It's A Small World

It all happened with me trying to cut my expenses traveling in Australia. I remember that time I was still in Japan. Every evening after I came back from work I will spend hours looking up the net, surfed through hundreds of hostel booking sites, read through thousands of reviews trying to get the best deal for my accommodation in Sydney. Then I banged to this site - couchsurfing.org. A platform where users offer hospitality exchange as well as social networking. It works on the concept as members "surf" on couches by staying as a guest at the host's house, host travellers or join events. It was not turn up well when I had my first few attempts sending requests to several hosts in Sydney, either I don't get a reply or they rejected my request. I kept trying until two days before I am going Sydney, a host named Brian Kozan accepted me. With a mixed feeling bombarded by both excitement and worry I dragged my black Samsonite all the way from Melbourne to Sydney, not knowing what is awaiting me ahead. It might turn up to be a whole new experience for me to travel in a new way or might become a nightmare what if my host is some kind of psychotic criminals wanted to take advantage of ignorant traveler like me?

I welcomed by a close to 7 feet tall guy speaking a very easy to understand American accent. (I have to admit I did have problem understanding some of the Western Australia's accent) He was originally from Arizona, Phoenix and has moved to Aussie for about 3 years. The reason being so was he thought Americans are way too pessimistic, well I keep no comment on that. After chatting I learned that I was the only surfer at his house. There were 1,2,3,4...9 yeah altogether 9 of us (excluding Brian) in his 2 bedrooms apartment. At first I thought God this is way too much! How could you let 9 strangers in your house and sleep, you ain't so desperate to make new friend right? I was the only surfer that time when I arrived in early evening. When the night screen was shutting in, more surfers turned out eventually. 2 from Germans, 1 Austria, 1 American, another 3 Germans and another German who is friend of the first two arrived Germans. They were all girls but me and Brian. Eventually we started to blend in well and have fun. We toured around Sydney harbour, went to the landmark - Sydney Opera House, had a sip of good beers and threw in parties. I love that everyone although of different nationalities and cultures but was able to mix together, had a fair share of talking especially exchanging our experience of different countries that we have been. I never thought it was gonna be so great, so fabulous!

Read out more about my profile at couchsurfing, click here. =) (read the reference at bottom right and you will find out how much you've missed out!)

I met Lauren (the American surfer at Brian's place) and we hanged out a little in Sydney on our own. She was going to make a visit to Indonesia after Australia, China and Japan so I was telling why not stop by Malaysia since Indonesia is just neighboring. At first she was still skeptical if that might worth it. She was kind of convinced after that. She left Sydney earlier than me so I thought there might not be follow up. Few weeks later when I was back in Malaysia I received her Facebook inbox asking me the POI of Malaysia apart from KL. I told her to go Langkawi, Penang, and of course Borneo. Initially she only planned a 4 days trip in Kuching but in the end extended to a full week. Since we were going to many national parks and gonna drive around I put up a public offer on couchsurfing forum asking if any traveler in Kuching would like to take up the empty rear seats and join us. Duncan from Melbourne responded almost immediately. Then we had Carina from Austria (friend of Duncan in the same guesthouse)  with us to Gunung Gading to spot the Rafflesia. Day after we had Arturoo from Spain and Nicolas from France to join us for Bako. Lots of fun we had and we did enjoy to the max. We saw the Proboscis monkey, had one of the best seafoods they ever had, chilled out at rooftop bar and lots more.

I started to appreciate the beauty of this planet as a big melting pot for different cultures to blend in making it such a vibrant thing to explore. I used to love shopping but after this I would rather spend my money on experience to see the rest of the world.

At jetty to Bako National Park

Seafood dinner

"Meow..." cat museum