CURRENT MISSION

back from Canada and the USA, back to German reality - and providing a couch

ABOUT ME

Hey,

we are a fun-loving, openminded couple from southern Germany and did in summer 2009 an interrail tour from Stockholm about Helsinki and Eastern Europe to Istanbul. It was the first using couchsurfing to get to know some new peoeple for exchanging experiences, doing something together,learning new cultures and view on lifes... The next experience followed in March 2010: We travelled through Canada and the USA for two weeks and surfed two couches in NY and Toronto. We`re surprised to make such good experiences and met a lot of nice, friendly, helpful and interesting people!

Helen is 22 years old and after school she did a gap year to taken voluntary work in an hospital (Sept. 2008- Sept. 2009) which was organized by the German Red Cross.
From the middle of October 2009 she has been doing Work & Travel in Canada which has started in Vancouver and finished in Eastern Canada.

I'm Simon, Helen's boyfriend and 25 years old. In Summer 2011 I finished my Master "Media and political communication" in Berlin. During the studies I worked for the "Verkehrsclub Deutschland", an NGO which to applies its energies to create a social-ecological traffic in Germany. After this time I changed the center of my life: from Berlin to Pforzheim, from big to small, from University to a local newspaper. There I work as an editor.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

During our trip through Europe we were hosted by a lot of people where we had so much fun and really great times!

It was the first time of using CS so first of all we surfed from northern to south-eastern Europe... but now I (Simon) moved to Berlin and have a mattress to host people.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

We made our first couchsurfing experiences in summer 2009 and it was a great experience! We`re glad that we tried it because it`s an other and propably better way to travel and to get to know countries and their cultures.

Interests

travelling, reading, relaxing in the sun, soccer (OK, only Simon...), movies, listen to music, rock concerts (Rock am Ring, Hurricane), going out with friends, meeting new interesting people, coaching pupils of elementary school, researching and writing articles, Asian cuisine (well...Helen), cooking..

• writing
• concerts
• cooking
• nightlife
• movies
• reading
• traveling
• billiards
• music
• soccer
• swimming
• communications

Music, Movies, and Books

rock- and punk-rocking music, but also Indie- Rock and good Reggae-Dancehall... from RHCP to Mando Diao, from "Die Ärzte" to Seeed and of course the Beatles, Abba..

Especially Helen reads a lot, e.g. thriller and crime stories (Karin Slaughter, Frank Schätzing, Dan Brown, etc..) but I have attached Simon to reading ;)

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Our first common trip to Berlin - with the absolutely recommondable nightlife in the quarter called Kreuzberg and night-swimming in a pool on the river called Spree...
...but after our Europe trip it`s hard to say...
..and more than ever after beeing in Canada and the States. So, what was the best? The loveliy Kensington Market in Toronto and the amazing, great people living, studying, drining there? The Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattens Skyline by night? The Niagara Falls?

Well, maybe the most amazing thing we have done is to meet the other: In an hostel in Hamburg two years ago!

Countries I’ve Visited

Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

Germany