Veronica: Whether you're young or old couch surfing is a cheap and sociable way to travel. Hi, I'm Veronica and today Trent Collins teaches WatchmMojo.com how to couch surf. So, okay tell us about couch surfing?
Trent: Couch surfing is a way for traveler to meet locals in a place that they're going. It’s a way for you to find some free accommodation but also to make some great friends in a new city and to learn about their culture that you otherwise never would have learned about.
Veronica: So are you actually staying on someone’s couch?
Trent: Many people offered just the couch. Some people offer a spare room. Some people offer just a space in the backyard that put your tents, it can be anything.
Veronica: Where can you do couch surfing.
Trent: Couch surfing has about 600,000 members spread in 226 different countries, provinces and regions.
Veronica: How safe is it staying with the stranger?
Trent: It’s as safe as you make it. Couch surfing offers three safety features as well as a back out member just beats tame. We have a verification system. We use credit cards to verify you are who say you are and has referencing system is where you leave good reference for somebody or bad reference depending on when you met them and the last one is trusted members can leave a vouch if they think you are trusted and they can leave a vouch for you and everything goes from there.
Veronica: So how do you go about choosing a house?
Trent: Well the first part is to go to way you want to go, where you’re travelling and you search from that area and then you are giving a list of the profiles. There are some small data there and you can then look through a person’s profile. You go through maybe five or six before you find somebody who you think you can be friends with and then you send them an email “Hi, I'm coming to town and I'm going to be here. If you're free go and hang out, maybe I can stay in the couch”
Veronica: So is it free.
Trent: The whole point of couch surfing, is that its hospitality not monetary. It’s all given free of anything.
Veronica: So do you have any tips for someone who wants back on their first couch surfing experience.
Trent: Spend some time to fill your profile out, so that people know who you are and then some time to really go through all the people’s profiles and figure out you know some cool people that you want to hang out with and once you're there you know just treat it as a good friend.
Veronica: How do you find out about couch surfing?
Trent: Well, the best place to go would be www.couchsurfing.com and it’s all there on the website and you can contact us if you have any questions.
Transcription by:
Scribe4you Transcription Services