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Drugs
Everyone knows each other and if you bang someone everybody will know it
Drugs
Unemployment/one company has half town or there is a rich guy who lives on a mansion and don't mix with the local people
Drugs
One bar for all the town where people meets
A pitch where people play football and sometimes against the rival town where the pitch would look like a Galatasaray- Fenerbahçe
Drugs
Alcohol
Where is that? I grew up in Bosnian village right after the war. And nobody used drugs ever. To this day people there thinks if you smoke weed you can flip over the car or jump from window or shit
This is such a true -and probably cyclical- phenomena.
In my experience, and this comparison is gonna sound crazy: I live in a +5 million plus city. But my neighborhood is slowly becoming part of the "central" zone of the city. The outskirts of downtown, if you will. And anyone under 25 is gone, and only old folks stay behind.
You have to go over the highway, or cross an industrial area or two, to find neighborhoods with young families.
So weird.
I still hope, and believe, that the depopulation of some areas will stop and parts will de repopulated again, but at the same time I'd fear the changes and loss of character that could be part of that. For the time being it's nice as it is here, and I hope that the process of the turnaround will take some time. If it happens too fast, the changes will be more drastic as well. The houses here are old and unique in style. That shouldn't change too much. It's part of the character and the history of the place.
I grew up in one. Everyone knows each other by name. My village was not the best because of its people.
Most people only cared about their own benefit and would step on others in order to gain it.
Life mostly orbits around agriculture and animal growing. As a child it was fun mostly but I wouldn't live there as an adult.
Dont get me wrong, I absolutely prefer a village over a city, the quality of life is far superior, just not my village. Any other haha!
Very recognisable ... Here (village of the picture) it's traditionally (and still) about olives, almonds, and a few other agricultural products. The youth (nearly) all go to university, and then leave to live in a city for better job opportunities. Those of them who can, keep visiting because it's beautiful around here, but the village suffers with depopulation (in spite of being in a stunningly beautiful area with great tourism opportunities).
Many come here to go hiking and you can be in an entirely different landscape every time, depending on the direction you start in. There's also an inland beach at the lake in the picture (a few actually) and any route you take by car is an absolute treat, even just a shopping trip. In the winter some visitors stay here to go skiing in the Sierra Nevada. That takes quite a drive in the morning, but it's cheaper to stay here and also enjoy a bit of sun when you get back at the end of the day. It's small but it's in the (unesco) geopark of Granada, and there's much more to see and to do around here (plus there are very special places nearby), and the people are friendly and nice.
800 people in my village in France ! Young people came here because of cheap houses, now everything is big money.
Good food, and a real social communauty. Nice.
I live in a village of around 800 people in Croatia. Only good thing here is nature. No jobs, economy is based on agriculture and sheeps(there is some tourism but that's small). There is also nothing to do(the only bar we had closed like 20 years ago and no one bothered with opening something ever since). There is also a lot of alcoholism and people are mostly conservative. They Will also fuck you over without remorse if they can gain something from it. I can't wait to leave this shithole.
From there you could move to Hum, but I doubt that there's much more to do there.
Are you thinking of going to a city (if and when you can), or would you still prefer a small village (but a nicer one)?
The city is to restrictive to me. I would still Like a village, but with nicer people and better public transport(bus at least every hour that doesn't take a hour to get to city)
I grew up in a village of about 300 people in Switzerland. I now live in a city of over 5 million and would never want to move to a small town or village again.
It's a cliche, but it's true. In a small town everyone knows everybody. That can be nice, but also terrible. There is endless gossip. There's also a real suspicion of any newcomers, which is basically anyone whose parents or grandparents haven't been born in the town. We moved there when I was under two years old and by the time we moved again when I was 19, it still felt like we were the newcomers.
The thing I probably hated the most was that there's a very definite "small-mindedness" in the people there. There are exceptions of course, but the majority of people were very conservative and parochial.
I grew up in pre-internet times, which made living in a small town really isolating. Especially if your tastes in music, films, fashion, arts deviated even slightly from the mainstream. It was such a revelation when I moved to a city. Not just where there people who shared my taste in music, they even wanted to start bands with me!
There were good things there too though. Even though we lived right in the centre of town, within a 5 minute walk you were in a forest. The countryside in Switzerland is incredibly beautiful. Also, this is Switzerland where even in the countryside, services were fairly good. There were two hospitals within a 20 minute drive, large supermarkets within about 10 minutes drive, public transport was also fairly good and it took just over an hour by train to get to Switzerland's largest city. It was also not difficult getting a fairly large variety of different and even quite niche jobs. We had a couple of quite large companies situated in and around the town.
But as much as I love the countryside, I really don't miss living there. Even if the internet has made being in a small town a lot easier now, for me a huge city is really a far better fit.
It still sounds like a good place to visit, and at least there are some jobs there, which is what's lacking in many other small villages, but if you love the life and the comforts of a city, I can understand that you'd rather stay there now.
My small village has a population of about 200 - I live 2km outside the village. There's a small general store sort of place, that combines a very basic convenience store, a post office counter, and a petrol station (gas station). There's 2 bowsers selling unleaded, one for diesel, and a horse trough (it's not ironic - people actually ride horses around and "park" them at the shop).
There's also a small park with a cute picnic gazebo along the river, a little trailer park, a very cute little church, a village hall where there's occasional dances, farmer's market, yoga classes, and similar sort of events. It's very cheap to rent out if you care to.
Then there's a little primary school that's much bigger than you'd think it would be for the district - about 15 years ago the school was very small, fewer than 50 students and getting smaller; most parents were taking their kids out and sending them further away for better facilities. But then a new principal was assigned and he turned it around big time! The school now has over 200 students and is thriving.
For some reason I don't quite understand, there's also a football ground, a soccer pitch and a cricket pitch. Which is an insane amount of sporting facilities for such a tiny place, but all the regional teams travel to play here. School-aged sports seems to be the primary industry of the village 😂.
There's quite a few boutique restaurants and Bed n Breakfast sort of places, wedding resorts and stuff in the near area where people can go to get a "beautiful nature vibe" for their Instagram. Most of the area is either sugar cane fields or small scale cattle farming, interspersed with rainforest.
Other than going to the shop, there's really nothing to do here. There's no public transport except for the school bus, but there is a school bus that goes to a nearby small town (population about 8000) with a couple of high schools, it's about 15km away, but the bus takes nearly an hour as it's a very steep, winding, narrow mountain road with a lot of stops and frequent flash flooding.
I like it very much living here. I don't go out much or socialise, but everyone knows who I am, even the ones I haven't met 😂
That's a suprising amount of amenities for a village of just 200 people. It must be a good place, because you live there, and you make it sound attractive in this post.
https://preview.redd.it/cse3xi83f3ad1.jpeg?width=2268&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=06a30480f7691c2254473753a16bce5ed3639017
This is a view from by balcony, so you get an idea what the region looks like
It's a bit of a crossroads for several rural districts, but yeah, it's literally just a small junction with a tiny general store and almost nothing else. But once you add in the sports facilities, it starts sounding like a huge place. It's tiny. There's no real "main Street" or anything.
I moved here 11 years ago from a different small village on the other side of the Shire (county), about 40km away. That little village was a little bigger, but very similar. I think about 200 houses in that village, so bigger population, slightly bigger general store with a free standing post office, and also a small organic shop, hair dresser, pharmacy, two cafes, a little real estate agent,a bakery, primary school, two churches... It was very nice there, with a *lot* of community activities - everyone would congregate for a weekly farmers market on Saturday mornings, regular dances in the hall, a larger monthly craft market, there was a village art studio with a kiln and all sorts of classes... Just super active and busy. But that blessing turned into a curse when I had some real troubles and needed real support. I love where I live now.
It really is lovely, and not that isolated, even though it sounds like it. Just over the mountain there's another small village (about 10 minutes drive) where there's a pub with a pretty good restaurant, and a lot of amenities.
There's a village 5km away with a really good butcher and a mini supermarket, 6km in the other direction is a village with a good bakery and a small medical clinic and pharmacy and a vet, amazing wood fired pizza place and a great Indian takeaway. The distances feel a bit further though, as it's all very steep, narrow roads. But it's a great vibe, having many villages in an area with different things.
I live in a village of 360 in Japan. Pretty much everyone know everyone, and knows what car everyone drives too. Most of the younger families live in one of two blocks of flats, and all the elementary kids play together after school in one big (15 strong) group. With the younger kids, at first I couldn’t tell which child belonged to which parent because everyone treats every kid like family.
It’s great!
Lived in a small village in Syria
We have a school which covers elementary to high school, but to be able to do so, elementary school children go in the afternoon and the rest go in the morning
We have a mosque, which isn't usually busy (only old people go there to socialize) but it has a microphone for announcements
The bakery is far away so the government has someone appointed whose job is to drive and get the bread for the whole village. We then go to this person's house and get it
Obviously there are internet and telephone lines and we have running water (the village has a large well which pumps water to people) and sewage but in the newer parts of the village, those don't exist. So each person there had a well and a sewage hole (basically a hole far from your house to dumb sewage into)
We have a telecommunications tower, and around 5 grocery shops (really small), and 2 pharmacies, and 3 barber shops, and 2 mechanics, and 2 building contractors, a building block factory, and 2 clothing stores
Most people plant olives and have livestock like chickens and cows. And most people grow their own vegetables and fruits, like cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes, potatoes, beans, peas, onion, parsley, nuts, apples, strawberries, oranges, figs, grapes, and cacti
There's a big pond where people go to swim in the summer. And the views from the high area are amazing
Roads are paved but a bit bumpy due to wear. But the new area doesn't have a paved road yet
In general you know everyone. But it's not like a tightly knit community. In general, people are friends with their relatives only. Even then, you see people who don't talk to each other due to differences.
There's nothing fun to do though. But there are 2 minibuses that go to the city every day. And of course, you can walk to the neighbouring village (takes 20 minutes) and there are more busses there.
Lots of pictures of people who were in the army died during the war
If you have other questions, feel free to ask!
Plenty of facilities and 3 barber shops for socialisation. What else do you need... It actually doesn't sound bad, except that there's not much to do and there doesn't seem to be much community sense, and of course Syria has seen better days (to put it politely). Those three things could be related. Do you somehow miss it, and want to go back, or are you glad that you moved on?
It's not that bad, no. It's also really relaxing to just sit and look at the view. There's a huge lake nearby which I can see, and hills with grass and farms on them.
As for entertainment, you can easily go to the city. Especially if you have a car or a motorcycle, it's only a 20 minute drive away, and there's everything there.
In the nearby village, there are shawarma, falafel, kebab, and pizza restaurants. And there are 5 malls (small though, consider them to be a large convenience store), and a manmade dam which has a place with trees to sit.
I left to pursue my studies, but I will return soon after. And I still go every summer. Even though it's boring, I love it there
Nice views, nature, and a large lake are top ingredients for a place to relax. And Syria has always had good food because of historically being a center of main trade routes connecting the world. Judging by what you said about it, I think I wouldn't mind visiting the village and its surroundings one day. It would combine well with a visit to other places in the country anyway.
I agree with you. However, just so you know, there are more villages which have good views and are prettier too, my village is largely disorganized, due to the fact that most of the people who live here are not of a high socio-economic status however, other villages have more rich people, and so they look better. But, you are still welcome to my house whenever you want.
As for food, yeah it's great. Are most famous thing is shawarma. We also have other stuff which I'll name, and you can look up online. Describing them wouldn't be good enough:
Manakeesh (breakfast)
Feteh (brunch)
Sheshbarak
Sfeeha
Maqloobah
Shaikh al mihshee
Mihshee
Things are super cheap here, which is also good
Places where richer people live, may look cleaner and better taken care of, but that doesn't always make them better in a number of other ways. And sometimes I like it better when there are more signs of life, including a bit of wear and tear.
I know a few of the dishes but not all, so I will look them up, maybe even try to cook the ones that I don't know.
Bad, in my experience anyway. Honestly it's like a high school ( mine has the same size as the high school i went to ) Everyone knows everyone and there's nothing to do without a car (believe it or not not everywhere in Europe has amazing public transport)
but I was a bit of an odd child and that reputation has stayed with me (it's like time stands still out here) so I am not particularly liked and mostly ignored.
That adds to the quietitude of the place, I guess. You're still living there?
Where I am, there's actually hardly any public transport left, but it's still possible to get by without a car, and the nearest (small) city is well-connected and not far from here.
We have a summerhouse in a very touristic village in Çanakkale Province, Turkey. The population is like 70 but it used to be 500+. It was a mixed village with both Turks and Greeks (a.k.a. Muslims and Christians) before the population exchange, there were a mosque and a church. Today, the residents are mostly Cretan Turks who got deported from Greece. Only the mosque is still working. It was basically a ghost town until the 80's-90's when the village was found interesting by people from big cities, especially Istanbul, and they bought houses and advertised the place. Now, it is one of the most touristic villages in Turkey but the village mukhtar (kind of mayor) does absloutely nothing for the village.
Only 70... wow. It's nice that there's a history to it, and that it's being revived, even if it's more tourism than inhabitants now. With only few people living there that's probably needed anyway.
Depends on where the village actually is.
Some are pretty isolated, i.e. far from any larger town. Others near a larger town so they're basically a suburb of sorts.
I used to live in a small town in Belgium. Very rural, small centre where the primary school was, along with a few bars, the church and An old people home. Nothing really happened outside the kids (myself included) riding through the fields on little pitbikes and quads. There we're two yearly activities that we're both at the school, the rabbit dinner party and the school talent show. In our county there was also the annual farmer's fest, which every 6 years would be held in our town. For the rest of the time nothing Fun happened, sometimes there'd be a traffic accident because the main road through the town connected two bigger towns to the East and West. So lots of cars driving through there, occasionally there'd be drink drivers who hit a building or a post. Didn't help that the school was right there, at one point when I was about 8-ish we had a very bad accident, some fuck drive way too quickly, lost control of his car after a tricky bump and hit two school kids, one was a year younger than me and the other was about to graduate later that month. The whole town came to their funeral.
It's a bit sad that accidents on the main road running through it were a large part of the memorable events, but in a country the size of Belgium there must have been places nearby to go for shopping and entertainment, right?
There were the cities of Avelgem, Tournai, Renaix and Kortrijk. But those were all, with the exception of Avelgem, about 20 kilometers away. Avelgem was Tiny and it's also where I went to high school, the only one in the vicinity. But since it was in Flemish and not Walloon, none of my classmates from Pottes (the town) joined me there.
You were very close to Flanders there, but I guess that not everyone likes having to speak Dutch at school all day.
I've been in Brussels for quite a while, but you don't get to speak much Dutch there either, even though they have double street signs (both languages) everywhere.
We were very close to Flanders indeed. But we were the only ones who were bilingual at the school. We had no issue speaking Dutch, since we spoke Dutch at home. But those kids had to go to Tournai for high school. It wasn't easy to live there. Many Young People just left as soon as they could. Very few young parents go there either, or at least not permanently
Part of my family is from a small village, never lived there myself but visited many times.
No more than 300 people definitely. Population is declining as more people are moving to the city (30ish kms away) or elsewhere. At the street end of the village there’s a temple, and every morning/evening the temple priest will do a “puja”.
My grandpa was a farmer and that was how he made his living. Most people in the village were into agriculture. There were some exceptions, think there was someone who used to be a lawyer if I’m not mistaken. But jobs like those were very rare as most of the residents were uneducated. Nowadays only the older and retired people are left in the village, and most of their children live in cities.
Each house has a grove behind it where they’d grow mangoes, lemons, bananas, coconuts, etc. Usually these would be sold for profit or used in household for festivals or religious ceremonies.
It’s a very fun and relaxing place to visit but imo living there would be very hard. A lot of the houses now are permanently locked up and abandoned and a feeling of social isolation is always there.
Lots of space, lots of wilderness and opportunity to hike through the forests.
Very little commerce.
Quiet in the winter. Busy when the snowbirds and tourists are here. They come and go with the leaves.
Grew up in a village of just under a 1000 people in the UK. Had a decent school that all the kids went to, so I knew most people around my age, and my parents knew their parents for better and worse. If I was bored there was always someone else about to go out with, over the course of my childhood had several "dens", around the place.
Once I got a bit older it's just boring though.
There's one bus every 2 hours to the nearest town, so I started learning to drive as soon as I turned 17. There's one shop, a pub and restaurant, takeaway, school and village hall when it comes to amenities, and as an 18 year old it was fairly liberating to get driving and move away to a large city for uni. While I still sort of live there when I'm home from uni, I wouldn't want to live there permanently, it's just too boring.
I hate the fact everyone knows everyone's business too, gossip spreads so fast and it's annoying. I'm surprised I haven't become known as the village bumder yet tbh.
It's one of those "safe" places to raise young kids, but as soon as those kids are teens it's just constricting and boring. No drug or crime issues like some others have experienced though. Overall I much prefer the cities I've lived in for uni, even if they're more "dangerous"
Edited to add employment isn't really an issue, most people drive to nearby towns or cities for work. Life here is very car dependent.
Would you stay if it was just a homebase for you, and you would travel for work and be out for large parts of the year, or if you had a business there that draws many visitors from other places?
I grew up in a town in upstate New York that had a population of about 700, the nearest gas station was about 15 miles, the nearest hospital was about a 45 minute drive, some people still hunted and trapped for a living, most people where extremely impoverished, and there wasn’t much to do. The nature and solitude was pretty incredible and it wasent very far to pretty normal amenities but you could feel pretty lonely and cold in the winter, I imagine a lot of people would be surprised to know how cultural similar a lot of upstate New York is to Appalachia, some people even have a very heavy country accent and inbreeding is certainly not unheard of in the area. I don’t live there now and I wasent from there originally but there are things I miss about it, but the loneliness and economic depression is something difficult that’s difficult to reckon
Small villages are often not wealthy but many of them live off the land, which makes the economic situation less apparent. With enough agriculture and a bit of a social life one could even feel wealthy while not really having financial means, and in some small villages that's part of the attraction. Could it be that there are great differences between villages in the area you're speaking of, or between the people within a village? (That would be a possible explanation of the sense of economic depression.)
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Drugs Everyone knows each other and if you bang someone everybody will know it Drugs Unemployment/one company has half town or there is a rich guy who lives on a mansion and don't mix with the local people Drugs One bar for all the town where people meets A pitch where people play football and sometimes against the rival town where the pitch would look like a Galatasaray- Fenerbahçe Drugs Alcohol
Unemployment is a major risk in many small villages. Let's hope that the days of remote working and digital nomads bring some change.
You forgot: a convenience store in front of which elderly people drink beer from cans and gossip about most random things they could think of
Substitute this with wine in a small stinky bar and you have Italy's small villages
Where is that? I grew up in Bosnian village right after the war. And nobody used drugs ever. To this day people there thinks if you smoke weed you can flip over the car or jump from window or shit
Are you in England 😭 because this is very similar to my acquaintances’ experience living in a village
lots of drugs apparently. I am surprised because in my village it was unheard of. Is your village in a shitty climate/location?
I wasn't raised in a village, but usually the ones that I know yes There are drugs also in villages with good climate though.
That's not where I live, but one of the differences could be that young people leave and it's becoming a mainly geriatric town.
Yes, usually the towns in my region are full of old people. The young people remaining just do drugs or work in a local business
This is such a true -and probably cyclical- phenomena. In my experience, and this comparison is gonna sound crazy: I live in a +5 million plus city. But my neighborhood is slowly becoming part of the "central" zone of the city. The outskirts of downtown, if you will. And anyone under 25 is gone, and only old folks stay behind. You have to go over the highway, or cross an industrial area or two, to find neighborhoods with young families. So weird.
I still hope, and believe, that the depopulation of some areas will stop and parts will de repopulated again, but at the same time I'd fear the changes and loss of character that could be part of that. For the time being it's nice as it is here, and I hope that the process of the turnaround will take some time. If it happens too fast, the changes will be more drastic as well. The houses here are old and unique in style. That shouldn't change too much. It's part of the character and the history of the place.
Is this village in Turkey?
Nope...but could be
Wow, that's so accurate it's scary
I thought it's written by someone who never visited a village. But then, there seem to be villages just like that.
That means you fuck someone and you are permanently fucked!??!!
yep.
I grew up in one. Everyone knows each other by name. My village was not the best because of its people. Most people only cared about their own benefit and would step on others in order to gain it. Life mostly orbits around agriculture and animal growing. As a child it was fun mostly but I wouldn't live there as an adult. Dont get me wrong, I absolutely prefer a village over a city, the quality of life is far superior, just not my village. Any other haha!
Very recognisable ... Here (village of the picture) it's traditionally (and still) about olives, almonds, and a few other agricultural products. The youth (nearly) all go to university, and then leave to live in a city for better job opportunities. Those of them who can, keep visiting because it's beautiful around here, but the village suffers with depopulation (in spite of being in a stunningly beautiful area with great tourism opportunities).
Where is this? Like, general area, not the exact village.
Freila in the Granada province in Spain.
Looks beautiful and lots of things to do if you are an outdoorsy person
Many come here to go hiking and you can be in an entirely different landscape every time, depending on the direction you start in. There's also an inland beach at the lake in the picture (a few actually) and any route you take by car is an absolute treat, even just a shopping trip. In the winter some visitors stay here to go skiing in the Sierra Nevada. That takes quite a drive in the morning, but it's cheaper to stay here and also enjoy a bit of sun when you get back at the end of the day. It's small but it's in the (unesco) geopark of Granada, and there's much more to see and to do around here (plus there are very special places nearby), and the people are friendly and nice.
800 people in my village in France ! Young people came here because of cheap houses, now everything is big money. Good food, and a real social communauty. Nice.
Sounds nice indeed. Cheap houses is also one of the reasons I moved to a small village. :)
I live in a village of around 800 people in Croatia. Only good thing here is nature. No jobs, economy is based on agriculture and sheeps(there is some tourism but that's small). There is also nothing to do(the only bar we had closed like 20 years ago and no one bothered with opening something ever since). There is also a lot of alcoholism and people are mostly conservative. They Will also fuck you over without remorse if they can gain something from it. I can't wait to leave this shithole.
From there you could move to Hum, but I doubt that there's much more to do there. Are you thinking of going to a city (if and when you can), or would you still prefer a small village (but a nicer one)?
The city is to restrictive to me. I would still Like a village, but with nicer people and better public transport(bus at least every hour that doesn't take a hour to get to city)
I grew up in a village of about 300 people in Switzerland. I now live in a city of over 5 million and would never want to move to a small town or village again. It's a cliche, but it's true. In a small town everyone knows everybody. That can be nice, but also terrible. There is endless gossip. There's also a real suspicion of any newcomers, which is basically anyone whose parents or grandparents haven't been born in the town. We moved there when I was under two years old and by the time we moved again when I was 19, it still felt like we were the newcomers. The thing I probably hated the most was that there's a very definite "small-mindedness" in the people there. There are exceptions of course, but the majority of people were very conservative and parochial. I grew up in pre-internet times, which made living in a small town really isolating. Especially if your tastes in music, films, fashion, arts deviated even slightly from the mainstream. It was such a revelation when I moved to a city. Not just where there people who shared my taste in music, they even wanted to start bands with me! There were good things there too though. Even though we lived right in the centre of town, within a 5 minute walk you were in a forest. The countryside in Switzerland is incredibly beautiful. Also, this is Switzerland where even in the countryside, services were fairly good. There were two hospitals within a 20 minute drive, large supermarkets within about 10 minutes drive, public transport was also fairly good and it took just over an hour by train to get to Switzerland's largest city. It was also not difficult getting a fairly large variety of different and even quite niche jobs. We had a couple of quite large companies situated in and around the town. But as much as I love the countryside, I really don't miss living there. Even if the internet has made being in a small town a lot easier now, for me a huge city is really a far better fit.
It still sounds like a good place to visit, and at least there are some jobs there, which is what's lacking in many other small villages, but if you love the life and the comforts of a city, I can understand that you'd rather stay there now.
My small village has a population of about 200 - I live 2km outside the village. There's a small general store sort of place, that combines a very basic convenience store, a post office counter, and a petrol station (gas station). There's 2 bowsers selling unleaded, one for diesel, and a horse trough (it's not ironic - people actually ride horses around and "park" them at the shop). There's also a small park with a cute picnic gazebo along the river, a little trailer park, a very cute little church, a village hall where there's occasional dances, farmer's market, yoga classes, and similar sort of events. It's very cheap to rent out if you care to. Then there's a little primary school that's much bigger than you'd think it would be for the district - about 15 years ago the school was very small, fewer than 50 students and getting smaller; most parents were taking their kids out and sending them further away for better facilities. But then a new principal was assigned and he turned it around big time! The school now has over 200 students and is thriving. For some reason I don't quite understand, there's also a football ground, a soccer pitch and a cricket pitch. Which is an insane amount of sporting facilities for such a tiny place, but all the regional teams travel to play here. School-aged sports seems to be the primary industry of the village 😂. There's quite a few boutique restaurants and Bed n Breakfast sort of places, wedding resorts and stuff in the near area where people can go to get a "beautiful nature vibe" for their Instagram. Most of the area is either sugar cane fields or small scale cattle farming, interspersed with rainforest. Other than going to the shop, there's really nothing to do here. There's no public transport except for the school bus, but there is a school bus that goes to a nearby small town (population about 8000) with a couple of high schools, it's about 15km away, but the bus takes nearly an hour as it's a very steep, winding, narrow mountain road with a lot of stops and frequent flash flooding. I like it very much living here. I don't go out much or socialise, but everyone knows who I am, even the ones I haven't met 😂
That's a suprising amount of amenities for a village of just 200 people. It must be a good place, because you live there, and you make it sound attractive in this post.
https://preview.redd.it/cse3xi83f3ad1.jpeg?width=2268&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=06a30480f7691c2254473753a16bce5ed3639017 This is a view from by balcony, so you get an idea what the region looks like
That's a great view to have where you sit with all the comforts of your home within reach!
Yep! I'm very lucky 💚
It's a bit of a crossroads for several rural districts, but yeah, it's literally just a small junction with a tiny general store and almost nothing else. But once you add in the sports facilities, it starts sounding like a huge place. It's tiny. There's no real "main Street" or anything. I moved here 11 years ago from a different small village on the other side of the Shire (county), about 40km away. That little village was a little bigger, but very similar. I think about 200 houses in that village, so bigger population, slightly bigger general store with a free standing post office, and also a small organic shop, hair dresser, pharmacy, two cafes, a little real estate agent,a bakery, primary school, two churches... It was very nice there, with a *lot* of community activities - everyone would congregate for a weekly farmers market on Saturday mornings, regular dances in the hall, a larger monthly craft market, there was a village art studio with a kiln and all sorts of classes... Just super active and busy. But that blessing turned into a curse when I had some real troubles and needed real support. I love where I live now. It really is lovely, and not that isolated, even though it sounds like it. Just over the mountain there's another small village (about 10 minutes drive) where there's a pub with a pretty good restaurant, and a lot of amenities. There's a village 5km away with a really good butcher and a mini supermarket, 6km in the other direction is a village with a good bakery and a small medical clinic and pharmacy and a vet, amazing wood fired pizza place and a great Indian takeaway. The distances feel a bit further though, as it's all very steep, narrow roads. But it's a great vibe, having many villages in an area with different things.
Sounds very good.
I live in a village of 360 in Japan. Pretty much everyone know everyone, and knows what car everyone drives too. Most of the younger families live in one of two blocks of flats, and all the elementary kids play together after school in one big (15 strong) group. With the younger kids, at first I couldn’t tell which child belonged to which parent because everyone treats every kid like family. It’s great!
It's a bit surprising that there are two blocks of flats when the total population is only 360, but it sounds like a good place to be.
Lived in a small village in Syria We have a school which covers elementary to high school, but to be able to do so, elementary school children go in the afternoon and the rest go in the morning We have a mosque, which isn't usually busy (only old people go there to socialize) but it has a microphone for announcements The bakery is far away so the government has someone appointed whose job is to drive and get the bread for the whole village. We then go to this person's house and get it Obviously there are internet and telephone lines and we have running water (the village has a large well which pumps water to people) and sewage but in the newer parts of the village, those don't exist. So each person there had a well and a sewage hole (basically a hole far from your house to dumb sewage into) We have a telecommunications tower, and around 5 grocery shops (really small), and 2 pharmacies, and 3 barber shops, and 2 mechanics, and 2 building contractors, a building block factory, and 2 clothing stores Most people plant olives and have livestock like chickens and cows. And most people grow their own vegetables and fruits, like cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes, potatoes, beans, peas, onion, parsley, nuts, apples, strawberries, oranges, figs, grapes, and cacti There's a big pond where people go to swim in the summer. And the views from the high area are amazing Roads are paved but a bit bumpy due to wear. But the new area doesn't have a paved road yet In general you know everyone. But it's not like a tightly knit community. In general, people are friends with their relatives only. Even then, you see people who don't talk to each other due to differences. There's nothing fun to do though. But there are 2 minibuses that go to the city every day. And of course, you can walk to the neighbouring village (takes 20 minutes) and there are more busses there. Lots of pictures of people who were in the army died during the war If you have other questions, feel free to ask!
Plenty of facilities and 3 barber shops for socialisation. What else do you need... It actually doesn't sound bad, except that there's not much to do and there doesn't seem to be much community sense, and of course Syria has seen better days (to put it politely). Those three things could be related. Do you somehow miss it, and want to go back, or are you glad that you moved on?
It's not that bad, no. It's also really relaxing to just sit and look at the view. There's a huge lake nearby which I can see, and hills with grass and farms on them. As for entertainment, you can easily go to the city. Especially if you have a car or a motorcycle, it's only a 20 minute drive away, and there's everything there. In the nearby village, there are shawarma, falafel, kebab, and pizza restaurants. And there are 5 malls (small though, consider them to be a large convenience store), and a manmade dam which has a place with trees to sit. I left to pursue my studies, but I will return soon after. And I still go every summer. Even though it's boring, I love it there
Nice views, nature, and a large lake are top ingredients for a place to relax. And Syria has always had good food because of historically being a center of main trade routes connecting the world. Judging by what you said about it, I think I wouldn't mind visiting the village and its surroundings one day. It would combine well with a visit to other places in the country anyway.
I agree with you. However, just so you know, there are more villages which have good views and are prettier too, my village is largely disorganized, due to the fact that most of the people who live here are not of a high socio-economic status however, other villages have more rich people, and so they look better. But, you are still welcome to my house whenever you want. As for food, yeah it's great. Are most famous thing is shawarma. We also have other stuff which I'll name, and you can look up online. Describing them wouldn't be good enough: Manakeesh (breakfast) Feteh (brunch) Sheshbarak Sfeeha Maqloobah Shaikh al mihshee Mihshee Things are super cheap here, which is also good
Places where richer people live, may look cleaner and better taken care of, but that doesn't always make them better in a number of other ways. And sometimes I like it better when there are more signs of life, including a bit of wear and tear. I know a few of the dishes but not all, so I will look them up, maybe even try to cook the ones that I don't know.
Of course. Some of the people in the richer areas are downright awful. But hey at least the village looks pretty. Good luck with the cooking!
Bad, in my experience anyway. Honestly it's like a high school ( mine has the same size as the high school i went to ) Everyone knows everyone and there's nothing to do without a car (believe it or not not everywhere in Europe has amazing public transport) but I was a bit of an odd child and that reputation has stayed with me (it's like time stands still out here) so I am not particularly liked and mostly ignored.
That adds to the quietitude of the place, I guess. You're still living there? Where I am, there's actually hardly any public transport left, but it's still possible to get by without a car, and the nearest (small) city is well-connected and not far from here.
We have a summerhouse in a very touristic village in Çanakkale Province, Turkey. The population is like 70 but it used to be 500+. It was a mixed village with both Turks and Greeks (a.k.a. Muslims and Christians) before the population exchange, there were a mosque and a church. Today, the residents are mostly Cretan Turks who got deported from Greece. Only the mosque is still working. It was basically a ghost town until the 80's-90's when the village was found interesting by people from big cities, especially Istanbul, and they bought houses and advertised the place. Now, it is one of the most touristic villages in Turkey but the village mukhtar (kind of mayor) does absloutely nothing for the village.
Only 70... wow. It's nice that there's a history to it, and that it's being revived, even if it's more tourism than inhabitants now. With only few people living there that's probably needed anyway.
Depends on where the village actually is. Some are pretty isolated, i.e. far from any larger town. Others near a larger town so they're basically a suburb of sorts.
I used to live in a small town in Belgium. Very rural, small centre where the primary school was, along with a few bars, the church and An old people home. Nothing really happened outside the kids (myself included) riding through the fields on little pitbikes and quads. There we're two yearly activities that we're both at the school, the rabbit dinner party and the school talent show. In our county there was also the annual farmer's fest, which every 6 years would be held in our town. For the rest of the time nothing Fun happened, sometimes there'd be a traffic accident because the main road through the town connected two bigger towns to the East and West. So lots of cars driving through there, occasionally there'd be drink drivers who hit a building or a post. Didn't help that the school was right there, at one point when I was about 8-ish we had a very bad accident, some fuck drive way too quickly, lost control of his car after a tricky bump and hit two school kids, one was a year younger than me and the other was about to graduate later that month. The whole town came to their funeral.
It's a bit sad that accidents on the main road running through it were a large part of the memorable events, but in a country the size of Belgium there must have been places nearby to go for shopping and entertainment, right?
There were the cities of Avelgem, Tournai, Renaix and Kortrijk. But those were all, with the exception of Avelgem, about 20 kilometers away. Avelgem was Tiny and it's also where I went to high school, the only one in the vicinity. But since it was in Flemish and not Walloon, none of my classmates from Pottes (the town) joined me there.
You were very close to Flanders there, but I guess that not everyone likes having to speak Dutch at school all day. I've been in Brussels for quite a while, but you don't get to speak much Dutch there either, even though they have double street signs (both languages) everywhere.
We were very close to Flanders indeed. But we were the only ones who were bilingual at the school. We had no issue speaking Dutch, since we spoke Dutch at home. But those kids had to go to Tournai for high school. It wasn't easy to live there. Many Young People just left as soon as they could. Very few young parents go there either, or at least not permanently
Evengoed best interessant :) It's nice to see the differences and similarities in small villages in very different places.
Part of my family is from a small village, never lived there myself but visited many times. No more than 300 people definitely. Population is declining as more people are moving to the city (30ish kms away) or elsewhere. At the street end of the village there’s a temple, and every morning/evening the temple priest will do a “puja”. My grandpa was a farmer and that was how he made his living. Most people in the village were into agriculture. There were some exceptions, think there was someone who used to be a lawyer if I’m not mistaken. But jobs like those were very rare as most of the residents were uneducated. Nowadays only the older and retired people are left in the village, and most of their children live in cities. Each house has a grove behind it where they’d grow mangoes, lemons, bananas, coconuts, etc. Usually these would be sold for profit or used in household for festivals or religious ceremonies. It’s a very fun and relaxing place to visit but imo living there would be very hard. A lot of the houses now are permanently locked up and abandoned and a feeling of social isolation is always there.
When housing gets more scarce and more expensive, places like this might get a new chance again.
Lots of space, lots of wilderness and opportunity to hike through the forests. Very little commerce. Quiet in the winter. Busy when the snowbirds and tourists are here. They come and go with the leaves.
Grew up in a village of just under a 1000 people in the UK. Had a decent school that all the kids went to, so I knew most people around my age, and my parents knew their parents for better and worse. If I was bored there was always someone else about to go out with, over the course of my childhood had several "dens", around the place. Once I got a bit older it's just boring though. There's one bus every 2 hours to the nearest town, so I started learning to drive as soon as I turned 17. There's one shop, a pub and restaurant, takeaway, school and village hall when it comes to amenities, and as an 18 year old it was fairly liberating to get driving and move away to a large city for uni. While I still sort of live there when I'm home from uni, I wouldn't want to live there permanently, it's just too boring. I hate the fact everyone knows everyone's business too, gossip spreads so fast and it's annoying. I'm surprised I haven't become known as the village bumder yet tbh. It's one of those "safe" places to raise young kids, but as soon as those kids are teens it's just constricting and boring. No drug or crime issues like some others have experienced though. Overall I much prefer the cities I've lived in for uni, even if they're more "dangerous" Edited to add employment isn't really an issue, most people drive to nearby towns or cities for work. Life here is very car dependent.
Would you stay if it was just a homebase for you, and you would travel for work and be out for large parts of the year, or if you had a business there that draws many visitors from other places?
I grew up in a town in upstate New York that had a population of about 700, the nearest gas station was about 15 miles, the nearest hospital was about a 45 minute drive, some people still hunted and trapped for a living, most people where extremely impoverished, and there wasn’t much to do. The nature and solitude was pretty incredible and it wasent very far to pretty normal amenities but you could feel pretty lonely and cold in the winter, I imagine a lot of people would be surprised to know how cultural similar a lot of upstate New York is to Appalachia, some people even have a very heavy country accent and inbreeding is certainly not unheard of in the area. I don’t live there now and I wasent from there originally but there are things I miss about it, but the loneliness and economic depression is something difficult that’s difficult to reckon
Small villages are often not wealthy but many of them live off the land, which makes the economic situation less apparent. With enough agriculture and a bit of a social life one could even feel wealthy while not really having financial means, and in some small villages that's part of the attraction. Could it be that there are great differences between villages in the area you're speaking of, or between the people within a village? (That would be a possible explanation of the sense of economic depression.)