REVIEW: Couch Surfing

In my experience when you travel you are either one of two types of people. You are the person that likes to be a guest and stays in a hotel or in a private Airbnb apartment. Or you are a person that is a backpacker and is happy to stay in a noisy, smelly hostel for the atmosphere. But now I understand that there is also a third kind of person. Someone who is so open to whatever the world throw at them that they stay with random — they are the couch surfers.

Using couch surfing for the first time was a bit of a frightening experience for me (although I have heard from some other users that London is particularly difficult). As I mentioned I didn’t get a lot of responses and when I did they were

I semi-creepy messages, that featured the ‘do you have a boyfriend?’ or even worse ‘You can sleep in my bed?’ kind of vibe. I even got a message from a Naturist (yep that means no clothes) offering me a place to stay.

I was about to write it all off as a place people just went to hook up when I got some other responses that started to turn things around — people who started to offer me contacts, or offered to share their experiences.

Then I got a message from Vlasta (the only offer from a woman) saying that she could host me. I clicked that accept button as quickly as I could. But the only problem was I didn’t really know very much about Vlasta. I read her profile and she sounded a lot like me in her interests and beliefs, but there were no references and no photos — she could have been anyone really, and it was dark outside when I knocked on the door.

It turns out Vlasta is wonderful . A Slovakian who has been in London for 12 years she is warm and funny and I like her so much I am staying another night just so we can hang out more — very successful outcome.

But back to the Naturist because I know you are all dying to know more., and to be honest so was I. So through the couch-surfing platform I contacted Yas, and asked if he would mind chatting to me. As he answers the phone the first thing I think is he sounds nice, young, sweet. I wonder if he is calling in the nude. Yas tells me that his interest in naturism was started when he watched a documentary on Channel 4 called “My Daughter the Teenage Nudist” and something struck a chord in him. He started looking online and wearing less around the house. I asked Yas the all importanti

question — why? What was it that made him want to be naked so much? He paused thinking, “I don’t have the greatest body but being naked makes you accept yourself more…. When you see someone wearing a suit you make judgment about them, when you see someone wearing track pants you make other judgments, but when you are with people and you’re naked you are just you.”

And you know what I think he has a point. When I first arrived in Sydney international artist Spencer Tunick was creating a naked human sculpture in front of the Opera House and always being one to try new things I went along. It was early, and it was cold but the adrenalin of being naked in front of thousands of other people on a national landmark was pretty powerful. As I lay in different positions, on the opera house steps I made friends with the other naked people. It was weird for awhile and then it just wasn’t. It was actually pretty liberating. In a world where we see so many photo-shopped bodies on advertising it was amazingly beautiful to see all of the wobbly bums, the tummies and the stretch marks. It made me feel so proud to be human, and made me chastise myself for ever doubting the beauty of my body.

Anyway back to Yas. He uses couch surfing to connect with more naturists and to encourage people to give it a try. He is very upfront in what you are in for, but also is gently on people who are willing to give it a try — you don’t have to go fully naked, and at any time if you feel uncomfortable you can put your clothes back on.

In a way what is beautiful about couch surfing is that you get to see a little glimpse into somebody else’s life. How they live, what they think about the world, and if you are lucky what they think about themselves — and you.

Tonight when I go back to see Vlasta I will raise my glass to couch surfing because despite all the creepy, I have made a new friend and understood a little bit more about the amazingly different people we get to live with in this world.