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Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

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Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#161

Post by alt_f4 »

siquick wrote: post #90

Barcelona - one of the best all-around cities in the world (climate/culture/architecture/world proximity/quality of living/beach/mountains) and a growing tech scene. Very easy to pick up development work here for a local company, you won't be required to know Spanish/Catalan for a job. The only downsides are that the pay is relatively low (€43k average for SE) and it can be quite difficult to find a place to live wit…

Barcelona is not one of the best all-around cities for sure.

1) climate -- not moderate, only good if you enjoy extremely hot summers

2) culture -- obscured by the tourism industry in the city. Pretty much all restaurants try to rip you off, public parks charge entry for certain areas, everything culture-related is aimed and priced for tourists.

3) architecture -- nice, but not really exceptional. buildings really tight together in the city center.

4) quality of living - very high cost of life, low local salaries

5) EXTREMELY dirty. Diesel car pollution makes the air toxic and unbearable. No walking culture, everyone drives everywhere (which makes sense, the air is toxic)

I would not move there.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#162

Post by xapata »

masonic wrote: post #55
chrismeller wrote: post #46

In order to give any kind of really meaningful feedback I'd have to ask a couple of other questions: 1) Define "cheap". You're in the Bay Area, which is by every definition the opposite of "cheap", but substituting that with something like Seattle or Austin or Brooklyn doesn't sound like it's accomplishing what you're looking for to me, even though it's absolutely cheaper. You said you want to focus on your own intel…

Living in the Bay Area means you're used to cool and rainy Rainy ? Rain averages 13-14 inches a year in San Jose.

Are you saying the Bay Area is synonymous with San Jose?

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#163

Post by arethuza »

tixocloud wrote: post #71

Edinburgh could be a good option. If you look hard enough, it is still relatively affordable (especially compared to the Bay Area) and I’ve found very intellectual people to work with. There seems to be a big focus in the U.K. on collaboration between academic and industry and if you’re into data, Edinburgh is home to a The Data Lab, an innovation centre around data. I moved here from North America and have previous…

The train links into Edinburgh are pretty good - I moved from central Edinburgh across to Fife and although where I live is only ~30 minutes from Haymarket it is pretty rural and property prices are much lower.

And every day you get to go over the Forth Bridge is a good day...

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#164

Post by california_aks »

I would recommend moving to Berlin. It is a small state in itself, so even if you are located somewhere outside the city, you will be close to the actual city. Also, due to many colleges and recent flush of student population, you will find many English speaking immigrants as well as Germans. Intellectually it is rich. Berlin is one of the hottest destinations in Europe for start-up scene, so you will find many free-lancing gigs for yourself there..last but not the least, night-clubs in Berlin are just amazing..

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#165

Post by oblio »

bogdanu wrote: post #116
cleansy wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I second this. But definitely try to get a remote SE job there. The pay is laughable compared to for example Berlin. Which is also a great city to work and live in.

I saw some jobs in Berlin that payed around 70K Eur. Assuming it's before taxes, it means that after taxes it's around 3.8k/month; a bit low if you ask me. I know pay is not the only factor, but heck, I make half in my home country, but the living costs are far lower (and I don't even pay rent).

Salaries all over Europe are like that. Except for London (maybe) or Switzerland. Don't compare them to Silicon Valley or the US in general, you'll be disappointed.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#166

Post by drjesusphd »

Gothenburg, Sweden.

Has a growing tech scene, English is spoken everywhere, a couple of good universities, surpringly affordable cost of living, winters are fairly mild (but long). Definitely has a healthy intellectual atmosphere, with lots of independent study groups/classes. A few hours from Copenhagen, Stockholm, and Oslo. Probably the most "livable" city I can imagine.

Finding rental housing is a real pain, but not because of cost.

Also worth looking at: Ghent, Utrecht, Thessaloniki.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#167

Post by bestest »

lixtra wrote: post #6

I lived a year in Vilnius and after the usual struggle to get connected found the startup community there quite thriving. Still, most of my friends where expats. You can live comfortably on 1300 EUR/month. (Average salary is 1000 EUR, but probably a bit higher in Vilnius). To evaluate visit first in winter because it’s the worst time.

As a local I can confirm, Vilnius has became very strong with its startup community. A lot of international businesses are moving in, a lot of big companies are already in. And that all gathers around the smaller companies and startups.

Super cheap 1-gig internet, super cheap unlimited data mobile LTE / 5G, great food and people. Accommodation is somewhat average, 500-600 euros for a flat in the city centre on average.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#168

Post by Kovah »

There are some smaller German cities like Göttingen which have - in my opinion - a high intellectual atmosphere because they are so called university-cities: lot's of students and academics in a rather small city. And, in comparison with big cities like Berlin or Munich, the rents are much cheaper: from what I know you pay 2/3 to half of the price for the same amount of space. Example: a flat with 55-60 qm is about 600-900€ in Berlin, and about 400-600€ in Göttingen.

Well.. and if you don't mind high rents: Berlin as the German Silicon Valley has tons of job offers for you, highly diverse and open-minded people and there would be no language barrier because so many people here speak English.

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#169

Post by nullify88 »

martinbundgaard wrote: post #83

Aarhus is Denmark's second largest city. It has a great university, beautiful surroundings and a thriving startup community. Also Danes are good English speakers.

I regularly visit from London. While I have yet to explore the startup community, I do love the surroundings. My Danish is terrible (but slowly improving!) and it definitely helps that almost everyone speaks English. I believe English is taught in schools early, and TV and movies are subtitled rather than dubbed over.

I believe Google also have an office here in Aabogade.

I'm looking to move, find work or work remotely in Aarhus but Brexit has thrown a spanner in the works.

Any hints to give me a head start on exploring the startup community here?

Re: Ask HN: Cheap places to live with a good intellectual atmosphere?

#170

Post by maxkwallace »

askmike wrote: post #151
maxkwallace wrote: post #134

I am doing this in Taipei right now. The living costs are low and there is a thriving intellectual community, but there is definitely a language barrier. Most Taiwanese can speak enough English to be friendly and helpful (which they are), but not enough to have intellectual conversations. If you are willing to tolerate the language barrier and put in the time to find the people who can converse intellectually in Engl…

What about Singapore, Hong Kong or Kuala Lumpur? The first two are definitely more expensive (KL maybe even being cheaper) but in SG and KL English is the primary language and in HK you'll be fine with it as well.

Singapore and Hong Kong are options but they're not inexpensive.

Haven't been to KL personally, but from what I understand it's relatively polluted and doesn't have the same quality of life as the other three.

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