Hi, there…
I am here to know what cities would you choose to live and why.
I have lived in Tainan for 22 years, four and half years in Taichung county. I usually went to Taipei when I was in military service.
Im looking for a LE(espanol) partner or a foreign woman to hang out with. Everytime when I try to find someone and type some keywords, most of the matches are in northern Taiwan. What makes foreigners love to stay in northern Taiwan? The city “Tainan” is great…for example, the rent is cheaper than northern Taiwan. The house where I live now is almost 400 sq. ft.(11坪) with a bathroom, cable TV, air conditioner and Internet, it just costs me 4500NTD per month. It is always sunny in Tainan. Unlike southern Taiwan, northern Taiwan is usually rainy and cold. The food here is famous, delicious and cheap. Tainan is the first developed city in Taiwan, many historical spots and special culture. Many of my friends who live in northern Taiwan love the atmosphere in Tainan. Not that crowded, weather is good, food is cheap and delicious, convenient, people here are more friendly, the life is not that tense and busy…and so on. Honestly speaking, Taipei is really great. The most convenient city, so many choices in food, pubs, activities, studying, jobs and great net of transportation. However expenditure on rent, food, daily cost…are extremely high, maybe it’s still cheap than living in the west. I know many foreingers love traveling when they come to Taiwan…so I wanna know your opinion about Tainan or other cities in southern Taiwan and the reason why you choose the city you’re living now!
The city which lets me wanna live there is who accompanies me, FRIENDS are the most important, not because some extra benefits or convenience.
That’s my opinion. Hope I could know your profound ideas.Thanks for your reply 
I guess demand (more job offers) and convenience (for those that have a choice).
In Taipei we have:
More job opportunities
Ease of public transportation
Proximity to airport
Proximity to pseudo-embassies/government facilities
Large expat community
Availability of goods from home
High concentration of Mandarin and English speakers (as opposed to Taiwanese)
That said, a number of our Forumosa expats choose to live in Tainan and love it there. I don’t blame them…it’s a beautiful city.
I didn’t realize at first this was in the Living in Taiwan thread and intended to say Aspen or Boulder or Honolulu or Zurich or Munich or Stockholm or even San Diego or something like that.
But, given that we’re restricted to Taiwan I’d list Hualien or Taichung if they had big international companies with appropriate work for me, though in Hualien my daughter and I might grow very tired of all the pointing and staring that we’ve encountered when we visited there in the past.
Jobwise, however, I’ve got no other choice in Taiwan but Taipei. That’s ok, though, I’m satisfied here for now.
[quote=“Mother Theresa”]I didn’t realize at first this was in the Living in Taiwan thread and intended to say Aspen or Boulder or Honolulu or Zurich or Munich or Stockholm or even San Diego or something like that.
But, given that we’re restricted to Taiwan I’d list Hualian or Taichung if they had big international companies with appropriate work for me, though in Hualian my daughter and I might grow very tired of all the pointing and staring that we’ve encountered when we visited there in the past.
Jobwise, however, I’ve got no other choice in Taiwan but Taipei. That’s ok, though, I’m satisfied here for now.[/quote]
Yeah, outside Taiwan I wouldn’t mind Melbourne or Adelaide (Australia), or Christchurch (New Zealand).
In Taiwan, Tainan is great. Apart from Tainan I wouldn’t mind moving to Pingtung and living the country life for a while.
I lived in Chiayi county for a long time, and came to hate it. It was cheap living, but it was hot, polluted and most of the foreigners there lived only to get drunk and stoned. There were constant problems making myself understood and I was an oddity because I was a foreigner. Not a person, but an object to be gawked at and commented upon.
Now I’m in Hsinchu, which has many of the conveniences of Taipei at a fraction of the price. There are mountains, beaches and nice cycling paths. The public transportation sucks, but you can almost always find parking with a scooter (a few blocks away if you’re in a car). I don’t get a second glance on the street most of the time (feel the bliss) and if I want to eat western food or go to a movie at a clean theatre, it’s easy! Most of the parks are okayish, too.
The selling point is the almost-unknown beach where I can take my dogs to run and usually never see another soul. Oh, and you can access BOTH highways (1 and 3) easily!
If not for the “staring factor” mentioned above and the “bliksemmed by almost every typhoon that hits Taiwan factor”, I’d go for Hualien.
I like Puli.
Wine, women & water.
[quote=“nemesis”]
Now I’m in Hsinchu (Xinzhu), which has many of the conveniences of Taipei at a fraction of the price. [/quote]
I rather liked Hsinchu when I visited it, it’s nice to know it would be decent place to live.
[quote=“naijeru”][quote=“nemesis”]
Now I’m in Hsinchu (Xinzhu) (Xinzhu), which has many of the conveniences of Taipei at a fraction of the price. [/quote]
I rather liked Hsinchu (Xinzhu) when I visited it, it’s nice to know it would be decent place to live.[/quote]
I applied for work in Hsinchu a few years back and it seemed decent enough, and my wife got all excited about Hsinchu after talking with a friend, but I had lunch with a Taiwanese guy on Tuesday who lives in Hsinchu and he would love to move out of there. He says Hsinchu’s a good place for work, but Taipei’s 1000 times better for living (more to do). He also disputed my impression that the air must be cleaner in Hsinchu. Not at all, he said. All those companies put lots of chemicals in the air, he said. They’ve got scrubbers and filters, etc., but there’s still lots of noxious gases in the air.
Anyway, that was just one Hsinchu resident’s opinion, but it was an interesting counterpoint to what my wife and others had said.
I have found that I get stared at much less these days in Hualien. It was pretty bad when I first got here but unless I’m putting around on a bicycle in Jian or Shoufeng, Hualien City has progressed quite a bit in terms of the gawking factor.
Good points. I’ve travelled around a lot of Taiwan and I really agree about it being cheaper and the weather being better. But there are a few issues about living in south Taiwan that makes it not so comfortable as northern Taiwan for many foreigners. A major problem is the staring and shouts about adoah etc. I mean unless you are strong minded or like the attention that stuff that really can make life uncomfortable after a while. That is not welcoming to me! I
But in Taipei we don’t really have to deal with that issue. We can just ‘mostly’ go about our lives with indifference.
Because it’s mainly Taiwanese speaking a lot of foreigners would have more difficulty communicating. Another issue would be it’s farther from the airport. Plus I imagine it has few foreign style pubs and restaurants (I could be wrong). Taipei has a large number of foreigners and foreigners tend to hang out with foreigners and it create a bigger core of things that foreigners like to do and places foreigners like to go , perhaps a little more varied lifestyle.
To be honest I don’t know Tainan well, I’ve been there a few times and it looked messy and dirty like most Taiwanese cities. It has air pollution problems. It also doesn’t have any subway system. It doesn’t have many parks (I guess) I know it has more old buildings etc., but they are not so obvious. It’s not really got something to attract foreigners to live there. Plus the pay is probably less for many jobs there.
What I liked about Tainan was Tainan County, Anping , the wide open country fields, more tropical feeling, it’s nice, plus it’s closer to Kenting, Alishan, Yushan area.