To think people are generally happier in the South of England than the North?

[TigerPath]

I've lived most of my life in the North... major cities like Manchester and Leeds, pretty Lake District towns and villages, Harrogate, York, a small town in the Dales etc... I've moved around a lot.

A few months ago we moved to the South Coast. I've noticed the people here seem so happy! They are friendly and smiley. They ask me if I need directions when I look lost, without me even approaching! They bend over backwards to help and just seem so content and positive. This includes nursery managers, Tesco staff, estate agents, taxi drivers, waitresses in pubs etc.

It's much sunnier here, in fact so bright I feel disorientated at times. The town is full of flowering trees and bushes and blossom- every street looks like a beautiful park! So maybe it's the climate. I'm used to rain and drizzle and cloud.

What do others think?

[StealthPolarBear]

From a child health post of view the best places to love are Wokingham, Richmond, Gloucester.
The worst paces are Blackpool, Middlesbrough, Knowsley, Hartlepool.
There's a clear north south divide.

[StealthPolarBear]

Thay said I live in the north east and love it. I travel to London regularly and love it too.

[Bitchqueen90]

I live in the Midlands and I've lived in the south west. Personally I'm happier where I am - money goes a lot further up here and I find the people to be friendlier! Although I'm moving to the south east in a couple of months which will be a new experience.

[StealthPolarBear]

Only place I've visited and not been keen on was Taunton. But I wasn't there long.

[limitedperiodonly]

I met you when you came down south StealthPolarBear. Do you know what? We were only pretending to like you

[bridgetoc]

The people are different up North... Is there anything worse for a person from down South to be on holiday, and be stuck in a hotel full of Northerners! You know what I mean southerners!

[bridgetoc]

I live in London now, and would not be anywhere else. I don't find the people to be miserable at all, and even if they were, I wouldn't care, because London feels like the centre of the world, and there is always something exciting to see or do!

[houseeveryweekend]

YABU i love the North! I would say that they seem to have a darker and more sarcastic sense of humour.
I lived in Cornwall for a time and i think i saw the saddest people ive ever seen there! Of course Cornwall is beautiful and there are lots of happy people there too but i think in some parts there is extreme poverty, isolation and unemployment. When i came back North it seemed like even in the most run down areas people seemed to be doing a bit better. I think alot of money has been invested in the northern cities and really in Cornwall there are still some extremely rural cut off areas.
TBF though it just depends on your experiences im sure there are happy and sad people everywhere in equal measure in the UK!!

[ShelaghTurner]

Surrey dweller here. I did come on to lightheartedly say that I thought the opposite was supposed to be true but I see it's turned into yet another SE bashing post so I won't bother. The south is bloody marvellous, wouldn't live anywhere else.

[TheSolitaryBoojum]

Perhaps the divide is more than just in people's heads, have a look at the settlement map.
www.medievalists.net/2009/05/19/the-politics-of-exile-in-early-northumbria/?utm_content=buffer06ca5&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

[Friolero]

FutureGadgetsLab "I've found home cunties people insufferable"

Well don't you sound like a delight? I'm assuming not all northerners are as unpleasant as this.

[Meeep]

I've lived all over and people are friendly everywhere!
Actually people in London might be more likely to want to make friends because so many of them are from elsewhere?

[TheSolitaryBoojum]

'Well don't you sound like a delight? I'm assuming not all northerners are as unpleasant as this.'

No, that's just robust Northern banter, telling it how it is. It only sounds rude and prejudiced...

[MargaretCavendish]

I love the way that Walliss one, admittedly unpleasant, post being nasty about the North got jumped on by lots of different people, but apparently it's fine to slag off all people from the SE.

For what it's worth, I don't think people are distinguishing between visiting and living enough. Obviously for a Southerner visiting the North the prices tend to put you in a good mood! But that's because you're getting the cheap prices on your SE wage. It also feels like there's less of a competitive busy, busy, busy feeling - which again is exactly what you want if you're away for the weekend, but unemployment is nearly twice as high in the NE as in the SE, and that's not so nice if you live there.

[TheSolitaryBoojum]

I agree. The area that I lived in in the NW years ago had a number of families with 3 generations of unemployment and less than 40% of its children stayed in education or training over 16. Many associated a southern accent with rich and patronising before they'd heard more than 'Hello'. Race relations were dreadful, and communities were very ghettoised.
5 miles up the road, it was picture-postcard pretty and holidaymakers flocked in the summer months.

[FutureGadgetsLab]

Well don't you sound like a delight? I'm assuming not all northerners are as unpleasant as this

Oh come on, there have been just as many posts insulting northerners! It's friendly rivalry.

[BeStrongAndCourageous]

I think it depends on the area. I'm from the north east, and have lived in the north west, the south west and London, before settling in a naice part of the Home Counties.

Most people where I am now are ok, but with a largish subset of miserable, snooty types with a misplaced superiority complex. Geordies general are friendly and cheerful, but a lot get aggressive when drunk.

Londoners, OTOH, may not be the most open and chatty lot, but I was never once left unaided in London when I needed it. Whether I was lost, drunk, injured - or one occasion all three - people always helped out, and I made the best friends of my life in London. I think, especially when you're young, there's a sense that "we're all in it together" and have to look out for each other, because most of us aren't "from there" and have all had those "oh shit, what now?" moments at some point.

I found New Yorkers friendly in a similar tbh.

[Dolly80]

I agree with the PP's who've said it's probably the people you meet/their personalities not the place they're from that determines happiness. I've travelled North and South and met happy people and miserable people all over. For example, I'm a Londoner and I'm happy!

That said, I travelled from London to Leicester one weekend, whilst pregnant and with a 4 year old in tow. I found people on the tube very unhelpful/unfriendly and was indignant that my fellow Londoners would be so grumpy on a Saturday... until I realised nearly everyone in the carriage had maps/cameras/tourist paraphernalia. Lesson learned - the person you meet in London (or anywhere) might not actually be from there

[MissHooliesCardigan]

Oh how original- another thread slagging off all us rude, stuck up unhelpful Londoners. I totally agree that visiting somewhere is completely different to living there. Commuters packed into a tube in rush hour are 'in a zone' and are unlikely to strike up conversations with strangers. Outside of that situation, Londoners are as friendly as anywhere else.
London is basically a series of villages with their own very distinct character- Stamford Hill is completely different to Whitechapel, Hampstead is completely different to Peckham. Within their own little parts of the capital, people are generally friendly to each other and there is definitely a sense of community. There is a park really near my son's school and, in the summer, it becomes a kind of communal garden where half the kids and parents decant after school. This park is on a massive hill with views of the London Eye, Houses of Parliament, the Shard etc and a group of locals organised a summer solstice party there last year complete with barbecues, picnics and an outdoor cinema screen. Those sort of impromptu things happen all the time.
I don't think the south is unfriendly - it just doesn't have the 'In your face' friendliness which, as an introvert, I find a bit much sometimes.
I have made literally thousands of journeys on public transport and can count on the fingers of one hand the occasions when I've seen a pregnant woman or an elderly person not be offered a seat.

[BadLad]

I have found cheerful people and miserygutses in the south and the north.

I personally was much happier living in the south.

[Shirkingfromhome]

Excellent, another north / south divide thread. Was starting to panic, it's been at least a week since the last one.

Everything is brighter, people are happier? Must be all that gold bouncing off the pavements.

[BadLad]

Its about eight hours after the latest "shoes on or off" thread, so it's on schedule.

[Abraid2]

My eldest, southern born, loves living in a historic city in Yorkshire. People talk to him, offer him taxi shares when they're waiting for buses late at night. I'm not sure he'll want to come home, tbh.

Mind you, some experience living in the north of Scotland made it clear to me that I need to be in the south for the better weather, even though the over-crowding is driving me mad.

[AgathaF]

What about people from the Midlands? Happy 3 days a week, miserable for 4? Sort of decent weather, but not as many fruit trees?

[Northumberlandlass]

The North is awful. We are really miserable, the sun never shines, we don't have any landmarks or anything of historical interest. Culturally, it is a barren wasteland & heavens, all those factories with no desolate beaches or rolling hills. I'm amazed that Northumberland has been voted the best place to raise families & for holidays in UK. What were they thinking?