CURRENT MISSION

Live without prejudices.

ABOUT ME

We are an open-minded family and are very interested in (other)people, other ways of living and enjoy to meet that kind of people.
We (Rob and Marion) love a lot of things. In the first place we love eachother, our children and our family. We have many friends that are very important to us. Although we have a very busy life, we try to see them as much as possible.
We traveled quite a lot in the past. Marion lived in France (Paris), we worked in a kibbutz in Israel and Marion traveled for 6 months through Africa. Since we have children, the travelling was most in Europe (France, Italy, Belgium), but a few years ago, we went with the children to Thailand for 5 weeks, backpacking. A beautiful experience. What a nice, friendly people in Thailand, what a beautiful landscape, what a beautiful sea!!!
We think we are open-minded people and we hope to raise our children in a way that they feel self-convident and open-minded towards other people and cultures.
Marion is setting up and leading projects for very young children in Amsterdam, most of them from Morocco and Turkey, in order to teach them dutch, so that they can get a good education in Holland.
Rob has his own "company" and works as an editor and sometimes makes his own (short) movies about different subjects.
Milou, our oldest daughter (24 years) is doing a Law Study and a Criminology Study in Amsterdam. She is living in an appartment of her own in Haarlem. She loves to travel and hang around with friends.
Lotte (21 years) is studying Journalism in Utrecht. She is also living there in a house with more students.
Floris, our youngest, is a boy from 17 years. He is attending Highschool and likes to hang around with his friends.

PHILOSOPHY

There are NO STRANGERS, only friends you haven't met yet. (Dalai Lama)

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

We have had quite some Couchsurfers in our house and have been couchsurfing ourselves several times. In Barcelona, Marrakech, Belgium and Germany.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

We have some couchsurfing experience by now. A few times people stayed in our house and we couchsurfed ourselves in Spain, Morocco, Belgium and Germany. All the CS-experiences were very positive!!!
In the past, when there was no CS......, we slept at the houses of "strangers", when we were hichhiking through Europe. We exchanged houses a few years ago with a family who lived in Ireland and also we did a "house-exchange" in the south of France.
Our oldest daughter lived for 3 months with a family in New Zealand and the oldest son of that family came back with her and lived for 3 months in our house.

Interests

Other cultures, nature, skiing and snowboarding, outdoor-sports, making music (the children), travelling, spiritual teachings etc.

• education
• movies
• traveling
• music
• outdoor activities
• hiking
• backpacking
• skiing
• snowboarding
• sports
• rock climbing
• teaching
• journalism
• law
• mountains

Music, Movies, and Books

We love all kinds of music! From rock-music, to dance, to world-music. We go to concerts now and then. Last concerts were: Sting, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Pinkpop (big festival in Holland).
We also love to read books, but we have not enough time for it.... Last book was: the Kite Runner (fantastic!). But we also love to read books from Eckhart Tolle or see his "teachings" on film.
We go to movies quite a lot, sometimes with the children and sometimes together.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

One of the most amazing things Marion has done, was going on a bush-hike in Zaire/Rwanda, looking for a family of mountain-gorilla's. The chief of the family, the "silverback" was incredible big and made her feel very humble.
Both Rob and Marion love very much snorkling. They did it in the Red Sea (Dahab, before it became touristic) and in the waters surrounding Koh Tao (Thailand).
One of the top-experiences Rob had, was climbing Mount Sinai (Egypt) and seeing the sun rising over the mountains/desert.

Countries I’ve Visited

Algeria, Belgium, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Congo, Czech Republic, Egypt, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Kenya, Luxembourg, Morocco, Niger, Nigeria, Serbia, Spain, Tanzania, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, United States

Countries I’ve Lived In

France, Israel, Netherlands

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