Hello! We are Shane (from England) and Azul (from Mexico), we are best friends and happen to be a newly married couple, we’ve been together for 15 years and married on our 14th anniversary which happened to land on a Tuesday. Instead of having a big fancy wedding, we saved all our pennies, packed up the house we shared for 7 years, sold/gave away 80% of our belongings and took a sabbatical from work. All so that we could travel the world together.

Azul studied Human Geography with Business at university, as she loves all things to do with people and places. Before leaving for our year away, Azul volunteered at a local sustainability social enterprise and was secretary for a community group with a focus in building community cohesion in our ever growing town.

Shane has over the past 3 years been developing and growing his plastering and rendering business to get it to a place where he can work and spend time making music and upcycled music instruments.

We also left behind our organic allotment and two cats Noodle & Katsura.

During this trip we want to meet new people from different walks of life, learn from new cultures and discover new ways to deal with old problems. But the key aim for our trip is to find ways to have a better life/work balance for when we return to the rat race.

Por qué estoy en Couchsurfing

Couchsurfing seems great in many ways but for us it’s mainly about meeting local people and getting insiders info on the areas we visit! There’s nothing better than living like a local when traveling. Saving money on hostels is just a bonus!

Intereses

• cooking
• reading
• traveling
• music
• geography
• volunteering
• art
• sustainability
• permaculture
• people watching
• recycling
• upcycling
• spicy food
• travel stories
• growing food
• reuse
• growing vegetables
• community development
• geometry

Música, películas y libros

Ohhhh, this is hard, but for Azul, it’s got to be late 90s/ early 00s Hip Hop and R &B for the music. Movie-wise, Sliding Doors with Gwyneth Paltrow as it shows parallel story lines and plays out the ‘what if’ realities of the same person, makes you realise how important each life decision really is! And her absolute favourite books are ; The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a F*ck and Sapiens.

For Shane, he loves all music from dub to Jazz, as long as it’s well produced and listened through good quality equipment. Movies, he loves include Momento and Ex-Machina, and he really enjoys books by Graham Hancock.

Algo increíble que he hecho

Azul volunteered at the London 2012 Olympics and was in the opening and closing ceremonies, where she met the one and only Jackie Chan. In her professional career, she very recently was invited to present at the World Health Organisation in Belfast in 2018 about her work on community activation and development.

Shane was just 24 when his music was picked up to be featured in a Love Music Hate Racism compilation ‘The Grassroots LP’ since then, he has set up his own record label. But he is most proud of making his own instruments from upcycled electronics.

Qué puedo ofrecer a los anfitriones

Cooking skills, Shane is a wiz in the kitchen, he can cook pretty much anything from your cooking cupboard, where As Azul has 5 recipes that she have perfected, but ask her to cook anything else, she will either burn or cut herself ; as we found out in Cambodia at a cooking lesson we took, which was being Live Streamed on their FB page and Azul cut her finger right on camera and the only way to stop the bleeding was to stick her finger in a shot of vodka!

Países que he visitado

Cambodia, Egypt, England, France, Gambia, Germany, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Macao, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Netherlands, Northern Ireland, Philippines, Scotland, Singapore, Spain, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Vatican City State, Viet Nam, Wales

Países en los que he vivido

England, Mexico