The biggest advantage of Couchsurfing is to meet locals. By inviting you for free into their home, they are generally expecting more than just exchanging a few words at your arrival. Talking with your hosts, getting to know them will teach you more about the country you travelled to than any tour you might join.

I'm going to try to keep these lists short, because I could go on forever. Music: Grouplove, Cage the Elephant, Rag 'n Bone Man, Bryce Vine, Blackbear, Post Malone, Imagine Dragons, Tyler the Creator, Khalid, Lorde, Hozier, Sofi Tukker, Twenty One Pilots Movies: Zombieland, Heathers, Gifted, Empire of the Sun, War Dogs, Dope, White Girl, Moonrise Kingdom, Brimstone, Captain Fantastic, Sing Street, Men in Black and basically all the Tarantino movies Books: After Dark by Haruki Murakami, Rappaccini's Daughter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh, Death with Interruptions by José Saramago, It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini and 1984 by George Orwell (and lots of his other work!)