CURRENT MISSION

To get a picture of myself in front of every US state welcome sign, and to leave the world a better place than it was when I came into it.

ABOUT ME

Hi. My husband, my young daughter, and I are once again living in Chicago. If you want to go for a walk around my beautiful city, drop me a line!

PHILOSOPHY

Live & let live.

Laugh often.

Breathe deeply.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I enjoy meeting new people and I love walking around the city.

We enjoy hosting as well, but have somewhat crazy schedules, a toddler, and two cats living in a one bedroom apartment. Doesn't hurt to ask though!

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I've gone to a few meetings, and my husband and I have hosted and surfed with some great people.

Every experience so far has been awesome, and I look forward to many more great surfs and hosts..

Interests

Vegan food, good conversation, tasty beverages, swapping stories, live music, languages, learning, day dreaming, exploring..

• cats
• dining
• vegan
• walking
• traveling
• music
• live music
• emergency services
• languages

Music, Movies, and Books

MOVIES: 28 Days Later, A Clockwork Orange, A Midnight Clear, Almost Famous, Amelie, American History X, Battle Royale, Big Fish, Black Snake Moan, Blow, City of God, Closer, Conspirators of Pleasure, Crash, Donnie Darko, el Espinazo del Diablo, Everything is Illuminated, Fight Club, Fried Green Tomatoes, Harold & Kumar go to White Castle, Harold & Maude, High Tension, Into the Wild, Joyride, Kill Bill Vol 1 & 2, La Vita è Bella, el Laberinto del Fauno, Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, the Missing, el Orfanato, the Pianist, Princess Mononoke, Ravenous, Requiem for a Dream, the Road, Scarface, Secretary, Seven, Spirited Away, Wisconsin Death Trip, Y Tu Mama Tambien

MUSIC: Alkaline Trio, Ani Difranco, Beck, Ben Folds Five, Ben Harper, Björk, car alarms, Counting Crows, Cypress Hill, Depeche Mode, Dismemberment Plan, Eminem, Fleetwood Mac, Foo Fighters, Joni Mitchell, Kanye West, Le Tigre, Lily Allen, Lucky Boys Confusion, Massive Attack, Mates of State, Neil Young, Nirvana, Paco De Lucia, Park Avenue Music, Pearl Jam, Portishead, Rainier Maria, REM, Shakira, Sublime, Sunny Day Real Estate, Syed singing along with ambulance sirens, Ted Leo & the Pharmacists, The Faint, The Postal Service, The Violent Femmes, Tricky, Tool, etc

BOOKS: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Be Here Now, One Hundred Years of Solitude, The Alchemist, The Little Prince, The Long Walk, The Star Rover, The Sun Also Rises, This Side of Paradise, We The Living

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

A few years back, my husband and I were driving on the back roads through South Dakota in the middle of the night. We saw large, dark shapes on the horizon, so we slowed down. The buffalo, as the shapes turned out to be, examined his bad-ass car while we snapped photos of them from not ten feet away.

While in Italy, I had my wallet stolen by gypsies, and it turned out to be one of the highlights of my trip. How else would I have gotten to visit the police station, befriend a man from Moldova with whom I shared no common language, or really experience travel in a foreign land with no money or credit cards to fall back on.

Teach, Learn, Share

TEACH: English as a foreign/second language, elementary level school subjects, how to get around in Chicago, how to get the most bang for your buck in various situations.

LEARN: more languages (especially Spanish, Polish, Arabic and French), more tricks of the trade from seasoned travelers, how to live as lightly as possible.

SHARE: laughter, a home-cooked meal, adventures, a bottle of prosecco.

Countries I’ve Visited

Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Jamaica, Jordan, Mexico, Morocco, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Turkey

Countries I’ve Lived In

Canada, Morocco, Poland, United States

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