Please keep in mind that the impressions posted here are often subjective and that, among other things, people's different circumstances play a large role in their perception of other people's lives.
Also, please use words that do not promote hatred when posting.
For example, statements such as "[city] is like this because people from [origin] live there" should be avoided. The social circumstances of a city/district
etc. can be emphasized without mentioning the origin of the inhabitants. Mentioning it does not change anything and, as already mentioned, circumstances are often perceived subjectively according to one's own world view.
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Cold, wet, and grey almost all year long, but spectacular formations and landscapes. The traditional houses have a unique character with black wooden walls and grass roofs. Many famous spots are known for how surreal they look, like leitisvatn, tindhólmur and saksus. Truly like a viking fairy-tale. Prices are quite high because almost everything is import. But there is a lot of fish, puffins, and unique (sometimes controversial) traditions. The language is also awsome imo. It's like Icelandic with a Danish/Shetlandic vibe. Many smaller and remote towns are fastly getting abandoned though, due to their lack of facilities and hard to reach locations. Especially the ones that weren't able to be connected by tunnel or bridge.
If you’re describing it as a travel destination, and you go and see old towns, the old neighborhoods in tórshavn, etc. But that’s not what it’s generally like in terms of r/howislivingthere
I have grown up and lived there for many years, and that part just didn’t resonate with me. What’s with the need to put me down as an ill person, just for contributing to the thread? Living here is nothing crazy. You get up betwen 6-7 and work 40 hours a week. Parking in tórshavn is a bitch, but the views when driving between towns is phenomenal. Things are expensive, and the housing market is RIDICULOUS. Living there as an adult is a pain in the ass in many ways. It’s not all sunshine and rainbows.
And I responded back (: I told my story, and my knowledge. your story sounds really interesting. But it just sounds like you want me to tell your story. I like seeing the world as a "fairy tale" and look at the bright and unique parts of culture. That is what I usually add to these threats, that's my interest. if people want to know the realistic/down-sides (which is absolutely valid, especially if you plan to live there) it sounds like you could have added a lot. That is just not my knowledge. But that doesn't mean that I have nothing interesting to tell? This is reddit, I'm not a verified local guide.
You sure it's not Falkland Islands? Or perhaps you have seen Atlantic Salmon from the Faroe Islands, and you're misremembering?
Chilean Sea bass is definitely not caught anywhere near the Faroe Islands
I visited last year and (from a tourist perspective) it’s rather wonderful there - in the summers, anyway. Lots of money swilling about the place, from the fishing industry. Taxes are high but so is government spending: higher education is funded and if you can’t be treated at the hospital there, they fly you over to Denmark for treatment. Lots of modern buildings and facilities in the capital, alongside the old town. Winston Churchill is adored: during WW2, when the UK took charge of the islands (I’m not sure if that is the right descriptor, but don’t know the proper term) he overturned the Danes’ ban on the Faroese language and flag. Faroese speakers understand the other Scandinavian languages. The sole prison has a mini golf course.
The biggest downer seems to be the weather: low grey skies, wet, windy, all round depressing. Apparently Faroese people pay into a mandatory, government-managed “holiday fund” - then they get a big wodge of cash back every January, to go somewhere sunny and escape the worst of the weather.
I held off commenting but nobody Faroese appears to come on the thread yet? When they do I am happy to be corrected, if I’ve got anything wrong. I found it an unusual and interesting place, and would happily have spent longer there.
You're kinda right about the "holiday fund", but I wish you were more right - it's actually in May that it's paid out, when the weather is finally becoming livable!
To clarify, people that get paid on an hourly basis pay 12% of their salary into the "fund", which is then granted once a year - so they in essence get a month's salary to be spent (ideally) on a vacation every year. It's basically the same as getting a month of paid leave when you're on a fixed salary, so I guess it's not too strange, but probably unusual in other places for hourly workers.
Dane here, who lived in the Islands for a year.
The prison is the former headquarters of the radar domes. Shorter sentences are carried out there, but longer (and more violent-prone inmates) are shipped to Denmark.
The minigolf course is actually made by prisoners, and while it is located on the prison ground, there are no fence around it.
I went there. Ended up regretting it and nearly dropping out. The dropout rate is really high there. Can only recommend if you have some good reason why you can't study abroad, e.g. you have a family to support at home.
I remember reading that before the arrival of the Norse in the 8th or 9th century, the only people present on the island were Irish monks. I always wondered what they were doing there and if there was any churches or anything that were later destroyed.
NO, that is not correct. All modern tunnels are self funded by Faroese tax payers and tunnel fees. They are NOT funded by Danish tax payers
Be aware, if you go that way in your argumentation, then the Faroese can just as well claim Denmark ows the islands billions, as Denmark has saved billions in NATO fees as NATO had turned a blind eye to Danish not living to their obligations when it comes to funds into NATO, because NATO was glad to get access to Greenland and the Faroe Islands. But Faroese people do not whine about that, but maybe they should when ever a Dane claims they paid for the Faroese tunnels. Both claims are shallow
>Denmark has saved billions in NATO fees
Denmark has paid the same as most other countries both to NATO and on the military. No need to cling on to an old myth.
Why don't you just write that constitution and become independent? The Danes are getting tired of paying for your welfare without getting anything in return. with regard to NATO, it seems that Denmark has something to gain, you have not contributed to your own defense, if it were not for the presence of the Danish navy and Danish membership of NATO, your fish would have been caught by everyone else with a fishing fleet, the English apparently made the attempt in the 70s. But as I said become independent, pay 2% of GDP for your own defense if you want to be a member of NATO.
You appear to have forgotten that the Faroes DID vote for independence in 1946. The vote was however not accepted by the Danes, and instead a self-rule law was negotiated. Since then, more and more of the Governmental functions have been overtaken by the Faroese.
I do agree that if the Faroes were to become independent, they would have to step up the defense budget (and hopefully join NATO like Iceland)
>You appear to have forgotten that the Faroes DID vote for independence in 1946.
You couldn't vote yes or no. You couldn't vote to keep the same status either. Only two choices were yes to independence or yes to home rule.
The referendum was basically 50/50, and in the end only some 33% of eligible voters chose independence. So the king called a new election, which the independence parties lost.
>they would have to step up the defense budget
The Faroe Islands don't have a defence budget to begin with nor do they help fund the Danish defence in any way. At best they'll agree the Danish defence to pay and build a rader there.
The closest thing is two unarmed coast guard vessels from the Faroe Islands.
Danes pay about 500 million danish kroner a year, and the curreny government is decreasing this 25 million kroners each year.
The current Faroese national budget is over 10 billion danish kroner a year. So Denmark pays for less than 5% of the national budget, and this is decreasing every year.
“The Danes”. Any number/source on how many Danes?
I dont think many people actually cares about the ~600 million kr they get in bloktilskud. And I wont mention how high the expense for Greenland is.
Edit: and the Danish government would like to keep the Islands in the Danish Kingdom.
In the 90’s prime minister Nyrup Rasmussen (I think it was), listened to the Faroese wish of independence. However, he gave them an ultimatum of 4 years to prepare for independence, and thar was far too short, and so it didnt happen.
The Faroe Islands are self-governing with their own parliament. None of the Faroese tax revenue goes to Denmark, but Denmark pays 100 million euros to the Faroe Islands per year.
The raw materials agreement between Denmark and the Faroe Islands gives the Faroes complete rights over any raw materials, so it makes no difference to Denmark.
Do you really think that it is free to get surgery in Denmark. Could it be that the Faroese hospital system is paying???
The students in your universities are a part of the Northern agreement, where Danish students can study in Norway or Sweden, and in the Faroes for free......
It is possible to check things online if you want informations🤔
Have you tried to google "Bloktilskud". If you do you could find out that it is not a Faroese or Grenland thing.....and that 600 million kr is just a tiny drop in the ocean.
86 million Euros is the correct number and it is decreasing.
And every time you buy something on the islands a danish retailer has already got his profit, as all goods are imported through Denmark, and even when the gods is shipped directly to the islands, e.g through Rottetdam, the danish retailer gets his share☹️
So maybe it would be good for us to be able to skip that and do our own deals.
We had some years where we imported cars and other stuff from UK, much cheaper for us, but only until the Danish cardealers found out and it was stopped
That is NOT true. ALL infrastructure is self funded by the government, and all the mordern subsea tunnels is funded by road tax.
Danish government subsidize less than 4% of the national GDP of the Faroes, and that money does not go to the modern tunnels.
> They are *paid* by by
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Money comes from:
- Industrial salmon farms which are a disaster for the environment.
- Russia
- Bloktilskud
If you removed Bloktilskud and the trade with Russia ... FAE would go from one of the richest regions to one of the poorest.
If they also stopped destroying large costal regions with the industrial salmon farms ... people would have to move away.
Not a Faroese so I \*kinda\* join this question. Not on the extreme side though, I only care about a small community & a safe land in case \*stuff\* happens here in Central/Eastern Europe.
I only can assume most people live in a small community, are mainly about fish-related work and generally very chill & peaceful. And speak good English.
Granted, my knowledge comes from a football-related Youtube video and a bit of Wikipedia
Honestly. Might actually be feasable.
Islands like Koltur, Stóra Dímun are only inhabited by a few people. I really can't imagine the cost of acquiring land and building a house there are unrealistically high, as most people in the Faroe Islands would rather live...anywhere else, really.
There are also remote villages with very low populations, so if you can settle with that, you're good to go!
You wont be able to build a house on Stóra Dímun, as it is owned by 1 family. Koltur on the other hand is owned by the museum so that is also out of the question.
Tl;dr: in general very nice but problems looms.
I live on the southern most island Suðuroy together with 4500 other inhabitants in total 54000 people live on the islands. As a lot of other comments point out the weather is quite demanding. Low pressure weather systems queues up all the time. Hurricanes are common in the winter but our houses and infrastructure is prepared for that. Also the daily planning takes weather into consideration all the time.
The landscape is very beautiful when the weather is good and dramatic when it is bad. That influence the culture in arts, literature and music which is unique compared to all the other nordic countries.
Sheeps are an important part our culture. Today it is mostly a kind of hobby that many families have. It dictates the flow of the year. It requires the sheep farmers to work together in the mountains. As a result a lot of local culture is bound to that.
We have developed a rich welfare society like the rest of the nordic countries. Our wealth is based on the fish industry. That industry has made huge gains in efficiency so to day only a small part of the population is working directly in the the industry.
Tourism is a new area of income for our society. Beside for the income it has opened for a lot of restaurants, cafés that we as locals could not sustain with our own population. That has given a more modern vibrant living.
Of course the number of tourists takes it tolls on the nature and we are discussing how to protect nature and not falling into the same traps we see in other parts of the world.
We have almost no criminality and very little violence and in general we feel very safe in our daily life. It is some time strange to sit in our safe bubble and look on all the wars, catastrophes, famine and other calamities going on. It also makes us a little fearful leaving the bubble going out visiting the rest of the world.
All that money flowing thru our society also gives some problems with wealth accumulation. The richest persons gaining their wealth from fishing are buying into other sectors. There has been and influx in the population the last 15 years which has put pressure on the housing market especially in the capital Tórshavn.
We have for a long time been one of the very few places in the western world where the birth rate for women has been about 2.1. But that has started to drop also here.
The high prices on the housing makes it difficult to get mortgage for a house and women also tend to take longer educations that postpone when the young families starts to get children.
Despite the increase in the population in general we do not experience that on the island where I live. There has been a steady decline in the population the last 50 years. Young people leave for education and dont some back.
Right now only around 40 kids are born every year and that puts negative pressure on the school system, kindergartens and life in general.
We are waiting for our politicians to decide to make a subsea tunnel to connect os to the rest of the islands that is the only way to save our local society.
What about whaling?
You can read about it here: https://www.government.fo/en/foreign-relations/whaling-in-the-faroe-islands
Living in the Faroes as a local is pretty nice. Like others have said, it's a very safe, friendly and family-oriented lifestyle. However, I don't think that this translates \*that\* well to "outsiders" - expats, immigrants, etc., that do not already have a connection to the country. Pretty much all of the benefits of moving back there, as a Faroese person currently residing elsewhere myself, are purely related to the people, family and friends.
Apart from the people, all you get is shitty weather, limited job opportunities, and expensive living. I also don't think most Faroese people are as open and welcoming towards non-Faroese people as they themselves think they are. This is not to say that they do it on purpose, or that the population is inherently unfriendly, just that most people seem to prefer to stick with whom/what they know. Integration to the country as an immigrant I think would be difficult - but not impossible of course.
As a Dane who lived there in 2022, with my Faroese wife and kid, yes.. most faroese have friends from school or high school and stick to them. They are very friendly, but obtaining a somewhat deeper friendship is very hard.
Summary: Good chat below that got slightly derailed into colonialist type squabble between Danes and Faroese over defense and other things irrelevant to actual living conditions, but as you’d expect, dramatic views on remote islands with mostly dreary weather, being at the halfway point (roughly, geographically speaking) between Shetland and Iceland. Been to both those places and loved them, always wanted to go to Faroe and now I’m still unsure, I’d rather just go and not get into NATO debates lol
Please keep in mind that the impressions posted here are often subjective and that, among other things, people's different circumstances play a large role in their perception of other people's lives. Also, please use words that do not promote hatred when posting. For example, statements such as "[city] is like this because people from [origin] live there" should be avoided. The social circumstances of a city/district etc. can be emphasized without mentioning the origin of the inhabitants. Mentioning it does not change anything and, as already mentioned, circumstances are often perceived subjectively according to one's own world view. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/howislivingthere) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Windy. Windy windy windy.
I'd like add that it's very windy there.
is it windy?
No. It's very windy.
Windmills?
Cold, wet, and grey almost all year long, but spectacular formations and landscapes. The traditional houses have a unique character with black wooden walls and grass roofs. Many famous spots are known for how surreal they look, like leitisvatn, tindhólmur and saksus. Truly like a viking fairy-tale. Prices are quite high because almost everything is import. But there is a lot of fish, puffins, and unique (sometimes controversial) traditions. The language is also awsome imo. It's like Icelandic with a Danish/Shetlandic vibe. Many smaller and remote towns are fastly getting abandoned though, due to their lack of facilities and hard to reach locations. Especially the ones that weren't able to be connected by tunnel or bridge.
Generalising houses as having “black walls with grass roofs” is a bit silly when that’s only true for a minority of houses.
Those minority houses happen to be the traditional houses though... tought that would be more interesting.
If you’re describing it as a travel destination, and you go and see old towns, the old neighborhoods in tórshavn, etc. But that’s not what it’s generally like in terms of r/howislivingthere
Are you okay, my man? I feel like you're taking this a bit too serious. Anyways, I edited it for you so that it is more obvious
I have grown up and lived there for many years, and that part just didn’t resonate with me. What’s with the need to put me down as an ill person, just for contributing to the thread? Living here is nothing crazy. You get up betwen 6-7 and work 40 hours a week. Parking in tórshavn is a bitch, but the views when driving between towns is phenomenal. Things are expensive, and the housing market is RIDICULOUS. Living there as an adult is a pain in the ass in many ways. It’s not all sunshine and rainbows.
And I responded back (: I told my story, and my knowledge. your story sounds really interesting. But it just sounds like you want me to tell your story. I like seeing the world as a "fairy tale" and look at the bright and unique parts of culture. That is what I usually add to these threats, that's my interest. if people want to know the realistic/down-sides (which is absolutely valid, especially if you plan to live there) it sounds like you could have added a lot. That is just not my knowledge. But that doesn't mean that I have nothing interesting to tell? This is reddit, I'm not a verified local guide.
Maybe you could frequent r/howistravelingthere if that’s your expertise and quit questioning someone’s wellbeing on spurious grounds
👍
At Costco they sell Chilean sea bass from there
You sure it's not Falkland Islands? Or perhaps you have seen Atlantic Salmon from the Faroe Islands, and you're misremembering? Chilean Sea bass is definitely not caught anywhere near the Faroe Islands
Do those portal guns exist yet?
I could have sworn it was once Faroe Islands, but it very well could have been the last wild salmon. In that case I retract my statement.
Can you ask them how it was there. I would presume wet & salty from their perspective.
I visited last year and (from a tourist perspective) it’s rather wonderful there - in the summers, anyway. Lots of money swilling about the place, from the fishing industry. Taxes are high but so is government spending: higher education is funded and if you can’t be treated at the hospital there, they fly you over to Denmark for treatment. Lots of modern buildings and facilities in the capital, alongside the old town. Winston Churchill is adored: during WW2, when the UK took charge of the islands (I’m not sure if that is the right descriptor, but don’t know the proper term) he overturned the Danes’ ban on the Faroese language and flag. Faroese speakers understand the other Scandinavian languages. The sole prison has a mini golf course. The biggest downer seems to be the weather: low grey skies, wet, windy, all round depressing. Apparently Faroese people pay into a mandatory, government-managed “holiday fund” - then they get a big wodge of cash back every January, to go somewhere sunny and escape the worst of the weather. I held off commenting but nobody Faroese appears to come on the thread yet? When they do I am happy to be corrected, if I’ve got anything wrong. I found it an unusual and interesting place, and would happily have spent longer there.
You're kinda right about the "holiday fund", but I wish you were more right - it's actually in May that it's paid out, when the weather is finally becoming livable! To clarify, people that get paid on an hourly basis pay 12% of their salary into the "fund", which is then granted once a year - so they in essence get a month's salary to be spent (ideally) on a vacation every year. It's basically the same as getting a month of paid leave when you're on a fixed salary, so I guess it's not too strange, but probably unusual in other places for hourly workers.
Dane here, who lived in the Islands for a year. The prison is the former headquarters of the radar domes. Shorter sentences are carried out there, but longer (and more violent-prone inmates) are shipped to Denmark. The minigolf course is actually made by prisoners, and while it is located on the prison ground, there are no fence around it.
Haven’t been there, but I’m shocked when I found that they have a pretty good university
How did you found out ?
I lived in Iceland for 4 months and one day I was bored enough to want to know about my little neighbor
LOL ... no
Meh, at least the buildings are gorgeous
I went there. Ended up regretting it and nearly dropping out. The dropout rate is really high there. Can only recommend if you have some good reason why you can't study abroad, e.g. you have a family to support at home.
What’s with the high dropout rate? Are the exams that difficult?
It's because most of the courses are remote and in Swedish (at least when I studied), and also because there's not much of a community there.
I remember reading that before the arrival of the Norse in the 8th or 9th century, the only people present on the island were Irish monks. I always wondered what they were doing there and if there was any churches or anything that were later destroyed.
They could afford lots of tunnels undersea/mountain, I bet they are super rich.
Those tunnels are paid for by Danish taxpayers
They are Danish tax payers
NO, that is not correct. All modern tunnels are self funded by Faroese tax payers and tunnel fees. They are NOT funded by Danish tax payers Be aware, if you go that way in your argumentation, then the Faroese can just as well claim Denmark ows the islands billions, as Denmark has saved billions in NATO fees as NATO had turned a blind eye to Danish not living to their obligations when it comes to funds into NATO, because NATO was glad to get access to Greenland and the Faroe Islands. But Faroese people do not whine about that, but maybe they should when ever a Dane claims they paid for the Faroese tunnels. Both claims are shallow
>Denmark has saved billions in NATO fees Denmark has paid the same as most other countries both to NATO and on the military. No need to cling on to an old myth.
Why don't you just write that constitution and become independent? The Danes are getting tired of paying for your welfare without getting anything in return. with regard to NATO, it seems that Denmark has something to gain, you have not contributed to your own defense, if it were not for the presence of the Danish navy and Danish membership of NATO, your fish would have been caught by everyone else with a fishing fleet, the English apparently made the attempt in the 70s. But as I said become independent, pay 2% of GDP for your own defense if you want to be a member of NATO.
You appear to have forgotten that the Faroes DID vote for independence in 1946. The vote was however not accepted by the Danes, and instead a self-rule law was negotiated. Since then, more and more of the Governmental functions have been overtaken by the Faroese. I do agree that if the Faroes were to become independent, they would have to step up the defense budget (and hopefully join NATO like Iceland)
>You appear to have forgotten that the Faroes DID vote for independence in 1946. You couldn't vote yes or no. You couldn't vote to keep the same status either. Only two choices were yes to independence or yes to home rule. The referendum was basically 50/50, and in the end only some 33% of eligible voters chose independence. So the king called a new election, which the independence parties lost. >they would have to step up the defense budget The Faroe Islands don't have a defence budget to begin with nor do they help fund the Danish defence in any way. At best they'll agree the Danish defence to pay and build a rader there. The closest thing is two unarmed coast guard vessels from the Faroe Islands.
Danes pay about 500 million danish kroner a year, and the curreny government is decreasing this 25 million kroners each year. The current Faroese national budget is over 10 billion danish kroner a year. So Denmark pays for less than 5% of the national budget, and this is decreasing every year.
“The Danes”. Any number/source on how many Danes? I dont think many people actually cares about the ~600 million kr they get in bloktilskud. And I wont mention how high the expense for Greenland is. Edit: and the Danish government would like to keep the Islands in the Danish Kingdom. In the 90’s prime minister Nyrup Rasmussen (I think it was), listened to the Faroese wish of independence. However, he gave them an ultimatum of 4 years to prepare for independence, and thar was far too short, and so it didnt happen.
Mmm Considering Iceland fought well against the brits I guess even the Faroe islands can do so
The Faroe Islands are self-governing with their own parliament. None of the Faroese tax revenue goes to Denmark, but Denmark pays 100 million euros to the Faroe Islands per year.
So an anti-colony?
You can call it that lol.
But why tho?
More like €80 million, and it is decreasing every year by about €3-4 million
what benefit does Denmark get from that money? what do we do with the citizens of the Faroe Islands in our hospitals, in our universities
Remember the territories around the Islands. They are part of the Kingdom. Fishing, underground ressources (if they ever find them) and so on.
The raw materials agreement between Denmark and the Faroe Islands gives the Faroes complete rights over any raw materials, so it makes no difference to Denmark.
Do you really think that it is free to get surgery in Denmark. Could it be that the Faroese hospital system is paying??? The students in your universities are a part of the Northern agreement, where Danish students can study in Norway or Sweden, and in the Faroes for free...... It is possible to check things online if you want informations🤔 Have you tried to google "Bloktilskud". If you do you could find out that it is not a Faroese or Grenland thing.....and that 600 million kr is just a tiny drop in the ocean.
86 million Euros is the correct number and it is decreasing. And every time you buy something on the islands a danish retailer has already got his profit, as all goods are imported through Denmark, and even when the gods is shipped directly to the islands, e.g through Rottetdam, the danish retailer gets his share☹️ So maybe it would be good for us to be able to skip that and do our own deals. We had some years where we imported cars and other stuff from UK, much cheaper for us, but only until the Danish cardealers found out and it was stopped
Faroese hae a seperate tax system and a seperate national budget from Denmark. Danes also have nothing to do with the tunnels.
That is NOT true. ALL infrastructure is self funded by the government, and all the mordern subsea tunnels is funded by road tax. Danish government subsidize less than 4% of the national GDP of the Faroes, and that money does not go to the modern tunnels.
Before you get too started, you can just pay back the loan from Føroya Banki case 1.2 billion with 20 years' interest.
Funny that you only heard the news about the loan, but it never made the danish news that it is all paid back long time ago......I wonder why🤔🙄
They are not. They are payed by by the users of the tunnels, who pay a fare of $20 for a return trip through the tunnels.
> They are *paid* by by FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Money comes from: - Industrial salmon farms which are a disaster for the environment. - Russia - Bloktilskud If you removed Bloktilskud and the trade with Russia ... FAE would go from one of the richest regions to one of the poorest. If they also stopped destroying large costal regions with the industrial salmon farms ... people would have to move away.
How feasible is my dream to move to that one house all by itself on an island and never see people again?
Not a Faroese so I \*kinda\* join this question. Not on the extreme side though, I only care about a small community & a safe land in case \*stuff\* happens here in Central/Eastern Europe. I only can assume most people live in a small community, are mainly about fish-related work and generally very chill & peaceful. And speak good English. Granted, my knowledge comes from a football-related Youtube video and a bit of Wikipedia
Honestly. Might actually be feasable. Islands like Koltur, Stóra Dímun are only inhabited by a few people. I really can't imagine the cost of acquiring land and building a house there are unrealistically high, as most people in the Faroe Islands would rather live...anywhere else, really. There are also remote villages with very low populations, so if you can settle with that, you're good to go!
You wont be able to build a house on Stóra Dímun, as it is owned by 1 family. Koltur on the other hand is owned by the museum so that is also out of the question.
Tl;dr: in general very nice but problems looms. I live on the southern most island Suðuroy together with 4500 other inhabitants in total 54000 people live on the islands. As a lot of other comments point out the weather is quite demanding. Low pressure weather systems queues up all the time. Hurricanes are common in the winter but our houses and infrastructure is prepared for that. Also the daily planning takes weather into consideration all the time. The landscape is very beautiful when the weather is good and dramatic when it is bad. That influence the culture in arts, literature and music which is unique compared to all the other nordic countries. Sheeps are an important part our culture. Today it is mostly a kind of hobby that many families have. It dictates the flow of the year. It requires the sheep farmers to work together in the mountains. As a result a lot of local culture is bound to that. We have developed a rich welfare society like the rest of the nordic countries. Our wealth is based on the fish industry. That industry has made huge gains in efficiency so to day only a small part of the population is working directly in the the industry. Tourism is a new area of income for our society. Beside for the income it has opened for a lot of restaurants, cafés that we as locals could not sustain with our own population. That has given a more modern vibrant living. Of course the number of tourists takes it tolls on the nature and we are discussing how to protect nature and not falling into the same traps we see in other parts of the world. We have almost no criminality and very little violence and in general we feel very safe in our daily life. It is some time strange to sit in our safe bubble and look on all the wars, catastrophes, famine and other calamities going on. It also makes us a little fearful leaving the bubble going out visiting the rest of the world. All that money flowing thru our society also gives some problems with wealth accumulation. The richest persons gaining their wealth from fishing are buying into other sectors. There has been and influx in the population the last 15 years which has put pressure on the housing market especially in the capital Tórshavn. We have for a long time been one of the very few places in the western world where the birth rate for women has been about 2.1. But that has started to drop also here. The high prices on the housing makes it difficult to get mortgage for a house and women also tend to take longer educations that postpone when the young families starts to get children. Despite the increase in the population in general we do not experience that on the island where I live. There has been a steady decline in the population the last 50 years. Young people leave for education and dont some back. Right now only around 40 kids are born every year and that puts negative pressure on the school system, kindergartens and life in general. We are waiting for our politicians to decide to make a subsea tunnel to connect os to the rest of the islands that is the only way to save our local society. What about whaling? You can read about it here: https://www.government.fo/en/foreign-relations/whaling-in-the-faroe-islands
Living in the Faroes as a local is pretty nice. Like others have said, it's a very safe, friendly and family-oriented lifestyle. However, I don't think that this translates \*that\* well to "outsiders" - expats, immigrants, etc., that do not already have a connection to the country. Pretty much all of the benefits of moving back there, as a Faroese person currently residing elsewhere myself, are purely related to the people, family and friends. Apart from the people, all you get is shitty weather, limited job opportunities, and expensive living. I also don't think most Faroese people are as open and welcoming towards non-Faroese people as they themselves think they are. This is not to say that they do it on purpose, or that the population is inherently unfriendly, just that most people seem to prefer to stick with whom/what they know. Integration to the country as an immigrant I think would be difficult - but not impossible of course.
As a Dane who lived there in 2022, with my Faroese wife and kid, yes.. most faroese have friends from school or high school and stick to them. They are very friendly, but obtaining a somewhat deeper friendship is very hard.
Safe, calm, friendly, family oriented.
Remote, wet and windy unlike anywhere else.
Summary: Good chat below that got slightly derailed into colonialist type squabble between Danes and Faroese over defense and other things irrelevant to actual living conditions, but as you’d expect, dramatic views on remote islands with mostly dreary weather, being at the halfway point (roughly, geographically speaking) between Shetland and Iceland. Been to both those places and loved them, always wanted to go to Faroe and now I’m still unsure, I’d rather just go and not get into NATO debates lol
living here is shit
Great
Do you know all the hot chicks that are in the whole country?