CURRENT MISSION

Spin, hoop and do circusy things...

ABOUT ME

Circus is my life, at the moment I am mostly training cyr wheel, I have previously focussed much of my time on hula hoop, but I also enjoy tightwire, aerial silks and I'm quite good at balancing a contact ball on my head! I am self employed - I teach classes, perform shows, build equipment and organise circus events. I hope to develop some social circus projects in the UK and also in developing countries across the globe. I am a qualified fitness instructor, and I teach hula hooping as a fitness class in gyms. I am currently studying engineering at Sheffield Hallam University. I plan to use this degree to develop new hula hoops and circus toys.

PHILOSOPHY

I think it is important to find something in life which you love and that makes you happy. I found circus - now this is my life :D

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I joined couchsurfing.org because I was planning a trip to Germany over the summer in 2011, and I decided to spend some time over there to go to various circus skills conventions/festivals. I needed places to stay in between and wanted to explore several cities. I planned some of my trip in advance, and had some places to stay with jugglers/spinners/hoopers that I met online on http://www.poiandfriends.com but actually left some of my trip to chance, and waited to see what happened when I got to Germany!
Before I left England to go to Germany I decided to host 2 girls from France, as I thought it would be useful to get some references before I went travelling.
As it turned out I made a lot of friends at the conventions, and I had plenty of offers of places to stay without actually using the couchsurfing website.
But I enjoyed having the girls from France stay with me, and I have since hosted 2 more couchsurfers, one from France and the other from Taiwan. Plus I often host circus friends from around the world and use some other hosting websites on the internet.
In the future I would like to travel more and intend to use the couchsurfing website to do this.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

Initially I had 2 lovely French girls come stay with me in Sheffield. They were not in Sheffield for long, but while they were here I showed them around the city, took them to some art galleries, met up for a coffee with some of my friends, and we also went to Corporation Nightclub (one of the major rock and alternative clubs in England) as I managed to get us some free tickets for the battle of the bands event going on there (I used to work at Corporation, and one of my friends was still working there at the time, he was actually on stage introducing the bands that were playing that night, so he sorted us some free tickets, which was pretty cool).
I have also hosted a couchsurfer from Taiwan and another from France. They were both here at the same time, which was great because some of the time I was busy trying to sort things for a hula hoop and circus skills convention I was organising in the city later that year, so they went off and explored some of the city while I was busy running about doing other things. I think they were amazingly lucky with the weather while they were here, there seemed to be some sort of freak heat wave in England and it was not raining! So we spent a fair bit of time outside in the sun on Devonshire Green where I often go to do some hula hooping when the weather is nice (as this is right outside my flat in the city centre). We also had a trip out to the Peak District (national park not far from Sheffield with beautiful countryside and lakes) with some other friends of mine, we took a BBQ, food and drink, plus some hula hoops and a few other circus toys, and some of us even went swimming/jumping into one of the rivers. I have been hosted by circus friends in other countries but I am yet to use the couchsurfing website to find hosts, but I plan to do this soon!

Interests

Cyr Wheel (roué cyr), hula hoop, juggling, poi, aerial silks, tightwire, pole dancing, circus skills, sailing, canoeing, roller derby, gymnastics, swimming, cheerleading, art, graphic design, cooking, music, dance.

• arts
• performing arts
• design
• graphic design
• festivals
• dancing
• dining
• cooking
• coffee
• bbq
• fitness
• running
• instructor
• gyms
• drinking
• clubbing
• traveling
• juggling
• music
• canoeing
• sailing
• cheerleading
• gymnastics
• swimming
• engineering
• languages
• lakes
• rivers

Music, Movies, and Books

My favourite book since I was a child is Alice in Wonderland

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Life constantly amazes me! ;)

Teach, Learn, Share

I can teach hula hooping including multiple hoop manipulation and hoop isolation

I would like to learn to speak more German (I would like to learn other languages too - but I think I want to get the hang of German first, as I understand more German than French or Spanish!)

Countries I’ve Visited

Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Spain

Countries I’ve Lived In

United Kingdom