Posted：周四, 2005-11-24 02:34 | 主题：They are Great!!!!

We belong to all of them and they are great

We joined up as we want to host people for the next year then when we travel, we will have learnt a bit about outher countries, got personal recommendations as where to go and what to see, learnt a bit about the culture and language of the country and already know a few people around the world that we can stay with, as well as being able to access and apply to stay with other people in other countries.

We have been members for just over 4 weeks and here is our personal appraisial of each one. 

http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ is the one that we personally find the most active for us - through HC we have already hosted people from Estonina and Germany, and people are coming from Chile, Spain, Chech and Italy in the next few months.  The serach facilites at the hospitality club are great - we can do a search for a person who will host X number for 1 week and is interested in culture and the results will come up. also a good forum. HC also has a facility where you can see who has been viewing your profile. 

http://www.globalfreeloaders.com/ is the place where we got our first guest from - within 12 hours of signing up!  We have had two guests through  GFL - Estonia and one coming from Poland this week. The search facilites are not all that great here, but they have a nice calendar where you can book out the dates you are not available so people won't contact you about those dates.

http://www.couchsurfing.com/ is, in our opinion in between the other two.  We will be having guests from Nigeria and Austria through this one.  Their forums are great as well as the groups that they have.  They also have a great facility where you can see if people whose profile you are looking at can be connected to you through others that you have as your friends.

All of these three places have these basic rules:

People must be prepared to host as well as stay as guests.  Some people join when they are travelling, but we wanted to do it the other way around first and it is great!

When someone has stayed with you (or the other way around) write a reference for the person.

You can change your settings for accommodation - at the moment we have ours set to Yes but when we start travelling, we will set it to No.  You can set how many people can stay and many other things.  If you want to have a look at a profile at those places, you can view ours - tangatawhenua is our username there too! 

How much you do or not do is entirely up to you.  Some members can only host in the weekend, some members are available to take people out for a beer or show their guests around the sites - how much you give is up to you :-) 

The way that we have found them for us may not be the same way that you find them.  We live in New Zealand, at the end of the road to no where and people usually come here if it is part of a RTW ticket stop!

We have already starting just looking to see what accommodation there is in Singapore and all countries through to China, then Nepal and India.  It appears that we will be able to stay with HC members in all of those countries, in different cities and this way we will be able to meet the "real people" and not the "tourist people" - it is why we joined these clubs in the first place

Posted：周四, 2005-11-24 11:52 | 主题：Global Freeloaders

Good to hear that tangatawhenua has had some great experience with the sites mentioned above.

I joined Global Freeloaders about this time last year, but never really got much genuine response when seeking places to stay.

Those I did communicate with seemed to mostly  have plans of expensive downtown entertainment. If I really wanted that, I could stay in a hotel in any city centre in the world.  

Posted：周四, 2005-11-24 20:12 | 主题：That is why the Hospitality

That is why the Hospitality club is far better as you can search for people with specific interests.  We usually use the advanced search and set the Maximum Birth Year so that we don't get young "party people" - also in our profile we state quite clearly no drugs, and when people read our profile we highlight that staying with us means a unique insite into Maori culture, so everyone we get is interested in staying with us for that reason, and not the expensive donwtown entertainment

Wocca, if you ever come to NZ and we are not roaming the world, then look us up - no expensive downtown entertainment while staying with us *LOL* and you are more than welcome 

Posted：周五, 2005-11-25 05:46 | 主题：Ever Come NZ

Hi tangatawhenua

I haven't made any definite plans yet for the upcoming northern hemisphere winter vacation. However, I could actually be in a position to take you up on your offer in January/February 2006.

Which part of NZ are you in?

Posted：周五, 2005-11-25 22:28 | 主题：Auckland

Wow  Wocca, that would be so great if you could come and stay with us - you are more than welcome

We are in Auckland which is where the main international airport is and we pick up our visitors when they arrive - makes it easier when coming to a strange country

If you sign up at the hospitality club then put tangatawhenua in the quickgo box on the front page, you will find our profile and all about us!  Don't worry about following our cultural rules - they are similar to many Asian cultural rules, respect, no shoes inside etc And let us know if there is anything that you don't eat, as our hopspitality rules means we provide the first meal

We are really excited about you maybe coming to stay with us, and once again, you are more than welcome

Posted：周日, 2005-11-27 14:34 | 主题：About WOCCA

Thanks for your warm welcome. You may care to view my webpage:

http://www.freewebs.com/wocca/ ;-)