In 2014. I found myself in America with not too much cash and 3 girlfriends, but I desperately wanted to see both the East and the West coast. We were searching for solutions and heard of Couchsurfing.

Although it became planetary popular, I noticed in conversations with my friends, that they still don't know what it is. Couchsurfing is a website where users like you and me provide to others a free place to stay in exchange of their company or maybe hosting them in return. You create a Couchsurfing profile, upload photos, write about yourself and get good or bad reviews.

I stayed in many hotels or friends places on my other trips, but the Couchsurfing stories were the best ones. One of my stories I always love to tell is my Las Vegas story. I applied with that story to some blogging contests, always was top ranked but never won. I guess it was too criminal (that's how I comfort myself).

What happens in Vegas, ends up on Steemit

It was summer of 2014. I was with 3 more friends in Virgina and we decided to do a route around USA. But the problem was, we had only 1500$ each. That amount can't cover a month of travel unless you have a free place to stay. So that's how we decided to couchsurf hoping that people will provide us a place to stay and trust us since we are girls. But from the first day of searching we had trouble in finding a person who would host all four of us. So we decided to split and search two by two.

Our initial plan was to stay 3 days in Vegas and then go with a bus to San Diego. I found a guy in Las Vegas with 100 positive reviews for me and my friend Ivana, and the other two girls Suzana and Kristina found another guy who agreed to accommodate them.

In the meantime there was some random guy called James who was texting me and offering me accommodation for all of us in a 5 star suite. He sounded like a scammer, so I rejected his offer.

Before getting in the plane for Vegas, Suzana and Kristina got a text from their couchsurfing host. He apologized and cancelled the deal with them. We were about to board on the plane, so I told them to not be crazy and that we're going to find something in Vegas. Me and Ivana still had our deal with our couchsurfing host.

After five hours we landed in Las Vegas and I told Suzana and Kristina that I can only offer them this guy James, but I am scared for their safety. Since we didn't have too much money to pay for hotels, they decided to take that crazy risk and called James. He imidately answered and agreed to host them the next day. Suzana and Kristina went to find some cheap motel to spend the night and that's when we separated.

Me and Ivana went to our host from the beginning od the story. He was nice and clean and a good company. We made him traditional Croatian food musaka and he took us out to the XS club. From time to time I was texting with Suzana and Kristina to see if everything is ok in their motel. The next day they met with James and started texting me like crazy: „Girls you need to get here. This is sick! We are in a huge suite in Mandalay Bay!!“

I asked them if they are in any discomfort with the guys and if they felt harassed in any way. After they said no, I packed my bags :D

Viva Las Vegas

After not too much persuasion, me and Ivana arrived at the lobby of Mandalay Bay where Suzana and Kristina were staying. It's a four star mega hotel with 3000 rooms and sharks swimming in aquariums. Most of the Vegas hotels are that size. We went to our room number on the 30th floor. It was a huge 100 square meter suite with one wall covered fully in glass with king size beds.

I asked them how the guys look and where they are, and Kristina told me that they are Filipinos in early thirties who talked to them a little, paid for the room and went to another hotel called Cosmopolitan to not make them feel uncomfortable. Later the guys texted us asking if we want to go to a club with them and we agreed to finally meet with these Asian Robin Hoods.

We went with them to a club called Drai's. During the whole night they were very polite and normal and not rude or inappropriate in any way. I think this was the first and last time in my life that I had a bodyguard by my side the whole night lol. After the clubbing they asked us to stay with them in Cosmopolitan for the whole week and skip going to San Diego, as we initially planned. Hyped by all the adrenaline, we agreed.

For the next seven days, I was hanging out with them, gambling, going to the city and had fun times. They never tried to hit on us and even were going away sometimes for a day or two. The room was under the name Davy Me. I knew something was off in this story but it was too late to back out since it was now only two days left of the Vegas trip.

I was partying so much in Vegas that I haven't seen the Grand Canyon and I feel very ashamed for it. Anyway, on Saturday 27th of September us girls were planning to go to our next destination Los Angeles. Friday night, the night before going to LA, we went out with the guys to a club and stayed until 6 AM. Being tired, we decided to go back to the hotel and they stayed and went to a strip club (which is common in Vegas).

I went to my bed to sleep and closed my eyes at 7 AM.

Who is Davy Me?

At 12 PM I heard loud knocking and someone yelling „is anybody here“??? I opened my eyes and saw a huge guy in a suit with a headset screaming „how many of you are in here“? I said four, and Suzana came out of the bathroom with her hands in the sky and toothbrush in her mouth. He asked me „who's room is this?“ I replied: Davy Me!
The next thing I heard was: „Who the fk is Davy Me? Well let me tell you. It's a fake identity and a stolen credit card and all of you will be accused for fraud, drug dealing, money laundering and prostitution“.*

I started crying and explaining that we are students from Europe who applied on Couchsurfing and that we had no physical contact with these guys. He believed us and let us go out of the room with 20$ in total and our passports. According to the Cosmopolitan hotel policy he had to call the police with a search warrant. The security guy gave me his phone number which I still have to remind me how stupid I was back then.

After hours and hours sitting in casinos with AC to not get burned outside, I called the security guy and asked if we can come back to our room. He said yes. After we arrived there everything looked like a tornado went through. All our clothes were on the floor, mattresses on walls and police officers sitting and waiting for us. Each of us girls had a conversation with them and we told them the exact same story I'm telling you right now.

There was even a funny situation when they found Kristina's „wish post-it papers“. It's some horoscope stuff where you write your wishes on a post it paper during full moon. She wrote „Želim imati 5000 $“ and American cops didn't understand the sentence and tried to accuse her of contemplating a 5000 $ robbery LOL.

At the end they joked with us, gave us our stuff back and we even took a photobomb picture with the security guy's phone (I wish I have it right now). The Filipinos were credit card scammers who lived like this for months staying in luxury hotels and hosting random people from time to time to actually help them out. In my country you can't get rid of a guy even after a 1$ drink and these guys were so polite and friendly all the time.

I never heard of the Filipinos again. Davy Me turned out to be a victim from California, according to the police. I tried to google police records but I haven't found much. It turned out that our hosts were big time drug dealers with bags full of pills and had a whole system of credit card scamming.

The four of us went safe and sound to Los Angeles where we had a normal vacation. I also visited America for 5 months in 2017, but this time I paid my own hotels or stayed at friends houses. As a memory I kept the Cosmopolitan room key. I was digging now through my closet to find it so I can take a photo.

Point of story

• Couchsurfing is a fun and great way to meet locals and new friends
• Based on my experience, check 20 times who are you going with
• I was 23 and I would never do that again
• My parents never found out
• I have a story to tell my kids one day
• Couchsurfing is a wonderful community and an amazing experience and this is just one in a billion story
• If you check on your hosts and if they have many positive reviews, there is nothing to be afraid of. These scammer guys had only 4 reviews.
• Normal couchsurfing mostly looks like this 😊

Thanks for reading this long post which can't be finished without a little bit of Elvis.