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Beach and mountains, with some wildlife.

I lived a few months in Madrid (Spain), a city where about 5000000 people struggle to breathe. I hated it. I love go back there for a couple of days, but no longer. I hated living there. Now I'm living in the town I was born -population 18,000 -, just like 1 mile and a half from Pamplona -population 180,000- and I love it. By driving 10 minutes I can be walking in the mountains breathing pure pre-Pyrenee air.

sebster wrote:
Fair point. You can get acre blocks in the foothills surrounding Perth, you can't see your neighbour, but from at night you can see the lights of the city centre. That looks like a pretty decent compromise.

Well, a decent compromise starting about a million dollars a piece.

Yeah, but it's still Perth.

If you want to fly from there to any of the more eastern Cities (strike that - any east coast city - no-one wants to go to Adelaide, even if it is east of Perth) it costs you a fortune.

Me, I quite like my city. Newcastle.
Nice selection of pubs.
Quite good food.
Adequate public transport.
Quiet neighbourhood (we have an OMC - "outlaw motorcycle club" a block away) so no-one causes trouble.

Some good bookshops as well as indy games stores and a comic shop.

Kilkrazy wrote:London and other major World Cities are where it's at!

This ^

I lived in a small town for three years while at university, and i was never happier than when i moved back to London. There's something for everyone in a big city, and as for the nosie, you just get used to it. I find that i struggle to sleep in the country without the comforting background hum. Yep, i'm definitely a city boy.

grrr

I've lived in a few "major" cities during my life, ( San Francisco for 3 years, Houston for a little over a year and of course New Orleans for over 30 years) and I honestly prefer "city life" over small towns/suburbs.

Sure theres crime and noise and trafic and at times you feel like you could cheerfully choke the gak out of someone.

But the fact that you can find a spot playing decent live music at 2 A.M, or decent food at 3 A.M and have a broad,diverse ocean of individules with wich to interact with far outwieghs the inconvince.

The area I live in now is about as close to "suburbs" as I can get,as it's what I call "urbanized suburbs",in that it is located 10 minutes outside of the Atlanta city limits...so I can be in the city (trafic permiting) in the time it takes me to smoke a cigarette.

Yeah, I love the city. I grew up in a dead-end town, so to move to Manchester was like moving to the future! There's just so much culture here, and so much to do. Manchester is really a happening place.

I like relatively small towns and cities, you know, where its like a happy medium. Pretty friendly, but there is actually stuff to do. York is a nice size, but its true, places lik NY and London make me want to hang myself. I just feel like.. we are all just germs when i see that many people.

OP you would certainly enjoy the German sociologist Georg Simmel's essay "The Metropolis and Mental Life." In short, living in a city makes you neurotic while at the same time dehumanizing you.
http://condor.depaul.edu/~dweinste/theory/M&ML.htm

Albatross wrote:Yeah, I love the city. I grew up in a dead-end town, so to move to Manchester was like moving to the future! There's just so much culture here, and so much to do. Manchester is really a happening place.

Oh yeah, and Manchester, thats a depressing gak hole too.

I live in the suburbs. I live 40 minutes from downtown Atlanta. My town has one movie theatre, a few restaurants, no gaming store, a starbucks, six waffle houses, and we're 20 minutes from a mall. If i want to go to a decent hobby store, I drive north of Atlanta and there are lots. But none where I'm at.

I don't care for traffic in the city and I like being in an area where I'm familiar with stuff. But there still isn't much to do, and you've got to go into the city if you want any sort of drama.

I grew up in the country, lived in cities and now have a house in the suburbs/exurbs. All have their charms and faults. Ultimately it's about what lifestyle fits you best, although I think it's willful blindness if you can't acknowledge the positives about other situations.

Case in point, I was in NYC this past weekend. We were strolling through Central Park and noticed how many people were out just enjoying the nice weather. It occurred to us that Manhattan residents don't have to spend hours and hours doing yard and house work every weekend like I do. Heck, they can even thoroughly clean their postage stamp-sized apartments in about 30 minutes. Sure leaves lots of time to go out and enjoy the day.

Although I think my suburban/exurban house and its big yard is a better situation for raising kids, the idea of easy apartment living and having everything NYC has to offer right outside my door still has some appeal.

I love the city life. Most of my family lives in the country and in small doses i can handle it, but after 4-5 days im ready to get the hell out.

I personally love the city (live in houston).

It can take a little while, and after about a year you adapt. You learn lots of times driving isnt worth it, ride a bike or walk. You learn the back roads and shortcuts, etc etc..

"the true new yorker secretly believes that people living anywhere else have to be, in some sense, kidding."

- john updike

I love the city. It's where I was born, and Raised to be. I don't think I could stand being out toward the country, or even in a small city for that matter.

I just enjoy having every option at my disposal.

Here's a little tune that I felt was fitting for this thread.

Caution: NSFW,Contains profanity.

I love visiting large cities. San Fran, L..A, Munich, Berlin, Frankfurt, Paris, London, Rome. I loved them all and had wonderful times in all of them, but I really would not want to live in any of them.

chromedog wrote:Yeah, but it's still Perth.

If you want to fly from there to any of the more eastern Cities (strike that - any east coast city - no-one wants to go to Adelaide, even if it is east of Perth) it costs you a fortune.

That’s a big ‘if’. Sure, it’s hard to travel to the Eastern States, but it’s the Eastern States so who cares? Not missing anything 


Nah, you are right though. I think we’re actually the most isolated city in the world here and it’s quite annoying. Is Newcastle a decent place to visit, for a weekend or so? I liked Melbourne a lot, and Sydney harbour is great, is Newcastle a place you can stay for a weekend and have a decent time?

I've never lived in a big city or a small town. However if I was going to choose between the two it'd be the city for sure. It's more expensive, however I'd love having access to varied activities, goods and a less homogenized population. God forbid you live a small town and don't happen to like whatever dinks you happen to move in next to *shudder*. A more dense population means more access to options. I like having access to choices, choices in transportation, in entertainment, in food, and in people. I visited a small town once for about a week. That was about 160 hours too long.