AIBU - living in England completely insufferable?

[hellosunshine5]

As per the title really, I loved living here for a few years but I now just find the whole country completely insufferable.

Does anyone else feel the same?

For what it’s worth, I’m English and was born here to English parents who then emigrated to NZ when I was 8. Lived over there until I returned to England when I was 20 to get to know my extended family and have an adventure etc. I ended up meeting someone and settling - South East for reference.

Fast forward 7 years and I am really struggling to tolerate life here any longer. I’m making plans to leave, but they’re obviously on hold for the foreseeable.

My reasons?

• I work hard in a fairly well paid job that I commute to in London, but I can still only reasonably afford to live in a tiny one bedroom apartment with no outside space. I see my friends from back home in similar financial situations buying 4 bedroom new build family homes with massive gardens.

• England is over crowded. I find it unbearable to have to circle my local supermarket car park multiple times (whatever time of the day) to find a space. Such simple things in life shouldn’t be so difficult.

• I hate the competitiveness of life over here. Everyone trying to have the newest car, the best holidays, the nicest house, the best schools for their kids, even if they can’t actually afford it. I think people elsewhere in the world are much more humble and happy with their lot.

So, AIBU? Are you genuinely happy living here? Appreciate it’s a difficult question for those that have never lived elsewhere.

I lived in London and the south east for many years, it is pretty grim. But not insufferable, that would be living in Syria.

However after a couple of years of the London thing I moved to Edinburgh. Gradually over the past 20 years my whole family have also moved up. Life is more chill, commutes are shorter and less crowded, houses are cheaper.

I could say the same for many places outside the south east bubble.

@catsjammies

**Hunny you can get to fuck with your last comment!!! NZ and Australia have some of the oldest and richest cultural histories in the world. It's just not white history. It was the white people who turned up and fucked everything.

Fuck you and your imperialist attitude**

You absolute 🤡 😂 wth has NZ or Australia contributed to history over the last few hundred years in comparison to Britain, you divvy!!

You aren’t being unreasonable at all. I am similar to you. Lived in NZ from age 9 and then spent 10 years in the Uk as an adult. I hated being there and didn’t get on with the culture at all. Back in NZ now and so so glad we made the move to Welly.
Everyone is different though and it’s not wrong to like different lifestyles. It sounds like you could be better off making a move back home.

Yes, pay your taxes on the way out. Most NZ’s don’t.

As per the title really, I loved living here for a few years but I now just find the whole country completely insufferable

The whole country? Have you lived and worked elsewhere in England?

England is over crowded

London is overcrowded, as are all of our cities, but you don’t have to live in a city.

Everyone trying to have the newest car, the best holidays, the nicest house, the best schools for their kids,

No they aren’t . You need new friends. I don’t have competitive arseholes for friends. Maybe I have a better arsehole radar than you do.

I have lived and worked in 3 cities in England, and London was by far my least favourite. This is the view near my house

What are employment prospects and salaries like outside of the SE? Most of my family are 'north of the Watford Gap' but secure employment paying enough for one of the oft mentioned larger homes than London is not as easy as 'just move then'. My brother and his wife both work FT. Can't afford to move from their tiny house. It's not as simple as 'it's a London problem'.

I get where you're coming from OP. The UK has changed a lot over the last 10 years and not for the better.

There are definitely more people willing to say 'just fuck off somewhere else then' rather than consider the points you have to make for a start. The superiority complex becomes weirder and more deluded by the day. But no need for self-reflection when you can just tell someone to fk off somewhere else.

Christ reading some of the responses on here you’re hardly painting English people in a flattering light.

bye then

Britain has no industry. We make very little and I don’t see that changing any time soon.
House prices are ridiculous and public transport is a joke. Sadly our buses and trains were all privatised, hence why they are so expensive. Look at the price of a train ticket.
We’ve had Tory governments obsessed with privatisation and down sizing our public services including our Armed Forces. At one point, Cameron even wanted to sell our national parks.
Also then Uk is full of angry little bald men in white vans, the main offenders of road rage.

I live in the south west of England and love it here and came from near london. We moved away 12 years ago and would never move back ever to near london

London is the greatest city on earth but only if you have cash to spend

I think about half of the posts on this thread unwittingly are proving @hellosunshine5‘s point about the current nastiness in the U.K.

@ThrowbackMagic
YANBU. I moved back here a few years ago after living away for a few years and found it utterly grim. I’m more acclimatised now, but will leave again when I get chance.

I dislike:

-The passive-aggressive politeness strategy
- The small-minded insularity
- The deluded sense of British exceptionalism
- The weird way the Brits have of making everything difficult and hard work. Like tying their feet together and trying to hop and then getting embarrassed and apologising for being shit at hopping
- The general grimness

There are things I like as well, but there are better places.

This right here. I wholly second this. I also dislike the deliberate ignorance of cultures that a lot of British people have. I also hate the rush to insult somebody that’s so prevalent in the UK, especially if you perceive them to be “better” than you or better off. The constant inverted snobbery. That coupled with a distinct lack of imagination in terms of understanding other people. I was talking to my husband about this a couple days ago. There seems to be a prevailing attitude in the UK of “That’s never happened to me or I’ve never heard of it so it can’t be real.” This is one of the reasons serious political and social issues like racism in the UK can’t or won’t be addressed.

Speaking of which... holy crap @Hunnybears you’re bloody racist.

Are you sure it's the whole country you are finding insufferable or just the people you are meeting where you live and work, close to London.

The things that you are describing are not a part of my life, or anyone I know.

So maybe go back to New Zealand?

Not being sarky. Seems the obvious solution.

The things that you are describing are not a part of my life, or anyone I know.
Nor part of mine in Zone 2 London

I get it. I'm British but lived in the US for 20 years. We moved back 2 years ago as I felt the US was a hard place to be happy with guns and Trump and racism (I was in the South). I feel foreign here now after being gone so long. I get irritated by the rubbish everywhere, poor service, crap restaurants etc...but love being back close to family. I do look at Brits differently now. I am equally appalled by the politics here etc. I hate being paid half what I was in the US for the same job! Would I go back? No. Will we stay in the UK? Only till our children leave school. They by the way love the independence they have here compared to the USA.

Living abroad is a curse and a privilege.

OP you can have whatever opinion you want about your preference for a place to live.

Mumsnet loves a London bash doesn't it. London is beautiful too.

You absolute 🤡 😂 wth has NZ or Australia contributed to history over the last few hundred years in comparison to Britain, you divvy!!

Australian scientists have developed or helped to develop: the first pacemaker, Cochlear implants, penicillin, ultrasound machines and cervical cancer vaccines. None of which I knew, but found out in a two minute Google. Which is what I would suggest you do before you make yourself look foolish next time. (I couldn't be arsed to look up NZ's contributions to humankind, I'm sure you can google that too).

London is the greatest city on earth but only if you have cash to spend

Auckland is WAY more expensive than London - there are fewer ways to be smart and cut costs, and the tiny population and distance from everywhere mean a lack of choice/competition and high prices.

In Auckland we have to run two cars because there is no public transport.
Rates are more expensive than council tax
Income tax is about the same but we have to pay for healthcare (although it is subsidised)
Most houses have no gas and electricity is much more expensive than in the UK
Our weekly shopping bill (Lidl) in London was £100, here it is £200-250
Buildings/contents insurance London £400pa NZ £1200pa
We sold a 5 bed in London for £840k and bought a 5 bed in Auckland for £960k

Could you get this for 300k in the uk ! www.trademe.co.nz/a/property/residential/sale/listing/2433210870?bof=oeEq69hc

People just get very defensive about where they live. It seems to be human nature, no matter what country it is.

It's like

Fuckin' tories, fuckin' tearing apart the NHS, Boris the bloody wanker can do one! Totally fucked up the Covid response, now all my degenerate scum neighbours are having BBQs and treating ths whole thing like a holdiay! And don't get me started on Brexit. Bloody' brexiteer/remoaner tossers, stupid racists/liberal loons the lot of them, fuck this country it's all a load of bolloc–what's that you just said? The supermarket carparks are too full? Fuck off to another country then! This is Great Britain, the clue's in the name! We're all lovely people and this country is truly wonderful! Won't have a bad word said about it! You just need to visit my lovely village where you'll be greeted with a nice slice of lemon drizzle cake and we can appreciate our great nation's four beautiful and well-defined seasons!

@twelvemonkeys exactly! 😂

I too find it insufferable, but not because of the reasons you describe - those are SE specific! I'm on the outskirts of the lake district. I generally hate the extreme-right culture but yet are incessant upon applauding socialist policies every week

@TwelveMonkeys