Hans-Jürgen, Enrico's father.

Sometimes I thought that Couchsurfing was the wrong place for me because the majority of the members were under 30. Simply too young for me to come closer in real life friendships. Enrico, a nice couchsurfer from Germany wrote me a somewhat strange request. At that time I was not even aware of Couchsurfing safety precautions and that every person should have a separate profile to make the host or guest feel safe. In case of problems it is also easier to report a separate profile to the MDST(Member Dispute and Safety Team), a team I just learnt about later.

Enrice wrote me a strange request for his 48 y/o father who was not good with computers and didn't speak English very well. Enrico's request was elaborate and showed very clearly that he bothered to read my whole profile. I decided to host Enrico's father because he was older........

I expected a worn-out silly old man who couldn't speak a word of English and possibly could not even leave the house without being run over by a car. The doorbell rang exactly at the time as I expected him. "Well, German punctuality." I thought. Surprise...surprise...I saw a fairly young-looking and athletic man with a beard and interested lively eyes. He entered and gasped a bit as he saw the breathtaking 180 degree view of the Sydney Harbour.

We spoke German for most of the time and he quickly lost his initial reserved behaviour. He...a married man with me, a woman living alone in a small flat. But we soon found some topics about his travels in Queensland and the European background of Kirribilli. We spent a warm Sydney evening enjoying the Sydney Harbour and drinking red wine. He had so many interesting stories to tell about the time as East Germany's wall was still reality. As a customs officer he told me exactly the same stories that my neighbour and friend from East Germany told me. Touching stories and the opinion from the other side: How arrogant they found the Westies and how they have been looked down at.

His son Enrico told me that I could possibly change his life by showing him more than the usual triad: working, shopping and watching TV. Hans-Jürgen wasn't lucky with the weather because it rained nearly all day and I had to work. So we spent quite a lot of time watching TV and the German DVDs that I brought from the university library. I cooked him an Australian Bratwurst made of lamb and rosemary and he could enjoy a sweet breakfast with mango ginger jam. He was more independent than Enrico described him. During the day he walked the Harbour Bridge to the centre of Sydney, visited Aldi in North Sydney and Luna Park just on his own and took a few pictures of Kirribilli. A seemingly less spectacular experience with just a common man who started to see the world and learn at a very moderate pace.....Oh, he was an excellent guest where house rules were totally redundant. I could see that his wife had taught him everything a good guest on Couchsurfing should know:-))))) He was not a particularly rich man but he was generous. I appreciated the bottle of red wine and the yodeling mole he brought from Germany.....

My first guest

Among the numerous copy paste requests there was one American guy, Nico Ackermann, who immediately caught my attention. His profile was full of guests and friends who talked about him as a warmhearted person whose couch was always there for you to crash on when you feel emotionally down. At that time I had my finger on the "Delete" button straight away and was not aware that it reflected back on the percentage of how many requests I had replied too. One of the Sydney hosts has taught me to prepare an automated response for those who don't bother to read my profile. Niko's request showed a few personal comments which were closely related to the information in my profile. He wrote that he could speak a bit of German to prepare me for going back to Germany. Of course he didn't know that I originally grew up in Sydney.

Niko arrived on the same day as I invited my friends Brendon and Paul to watch Queen Victoria cruise ship to enter Sydney Harbour. He was as nice as his request but I simply felt weird to let a stranger, no matter how nice he was sleep in my flat. Brendon and Paul were very surprised that Niko was not a friend but just a stranger I "picked up" from the internet. I didn't tell them about Couchsurfing and they wondered what was in there for me that I wanted to host a total stranger.

Niko was a good guest and wonderful character but at that time I thought I would prefer to meet people first, invite them for dinner or coffee at my wonderful apartment with Sydney Harbour view but don't let them stay overnight. The idea that strangers save money for their travels at my expense didn't make me feel good.