After 10 days of relaxation in Thailand and quick run through Kuala Lumpur we finally arrived to the country I wanted to visit for many years. Singapore.

Travelers’ reviews of Singapore vary from “the whole city is just one huge shopping mall” to “a place where you can meet all the cultures of Southeast Asia better than in the countries of origin themselves”. As always, truth lies somewhere in the middle and depends on your initial attitude as well as a chosen route. I personally enjoyed Singapore a lot.

I’m not going to tell you a long story of what unique place Singapore is and how highly developed it is compared to the surrounding countries.

Instead, let’s better look at the pictures which I will briefly comment.

We mostly followed a kind of shortened version of great itinerary from Wikitravel called 3 days in Singapore.

Let’s start with official symbol of Singapore. Merlion is the strange animal which is half-lion and half-fish.

It’s located in one of the tourist attractions, Marina Bay. This is how this place looked on the New Year’s eve:

For some unclear reason Singapore officials decided to keep ages-old sign in front of one of the bridges nearby:

In fact, Singapore resembles Western world more than Asia, even English is the official language here.

However, most of the inhabitants are Asian and you can easily feel the authentic culture shining through although at first it might look as a city of shopping malls…

I generally like places where people like bicycles

Laws are very strict not only in terms of littering. When passing a border we were given a small nice guide informing us that we can get executed for importing drugs for example. Durians are famously forbidden everywhere.

Sometimes I feel that we would benefit from the same approach in Russia…

And you know… You actually can feel it that Singapore is one of the safest places in the world. Although, it would be fare to note that strictness of the laws compared to those of Iceland, Norway and Austria did play a role here.

That’s how you buy a subway ticket. As in Japan, Price depends on distance.

What makes Singapore really interesting is its ethnic neighborhoods: Chinatown & Little India.

And these are not just tourist attractions. Actually, I really felt like travelling to another country when visiting them.

Little India is an interesting place. I’m not sure whether it’s called after Little Italy in New York but it certainly has the same charm and make you feel as if you’re actually in India.

Or Chinatown:

Ironically, the most appealing Buddhist temple we visited in our trip to Southeast Asia was in Singaporean Chinatown.
Although, we didn’t really see that many and probably missed something. This one is called Buddha Tooth Relic Temple & Museum.

An island of tranquility in a fast-paced city.

Protected by fierce Asian Hercules…

There are 10 000 Buddha statues in the place. Well, all religions are alike in some way…

It’s a working temple actively used by locals. Actually, I didn’t see all that many tourists there.

That’s where we stopped our days-long rush through the attractions for an hour to drink a cup of tea, listen to meditative music and read Encyclopedia of Buddhism and similar books.

And here is the Hindu temple:

Switching from spiritual to mundane…

Of course you cannot visit a place like Singapore without trying out different cuisines. Long walks also contribute to appetite.

This is the Chilli Crab that is so difficult to eat if you’re wearing a white shirt. Although, I guess I even managed to keep it clean.

In Little India we continued our introduction to Indian food that started in Batu Caves, Kuala Lumpur.

Although Indian cuisine is kind of an opposite of what I normally eat, we really enjoyed food it.

Most indians eat rice with their hands, so we tried as well.

There is a local market on the subway station where our hotel was located.
We were impressed by the amount of seemingly strange and synthetic food over there:

We couldn’t stand the temptation and tried some green soy pancakes and few similar things. Still alive

Also, there is huge island resort next to Singapore called Sentosa. We’re not big fans of amusement parks but we found something interesting to visit there.

Underwater World is an oceanarium with many ancient and deep water sea creatures and… sometimes people!

I wonder whether we really look like a typical Russians and are easily detectable even through the glass or he is Russian himself…

And this is a really deep water creature that is called whether a devil or an angel I guess. Pretty interesting looking I should say.

To celebrate New Year 2011 we got to the New Asia bar in Swiss Hotel just a couple of seconds before 00:00. If we were just a little bit less lucky we would still be in a long queue on the first floor. But we got there just at the perfect time to hear the countdown and see the fireworks.

Whereas Chill Crab is a traditional Singaporean meal, then Singapore Sling is a traditional Singaporean cocktail. It’s not bad but I remain conservative preferring red dry wine and bourbon whiskey.

I realize, the post is quite chaotic and muddled but so was our 3-days visit to Singapore: from temples and museums to shopping malls and bars. Hope, these notes from different part of the world are at least a little bit interesting to read and see. Otherwise, your feedback is highly welcome!

No similar posts.

I’ve been thinking for a long time of putting all the travel lifehacks in one place. Finally, I found time to give a birth to this post. Name speaks for itself. So, I hope you’ll enjoy!

COSTS

Basically, all travelling costs fall down in few categories: preparation, getting there, living there, eating there, sightseeing, having fun there & shopping there. We will cover them all, one by one.

1. Preparation

People often spend way too much money on preparation stage. Let me suggest few alternatives. Instead of buying expensive Lonely Planet (or whatever) guides, use free web-sites. If you travel to the country where clothes are cheap don’t buy them at home even if you need them. If you travel to the country where everything is more expensive, then make sure you buy all your sun sunscreens, swimsuits and sunglasses at home. Common sense, but people don’t do it surprisingly often.

Get started:

• Wikitravel is an incredibly useful crowd-sourced web-site that covers widest range of places and topic;
• Google maps will substitute those maps you would otherwise need to look for and buy;
• Youtube can also be a very useful tool for your research into the place you’re going to.

2. Getting there

Tickets is always a significant part of a travel budget. But there are few ways one can buy tickets cheaper or even get it for free. Yes, you can get your tickets for free if you have enough frequent-flyer miles. No, it doesn’t necessarily always mean that you need first to buy 100 tickets from a certain airline to get 101-st for free. It’s also possible to earn them other ways. How? See below.

Get started:

• Momondo.com is an incredible website I use each time I want to buy a ticket. Basically it allows you to compare all the offers out there, pick the best one and even see if you could pay less by shifting your dates by couple of days;
• Travel hacking cartel is the project launched by Chris Guillebeau who already visited 140+ countries. This is the place where you can get to know about all the deals to earn additional miles. There is a catch though: usually you will need to spend some time signing-up, filling questionnaires or will even need to prefer certain hotel/restaurant, etc;
• List of low cost airlines – take a look, there are a lot of them. Low costs in air transportation industry doesn’t necessarily mean low-quality. It depends on a particular company of course, but I was more than happy with AirAsia on my trip to Southeast Asia for example.

2. Living there

There are few options here as well. From living for free with your international friends to significant increase in price by making the smart choices.

Get started:

• Couchsurfing.org is the international community of those who’d like to host guests at home and live in somebody else’s home while traveling. If you’re adventurous enough and like to meet new people, that might work for you. Despite all concerns, absolute majority of users report highly positive experience;
• Guesthouses & hostels are cheap alternatives to hotels and might be a good option for those who are not too demanding in terms of comfort and especially for those who travel in big groups. Though, it’s not for everyone of course;
• Tripadvisor. If you prefer to pay a little extra but live in a comfortable hotel with nice reception then I suggest you at least make sure that you get what you pay for. Tripadvisor lets you do exactly that. Filtering hotels by the price and location you can easily find the best one for you and check out all the negative review before actually getting a credit card out of your pocket.

3. Eating there

Sometimes, costs for food will even be lower compared to your home country if you travel somewhere like India. So, you actually save money by traveling. But sometimes food is quite expensive.

Best practices are:

• Stick with local cafes instead of international chains. Yeah, I know multi-billion Starbucks brand awareness campaigns  make it more appealing for you than local coffee shops but think again and get you cappuccino for a dollar instead of 3.
• Notice where locals tend to eat. They know better.

4. Sightseeing, having fun & shopping

Ok, with spending money on entertainment & shopping it’s tricky. You either want to save or you want to spend. I won’t say that all the spending should be cut. Of course, that would make you miss many experiences that you would otherwise have.

I can only suggest few things to keep in mind:

• Price doesn’t necessarily correlate with the quality of an experience. I enjoyed learning about Japanese tea ceremony more than going to night club for example. Believe me, it’s much more interesting to discover the real culture of a given country then going shopping for the same international brands or watching the same Hollywood movies.
• People tend to spend more on holidays… Which they often regret. Ever heard of a concept of impulse purchase? Would you buy that jacket at home? Maybe it’s even cheaper there?
• Don’t be trapped by the most popular attractions. People often think that they have to try something just because this is the place to do it. And they get charged accordingly. Why go to casino in Las-Vegas or to museum in Saint Petersburg if you hate both? I personally enjoyed planetarium in Kuala Lumpur not less than the sight of those tall Petronas towers. So, find something you personally like instead of just ticking boxes.

INCOME

While thinking about traveling people usually only consider costs. But fact of matter is in addition to reducing costs you can also increase your income. Yes, income from traveling.

1. Rent out

If you plan to travel mid to long-term, renting out your current apartment (if you own one of course) can be an awesome option. It’s an especially attractive for those of you who live in a developed country like the US, EU and traveling to somewhere like Thailand or Latin America.

2. Import/export

Don’t be frightened by business lingo. I don’t suggest you deal with warehousing, customs, air deliveries and things like that. You won’t make a fortune of course, but can cover some expenses. So, you might consider bringing few gadgets with you. Just to give you a perspective: iPad prices could easily vary by 30% in different countries. What is even better you don’t pay VAT tax in a foreign country which can be from 3% to 25%. You can do the math yourself

Get started:

• Learn about differences in international prices. And don’t forget to research the demand: probably nobody needs your latest Macbook Pro in Zimbabwe…
• Learn about VAT policies of the country you travel to and make sure you get all the necessary papers (insist on it directly) when you make a purchase. Otherwise, you can get rejected when trying to get your money back at an airport.

3. Earn

I know what you thinking. “I just want to have a beach vacation and you suggest I freaking work there?!”. But hold on for a second. That’s not an option for everybody of course. But if you’re long-term traveler and want to stay in a country for few months or maybe even longer than a year and if you love what you do why not to get an international working experience? What worked well for many Westerners is teaching English somewhere in Asia or doing freelance programming, design or other kind of work location independently. Just another thing to consider.

Get started:

• Freelance web-sites: Elance.com, Guru.com, ScriptLance.com
• Working abroad: GoAbroad.com, GlobalChoices.co.uk.

Recommended further reading:

• Vagabonding: An Uncommon Guide to the Art of Long-Term World Travel
• Living Well vs. Doing Well by Rolf Potts’ (author of the book above) guest post on Tim Ferriss’ blog
• Chris Guillebeau’s blog

That’s it for now, hope you found couple new ideas for yourself. Or maybe you have anything to add?

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1. What are the best places to live and travel to: rational side of the issue
2. Guide to Ao Nang Krabi in Thailand. Bonus: breath-taking pictures!

A month already passed since our trip to Southeast Asia. Winter sights and grey colors that we see everyday on our way to work don’t look unfamiliar anymore. Pictures from the trip, on the other hand, seem to originate from a completely different world. World that we were able to escape to for a while but that fades away now. I guess, blogging is just another method to get back in those days, awaken the memories and store them in a more reliable form. I invite you to join my reminiscence and travel with me to 3 countries of Southeast Asia. What I promise from my side is (hopefully) beautiful pictures, (probably) useful advice and (supposedly) witty comments.

Well, we had an ambitious plan: 10 days in Ao Nang – Krabi (Thailand) → 2 days in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) → 3 days in Singapore (Singapore ) → 2 days in Bangkok (Thailand) → back to Moscow. Total of 5 flights (2 of which were connection flights) & one bus + transit to/from airports + subway. Not without a pride I can say that we carried out the plan on time in full.

Although, it’s still not comfortable at all to sleep there waiting for your connection flight… When will we actually have 100% comfortable sleeping lounges in airports, I wonder?!

One AirAsia (awesome!) flight later we finally got to Krabi and took a bus to Ao Nang.

The hotel we found on TripAdvisor and enjoyed staying at.

From now on I’ll try to switch from a personal story to more of a guide style answering popular questions, hope you’ll find it useful.

Where and what to eat in Ao Nang?

There are many of places offering a variety of food. So, it pretty much depends on your taste, you can actually find everything from Thai seafood to English breakfasts. We especially liked the restaurants by the beach. Unbelievable view and delicious food. Life is not all that hard after all.

I was so amazed by the beauty that even recorded a short video:

BTW, make sure to try a crocodile steak!

Another option is cheap street food. You can see the prices in local currency below:

Currently, one US dollar = 30.9 baht.

Where to see a Muay Thai boxing in Krabi?

The biggest event takes place in Ao Nang Krabi stadium. You will see and hear (believe me) announcements all over the place. This is the place to go if you want to see the real fighting. On the event we’ve been to they started with juniors and gradually got to senior fighters. Whether you’ll like it or not depends on your attitude towards martial arts and violence.  But keep in mind that this not just fighting, but a part of culture. I personally enjoyed it because I had a brief practice myself about 3 years ago and it’s always interesting to watch the professionals in sport you tried.

One thing I would definitely advise against is watching a Muay Thai in a nearby restaurant or hotel. Not that you should actively avoid it, but just keep in mind that it has nothing to do with the real fighting. We’ve seen of those shows after visiting the real competition and it made us laugh. Actually, it looked as if they organizers just picked 2 random guys on the street 10mins ago, gave them shorts and asked to imitate a fight…

What are the sightseeing attraction around Ao Nang, Krabi?

In about 40mins drive from Ao Nang you can find the Tiger Cave Buddhist temple. You can get there by yourself or buy a tour from a firm which can be combined with something like elephant riding on the same day.

Where to see a fire show in Ao Nang?

No need to look for a particular place, they just happen around cafes. Most probably, you’ll just randomly come across one of them while walking in the evening or having a dinner. Don’t sit to close though.

Where to buy tailored clothes in Ao Nang?

There are tailors’ shops all around and you can buy a tailored suit, shirt or trousers quite cheap. I heard some stories about tailors deliberately delaying their work after receiving 50% prepayment from you. I personally haven’t had any problem of that kind but make sure you come there in advance as it takes time to get all the measurements and manufacture your cloths. Another thing to keep in mind is to bargain. If you don’t I’m not even sure how many times more you will pay. Also, as you can see fake brands are very popular. There are Ray Ban sunglasses and Lacoste polos in each shop… I personally chose the shop which didn’t try to mimic popular brands (Victoria on the picture below) and was satisfied with a result.

What to beware in Thailand?

You should be careful with jelly fish and other poisonous creatures in the ocean. Especially after the storm and in the night. Another thing that some warn against is snakes. But we never came across any of them. So, probability is very low I suppose. And beware falling coconuts of course! And I’m not joking. This is urchin, one of those weird creatures you need to be careful not to tread on:

What else to do in Ao Nang?

In addition to things mentioned above you might want to try rock climbing, snorkeling, kayaking & diving. What else? Well, if you still have some time left (which I doubt) you can plan your next travel destination (that’s what we did) or read on of the books you intended to read on a beach…

Also, it’s a very good idea to get out of Ao Nang and visit Ko Phi Phi, Bamboo and other islands around. Here is the video from a speed boat we took to get there:

Bamboo island looks like a Bounty commercial:

Just random pictures in no particular order:

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1. Shortest guide to free or radically cheap travel
2. Trip to Madrid: pictures and impressions
3. Turkey, pictures. Apr, 2010

I came to Romania to work for 3 months. Frankly speaking I wasn’t full of enthusiasm about it from the very beginning. It’s not all that exotic — same old Eastern Europe, it’s not widely known as a perfect place for tourism and vacations with great beaches and service, it’s not in the list of the most developed and advanced countries in the world that would be interesting to see. In other words, I could not find a single reason to see it.

But at the end of the day why not to use the opportunity to visit country which I would otherwise most probably miss? Wouldn’t it also be interesting to see the country that only left its Soviet past behind in 89 and already joined EU in 07? Aside from that I didn’t know much about the country to be honest. Others around me didn’t seem to know significantly more though: I was quite tired of jokes about Count Dracula long before actually going there… In fact, it appeared to be quite an interesting country to visit.

As one could naturally assume from its history, Romania is quite a “country of contrasts”. Sometimes you feel like you are in the Soviet Union, sometimes like you are in the European one. For example, two pictures below were taken in only about 30 meters distance from one another:

Are you also thinking of EuroTrip movie?

Situation with taxis is much better than the one in Moscow and this is when I was thinking of Europe. All of them are official yellow-colored with fares written clearly on cars. If you’re lucky enough taxi-driver will even understand some basic English. Not to mention prices: trip to work cost me about $1.50. And usually you don’t wait longer than 5 minutes if ordering via phone.

One of the biggest problems of Bucharest is its stray dogs. I don’t like them much even if they are domesticated. Why someone mentally healthy would like to have such a creature at home? But it’s even stranger to see them in the capital, all over the place, often in packs, up to 7. As a free bonus to railroad in 100 meters from my apartment I could enjoy barking all night long. Apparently, there is no political nor civil will to solve the problem…

While the capital seems to in bad shape, compared to Russia, I was pleasantly surprised by rural areas and other towns.

Two main ways people prefer to spend their weekends outside Bucharest are sea side and mountains, depending on weather I suppose. These are the directions, in which one could notice most of traffic jams Friday evening, Saturday morning and Sunday evening. Mountains are beautiful of course.

Believe it or not but I actually went fishing. Though it’s always interesting to try something new. My colleague is a big fun, so he found a place. However, it is kind of fake fishing as trouts are actually grown just 10 meters from pond. That’s how it actually looks:

We traveled to sea side together with my colleagues and were more than disappointed, to be honest. Beach and water itself were so terrible that I packed my swimming goggles back quite quickly. According to locals we were just incredibly unlucky to come at the wrong time, stay at the wrong part of the beach and so on and so forth. But still surprisingly enough, beach was packed with people regardless from the very morning. All the other things were great though: sunny weather, decent restaurants with low prices, etc.

Ok, just to tick the box. Of course this post would be complete without a picture of the castle where Vlad III or simply Count Dracula used to live:

Haven’t been inside though, but heard that it’s nothing special…

And in some places Romania looks like this:

But keep you jaws from dropping, this is just a museum showing traditional settlements few centuries ago.

Quite often you can find an exercise machines on the Bucharest streets. Idea is good of course, but in fact don’t look very usable and seem to be abandonded. I’d opt in just for a walk. Unless there is an equipment for proper squats, bench presses and pull-ups…

More pictures of Bucharest:

One of the Bucharest sights is Palace of Parliament which is the largest administrative building in the world.

That’s the first time I experimented with travel video to show you how it looks in reality. So, this one is delivered to you directly from Bucharest:

And this just made me smile. In of the grocery stores they actually sell… Crap!

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I would like to devote this post to Japanese temple, imperial palaces and just gardens. I believe, you can enjoy their beauty and sophistication regardless of your attitude towards monarchs, religion or concept of God in general.

A couple of words about religion. Buddhism and Shinto prevail in Japan, so these are the ones that I’m going to cover here. However, in general Japanese tend to associate themselves with few religions at the same time. Moreover, only 20% of population actually believes in any God.

Shinto is the most widely spread religion. Followers believe in spirits, called kami which exist in everyghing: humans, animals, nature. I think you know a lot about Buddhism yourselves and most probably even more than me. And anyway it’s pointless to try summarizing it in a few words.

What I found interesting is that Shinto shrines often get rebuild which actually reflects the idea that essense of life is in constant change.

You can tell a Shinto shrine from Buddhist temple based o few signs, such animals statues and big red gates at entrance that are called Torii and symbolize transition to sacred place.

Temple in central Tokyo:

Here we accidentally stumbled upon traditional Japanese wedding:

Omikuji are papers with your destiny, some kind of sacred lottery:

Water-filled basins are used to purify one’s hands and mouth before entering a Shrine.

One of the most beautiful temples in Japan. Kinkaku-ji is Zen Buddhist temple in Kyoto.

Below is Kyoto Imperial Palace, a place where Emperor lived before moving to Tokyo. You need to arrange a visit in advance to get there. And it’s even more difficult to see the actual Imperial Palace in Tokyo.

And this is a beautiful garden in a restaurant we were lucky to visit:

Few more pictures from various places:

However, you understand that photos don’t even show 10% of real atmosphere, especially in re-sized format. But I hope it was still interesting.

Other posts about Japan:
1 post: First impressions and pictures;
2 post: Cuisine and food;
3 post: Tea ceremony;
4 post: Devil is in the detail;
5 post: Temples, palaces and gardens.

I think this is my last post about Japan, so you can breathe out with relief…

You might also like:

1. Trip to Japan, impressions and beautiful pictures
2. Japan: cuisine and food
3. Japan: devil is in the detail

You might also like:

1. Trip to Japan, impressions and beautiful pictures
2. Japan: cuisine and food
3. Japan: temples, palaces and gardens

You can find slightly better resolution in my photo journal or in flickr.

Hope, you enjoyed!

You might also like:

1. Trip to Japan, impressions and beautiful pictures
2. Guide to Ao Nang Krabi in Thailand. Bonus: breath-taking pictures!
3. Trip to Madrid: pictures and impressions

You might also like:

1. Japan: cuisine and food
2. Trip to Japan, impressions and beautiful pictures
3. Japan: devil is in the detail

You might also like:

1. Japan: tea ceremony
2. Trip to Japan, impressions and beautiful pictures
3. Japan: temples, palaces and gardens

My plans to visit Japan turned into reality! Thank you all for your recommendations! If I were to describe the trip in one word I would call it unforgettable. We usually slept for 4-7 hrs a night trying to experience as much as we could.

Let me answer expected questions right away. How did I get there? Well, have been a PhD student in Higher School of Economics during the last year and a half. As I surprisingly still didn’t get kicked out I decided to participate in the organization of the student exchange with the Japanese Masters and PhD students in June 2009. Took days off at work and helped guys to get around the city and see lots of cool things.

Then, there was a long delay with no news. So, I saved some money and vacation days at work. But after 10 months the reciprocal trip was organized! And it was organized on the breath-taking level!

As a result, I’m sorting out gigabytes of the pictures and planning a series of posts on various topics: from tea ceremony and temples to cuisine and clubs. I promise, there will be more colorful pictures than boring letters. So, turn your RSS readers on and wait for the broadcasts.

As the first adjective that comes to mind when trying to describe Japan is beautiful I suggest to finish with your reading and my writing for today. Instead you might like to contemplate few pictures.

Don’t forget to ask me in comments if there is anything particular you would like to read about or see at pictures.

BTW, 19-23 Apr I’m going to be in Turkey. Check Twitter & Facebook for more status updates.

Other posts about Japan:
1 post: First impressions and pictures;
2 post: Cuisine and food;
3 post: Tea ceremony;
4 post: Devil is in the detail;
5 post: Temples, palaces and gardens.

You might also like:

1. Trip to Madrid: pictures and impressions
2. Japan: cuisine and food
3. Japan: devil is in the detail

Choosing a place to live as a part of lifestyle design

In the era of globalization more and more people realize that they aren’t bounded by the city or even the country they were born in. On average we travel more, tarlk and meet people from other parts of the world more and get to know other cultures more. Technology, Internet, blogging, global careers or location independent entrepreneurship – all of these are factors contribute to it. But once we’ve realized that in the long-term we are pretty much free to decide where to live we face another challenge. And this is how we can possibly make a choice like this?

©

I, personally, think that a place that can be called “the best for everyone” simply doesn’t exist. Besides, probably there is no one single place which is “best for you”. But certainly there are places which you would or will enjoy more and less, there are places where you’ll have more opportunities for self-realization and those where list of opportunities is shorter. So, what can help one to make the decision?

Location, location, location

Well, there are many approaches answer this question. And no, I don’t consider “just live where you were born” as one of them.

One of the options is to travel the world and try to live at least for a few days/weeks/months/years in each country to understand cultural differences and other distinguishing characteristics and figure out which country fits your personality, interests and passions the best. This is what Onizou guys are doing. But it’s a kind of difficult thing to do though, considering that there are 233 countries in the world. It would be time and money consuming, but probably worth doing.

©

Another option is to listen to your friends, relatives and acquaintances with the similar mindset and try to catch the gist of their impressions from different parts of the world. But still the biggest risk is the subjectivity and difference in life priorities, in likes/dislikes and interests. One person cares most about safety levels and would never live in the country where crime rate is still high because family safety is the top priority for him/her, another person values adventures more and cannot live without new exciting experiences and challenges, someone else simply has some specific interest like Argentinian tango and would obviously end-up somewhere in Latin America.

What gets measured gets managed

I think that the best way to go is to combine all the methods and analyze all the available information. But let’s look on the other side of this issue.

How can official statistical information, ratings and rankings contribute to your decision making? Of course this data will be more useful for those of you who care about sustainability, safety and financial issues more, but those with other priorities will definitely benefit as well.

©

There are a lot of pretty interesting international rankings and ratings that sort different countries and cities on the basis of the specific factor or set of factors. Let’s take a look on some of them:

What are the best cities to live in?

1. Mercer’s Quality of Living Survey

According to wikipedia, important criteria are safety, education, hygiene, recreation, political-economic stability and public transportation. The importance of the list lies primarily in the fact that internationally operating companies use it to determine where they will open offices or plants and how much they pay the employees.

Result:
City Country Rating
1 Vienna Austria 108.6
2 Zürich Switzerland 108
3 Geneva Switzerland 107.9
4 Vancouver Canada 107.4
Auckland New Zealand 107.4
6 Düsseldorf Germany 107.2
7 Munich Germany 107
8 Frankfurt Germany 106.8
9 Bern Switzerland 106.5
10 Sydney Australia 106.3

2. The Economist Intelligence Unit’s World’s Most Livable Cities

Each city is assigned a score for over 30 qualitative and quantitative factors across five broad categories: stability, health care, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure. The categories are compiled and weighted to provide an overall rating of 1–100, where 1 is considered intolerable and 100 is considered ideal.

Result:
City Country Rating
1 Vancouver Canada 98.0
2 Vienna Austria 97.9
3 Melbourne Australia 97.5
4 Toronto Canada 97.2
5 Perth Australia 96.6
Calgary Canada 96.6
7 Helsinki Finland 96.2
8 Geneva Switzerland 96.1
Sydney Australia 96.1
Zürich Switzerland 96.1

©

3. Monocle Most Liveable Cities Index

According to wikipedia, important criteria in this non-scientific survey are safety/crime, international connectivity, climate/sunshine, quality of architecture, public transportation, tolerance, Environmental issues and access to nature, urban design, business conditions, pro active policy developments and medical care.

Result:
City Country 2008
1 Zürich Switzerland (04)
2 Copenhagen Denmark (01)
3 Tokyo Japan (03)
4 Munich Germany (02)
5 Helsinki Finland (05)
6 Stockholm Sweden (07)
7 Vienna Austria (06)
8 Paris France (10)
9 Melbourne Australia (09)
10 Berlin Germany (14)

As you surely noticed, ratings are a little different. Yes, this is due to the differences in the factors and weights. I’d recommend you to follow the links above to learn more about the methodologies behind and get a better understanding of how it fits your personal priorities.

What are the most developed countries?

Here I’d suggest you to look at the list of countries by Human Development Index (top 5 are Iceland, Norway, Canada, Australia, Ireland) and the Quality-of-Life Index (top 5 are Ireland, Switzerland, Norway, Luxembourg, Sweden).

What are the richest countries?

Although money is not the ultimate measure of the quality of life, it still matters. So, if you are interested on getting to know where people on average make the most money you can take a look at the list of countries by GDP (PPP) per capita.

But those are just materialistic economic measurements, how about the actual human happiness?

Well, the problem is that it’s quite complicated to measure such an ephemeral thing as human happiness. But happily there were few attempts. One of them is satisfaction with life index.

You probably want to know the result? Well, the happiest countries in 2006 were as follows:
1. Denmark;
2. Switzerland;
3. Austria;
4. Iceland
5. The Bahamas;
6. Finland;
7. Sweden;
8. Bhutan;
9. Brunei;
10. Canada.

I won’t get into the details of methodology and discussion of the cultural differences, but if you want to know more, Wikipedia is there for you.

But happy and healthy people are supposed to live longer aren’t they?

Well, there is a correlation between those factors and if you are interested in the specific figures the following indices might be interesting for you:

1. List of countries by lifespan (CIA World Factbook, 2009 estimates):
1. Macau 84.36;
2. Andorra 82.51;
3. Japan 82.12;
4. Singapore 81.98;
5. San Marino 81.97;
6. Hong-Kong 81.86;
7. Australia 81.63;
8. Canada 81.23
9. France 80.98
10. Sweden 80.86.

2. List of countries by lifespan (list by the United Nation, average for the 2005-2010 period):

1. Japan 82.6;
2. Hong-Kong 82.2;
3. Iceland 81.8;
4. Switzerland 81.7;
5. Australia 81.2;
6. Spain 80.9;
7. Sweden 80.9;
8. Israel 80.7;
9. Macau 80.7;
10. France 80.7.

These are the rankings I wanted to share with you. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not implying that you should believe them 100% and move to mentioned cities/countries ASAP. But I hope it widened your perspective on the world and gave some additional food for thought. I would love to hear your opinion or some additional information of that kind!

Bonus update – August 2010!

Best passports

I just discovered quite an interesting ranking done by Henley & Partners and reflecting visa restrictions for citizens of various countries.

Below is the 2009 global ranking that shows the number of countries citizens of different countries can travel to without need to get a visa:

1. Denmark – 157;
2. Finland – 156;
2. Ireland – 156;
2. Portugal – 156;
3. Belgium 155;
3. Germany – 155;
3. Sweden – 155;
3. United States – 155;
3. Canada – 155;
4. Italy – 154;
4. Japan – 154;
4. Luxembourg – 154;
4. Netherlands – 154;
4. Spain – 154;
5. Austria – 153;
5. Norway – 153;

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Last Friday we’ve been to the amazing presentation give by two designers traveling the world that call themselves Idea Nomads in Moscow. Oni and Zou (these are their aliases) have a goal to travel the world without taking flights.

So far, they visited China, Hong Kong, Tibet, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Russia, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan giving various creative/design presentations and arranging the workshops and of course doing some self-PR. They don’t seem to be willing to stop so far, the route they had drawn on the world map is far from being complete.

I don’t know about you, but it’s another source of inspiration for me:
http://www.ideanomads.com
http://twitter.com/onizou

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1. Japan: devil is in the detail

One thing at a time though.

First impression is made by subway.

BTW, you can get from beautiful airport Barajas to the city center in only 40 minutes.

Subway is quite unpretentious compared to Moscow: no sculptures and ceiling mosaics, but very clean and bright stations with nice trains that even have buttons on doors (why open them if nobody is leaving a train nor getting in). In overall it makes a good impression.

If you’re too lazy to take stairs you can use elevators which can be found on many stations. (estacion de Plaza de Espana on picture).

Surprise-surprise! There are a lot beautiful and narrow streets, cozy cafes and welcoming terraces in the city.

You can also find a sweet botanical garden over there, take a seat on a bench and thing about the meaning of life for a while.

Well it may seem like the only things I’ve seen in Madrid is Gardens (which is not true of course , but I definitely should show you the pictures of the another one, this one is paid. Garden is beautiful of course, but it’s too early to visit it in May as everything had been already planted, but nothing has sprouted yet. So, it’s kinda boring and looks like a typical Russian dacha.

Night life is quite diverse: from small pubs to authentic Spanish clubs where they dance Salsa all night long. And of course regular large american style night clubs with few floors like this one:

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What is important for the entrepreneur who travels around the world? To be totally mobile. And part of being mobile is to have all your information, both business and personal available with you at the any part of the world. Preferably, without carrying anything with you. Well, Evernote lets you get precisely that.

This is the online service which allows you to store any images and texts (even Microsoft Office documents in the paid version) that you want to use as a reference in future. You can save the data right from the browser by selecting pieces of information and pressing just one button or using the shortcut or you can type something manually. All the notes can be viewed and updated if it’s needed either with the Evernote application or online web-site.

But the most important thing about online storage services like this is that they lower your level of worry. When you know will not lose any information because it’s stored on the server and accessible 24/7 from any place in the world that has the internet.

What makes Evernote even better is that it has a very powerful search engine built-in. It means that even if you upload a picture with text, it will be automatically recognized and transformed to the text format. To make the long story short, this is a priceless tool for me. And if you still don’t have an account I recommend you to get one right now.

So what are the useful lifehacks that can help you get the most of Evernote?

1. Use the web clipper

It’s ten times easier and faster to use Evernote if you integrate it with your browser. First, you need to install the Evernote application itself and then you can get Evernote Add-on for Firefox. With a web clipper Evernote becomes a bookmark manager and your personal knowledge base at the same time.

2. Take digital pictures of all the important documents and upload them to Evernote

It allows you to have a backup copy of your documents and be able to get any details (like passport number of issue date) very quickly anywhere in the world if you have the internet access. Same thing applies to your tickets BTW.

3. Take pictures of all the business cards and upload them to Evernote

It allows you to save time and be able to find necessary contacts no matter how far from home you are.

4. Use tags

There is a great search tool built-in, but still tags are very useful if you want to find one of your notes.

5. Use the phone application

This is how you get really 100% mobile. Any information you found useful once and saved in Evernote is available any second on your phone if you have the internet connection. But be careful using your mobile internet in the roaming, some mobile operators charge ridiculously high prices for this kind of service.

6. Use the audio notes

You can also record the audio notes which will also be uploaded to the service. It’s very useful if you don’t want to forget your genius thoughts that always come at the wrong time. And it’s also less time-consuming compared to the text notes.

The other ways of using Evernote include files backup, creating photo galleries, storing your birthdays there and using it as a complete GTD system. But in my opinion there are tools that are better suited for these purposes (and I’m going to tell you about them) and it’s better to use Evernote for the purpose it was created for: information storage.

Do you have any ideas what to add to the list?

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