CURRENT MISSION

I want to see the world and create some memories of my youth that I can enjoy forever.

ABOUT ME

I am 18 going on 19....
My name's Xan, I'm an arts student at Sydney University.
I grew up in a much hotter part of Australia and I only moved back to Sydney a year ago so I'm in love with (what australians consider) the cooler weather.
I have friends all over the world, all of whom I hope to meet some day.
I'm an outgoing person, people often describe me as confident or charismatic (though I would tend to disagree with them). I love a good chat and I'm a bit of a joker and am prone to fits of laughter. I'm not an intensely bubbly person though, but if I enjoy your company then I'll always be happy to hang.
I love my home but I'm not deeply attached to it in the way some people are. I am more attached to the people in my life than the place I live. I love to travel and I rarely get a sense of missing my home. I love to explore the unfamiliar and I find new places and things fascinating.

PHILOSOPHY

I am not a religious person but I do believe in people.
There is nothing I detest more than the idea of forcing my beliefs onto someone else, religious, political or otherwise.
I value knowledge and I will always respect a person more and be more willing to accept them and their point of view if they are informed and not aggressive in the way that they address the world.
I'd like to call myself an optimist but I am also practical and very logical.
However I am a very emotionally driven person and so I often like to consider the world and the actions of others through the lens of how easily we can be swayed by our emotions (and how that is a good thing and not a sign of weakness).
I am quite a serious person when it comes to the important stuff but don't trust me to refrain from making a joke at any opportunity.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

I have met a bunch of great people in the last few months, hosted a bit and explored my home town with travelers. I've had a wonderful time and can't wait to meet more lovely people (:

Interests

I love to write music and play songs on my ukulele or guitar.
If I were to someday be a singer in a swing band I think I would die happy.
I make videos on youtube and I love writing and producing my own short films.
I'm also very much into stand-up comedy and independent theatre. One of my favourite things about where I live is the buzzing arts community, there is so much independent music, excellent comedy and simply amazing theatre here. I love it all.

• arts
• writing
• movies
• traveling
• music
• guitar
• mountains

Music, Movies, and Books

I love classic rock and new folk music. I'm a big fan of all the greats, the Beatles, the Stones, the Ivies and later stuff too like the Pixies, the Stranglers, Radiohead, the Shins and more. I listen to a lot of independent music, small time artists that got their start on youtube (like me) but I love new folk most of all. I love Fleet Foxes, Iron and Wine, Angus and Julia Stone, The Talles Man on Earth, Mumford and Sons, Noah Gundersen, Sondre Lerche and oh so many more.
I'll read almost anything, I like the classics but I also love new wave fantasy/horror. I'll read the first chapter of any book but I won't always finish it.
I think it's important to support your local film industry so I watch a lot of Australian films. I love documentaries, animations, shorts, drama, horror, comedy, indie and blockbuster.
I have my favourites but I'm a film nut so I'll give almost anything a chance.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

I've been to Hong Kong, Japan, Fiji, Canada, USA, Thailand, Laos and Vietnam. I've seen some amazing things. I've helped built a new school building in a mountain town outside of Luang Prabang in Laos and I've hiked for days through the jungle and ridden elephants in the mountains outside of Dalat in Vietnam. As a child I backpacked with my father through Japan travelling by train and staying in tiny hostels. I love to travel and even though I've seen so much and I'm still so young I feel like I can never have enough.

Teach, Learn, Share

I am student of English, I love language. I find it fascinating and baffling and beautiful.
To me words are beautiful and being able to use them skillfully is something I treasure. Eloquence is something I think is greatly under appreciated today. I love talking about language, especially to those who speak English as a second language and I love to teach people new words. It makes me sad to see that (especially in my country) there is such a poor attitude towards the development of word skills. Australians often see a talent with words as a negative thing, as if possessing such skills makes you inherently manipulative or deceitful. I resent such an attitude and hope to be able to teach and learn as much as I possibly can in the area.
I currently only speak one language but I am determined to know as much as I can about it and I hope that one day (if I can ever find the time) I will be able to study another language in the same depth as I have English.