Hi everybody,
My name's Sebastian and I'm from London. I was one of the original Airbnb hosts in the UK back in 2008 when three fresh faced young men from San Francisco came to London with some odd idea that we should all open our doors and let complete strangers come and stay in our home. Those three were of course Brian, Nathan and Joe and we've all come a long way in those twelve years. Airbnb completely transformed my life. As my mother never ceases to remind me, I've never had a proper job and for the last decade or more Airbnb has made possible a life of mischief making and activism, most recently with the Green Party of England and Wales and now Extinction Rebellion.
The last month has been extremely challenging. My first Covid-19 cancellation, which for the purposes of the story (and because it's true) I will never forget. It was a glorious sunny day in mid March and I was on a boat on the River Thames. I was travelling from Westminster where I had been agitating at Parliament that morning to the Tate Modern where I was to spend the afternoon experiencing art. I remember it mostly, not because of any fears about a pandemic, but because it cost me a lot of money. It was a £2K booking but hey I thought, it's not til May, the apartment is bound to get rebooked.
As with much in life, as we know now, I could not have been more wrong. Over the next thirteen days, email by email, phone call by phone call I watched the cancellations roll in, and as they came in, out went any income or visible means of support by which I was to live this summer. I've had some hairy moments in my life but this I think was the most sustained and unrelenting period of helpless terror I have experienced. Thirteen days is a long time.
When Sarah from Glasgow finally got around to cancelling her two night stay worth £78 (what kept you woman???) I felt nothing but relief. It really now could not get worse. Here I was, a little over a hundred pounds in the bank, two rented properties that need six thousand pounds a month to keep afloat before I can even think about buying gin, the prospect looming of being locked in my home by a government of breathtaking incompetance and facing little more, once people started to calm down and stop panicking, on day one post lockdown of being quietly evicted, unnoticed by everyone else out celebrating, and at the age of fifty seven facing a life which at twenty seven would have been an interesting challenge.
That's pretty much where I'm at now too. The hundred pounds has lasted well, topped up by friends of course, but each day brings a new idea as to how to survive and meet the challenges. This group is one of them and I'm delighted to have been asked to join.
I'll be even more delighted when our american friends learn to speak english and can explain to me what a "Frontline Responder" is. After twelve years with Airbnb I still struggle to speak Californian but tbh, that's the least of my worries at the moment.
Looking forward to working with you all and rediscovering the DNA of Airbnb. It has to be so much more than people ending phone conversations that have cost you a thousand dollars with "If there's nothing else I can help you with, have a nice day".
Sebastian
