Basically, you create a profile, offer some space on a couch/extra bed/floor/etc or offer to show people around. Through this site, you can also seek out people in places you want to travel. You stay there and avoid ho(s)tel costs, and you also get an inside look to the city. As many of you know, when you stay in a ho(s)tel, you only get to know other people staying there.
Let's take Alen, for instance. Alen is a young man from California who is now studying in London. For Easter Break, Alen decides he's doing a roadtrip through Central/Eastern Europe with a major bus line here. He is coming to Budapest and needs a place to crash, so he gets on couchsurfing and posts a message, asking for a place to stay.
I, being an awesome person, respond to his post because all of my roommates have disappeared for Easter weekend. I offer him a place to crash and some tourist-y type advice and occasional company.
So, Alen came to my flat and immediately we head out in search of food. After enjoying a good Turkish meal and some great conversation, the topic of future travels comes up. Alen is planning to go to Romania and then to Krakow and Oswiecim in Poland to see Auschwitz. At which point, I am blown away because the very weekend that he is planning to go is the very weekend I had originally planned to travel there myself. Unfortunately, I had postponed my trip due to lack of travel companion (and now, you see where this is going!) One thing led to another and before I knew it, I canceled any plans I'd made for later in the week and started trying to find places to stay in Krakow.
Alen canceled his plans to Romania because of the distance, time and money needed to get to Bucharest, his hopeful destination. So instead, Alen hangs out a few more days in Budapest. He got to see my placement and join me for my birthday party, so he got a good taste of what it's like to be a volunteer here.
Then we headed off. 7 hour bus ride to Krakow... check. Couchsurfing host... check. we stayed in the flat of another person like me who was offering a place to crash for two nights. It was a good experience and being my first time ever couchsurfing, I was definitely glad to have done it with someone else.
Stories from Krakow and Oswiecim will come later (when I get my pictures and thoughts organize).
Then after 2 days in Krakow, we said goodbye. After spending almost a week with one person, you learn a lot about that person and also about yourself. We have some crazy travel plans for the future that hopefully work out. It'd be funny to have a permanent travel companion :)
And of course, questions have been raised about the fact that he's a boy and I'm a girl. we loved that question. can't a boy and a girl just hang out anymore? yes, yes, we can and we did. So, if you see glimpses of this guy in the future, you'll know how we met. I also wanted to make sure that this was written down somewhere so that I never forget the randomness of it. :) So good!
*~*~*
A step into the past - Alen and I went on an Easter Monday excursion to The Szentendre Skanzen, an outdoor museum north of Budapest. Look at what we found!
NOT a Trazy-sized windmill! :P
I'm still curious how short people actually got INTO those beds! Look at how high they are! I'm picturing it like this "Hey! I wanna go to bed - bring me the ladder!" Or maybe one of those little staircases like they use for dogs to get into beds.
aw, so romantic! an old well!
you have to click on this one to see it - but look! thatch roofs!
Alen's goofing off by the bell tower :P
pretty girls in folk costumes
outdoor ovens. some like these are still used in the summer so that the whole house doesn't heat up.
more thatch roof homes in the village...
the church is part of the museum that we didn't get to - it was too rainy and we didn't get there very early.
a shot of the windmill from far away
uhhh... okay... i'm gonna take a guess and say it's NOT normal to keep a casket in your barn, even in Hungary. i could be wrong, but that seems almost too strange.
then again, these are some crazy looking goats. I don't think it's normal to keep them either... alas, they provided us with some good laughs because in order to get to the goats, we nearly fell into the mud a few times.
Yes, Alen, it was worth it. It's always worth it if laughter is involved.
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