Why Couchsurfing?

Hey guys, now that I finally talked about the hip hop festival the next important adventure is the courage to finally travel by myself to a city. I always wanted to become a New Yorker since I was a kid since New York always excites me no matter how many times I visited the city. The diversity of the people, the infrastructure of Times Square, you know...the city life you see in TV. I always wanted to cruise around Central Park, sit at a coffee shop outside, attend plays, go to bars and nightclubs. However, I knew that if I wanted to stay in New York for the weekend, I have to find a place to stay. Unfortunately, I only had one friend at the time that lives in New York. Luckily for me, my amazing friend from Germany named Maria told me about this website where I could meet people from around the world and stay on their couches for at least one night. My initial thought? GO TO A STRANGER'S PLACE AND SLEEP THERE?!!! My mom will have my head!!!! After hearing about her successful weekends from couch-surfing and similar stories from my other international friends, I decided to first do couchcrash 2010 in order to check out the vibe of going to New York to meet with people. Much to my surprise, I am meeting many folks from around the world, including India, Germany and France.

Couchcrash is a series of New York city tours, dinners, museum trips, art projects, bike rides, workshops, barbeques and parties. Best of all, these events are all either free or really, really cheap. They have an amazing rooftop art party at the end of the party. Not only I have met the world for a day, but it convinced me that from this moment that I want to be a traveler. I know that I am going to Trinidad and Tobago in Spring 2011, but I hope I continue from there. Couch-surfing has grant me more friends in different places around the world as well as a chance to find a place to stay when I do not have enough money to stay at a hotel, although I did was fortunate to stay at a New York Hostel for 40 bucks and my friends lovely ladies from the UK. I am amazed of how elaborate the couchcrash rooftop party was from last year, although I doubted I met the owner of the place. You meet some of the nicest, coolest, and the most hilarious people in the world and the guy who hosted a party for hundreds of people and offer his place to stay for complete strangers is extraordinary. Before I go to any country, I am sure to look up potential hosts to lend me a place to stay.

The best thing about couchsurfing, whether you are getting a free place to stay and the chance to explore newly discovered places is that you come in as a stranger, but you leave as a friend. Trust me, I am sure to fill my future summers with some time for couchsurfing.