Jimmy Wales, the founder of Wikipedia, had no clue how to eat his idlis.He ate his three idlis by themselves and drank three cups of sambar to compensate.There is no way for us to know this anecdote if Kiruba Shankar and his family hadn’t been benevolent enough to open the doors of their home to him when he was visiting Chennai.Say hello to Couchsurfing. Monitored and supported by the website couchsurfing.org, Kiruba, who runs a company, aptly titled, Business Blogging, explains how couchsurfing works, “If I am going to a city or a country where I have no relatives or friends, the only option I have, will be to stay at an expensive hotel or a relatively cheaper guesthouse. So with couchsurfing, I can stay at a complete stranger’s house.” In other words, it is as straightforward as it sounds.A person has a couch to spare and he is offering it to you. “It is not just about finding cheap accommodation, we sometimes end up becoming good friends with the host and have an opportunity to share stories, cultures and experiences,” explains Kiruba and adds, “It is extremely enriching.” Just like him, his entire family is game to the idea of having complete strangers in their home. “My kids are so comfortable with foreigners and they have matured in dealing with people,” he says. His wife and mother also go out of their way to make the guests feel at home, cooking for them and as Kiruba’s profile on couchsurfing.org says, the guests even get their laundry done if they are nice to his mother.Earlier this week, Kiruba and his family hosted a French mother-daughter duo, Kalida, a social worker and Melvina, a sociology student and tennis enthusiast.“I liked it that Kalida’s profile said that she enjoyed jogging and trekking and we had a lot of common interests,” Kiruba provides as an explanation for accepting her couchsurfing request. As Kalida and Melvina sit for dinner after a day-long visit to Mahabalipuram, Kiruba and his family join them at the table, explaining what to eat their dosas with and how to use their fingers. “We love the dosas here,” says Melvina appreciatively. Kalida walks up to the fridge and helps herself to some water.Having a stranger taking so much liberty in your home might put some people off, but not Kiruba. “Initially, Kalida would hesitate to open the fridge, but I told her that it was completely okay,” he says.“You can take the liberty to do things that we wouldn’t mind others doing at our home,” offers Melvina, speaking from the experience of hosting various couchsurfers themselves.When it comes to having strangers in your home, the issue of trust also comes up.Kiruba explains the foolproof system that the website has. “I will now write a small brief about Kalida as a guest on her profile and she will rate me as a host. So it is entirely based on trust and experiences and these ratings are usually honest.” Kiruba will also be shortly authoring a book on couchsurfing, using his experience of hosting over two dozen people to fill the pages.“I am always looking for ideas that nobody has acted on and when I checked Amazon, there were no Asian books on the subject,” he reveals. Interested hosts can sign-up at the website and start off by just taking the guests out for dinner or show them around the city before opening up your homes to them.[email protected]
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