Anyone lived , spent time in San Francisco , what did you think?

l've lived all over Australia actually , in the best places it has.
Sadly l'm in a nice area now, Great Ocean Road ish' but where l'm actually living itself is pretty disappointing after everywhere else l've lived.
Weird how life works out though , so sick of moving think l'll just stay here these days.
Mind you' l'd still move over onto one of the coastal towns in a second but l'm way out priced now.

 

Yeah l've heard the homelessness over their is just in your face and pretty upsetting.

 

I totally agree re the homeless, sounds like it hasn't changed in the 20 yrs since I was there. We won green cards in the lottery the US held, don't know if it still does, and we went for six months to travel around and see if the ex could find a job and if we wanted to settle there, I really liked the idea of Seattle.
I was blown away by the numbers of homeless in SF and other major cities, metal detectors in high schools, the private health system was being slammed in the press, and how every city seemed to have no-go areas. We came off the freeway in Washington DC one night to get fuel and there was about 3 inch thick bullet proof glass between you and the attendant and the vibe was really scary.
I stood behind a woman in a bank who was taking out cash because her husband wanted to buy a gun to celebrate the fact that their son had just turned one. The teller and I kind of looked at each other and the woman just shrugged and said 'it's a guy thing'.
We came back to Oz.

 

Haha l like that , we came back to oz.
Good for you.
That gun thing is bizarre.
l was watching one of those real life shows where they loved pig hunting.
He had 3 daughters, and they'd all go out on quad bikes chasing wild pigs with 6guns and belt, just like the westerns.
Unreal.
The girls were just swinging guns all over the place.
What the.
Wonder if they survived haha.
Actually come to think of it one of their dogs got shot.

 

Yeah. I was once accosted by a homeless bum and called a country fool for not giving him money.
Didn't realise it at the time..but he was right...I ended up in Brisbane

 

The bay area is really scenic and beautiful..probably more so than sydney. Golden gate is amazing. 30 mins or outside san fran it's all farms and open spaces

But san fran is dirty compared to Sydney or melb.. 2 streets off the main street in san fran you feel like you are in that will Smith movie.

Otherwise it's good fun...i could probably live on the outskirts not in the city.

 

I've spent quite a bit of time there,
Like so many other Cities, its a case of 'Haves' & 'Have nots'.
You can stand in the park drinking coffee admiring & looking at the row of beautiful homes known as 'The Painted Ladies'....then be confronted by plenty of homelessness & people searching through rubbish bins only a ten minute walk away.
Its Chinatown district is even better than Melbourne's imo. Don't go to any of the restaurant's on the street level, ask a local shopkeeper where is a great place to eat. They will usually show you a doorway down into a basement level restaurant. There are no English menus down there. So just point at the pics , smile a lot & admire the often tacky furnishings.
Absolutely awesome food is the result & as virtually no English is spoken most will show you on a calculator what your cost will be (its very cheap).
Parking is often problematic in SF....can be bloody atrocious to find at times in the Summer months.
Its a beautiful City. If you haven't been there you should visit if you ever get the opportunity.

 

So would everyone rather live here or in the US or San Fran ?
Funny , we get very few Americans living on Oz don't we.
l've lived all over and it's rare to see or meet an American living here.
There's this American chick working at our Bunnings and l'm not kidding , she's the hardest sever in Bunnings to get along with. You drop your stuff at the counter and all she has to do is scan it but she complains every time.
Have never had anyone else in that whole store complain ever , about anything ahh, they're suppose to be serving you , right.
But apparently she doesn't like that idea much.
.

 

they are built with a different material. putting up with all that homelessness, private medical and gun **** is normal for them. in return they get a (supposedly) free country and lots of opportunities.

aussies on the other hand are fine with less opportunities, a relaxed lifestyle for their medicare and a gun free society.

 

Well..if anyone does go there to SF, make sure to say hello to Catherine trammel

 

Will she be wearing flowers in her hair? Murkin's don't count.

 

San Fran is not representative of most of America...it's like when tourists come to Aus, and only fly into Sydney, then zoom up to the Great Barrier Reef, then on to Kakadu Park, then bugger off back home....doesn't give you the real picture of the whole Country at all.

I love Americans and I love America...we met lots of fabulous people there and we loved the experience, but nup; Aus is generally better for mine....

If I was forced to go and live there I would be happy enough; they are pretty much like us for the most part.

 

Australian's and Kiwi's are much more likely to travel overseas - we are small countries, with diverse background but sparse populations, so are more open to other cultural experiences and visiting other places. Aussie's and Kiwi's are also more transient for jobs and opportunities and experiences - we think nothing of going overseas, to another state or another part of the country.

I know this is generalising, but a lot of Americans are very closeted. America is the centre of the universe and they have no desire to go elsewhere (actually, many don't even realise "elsewhere" exists). I have several friends from the USA and they often lament how close-minded their friends and family back home are. They often are born, live and die without ever leaving their home town.