What would it take for you to leave the country?

[WOM]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

I'm worse. I didn't even know he was a US-based poster.

[My Name Is Ian]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

ursus arctos wrote: Ian, Bernie Sanders was Mayor of Burlington in the 80s, though she may know him either as the member of the US House of Representatives (1991 - 2007) or as one of the state's US Senators (2007- present).

Vermont is one of those unusual states whose population is so small that they have fewer Representatives (1) than Senators (2)

She's all over Bernie Sanders. Posts his things on FB all day. She's very proud of the fact that he's the senator for Vermont, but I don;t even know whether she's aware that he'd once been the Mayor of Burlington. She's not very political and has only ever voted once before, in 2008 for Obama, but is really engaged with it at the moment.

She's in the process of applying for an overseas vote for next year now, I think - he certainly seems to have connected with her friends, but I'm not surprised by this, as they're all young and both socially and politically very "liberal" (in an American political sense.)

[Third rate Leszno]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

I think I'm the anti-hobbes, at least in climate terms. I would love to go and live somewhere cold, bleak and remote, at least for a little while. Faroes, Alaska, Yukon, Iceland, Newfoundland, some of the wilder bits of South Island NZ... all of those look like somewhere I'd be interested in. Not going to happen though, as Mrs TrL is too attached to her family, and not such a fan of the bleak and remote unless it's just for a few days on holiday.

[S. aureus]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

ursus arctos wrote: I'm clearly behind, as I thought you were still in Houston.

Wow, I left Houston in 1993! (and the UK in 1989).
Clearly I don't say much about where I actually am. For the record I've lived in the Bay Area, mid-Peninsula except for a couple of years in SF itself, since I left Houston.

[ursus arctos]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Ah, thank you.

Say hi to El Camino Real next time you are on it, with special greetings to the Top of the Hill, Daly City.

[Sam]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

I'm starting to feel like the only person here who basically left for a bit of an adventure/because I wanted to give living abroad a go (although I get the impression treibeis might have been on even more of a whim). Is that a good enough reason?

One of my aunts moved to Barcelona for university after going there on holiday and deciding she liked it so much she didn't fancy leaving. I suppose that might be where I got the idea.

[Sam]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Oh and to folk saying they have no aptitude for languages: I didn't either, at school. Hated then. It's surprising how easy they are to pick up when you just have to use them every day, though. I'm not saying I wouldn't be daunted by Hungarian or Mandarin or whatever, and I doubt I'll ever pick up a third language to the level I now speak Spanish, but I wouldn't let a current lack of language put me off living somewhere in the future.

[delicatemoth]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

I'd love to move to a country where I could access essential healthcare without having to wait for five years, but I'd prefer this to become possible in the UK.

What it would actually take is me not being severely ill and having the means to earn a living wherever I went to. But I'd probably just get disaffected there as well.

[JVL]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

I left the UK in 1999, with the intention of staying in Germany for year or so and then returning. 16 years later, still here... married, 2-year-old son, and we've both just handed in our notices and are starting on the process of applying for immigration to Canada.

Nova Scotia. That's where we're headed. Well, we'll find out for definite once all the paperwork is translated, stamped, submitted and processed, which could take a while.

By and large, I've had a very enjoyable time in Germany but for many reasons (some work-based, some family-related, and too long-winded to go into in detail here), it feels like the right time for a change.

[WOM]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Holy cow, J. That's news. Let us know how it goes. And how, if I might, did you settle on NS?

[diggedy derek]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Hey evilC – I know someone who lives in Cambeltown.

[linus]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

In favor of Nova Scotia is its proximity to Europe, lower cost of living/housing prices, slower pace and less urban stress. If you can get a decent job there it's not too bad. I have some friends from Montreal who took that route, young family that couldn't afford to buy a house here.

On the topic of best weather in Canada: the Okanagan Valley in inner BC, hands down, by a mile. It's the northern end of that relatively arid strip of inner land beyond the coastal mountain ranges. Four seasons with relatively mild winters (comparable to say, France), dry summers, wine country weather. Downside is that it's somewhat rural and a retirement/resort setting.

[Cal Alamein]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

My wife has talked about moving to Nova Scotia - never really explained why.

From what we've experienced from extensive travel in Europe, we'd be perfectly pleased to live a few years in a number of European countries. Don't know if we could retire there though.

Fairly content in Albuquerque. More positives than negatives. Big negative is more environmental - fear of continued drought.

However, not at all content that a vocal minority has garnered so much power in our nation and our broadcast media. Very depressed that a majority of citizens are not bothered to go to the polls for any election other than presidential ones.

[Amor de Cosmos]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Four seasons with relatively mild winters (comparable to say, France), dry summers, wine country weather. Downside is that it's somewhat rural and a retirement/resort setting.

Relative too...? Eastern Canada perhaps. It's fucking freezing compared to the coast. And the the political culture can politely be described as Reaganesque.

[Amor de Cosmos]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Sam wrote: I'm starting to feel like the only person here who basically left for a bit of an adventure/because I wanted to give living abroad a go (although I get the impression treibeis might have been on even more of a whim). Is that a good enough reason?

I did that too. I wanted to spend time in the Yucatan, and financed that by working in Canada. Which I returned to, and where I've remained.

[linus]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

True, AdC. Personally though, weather wise, I would trade two months of (often clear) freezing weather in winter vs the 6 months of cold damp weather, esp with 3 months of very warm weather where you could swim at night. Living in Quebec, I came to appreciate late winter days where it's slightly below freezing but very bright and sunny, where you could soak in the rays in your greehouse. The Okanagan mid-winter is like Montreal in late March . Days with horizontal rain at 3C are no fun, nor are months with 27 days of damp grey skies and indoor mold.

As far as culture and politics, I would guess that it's probably moving from a red state (province) to a purple one, like other traditionally conservative western areas of Colorado or Arizona.

I have no idea where I am going to end up 10 years from now, but I'm leaning towards somewhere in the olive belt (Greece, Turkey, Spain...)

[jameswba]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Sam wrote: Oh and to folk saying they have no aptitude for languages: I didn't either, at school. Hated then. It's surprising how easy they are to pick up when you just have to use them every day, though. I'm not saying I wouldn't be daunted by Hungarian or Mandarin or whatever, and I doubt I'll ever pick up a third language to the level I now speak Spanish, but I wouldn't let a current lack of language put me off living somewhere in the future.

Most of that goes for me too. I didn't hate languages at school ; in fact I developed a nerdish kind of interest in grammatical structures and whatnot, but I never even approached being able to communicate with real French or German people.

But, since it's been necessary to use Slovak and (to a lesser extent) Czech, I've learned to use them, despite them supposedly being difficult* and despite never taking a really systematic approach to studying. Having non-English speaking in-laws helps of course. So does a determination to read local media. And, maybe most of all, living in a provincial place where there's no ex-pat community to speak of.

I guess I would be daunted now by the thought of moving to a completely new country, though that's partly age and a declining desire for adventure.

*Slovak people sometimes quote a study at me that purports to 'prove' that Slovak is the world's most difficult language for a foreigner to learn. It's bollocks, surely. For a start, how would you even set about proving such a thing? Second, Slavonic languages don't seem anywhere near as hard as, say, Hungarian or Estonian.

[San Bernardhinault]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Thinking more about this, I really don't think any abstract political change would drive me to leave the country. The "If the Republicans win I'm moving to Canada" thing just isn't enough to drive me.

If there were political change that immediately and directly impacted me, that would be different, but I'm a middle aged, middle class straight white white man and, frankly, that means I'm not under attack and am unlikely to ever be under attack in the west. And therefore I'm not going to need to flee anywhere. I'll end up moving because I want to, or because of personal circumstances - jobs, family, that sort of thing - rather than because of grand societal changes.

I appreciate that not everyone is as lucky as me, having this freedom.

[Amor de Cosmos]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

linus wrote: Days with horizontal rain at 3C are no fun, nor are months with 27 days of damp grey skies and indoor mold.

As far as culture and politics, I would guess that it's probably moving from a red state (province) to a purple one, like other traditionally conservative western areas of Colorado or Arizona.

The former is a pretty good description of an English winter. And I agree, it's miserable.

I prefer uncompromising weather, if it's going to rain then bring it on. Forty days and forty nights of torrential downpour.

If the interior's changing politically then it's going to take awhile. The Libs won just one BC interior seat in the election.

[gavc23]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Amor de Cosmos wrote:

I'm starting to feel like the only person here who basically left for a bit of an adventure/because I wanted to give living abroad a go (although I get the impression treibeis might have been on even more of a whim). Is that a good enough reason?

I did that too. I wanted to spend time in the Yucatan, and financed that by working in Canada. Which I returned to, and where I've remained.

We moved to Finland as we quite liked Helsinki and I'd been a big Hanoi Rocks fan. Worked out ok though

[ad hoc]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Politically there is no country in the world that will not eventually drive you fucking crazy (and many of them will do it fairly rapidly). I've come to the conclusion that in the end the best you can hope for is a country in which people talk about politics a lot, in which there is a high level of public critical thinking, in which there is the freedom to do so without fear, and in which people believe they can - to some degree - make a difference (and with evidence to that end).

By these criteria Romania is about the best place to live in Europe at the moment, as people have been out on the streets 3 times in the last 2 years and in so doing have had fairly major effects on the political process. Now clearly by this logic a country has to be shit enough to make people angry enough to get out on the street, but not quite shit enough that they would be afraid of being shot/imprisoned for doing that, but I reckon that I prefer this to countries in which the population boil like frogs.

jameswba wrote:
*Slovak people sometimes quote a study at me that purports to 'prove' that Slovak is the world's most difficult language for a foreigner to learn. It's bollocks, surely. For a start, how would you even set about proving such a thing? Second, Slavonic languages don't seem anywhere near as hard as, say, Hungarian or Estonian.

Really? Hungarians quote one at me (and everybody seems to be aware of this spurious study), in which Hungarian is officially without any shadow of a doubt, the second hardest language to learn in the world. It's not, however, Slovakian that beats it but - apparently - "Chinese". When I ask which language from China that means there's typically a bit of foot shuffling and umming and ahhing.

[jameswba]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

Ha, there must be a version of this 'study' in every central/eastern European country. Come to think of it, I might well have heard about the Hungarian version when I've been in Hungary.

I agree (Ad Hoc) with the first lines of your post as well. I think if you were to up and leave Britain only because of political elements in the country, you'd find yourself either leaving your new country as well, or adopting the Jonah posture and insulating yourself.

[Antepli Ejderha]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

The version I heard was it was Polish.

The structure of languages like Hungarian, Finnish and Estonian make it trickier to learn for those of us who speak Indo European languages.

Turkish is also from a different language family and has a similar structure as those above but no Turk has ever told me that Turkish is one of the most difficult languages to learn.

I would say something like Korean, another Altaic Uralic language but one which uses a different script, would be very tricky to learn.

[Antepli Ejderha]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

As I've mentioned on other threads I'm so glad I no longer live in Turkey. It's become very anti democratic and censored meaning that many people are trying to find a way out. Many of them leaving could create a brain drain in Turkey.

[Femme Folle]

What would it take for you to leave the country?

ad hoc wrote: Politically there is no country in the world that will not eventually drive you fucking crazy (and many of them will do it fairly rapidly). I've come to the conclusion that in the end the best you can hope for is a country in which people talk about politics a lot, in which there is a high level of public critical thinking, in which there is the freedom to do so without fear, and in which people believe they can - to some degree - make a difference (and with evidence to that end).

Jeez, by those criteria, the USA seems like an okay place to live. Canada might be a little better, though, but I'm sure it has its own problems.