Over, Victoria here!

Wanderlust is probably my defining trait, and travelling is perhaps the best thing you can do in this life. So I try to do it as much as possible.

I also dig birds.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

I've recently started working for a Dutch company and going on a short business trip to Amsterdam. I thought that staying for an extra day at my own expense to explore the city and hopefully make a Dutch friend is an excellent idea, since I don't know that much about the country. I spent a single day in Amsterdam before - I was 10. The houses and canals were pretty and my parents kept arguing who's staying in the street with me and who's going inside the coffee shop (no one did in the end, chickens!). I certainly have space for new memories!

Interests

See my favourite stuff below, birds, weird and very spicy foods, being an information sponge on Wikipedia at 3:17 AM, spending hours in museums and libraries/book shops with friends, second cheapest wine, gigs, pub quizzes, discussing great book plots/movie scripts, world cultures.

• chickens
• birds
• books
• wine
• coffee
• pub crawls
• shopping
• traveling
• business

Music, Movies, and Books

What if you liked everything about my profile just until you've read about my obscene tastes? What are you going to do now?.. Oh no, please don't go!..

Music: Blur, Kula Shaker, My Bloody Valentine, the Dismemberment Plan, the Wrens, Sebadoh, Cleaners from Venus, Courtney Barnett, Mac Demarco, Destroyer, Unwound, Tame Impala, the Horrors, let's just go to an indie gig already!..

Movies: lots of Kubrick, lots of Akira Kurosawa, Ugetsu Monogatari, An Actor's Revenge, Lawrence of Arabia, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Apocalypse Now, Coppola's daughter is a cool director too, if..., O Lucky Man!, gotta love Malcolm McDowell, Angel Heart, Heathers, Wes Anderson makes good films, and so does Paul Thomas Anderson, Withnail and I is special, can always watch something by Danny Boyle (but love him for Trainspotting only, although his camera work and choice of soundtracks are the best). I can't go on for much longer than this, I'm sorry.

Books: Madame Bovary, The Red And The Black, The Secret Garden, pretty sure I'll like The Goldfinch too, things by Amelie Nothomb, Chinese medieval fairy tales which are SO underrated, the Pillow Book, Sergei Dovlatov, Chekhov?..

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Crawled metres on my stomach across and seaweeds to get close and take a picture of a seal in Iceland without scaring it. In the end, I was the one to be scared, turned out they can be really loud, and I'm skittish.

Teach, Learn, Share

Can certainly teach you a couple of Russian of phrases, or, if you are planning to get a tattoo of your name in Chinese characters, check whether everything is smooth there. I majored and am decent at explaining cultural differences between the West and the East, maybe you have a question or two?

What I Can Share with Hosts

Let me know if I should bring you some Russian sweets, or maybe a few packs of cigarettes, if you are a smoker (they are much cheaper here than in EU).

Countries I’ve Visited

Belgium, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Macao, Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey

Countries I’ve Lived In

China, Russian Federation, United Kingdom, United States