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Forum -> Inquiries & Offers -> Moving/ Relocating

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amother

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 6:48 am

Didn't know where to put this
I love learning. About new places
How do u live in your town? I live in USA
Is England, south Africa, and everywhere else same type of day to day living?
What houses do u live in?
Tell me how you live, would love to learn!

amother

Purple

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 6:51 am

I live in a 5 bedroom semi detached house. 2 bathrooms. Its about 80 years old. Not that different to the house I lived in Brooklyn, but somehow also different.

amother

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 6:57 am

amother Purple wrote:

I live in a 5 bedroom semi detached house. 2 bathrooms. Its about 80 years old. Not that different to the house I lived in Brooklyn, but somehow also different.

Where do you live now?

amother

Petunia

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:01 am

This could be a very fun thread.

amother

Emerald

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:17 am

Montreal:)

The primary language in most non jewish stores (walmart, pharmacy etc) is french.
Cars are much more expensive than in the US
Houses are not typically detached although you can find some here and there.
We get back a percentage of what we pay our cleaning help from the government based on income and how many kids you have! There is also monthly and quarterly childcare benefits based on income.
We have a GREAT downtown

amother

Daphne

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:21 am

I moved from the US to the the UK. What do you want to know?

Chickensoupprof

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:27 am

I never lived anywhere else but in the Netherlands. Ehm... I go mostly to non-Jewish stores, I speak mostly Dutch, eh... everyone has health insurance which is for me 130 euro a month + dental most of the things are covered. Ehm... I travel mostly by bike in the city. I live in a two-bedroom apartment which is tiny. Antwerp is 2 hours, Amsterdam is 1 hour and 40 minutes. So yeah I travel to each of these cities for mikvah, kosher meat is in a freezer in the shul big chunks of meat. I exercise in a gym

amother

Geranium

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:34 am

I live in a yishuv in Israel. I live in a 4 bedroom unit. Not an apartment building, more so like a town house, a few units attached.
Our views on one side of our home is rolling judean hills. I get breathless every time I look out the window.
I live across the road from the makolet. This is both good and bad Wink

I would assume day to day living is the same in much of the world. Work, school, home, dinner, bed, no?

amother

Cerulean

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:42 am

I live in South Africa, life is very different here. Property is much cheaper, most people have large houses with big gardens and pools. Most people have full time cleaning help because labor is very cheap. There are wealthy people here but they are the minority and there are plenty of families that struggle .
Life in general is much more chilled, many people are self employed and people in general aren't workaholics.
The greatest plus for us is belonging to a warm community that is built on Chessed, we are part of a small community where everyone truly looks at for each other. But the general Johannesburg Jewish community is exceptional in its Chessed looking after the aged, the poor, and so much more.

amother

Clematis

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:43 am

Op are you the same op of “sell me on your community”?
Just wondering!
Where do you live?
Tell us about your community!
Curious to learn! Would love to hear!

essie14

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:45 am

I grew up in the US and then made aliyah.
We live in an attached house but it's pretty spacious and "American style"
The school day is different than in the US for the kids. Kids do chugim after school, and also have youth groups. We didn't have that in the US.
I still do carpool and shop/cook/clean/work.
I definitely have a much better and more beautiful view than any city I've lived in, in the US Smile

And the weather is far better than where I came from.

amother

Yarrow

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 7:54 am

I live in Melbourne, australia.
I’ve spent time in Israel and America (a year in each)
In many ways, yeh life is the same, work, home, school, shul, supermarket... But it’s also different.
Hard to pinpoint what it is exactly.

The majority of the Jewish community lives one general area. With each group living near their mosdos, pretty much.
We are chabad and I grew up walking to school, and for the first 8 years of my kids in school we lived in walking distance as well. When we moved a bit further it was a big change to have to start driving everyone! And we aren’t even that far, it would be a 25 minute walk. Now my big kids get themselves to school, either by bike or public transport.
the first time I saw yellow school buses I thought it was the funniest thing, I couldn’t believe they really existed like in the picture books.
The MO schools that have campuses further out do have buses, but they use coaches.

People live in houses or apartments. Housing is very expensive.

Most of our local kosher food doesn’t have a hechsher on the packaging, we have a kosher list that is sent out every year, along with an app. It can be annoying, but you get used to it.

Rosh Hashana is in the spring, to me it makes so much sense, new things sprouting and growing every where as then we year begins

amother

Mon, Sep 19 2022, 10:34 am

amother Clematis wrote:

Op are you the same op of “sell me on your community”?
Just wondering!
Where do you live?
Tell us about your community!
Curious to learn! Would love to hear!

no im not that op...
ive lived in israel , australia and usa

so im very curious about europe and south america and africa

amother

Firebrick

Tue, Sep 20 2022, 3:06 am

I live in Israel.
4 bedroom apartment , small kitchen and living room but airy and pretty.
Life is more laidback than other places I've lived.

A lot of face to face social interactions.
Mothers sit in the park every afternoon with their kids and neighbors.
Kids play outside a lot with friends. Bikes, jump rope, hopscotch

amother

Seafoam

Tue, Sep 20 2022, 3:19 am

I live in a beautiful area in Israel. Large city. Great transportation. (even without a car). We have a 5 bedroom apartment. Really blessed with great neighbors. We have an amazing view. Most people here have a nice sized porch/patio so we all make our Succah's right off our living room. Lot's of Shopping. Pretty good prices. Lot's of schools, after school activities for kids. Loads of Shiurim for Men and Women on all Levels of their learning.

amother

Mayflower

Tue, Sep 20 2022, 4:17 am

amother Seafoam wrote:

What city/neighborhood?

amother

DarkRed

Fri, Feb 17 2023, 6:39 am

Omg this post makes me long for Israel!! Sad

I live in boro park. I've lived in many cities and countries. I like the walkable part of boro park, but I also miss the driving lifestyle of LA as funny as that sounds. Like I love walking to the store here and it never gets old that kids walk themselves places, growing up in LA I never had that. I think if I get a car here I'll fill that void - like it's nice to have your own private space you know? Like when you take an Uber or walk you are never just by yourself..

I love the community feel of boro park. It reminds me of living in Israel.

It's really special to live in such a vibrant Jewish community.

For reference and interests sake OP I lived in Tokyo, Japan for some time. It was fascinating to me since it was my first experience in Asia at all. I also visited other areas of Japan and went to South Korea.

What struck me there was how completely 180 degrees different it was. Not like how Europe and Israel are different than the US, like completely different. Also I felt self conscious sometimes looking too touristy, taking pics everywhere, asking questions in English (obviously I don't speak Japanese) and then when I would see foreigners who love Japanese culture and tried to fit in (dyed their hair black, spoke the language, dressed like them) but were obviously still not truly Japanese, it clicked in my head -like why try to hide/deny who you are? Celebrate it! Everyone can see you anyways, you are not fooling anyone! (It's a common thing it's called japanophile or something where foreigners become obsessed with Japanese culture and try to become Japanese which is obviously impossible). So that was a big lightbulb moment for me and I enjoyed my experience much more after that. In general it's a safe beautiful place to visit in my opinion, just several touristy places are avodah Zara so you have to be careful which sites you visit.

Also the culture in japan is very polite so they do try not to stare, etc. South Korea I did not enjoy, I found it unsafe (I was in Seoul) even though I didn't travel alone I felt very vulnerable and got injured twice - I felt like the value on life there was not very high, like in the street I got injured twice BH I was ok. It's a great cheap place to get high prescription lenses for glasses/glasses tho, like they do it in the street, and I got some! They have thinner lenses than in the US Smile

I did go to a cultural performance there which was nice (like dance/music) and went to an all women's spa (that's popular there) which was interesting lol.

Good shabbos!

amother

Magnolia

Fri, Feb 17 2023, 7:00 am

I grew up in Thornhill, Ontario, it’s a suburb just north of Toronto. It’s very clean with lots of trees. There’s a big fully kosher supermarket with pizza, sushi, bakery, fleshing takeout, deli counter etc, some kosher takeout options but nothing that great tbh (my subjective opinion now living in town). Going to school in Toronto proper I spent half my childhood carpooling to school and traffic was horrible. I believe there are now more school options closer north so that is less of an issue, as most ppl living in Thornhill can now send to schools in the area like BY Thornhill which is new or Toronto Cheder which moved north, or Netivot which is coed up to a certain grade. Being outside of city limits means limited access to public transportation, or needing to transfer a bunch of times. Public transportation in general is ok but not that convenient. There are government subsidies for childcare (it might be a new thing), free healthcare for all citizens, private health insurance is needed for dental, eye care, pharmacy, medical equipment etc. Healthcare is free but can be extremely challenging in certain circumstances (really hard to get into a pediatric or adult practice as there aren’t so many and they fill up fast, hard to get appointments, government can chose not to treat you if you’re old etc). There are lots of parks and playgrounds. Housing is exorbitantly expensive (think minimum 1 million for a three bedroom house that isn’t renovated). Salaries are lower than the tristate area on average and taxes are pretty high. It’s a pretty diverse area, lots of Chabad, yeshivish, MO, BT crowd, israelis, non frum etc. Retail is nothing like in the US, less selection and not as good sales, online shopping is much more limited than in the US.

amother

Daphne

Fri, Feb 17 2023, 7:32 am

Grew up in the tri-state area in a very suburban place. Big house, big backyards. I now live in London UK in a very small house. Ask away.

amother

Papayawhip

Fri, Feb 17 2023, 8:24 am

I live in Ecuador (definitely anonymous for this one!),
It's hot all year round, rains heavily a few months a year and dry the rest of the year. The rainy season is pretty unpleasant because it's super humid.

Labor is cheap so we have household help 8 hours a day 5 days a week.

There is a lot of poverty, so the cars are all older and cheaper. The roads in the big cities are paved, in the villages and towns and in between not so much, so when it's rainy it's very hard to drive.

Electronics are very expensive since they're all imported and the taxes for importing are very high. That also means we rarely order things online to be shipped, like from Amazon.

In general things are slower and a couple decades behind America. Like when you ask a doctor a question they'll likely give you the answer they gave in America before they did a few more years of research, so you have to be careful and not trust blindly what they say.

There are big supermarkets, like Walmart style, but they have a lot less variety than America. (I'm comparing to America because that's where I lived before here). Like let's say you want puff paint, so you go to an art store, and they have no idea what that is. Nor binder rings, or index cards, etc.

However there are a ton of specialty shops with a huge variety of specific things, like material stores, bead stores, etc that are really fun to go into and shop in, since they're also very cheap. You can buy material and have a dressmaker sew you a custom dress (read tzniusdik) for a total of like $20, with a little shlepping around from one place to another.

This post is getting long so I won't get into life as a Jew because that's a whole separate chapter.

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