The way that I'm going to make NL's codeplatform entirely pink, to compensate for having to de-pink my house π₯²πΈ
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@ij somewhere green in the Netherlands would be fine for now too. The problem is that my budget (half a million btw?!?) mostly allows for crappy rijtjeshuizen like this soulless brick box:
@Gina I have no idea about the prices there, but the houses are not that large either. It were 2-person bungalows first and then another floor was added later, but I fear it's not cheap either because of the near-by plassen...
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"But Gina what's wrong with your house in Amsterdam?"
Yall, I used to have a beautiful garden, where my cats could play outside, and now I live in a soulless shoebox for 2k a month that gets NO SUN. Literally none. It's entirely north facing. Plus, I'm so over Amsterdam. I'm old. I want peace and quiet and greenery and gardening.
@Gina moving out of the city was the best thing I did for the last 10 years
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@Gina moving out of the city was the best thing I did for the last 10 years
@sturmsucht I wanna move too, but not to a rijtjeshuis

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@h3artbl33d I'm looking at both. My budget is up to 2k for renting and up to β¬500.000 for a house (which I know is ridiculous, but I sold an apt in Amsterdam a while back).
The thing is.. in most of the Netherlands it's just not worth it?? I'm not paying 2k for a shitty shoebox apt. Or half a million euro's for a rijtjeshuis. Esp when I could buy the house of my dreams in a location of my dreams, like this beauty close to Fontainebleau:
@Gina @h3artbl33d lots of really nice houses in Groningen for less than 500k

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@sturmsucht I wanna move too, but not to a rijtjeshuis

@Gina those always remind me of Vivarium.
Vivarium (2019)
A young woman and her fiancΓ© are in search of the perfect starter home. After following a mysterious real estate agent to a new housing development, the couple finds themselves trapped in a maze of identical houses and forced to raise an otherworldly child.
(letterboxd.com)
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@Darkasvim I always wanted to live in the US when I was younger (actually lived in Idaho for a year when I was 16), but not with the current political climate.
@Gina
Having to currently live under said climate, I totally understand. I'm cautiously optimistic that things are going to get better next election cycle. Idaho is beautiful county. That is where I'm actually looking to build my retirement "hermit cabin" as my ex wife calls it.
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@Legit_Spaghetti for now I'm bound to the Netherlands, due to my job (which I love). I'd only move abroad for a similar role in my field. Something tech policy or advocacy related.
@Gina There may come a day when you'll have to choose between working a job you love and living in a place where you feel alive. Maybe that day is already here, but ultimately only you will know when it's time. When that day arrives, my only piece of advice is, think of "Ten years in the future Gina" and consider what she'd want Today Gina to do.
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@Gina I moved from Seattle, in the rainy cloudy green US Pacific Northwest, to Tucson in the the sunny dry yet surprisingly green US Southwest.
I miss the conveniences, but I love the sun and relative quiet.
@Gina (I also miss the paychecks, but we got priced out of Seattle and then out of the neighboring area. From what I understand most of my former tech cohort in the PNW is struggling with staying sufficiently employed to afford life)
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@Gina There may come a day when you'll have to choose between working a job you love and living in a place where you feel alive. Maybe that day is already here, but ultimately only you will know when it's time. When that day arrives, my only piece of advice is, think of "Ten years in the future Gina" and consider what she'd want Today Gina to do.
@Legit_Spaghetti @Gina And as an aside, do not accept "foreigner contracts" where the conditions are illegally worse than local hires even if you are EU
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"But Gina what's wrong with your house in Amsterdam?"
Yall, I used to have a beautiful garden, where my cats could play outside, and now I live in a soulless shoebox for 2k a month that gets NO SUN. Literally none. It's entirely north facing. Plus, I'm so over Amsterdam. I'm old. I want peace and quiet and greenery and gardening.
"Okay, but why not just rent somewhere else in the Netherlands?"
I'm not joking when I say that there are no rentals in NL. There are a few other 2k shoebox apartments, but that's it. This is mostly due to disastrous housing policies by the previous governments and decades of barely building new housing.
To anecdotally add insult to injury, my current landlord is a pension fund. The Netherlands is a boomers paradise.
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"But Gina what's wrong with your house in Amsterdam?"
Yall, I used to have a beautiful garden, where my cats could play outside, and now I live in a soulless shoebox for 2k a month that gets NO SUN. Literally none. It's entirely north facing. Plus, I'm so over Amsterdam. I'm old. I want peace and quiet and greenery and gardening.
@Gina I feel this. Not sure I'd recommend moving to the UK generally given the state of our relations with the EU but I love where we live in London. We are surrounded by so much green and then it's just 25 minutes to Liverpool Street station on the overground. You can walk for something like 12 miles out from where we live through woods and plains here and cross maybe 5 roads in that time.
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@Gina @h3artbl33d lots of really nice houses in Groningen for less than 500k

@chasalin @h3artbl33d bruh if I'm going to move that far I'd rather live on the Waddeneilanden.
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@Gina @h3artbl33d lots of really nice houses in Groningen for less than 500k

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@chasalin @h3artbl33d bruh if I'm going to move that far I'd rather live on the Waddeneilanden.
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@Gina
Having to currently live under said climate, I totally understand. I'm cautiously optimistic that things are going to get better next election cycle. Idaho is beautiful county. That is where I'm actually looking to build my retirement "hermit cabin" as my ex wife calls it.
@Darkasvim it's a gorgeous state. Ironically I barely saw any potatoes!
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@Gina There may come a day when you'll have to choose between working a job you love and living in a place where you feel alive. Maybe that day is already here, but ultimately only you will know when it's time. When that day arrives, my only piece of advice is, think of "Ten years in the future Gina" and consider what she'd want Today Gina to do.
@Legit_Spaghetti that's literally my dilemma currently π₯²
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@Gina (I also miss the paychecks, but we got priced out of Seattle and then out of the neighboring area. From what I understand most of my former tech cohort in the PNW is struggling with staying sufficiently employed to afford life)
@randomgeek it's crazy that people being priced out is happening everywhere rn. I wonder how things will look like 10 years from now.
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@Gina I generally would recommend Maastricht. It's a lovely city with a bunch of NS IC connections. But also a train to Germany every half hour and an easy connection to Liège from there you're fast in France, Luxembourg or even the UK and Cologne or Frankfurt.
And some interesting landscapes are just 15 minutes by bike from outside of the city center. I took these pictures yesterday with my GF on a small cycle trip :3
@Gina Ah and if you have a car you can just go get gas over the border in Belgium for cheap and do your weekly shopping cheaply in Germany. Yes you would need to drive a bit but you often only pay half of the price.
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@Gina I feel this. Not sure I'd recommend moving to the UK generally given the state of our relations with the EU but I love where we live in London. We are surrounded by so much green and then it's just 25 minutes to Liverpool Street station on the overground. You can walk for something like 12 miles out from where we live through woods and plains here and cross maybe 5 roads in that time.
@interpipes not to hate on your country, but I feel like the UK is in a much more dire state than the Netherlands, with the cost of living crisis, deteriorating public services, and wealth inequality. I'd never consider moving there (even though the countryside looks beautiful).
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@Gina Ah and if you have a car you can just go get gas over the border in Belgium for cheap and do your weekly shopping cheaply in Germany. Yes you would need to drive a bit but you often only pay half of the price.
@sad_electronics I like cheap gas

You made me laugh out loud.