Just recently, after more than three months in Shanghai, I was reflecting how different my life is now compared to other places I had been staying before. Here is my top 4 (in chronological order) – Kotka (Finland), Prague (Czech Republic), Almhult (Sweden) and Shanghai (China).
Kotka – a small coastal town in Finland (around 120km east from Helsinki), it actually means eagle in Finnish. A big plus was that you are surrounded by sea (no swimming recommended though, too cold) and it was a rather short way to St. Petersburg in Russia (that was one of the best trips I have ever been, it's amazing city). I was staying in Kotka for 6 months as an exchange student. Most of the time I hanged around with other foreigners, because Finnish people were not really into us. But our Survival-Finnish course teacher was great and I did get one Finnish friend. With the long days in early summer (or what passes for summer in Finland), the sunsets and sunrises were truly amazing! The worst was buses going form student dormitory to school, there was no real schedule and so you just get on the bus stop and wait and in middle of winter with -20 outside, it's no picnic. But overall it was great experience.
Pic: Real sauna in Kotka! When taking this picture, I was in a cafe, nicely warm.
Pic: Field trip with our Finnish language course, I am on the right, on the left is Tangu, my friend from Malawi and in white jacket its Arja, our teacher
Pic: This is like 2 o'clock in the morning, on the bikes we are heading from local club BePop (me on the right, Lee on the left)
Pic: This is the sunset/sunrise I mentioned...
Prague – relatively big city, but peanuts compared to Shanghai. Public traffic sucks. Subways are ancient, which makes them slow, noisy and highly inconvenient. Rents are hilariously expensive, as one person you can easily spend half of your salary on a flat which would be neither luxury nor the best location either. Good thing is that it's quite easy to get a job there, unlike rest of Czech Republic. For a foreigner it's the only place you live so so with only English. The beer is great, but they like to cheat foreigners on prices in restaurants and the same goes for taxis. As you can see I am not a big fan of Prague. Of all my temporary stays abroad, Prague was definitely the least enjoyable, which was a reason why I commuted every weekend to my parents place (3 hours on a bus every Friday and Sunday – it's a lot within Czech Republic, where you almost travel from one end to another, but rather normal in Sweden and really nothing in China).
Pic: Prague airport obviously
Pic: Main Prague square in the evening
Almhult – the tiny (compared to Shanghai, basically everything is tiny) town in middle of woods. I wish there were some hills around, that I missed most. The entertainment and food options are rather limited (enough to say that the closest McDonald's is what...50km away?). Good thing is you don't need to think about quality of water, food and air (constantly on my mind in Shanghai) and when you are crossing the street, the cars stops for you (it's a miracle when it happens in Shanghai and it confuses other pedestrians who apparently never experienced anything like that before). If you have a car you are free to go anywhere you feel like without being stuck in traffic jams most of time. Again, good experience (both work-wise & from private perspective) and made lots of friends!
Pic: Very typical - rain in Almhult
Pic: Look what snow we got overnight...
Shanghai – the city never sleeps, even though I still need my (at least) 9 hours of uninterrupted sleep. Often that is not happening for the following reasons: traffic outside, I think it doesn't matter if you have double- or triple-glazing, nothing can possibly shut out all the. Then there are the mysterious calls I am getting quite often during the night, usually around 2am. Some unknown number just rings once on my mobile phone and that's it. Different numbers all the time, yesterday I even got a sms asking me (in Chinese) where I am. That was 0:10am, of course I was in bed, what a question... I need to start switching off the phone for a night. The definitely good thing is the big variety of different food and enormous choice of restaurants. There is a one restaurant we like with Lee very much, Xinjiang style (north-west region, minority people are similar to Turkish people if I can say so). The only problem with the restaurant is that the portions are huge! If you really wanna enjoy the food there and order different things, then its best to go there with a group of at least 5 people. The most confusing thing for me is that a litre of milk cost more than 2 litres of Coke(more than double the price)! I live and learn...
Pic: My first visit to Shanghai ever (that would be like 5 years ago)
Pic: It was at the end of June and the temperature in the evening was 36 degrees Celsius.
Pic: Thats how I remember Shanghai then - lots of pollution and all covered in mist, couldnt see much...
So, who is the winner and who is the loser? The loser is definitely Prague (I am local, I am allowed to say it :-)). The winner? I think when I find a place I want to settle down that will be my ultimate winner.