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  • Last login about 5 years ago

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Overview

  • 55 references 46 Confirmed & Positive
  • Fluent in Chinese, English, Taiwanese; learning French, German, Japanese, Russian, Spanish
  • 38, Male
  • Member since 2008
  • Full-time student, and part-time columnist and interpreter.
  • International Business for BA, Building and Planning for MA
  • No hometown listed
  • Profile 100% complete

About Me

CURRENT MISSION

To feed myself!

ABOUT ME

There are three things in traveling that make it a necessity for me.

First of all, curiosity. I try to maintain myself as a kid refusing growing up, and keep asking 'what is this?', 'why is that?', 'and then?' In the context of everyday life that we are used to, somehow we've lost the ability to see, to observe, and to doubt. We are grownups after all, and are not supposed to be curious---and naive. We sometimes have to pretend that we know even though we actually don't, which leads us into being half-blind due to getting 'mature'. Therefore, traveling in a different culture that we are not familiar with is the only way to awake our sleeping curiosity. I long for that natural, unpretentious curiosity, which is what I need as the right posture to welcome knowledge.

Secondly, traveling always leads to home. Given that one can only conceive the existence of himself/herself by contrasting the others, one can only get a better understanding of his/her home through foreign lands. I spent my childhood in a industrial neighborhood, and the drains for wastes, warehouses, as well as the waste treatment complex are all I have in my world. Travel experiences afterward reveals how small my world was, and that world used to be my home. I need travel, as I need a home.

Lastly, it's a sentence that inspires me the most. "Reading is the only way to experience different lives of people within our lifetime." I am a couchsurfer. The experiences that I stay with the locals are exactly experiences of others、 lives as well: the truck driver in Brussels, the rock band vocal in Moscow, the Jujitsu player in Montreal, and the computer engineer in Mumbai. All the experiences compensate the fact that I can live one life.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

Though not thru this site, I did have some couchsurfing-like experiences. The first one was in the summer of 2006 at Niagara Falls, USA. I along with two of my friends were accommodated by a stranger who we happend to meet at midnight. Some other experiences were on my way on the Silk Road in 2007 as well.
I am also a host to travelers coming to Taiwan. We have a cozy flat in the hot-spring tourist area near Taipei which you may enjoy at all time.
My current location is right in the very center of Taipei City, which offers great convenience from shopping to transportation.

I am heading for an exchange student project overseas from Jul 09 to Jul 10.
You are always welcome to contact me once you have a plan in my place, and my girlfriend in taiwan will give you any assistance even I am not there.

Interests

I like: Judo, Photography, budget traveling, walking, thinking, calculating, eating, talking, theories, practical facts against theories.

  • culture
  • photography
  • walking
  • shopping
  • reading
  • traveling
  • engineering
  • history
  • budget travel

Music, Movies, and Books

Movie: Taking Woodstock, Das Leben der Anderen, 悲情城市, Russian Ark, La Mala Educacion... to name a few.

Music: Paul Weller, Ska-P, Skid row, Tizzy Bac, 8mm Sky, 盧廣仲, W&Whale, and all other folk musics...

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

I've done 200 km of Camino de Santiago.

Teach, Learn, Share

As I am working in a paper museum in Taipei, I might be able to share the history of paper with you.
I may offer you a Chinese course as well (with Taiwanese accent.)
And Judo, if you are interested.

Countries I’ve Visited

Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Canada, China, Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Laos, Latvia, Lithuania, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Netherlands, Palau, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Russian Federation, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, United Kingdom, United States, Viet Nam

Countries I’ve Lived In

Spain, Taiwan

Old School Badges

  • 4 Vouches

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