Baltic backpackers check out of hostels, onto couches

  • 2007-02-21
  • by Joel Alas
TALLINN - Since the 1970s, hostel dormitories have been the standard accommodation option for budget-conscious travelers. But savvy backpackers have now discovered a new way of finding a bed for the night for an even lower price 's completely free. It's called 'couch surfing', and the name says it all. People offer their couches for others to sleep on for a night or two, completely free of charge.

It functions via two Internet sites which allow travelers and couch owners to find each other in nearly every city on the planet.
The Baltics have embraced couch surfing as eagerly as the rest of the globe. The most popular couch surfing site, www.hospitalityclub.org (see related article, page 8), has more than 10,000 registered users in all three Baltic countries. Even the most obscure towns in regional areas have at least one willing participant.
The immense popularity of this new mode of travel was displayed in June 2006 when one of the websites, www.couchsurfing.com, experienced a system overload. When the site's main server crashed, tens of thousands of budget travelers across the world found themselves without a bed.

The site was quickly restored, but not before newspapers around the globe wrote about the crash and its impact on the world of budget travel.
For travelers, couch surfing is a way to escape the worn path. While backpacking began as a bohemian passion in the 60s and 70s, it has now morphed into a highly commercialized industry. Guidebooks dictate where backpackers will eat, stay and party. Hostels seem as regulated as school classrooms, with rule sheets pinned to every inch of available wall space. Backpackers often return from their adventures jaded by the system, which offers little opportunity for fresh experiences.

But by couch surfing, travelers are given access to the most valuable source of information any city can offer 's its locals. And locals are often more than willing to share the secrets of their city, since it gives them an opportunity to meet people from other cultures.
While it began as simply an accommodation swapping service, couch surfing has morphed into a lifestyle, complete with its own community. In Tallinn, members of www.hospitalityclub.org come together for a party at least once a month, dragging their international guests along for a collective drink.

Newcomers to the concept of couch surfing normally question its safety. How can you be sure the stranger sleeping on your couch won't strip your apartment and kill your cat?
Both major couchsurfing websites go to pains to explain that they are not responsible for the safety of participants. A lot revolves around trust, but there are a few safeguards. Registered users obtain a rating upon signing up. If a host is unhappy with the behavior of the guests, they are able to write a complaint which is permanently attached to the online record, visible to all future hosts. Similarly, positive comments about hosts and guests can also be logged.

All good in theory, but does it work?
From personal experience, couch surfing through the Baltics has never failed.
I saw the dreary border city of Narva in a different light thanks to Gregoriov, who hosted me and three friends for a night and escorted us on a tour of smokey and raucous basement bars.
In Tartu, the thriving student nightlife was revealed to me by two girls who hosted me within six hours notice 's and all I had to do was cook them dinner.