I have been hesitating a lot if I should comment on my negative reference on couchsurfing in my blog, mainly because it happened many years ago, but as I have been very active in CS during those years and I have met hundreds CSers so far I was asked many times what exactly happened and although I was trying to explain it with patience, it gets very annoying to give explanations on the same topic over and over again. Next time if someone asks me to explain the circumstances of my negative reference I will tell him just to read my blog. It happened a very long time ago but I will do my best to explain everything as precisely as possible.

I have already described my travels to France earlier in my blog. I went to France for the first time in summer 2002 when I was 19 and then I travelled there again in spring and summer both in 2003 and 2004. I was initially visiting my IRC friends who I met on the channels #Paris and #france. I joined couchsurfing in June 2004 and I wanted to visit Bretagne for the first time so I contacted a guy called Damien (his profile is easy to find because he uses the same nickname on CS). I still remember that it was Wednesday when I took a train from Lyon to Rennes and while looking to the calendar I believe that it must have been on July 21st 2004. I was initially looking for a place to stay in Rennes and I asked Damien to host me there, but he told me to come to Arzon because it was by the sea and it was a nice place to visit. While I agreed to go there I didn't find out before going to Bretagne where exactly Arzon was and I asked him to meet me in Rennes. I didn't know that these cities were 100 km far away from each other and it wasn't my intention to ask him to meet me so far away, but unfortunately he agreed with the meeting in Rennes and later blamed me for that. 

When we arrived in the camping I was staying in the tent of his friend Tibo who was a very kind guy and a great host. I would have enjoyed my stay in Arzon because it was a wonderful place, but the relations with Damien weren't good. Firstly, I am usually known as an evasive person and people who are too straightforward make me uncomfortable, but the main thing which I didn't like about him was the way he commented on my behaviour. He treated me like a spoiled child which made me feel so bad that I refused to speak with him. I was discussing the situation with my friends on the internet and they were trying to help me to find another accommodation in Bretagne but we didn't succeed. I was supposed to travel to Bordeaux on Friday 30th and I needed a place to stay till then. I got stuck in the camping and I couldn't leave. My friends told me that I was making a mistake to stay in the camping in this situation but I didn't want to listen to them. 

Then Tibo was supposed to have some friends arriving on Tuesday 27th. As I didn't bring my own tent, I discussed with a Spanish guy called Javier what I should do and he offered to lend me his tent. He also told me that nobody was checking tents during the night so I should try to put it there for free and hope that nobody would find out. I thought it was a great idea, but Damien didn't share my enthusiasm and became very angry instead. Tibo's friends didn't arrive that evening and I could stay there two nights longer. Then one of my IRC friends found someone in Nantes who could host me there for one night and I left Arzon on July 29th. 

Overall, I am willing to admit that it was mainly my fault what happened because I was solving the situation in an unfortunate and certainly inappropriate way but I don't believe that this guy is completely blameless either. For example he can say that I was stupid when I hadn't found out before going to Bretagne where Arzon was and how to get there, but he agreed with the meeting in Rennes although he knew it was 100 km far away. And then, if he had explicitly told me that I could stay in the camping for one week he must have counted on the possibility that I wouldn't be able to leave earlier. I was certainly behaving immaturely at the age of 21 but since that time I have already visited 70 people on 4 continents and I hosted 100 CSers and with most of them I managed to have a good conversation and spend pleasant time. 

I had to answer other questions regarding my reference, e.g. why I didn't leave a negative reference to his profile too and why I didn't delete my profile and create a new one when this reference was actually the first one. Initially I left him a negative reference too but when my friend sent him e-mail and asked him to delete the reference from my profile I could clearly understand from his answer that he would never admit sharing any part of fault and in this case I didn't want to fight with him for the rest of my life and I deleted the negative reference from his profile. I didn't delete my profile because I didn't suppose that I would be still hanging on CS 8 years later with 350 friends and now it is too late to think about it. 

It is very unlikely that I would ever manage to correct what I have done because if I tried I could make everything even worse, but although my stay wasn't finished in a good way I am really glad that I had an opportunity to visit Arzon and get to know Tibo and Javier and I will try to meet them again in the future.