Homestays: Finding Comfort in a Stranger's Home
While planning a trip to Peru last July, Brian Twite and his girlfriend, Constance Hansen, decided to skip hotels and stay with a host family ( ). At $35 a night, the accommodation ( ) in the Santiago district of Cusco was a bargain ( ). But the warmth of their host mother, a 65-year-old widow named Marie, won them over.
“We’d wake up and she’d yell, ‘Chicos!’, calling us for breakfast down the hall,” said Twite, a Chicagoan who works in manufacturing logistics ( ).
After a long day of sightseeing in the Sacred Valley, Twite, 32, said he was grateful to come home and share highlights ( ) of his day with Marie and her son, Jonathan. “You sit down to a meal and talk about your day. They asked us, ‘What did you do? Where did you go?’ That was really magical because you don’t get that with a hotel.”
As travelers’ appetites ( ) move toward wanting more intimate ( ), locally driven and non-generic ( ) experiences in recent years, homestays — traditionally the fallback ( ) for backpackers and foreign exchange students — are emerging in a new light.
“It’s the best way to get a feel for the place you’re visiting,” said Cliff Carruthers, a retired urban planner in York, England, who booked a homestay in Pakistan last month.
At London-based Wild Frontiers, a luxury tour planner, the founder ( ), Jonny Bealby, says 80% of his tours today include at least some kind of homestay. In some cases, popular itineraries ( ) have been revised to include a homestay; a walking tour of Palestine that’s been offered since 2013, for example, now features a village stay in Sanur.
“It’s being driven by the customer,” Bealby said, noting that travelers from London, Boston and New York seem willing to forgo ( ) the conveniences of a plush ( ) hotel every night. “What they want to do is connect.”
“It absolutely takes a bit of trust,” said Yvonne Finlay, managing director at Homestay.com, which launched in 2013 and now operates in 142 countries. “Effectively, you’re coming into this person’s home. So there needs to be that element of respect.”
Homestays also have a practical appeal ( ). With Cuba’s limited hotel inventory ( ), homestays are often the best option. One boutique ( ) travel company, Pelorus, pairs guests with specific hosts and neighborhoods, depending on their interests — food, music or retracing ( ) family roots. “Homestays allow us to be more flexible ( ),” Jimmy Carroll, the company’s co-founder, said.
寄宿家庭：來去別人家住一晚
戴懷特和女友康斯坦絲．韓森去年七月規劃秘魯之行時，決定不住飯店，改住寄宿家庭。寄宿家庭位在庫斯科省聖地牙哥區，每晚35美元（約台幣1050元），物超所值，而65歲的主人媽媽、寡婦瑪麗更用溫暖的接待贏得了他們的心。
戴懷特回憶說：「我們醒來時她就會大喊『孩子們！』，要我們過去吃早餐。」戴懷特是美國芝加哥人，從事製造業物流工作。
32歲的戴懷特說，在秘魯聖谷遊覽一整天後，他很感謝能回到寄宿家庭，跟瑪麗和她的兒子喬納森分享當天趣事。戴懷特說：「我們坐下來用餐，談談那天發生的事。他們會問，『你們做了什麼？去了哪些地方？』這真的很美妙，住飯店你不會得到這種經驗。」
隨著近年來旅客日益渴望更為親密，由當地人主導，且不一樣的經驗，傳統上是背包客和外國交換學生的選擇的寄宿家庭體驗，也以新方式興起。
英國英格蘭約克郡退休都市計畫師卡魯瑟斯，上月預訂了在巴基斯坦一個寄宿家庭的住宿，他說：「這是對你到訪的地方產生真切感受的最好方式。」
總部在倫敦的高檔行程旅行社「狂野邊界」創辦人畢爾比說，現在他販售的行程中，80%包含某種形式的寄宿家庭體驗。一些人氣行程也經過修改，納入寄宿家庭體驗，例如2013年推出的巴勒斯坦步行遊覽行程，現在主打薩努爾村住宿。
畢爾比說，「這是為了迎合客人需求」，倫敦、波士頓和紐約的客人似乎願意放棄每晚入住豪華飯店的便利，「他們要的是接地氣」。
Homestay.com旅行社創立於2013年，目前在142個國家有業務，總經理伊馮．費萊說：「這絕對需要一些信任。事實上，你是進入這個人的家，所以必須懷著尊重的心。」
寄宿家庭體驗也有實務上的吸引力。古巴旅館有限，寄宿家庭體驗經常是最好的選擇。販售精品行程的旅行社「方位儀」，根據客人感興趣的事物，如美食、音樂和追溯家族根源，把客人與特定寄宿家庭和鄰里配對。共同創辦人卡洛說：「寄宿家庭體驗讓我們更有彈性。」
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