CURRENT MISSION

See the good in all people

ABOUT ME

I am an artistic, friendly and outgoing person who loves to travel! I have been all over the U.S. and to Europe, would love to go to other continents. I run my own wholesale vegan pastry business in a warehouse kitchen in central NJ. It is an environmentally-oriented company, vegan for the sake of avoiding factory farming, not because I am personally (was once, not anymore). I also teach yoga part-time. I love seeing my students relax and connect with their essential selves. My favorite teaching job is at a woman's medium-security prison. I would like to do more teaching in communities where it is lacking. I like to draw, paint and do printmaking and mosaics.

PHILOSOPHY

The thing that makes me happiest is helping others/feeling of service.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I just joined, but am excited to get started. I love meeting new people, and the way traveling reminds us all to be more in the process than the product of things. I would be enthusiastic about sharing my place and showing New York City to people if time and circumstance allows. When I return home around Labor Day, I can get verified!

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

New to CS, but in my travels I have always been grateful to meet "strangers" who reached out and became familiar through their generosity and openness. One instance that comes to mind is a Norwegian man that my friend and I met at an outdoor market in Vienna, who welcomed us into his beautiful home and cooked for us. It's so refreshing to realize how many trustworthy people there actually are in the world!

Interests

Yoga, art, hiking, cycling, rollerblading, cooking, gardening, adventuring, reading, writing, wine tasting, interior design, product design, volunteer work, hybrid/electric/bio diesel cars.

• arts
• writing
• design
• interior design
• cooking
• wine
• baking
• wine tasting
• vegan
• yoga
• running
• gardening
• flowers
• reading
• traveling
• volunteer work
• cars
• painting
• drawing
• outdoor activities
• cycling
• hiking
• backpacking
• camping
• scuba diving
• business
• volunteering

Music, Movies, and Books

Movies: anything by Jim Jarmusch, Ingmar Bergman, Fellini, Kurosawa, or Satyajit Ray.
Music: Ida, The Magnetic Fields, Groove Collective, Alison Kraus, obscure 80's pop, Ali Farke Toure, Belle and Sebastian, Elliott Smith.
Books: lots of non-fiction, David Sedaris, Paul Auster.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Living in the back of Moonflower Canyon outside of Moab, Utah (hence my screen name) for 2 weeks. No couch required! (My favorite thing is to camp out...would be cool to organize backpacking trips through this site, too...) A beautiful spot...you could hear it echo even when you sneezed...and there were petroglyphs on the wall beside me...and amazing flowers sprouting from red rocks. I met a lot of great people on this trip.

Teach, Learn, Share

Yoga. Many art mediums - woodblock printing, glass mosaics, painting, drawing, etc. English as a second (or third or fourth) language. Cooking and baking. New York City, my hometown.
I would love to learn to speak Spanish fluently, and to scuba dive!