Sofa so cool

Travel can be expensive for some, especially when you are young. But what if you could stay for free and make new friends at the same time?

Couchsurfing.com is a hospitality and home-stay network which offers you all of that.

Ten year old Ermao is the youngest host in Beijing. She might not have traveled the world but she has met people from Canada, Singapore, America, Russia, Brazil and Switzerland.

Her face lit up as she talked about her favorite guest while sitting on a sofa between her parents at their Beijing home.

“I like CaiCai the most. She is from Singapore, she wears sandals in winter and she taught me how to make balloon sculptures!”

Even though Ermao’s picture is on the family’s listing at couchsurfing.com, her mom, Zhang Jinling, is the person who makes all the arrangements. She said they had their first guest in 2008 during the Beijing Olympics. She was a Canadian girl named Isabelle. They found each other through Thebeijinger.com, a Beijing’s premier English language site for free classifieds, event and directory listings. Isabelle introduced them to the couchsurfing.com website. Since then the family has hosted ten guests in two years.

Ermao’s dad, Wang Zhaohui told me that the reason they take foreign guests wasn’t for Ermao to learn English, but for her to encounter other cultures besides Chinese, and he wants her to be relaxed with people who are different from her own kind. It seems to be working.

“I liked all the guests. They are different as Chinese people. They look different and they talk different, even their personalities are different. They like to talk to strangers and they like to make friends. Chinese people are very shy.” Ermao said all in one breath.

The family also enjoys showing their foreign guests bits of Chinese culture they might not see otherwise.

“My Dad once took a guest to jog to the park in the morning, when the guest saw Chinese old people dancing, singing and playing in the park, he was very surprised!” she said.

“Yes, we want to show the guests the other side of Beijing which they can’t find in the books.” Her dad said.

Ermao said she had no problem communicating with her foreign friends.

“I would go to the guest room and point to the kitchen to let them know it’s dinner time, I would then drag them if they don’t get it.”

Since 2004, over 1.7 million successful couch surfing stays have been recorded, and over 130,000 of those have resulted in close friendships. Couchsurfingt.com users have reported that an incredible 99.7 percent of their experiences were positive.

However, when dealing with strangers, there are always potential safety risks to consider for both sides.

In August 2009, Abdelali Nachet from UK was imprisoned for ten years for raping a tourist from HongKong at his flat in Leeds after meeting her through couchsurfing.com.

Incidents like this, however, are rare among the couch surfing fraternity.

“We can check the applicant’s references, the comments which been left by formal hosts, we also exchange a lot of emails beforehand, so far, we haven’t had any negative stories to tell.” Ermao’s dad said.

Each member has an online profile in which he describes himself, the accommodations he’s seeking or offering and other factors such as pets or smoking habits. References consist of feedback that members write on each other’s profiles, describing their experiences with one another. Members cannot delete or change any references left for them.

Isabelle, the family’s first couch-surfing guest, is studying at Beijing University.

“My plan was to come to China only for a month, but after my stay with the family, I fell in love with China and I decided to stay.” She said.

Isabelle has been a member of couchsurfing.com since January 2007 and the total number of her couch-surfing experiences is around 70. She has been to Japan, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, France, China and many more places. She has also hosted people from all over the world.

“Maybe people started to use couchsurfing.com because of cheaper travel, but after one or two good experiences, you start to value the culture thing. You start to make friends, you are not just visiting places, you are meeting people.” She said.

Apart from the couchsurfing.com, there are a few other couchsurfing websites which are popular among the travelllers.

www.hospitalityclub.org, aiming to “bring people together”.

www.stay4free.com A global “free accommodation network” based in Holland.

www.travelhoo.com . Also offers a travel partner-finding service.

www.globalfreeloaders.com An Australian hospitality network.

Video: Yu Chenkang

Script: Cao Huan