I grew up watching American travel show host, Rick Steves, and realized recently how much his travel ethos really shaped mine. If you're unfamiliar with Rick Steves, he is an extremely wholesome American who believes it's his life's mission to get Americans to travel to new countries and broaden their cultural horizons. One of his biggest takeaways is that we're all more alike than different, which is something we learn through traveling. When we travel, we see ways in which we're different--we have different cultures and languages and ways of living, but it's through Couchsurfing that I remember how similar we all are. Some of my closest friends are people I've met through Couchsurfing. I travel so that I can meet friendly, open-minded, and interesting people, and if that isn't what Couchsurfing is about then I've been doing this wrong for years.

PJ Harvey, Neil Young, Nick Cave, Pearl Jam, Joni Mitchell, Kate Bush, Ani Difranco, FKA Twigs, Death From Above 1979, Fleet Foxes, and Bjork. Really into quick, informative podcasts. Favs include Everything, Everywhere Daily (deep dives into random topics all less than 20 minutes an episode) and This Is History: A Dynasty To Die For (episodic pop history podcast going through the history of the Plantagenet Dynasty in England and France. Manages to be laugh out loud funny at times).