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I'm still amazed when people say airbnb is so innovative:

https://www.couchsurfing.com/

I'm going to go with some practical travel advice here and let all the prior posters cover the why/why not you should go.

Being a student on a budget I'm sure you've heard the old fashioned technique of surviving on ramen noodles. Well there can be some travel equivalents.

For lodging you can try hostels or try Couch Surfing. (I use couchsurfing personally and have had some great experiences).

For travel you can sometimes find good deals if it's within your country via bus or rail. There are also ride shares if you're feeling ballsy (though I never have). There are also quite a few discount airlines depending on where you're at. I've used Spirit Air which wasn't too bad. I think there are some actually geared towards students but may require memberships.

If you can combine some of these things while seeing funding assistance as some of the prior posters mention - you can probably make this happen for free/close to free.

So if traveling is your thing - consider some practical, though maybe slightly unconventional options. Life is meant to be lived. :)

Check http://www.couchsurfing.com./ A lot of people travel on the uber cheap this way. It's pretty nice :)

I'm a member of CouchSurfing.com, and I know that they are always looking for smart techies to volunteer:

http://www.couchsurfing.com/careers.html

Hopefully no Canadian hotels hear about this and jump into the fray. Sites like couchsurfing charge a small fee for membership. Members are provided a forum to find people willing to let other users stay at their place free of charge (while on travel or whatnot). No licenses, no taxes, no government involvement whatsoever. Sounds like we need some government intervention!

Great idea! Why don't you start by leaving your door open and welcoming whomever wants in.

I do! It's great, really, I've welcomed strangers from all over the globe to spend a few days with my family. Join couchsurfing.com, open your house, ressurrect hospitality!

On an entirely separate note, why are we so suspicious of one another that we live in legally constructed imaginary fortresses upon which the mere presence of somebody else causes us to go berserk?

Personally, I'd prefer to live in a place where people I didn't know came to visit me all the time. In fact, I actively try to solicit that.

I am currently traveling, I have been traveling since March 2006. I am in North Africa now. I have a laptop, IBM T43p, can't traveling without it. I use my laptop mainly to store digital pictures. The weight is my only problem. Once in a while I just want to chuck the damn thing in the river. The laptop is little over 1/3 of the total weight of my backpack. I have a smaller day pack I use to take my valuables with me (laptop, copies of passport), leaving the larger backpack in the car, hotel, etc.

Oh, this is not tech related but it will be a wonderful experience for you if you get a chance to meet one of the host on http://www.couchsurfing.com/

My wife and I are extremely active on Couchsurfing: http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=3Q8M8P is my profile. My wife's profile has username MOKSHA and is linked from mine. Apart from having hosted a huge number of people, many of them women travelling alone or as a pair, my wife has travelled in India, China and a lot of Europe using Couchsurfing. It's been the source of some of our best experiences travelling, and I can't recommend it enough. In fact, we've just finished hosting two friends from Mumbai who we met whilst Couchsurfing there, and we're hosting an Australian woman travelling alone right now.

At a technical level, the reference system works very well. Beyond that, the idea of Couchsurfing is all about trusting people. I won't deny that there are dangerous people out there, but I am very happy for my wife to travel alone using Couchsurfing; and when we travel together I prefer to use Couchsurfing to meet people who invite us into their homes and let us see the place we're visiting in a way that you never see as just a tourist.

Couchsurfing has a vouching system whereby you can vouch for another person only if you yourself have been vouched for three times. This allows for a reasonably high degree of trust in people who have been vouched for. Also, the system displays the shortest possible path from you to the person's profile that you are viewing. If you know people in the system, you can follow this path to reassure yourself about your prospective host.

I understand that you might instantly feel concerned about the idea. You have no idea how many people say: "What if they're an axe-murderer!". (It's always an axe-murderer for some reason.) My response is this: one day I, or Emily, might meet an axe murderer, but the chance is incredibly small and until then we're going to have the most amazing experiences and meet the most amazing people. The alternative is to not have those experiences, and I'm more than willing to take that tiny risk for the amazing rewards. I know that Emily is the same.

Seriously. Look into the idea and think about it. You don't have to offer your couch, and no-one will force you to travel and stay with people you don't trust; but the more that you use the system, the more you will get out of it. On top of that, if you're ever in the North of England then you've got my profile link right there.

Just because a media machine run by anorexic women and gay men tells you that curves aren't attractive, doesn't make it true.

Ceren may have put on weight but she is still gorgeous.