializing
  • music
  • cycling
  • boxing
  • rock climbing
  • psychology

Music, Movies, and Books

I love a huge variety of music, usually instrumental and rhythmic.. crazy complex rhythms drive me wild! I'm currently listening to a lot of dubstep but also like breakbeat, jazz, drum and bass, electronica.. all sorts.

I don't watch films as often as I would like, partly because I like to only watch films that my friends have recommended to me - there's too much Hollywood trash out there. I do love a good film though, I think it can be really mind-expanding, like travel and CouchSurfing.. it transports us into a fantasy world for a couple of hours to see the world through another person's eyes.

I love to read, there's something great about books, the feel of them and the fact that they can go really deep into a topic and develop ideas across a few hundred pages. At the moment it's mostly non-fiction, things that I hope will help me save the human race from self-extermination, like how to successfully communicate ideas, change behaviours and build a social movement.

Here's a few books I've read recently - I'd love to discuss them or any you've read that are on a similar topic:

- "In The Bubble: Designing in a Complex World" by John Thackara
- "Reality is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World" by Jane McGonigal
- "A User's Guide for the 21st Century: Worldchanging" compiled by Alex Steffen
- "Herd: How to Change Mass Behaviour by Harnessing Our True Nature" by Mark Earls
- "Requiem for a Species: Why we resist the truth about climate change" by Clive Hamilton
- "The Story of Stuff: How Our Problem with Overconsumption Is Trashing the Planet, Our Communities and Our Health - and What to Do About It" by Anne Leonard
- "Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces that Shape Our Decisions" by Dan Ariely
- "Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard" - by Dan and Chip Heath
- "Made to Stick: Why some ideas take hold and others come unstuck by Dan and Chip Heath
- "Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things
William McDonough, Michael Braungart
- "Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things" by Donald A. Norman
- "The Silent Takeover: Global Capitalism and the Death of Democracy" by Noreena Hertz

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

CouchSurfed my way around Europe by train for three months. Three times.

Teach, Learn, Share

Photography and Digital Art, Massage, general computer stuff, Djembe, User experience design, Artificial Intelligence, Ruby on Rails, Web design, English/French conversation, how to speak enough Polish to make people laugh, vegan cooking for lazy people, how to live sustainability and still have fun

Countries I’ve Lived In

England, Hungary, Netherlands, Poland, Romania

Old School Badges

  • 6 Vouches
  • Pioneer Badge

Join Couchsurfing to see Jonathan’s full profile.

My Groups