Help me with a very anxious friend, please...

[stilettoed]

A friend is looking to relocate to the UK for two to three years, possibly longer (she's been offered a job transfer from her overseas office). She lives in a beautiful and pretty safe city at the moment and she came to the UK for a recce of places to live over the summer (her only criteria was one hour or so to London each way). She tells me that, having agreed the transfer, she's now getting cold feet as she couldn't find anywhere in the UK that is:

• Beautiful/scenic
• Close to a buzzy and attractive town for cafes and restaurants etc
• Safe
• Has good/great schools (she can afford private but if they stay long-term her toddler might need state school)
• Good range of kids' activities
• Isn't overrun with oiks and antisocial behaviour during the evenings/at weekends.

That last point is very important to her as she says that when she visited all these places she had been told were charming (Richmond, Guildford/Oxford/Cambridge/York etc etc) she was shocked at the number of rowdy teens and adults she encountered, vaping and cussing and generally being intimidating especially after daylight hours.

Of course the drinking culture in the UK is terrible and I can see why someone from a place that doesn't have this would be concerned, especially as she has a tween and a teen who have some independence where they live at the moment. My question is, is this in every British town and city? Is there no place that is still charming and welcoming and not overrun with marauding drunks and vapers and County Lines drug dealers? I'd like to reassure my friend...

Cambridge is pretty OK, quite happily let my teen go out there. Ely might tick alot of her boxes and Cambridge is close by train if want a bit more of a busy evening.

Why reassure her? Her observations are very accurate, and she’s be mad to move to here at this point in time.

Absolutely she's correct - the U.K. is full of oiks which totally comes as a shock after living in other parts of the world.

She'll also be shocked by other aspects of the country right now I expect - it's pretty desperate right now. I wouldn't move if I was her.

Unless she is coming as an expat, so free car, housing, schooling, tell her not to bother.

Also to note. There’s a massive recession coming. Better to weather that in your home country than a foreign one. She could easily lose her job.

Where is she coming from? I feel this is relevant….

@WhoopItUp she's coming from the Boston area in the US

I spend a not insignificant amount of my time wondering how I can leave this island. If a friend of mine was contemplating moving here, unless their current situation was truly grim,; my only advice would be; run like the fucking wind.

Isn't overrun with oiks and antisocial behaviour during the evenings/at weekends.

Where I live isn't overrun by people like this, but I live in a village several hours from London.

I would stay in Boston if I were her.

Ive always thought Richmond was nice? What about Godalming? I think it sounds like a great opportunity for her, at least coming from Boston she will be used to an urban setting.

Don’t she will find anywhere safer than some of the places she has already discounted like Guildford. If she’s that anxious she should stay home

Doubt not Don’t.

Tell her the kind of guaranteed sanitised ‘burb she’s looking for doesn’t exist.

And to be honest, if she’s that shocked by ‘vaping and cussing’, I think she should stay in Narnia suburban Massachusetts.

She’s coming from the US and she thinks the UK is unsafe? I’ve lived in both and I know where I’d rather live.
also economically prices are still way cheaper here. Even with the shit pound.

I think she’s already been to very sanitised places. I can’t think of anywhere that’s more safe in the evenings. Even suburbia has antisocial teens in the parks.

It doesn't sound like she likes London and it's surrounding area very much. Not sure what she is looking for exists. I think she had better stay in Boston. She has discounted, in my opinion, several safe and aspirational places to live.

Don't take on the responsibility of selling the UK to her. She sounds like a difficult person for a start but even without that you are setting yourself up for disaster.

I lived in Boston for a year and KNEW she would be from there!
Tell her not to come. I remember a wedding being stopped by the police for "overcelebrating" and I realised what a culture clash was.
She will never like it. Bostonians are some of the world's most puritanical people. Good and bad comes with that but they will never fit in the UK

That's just how the drinking culture is here. Pretty much any town on a Friday or Saturday night especially will have drunks. I had some friends over from Switzerland and they couldn't believe the way people behaved. They were literally wide eyed when we went out one evening. It's terrible and shameful and yet most people here seem to think it's perfectly normal. I can't think of anywhere in the UK that won't have drunks and yobs. I just avoid it by avoiding weekend evenings in busy places with lots of bars. It's possible to find quiet areas of most towns that aren't overrun with drinkers. Can your friend do that? It's either that or just don't move here (and who can blame her!).

I've lived in several of those places and grew up in Richmond. While there are often 'youths' out at the weekend in the evening, the rest of the time it's a lovely place to live. If she doesn't like it in those cities/towns, she's not going to find anything that suits.

Why are you taking on the role of selling it to her?

Much much less gun crime here.

Err I've just come back from Boston and while very lovely it was absolutely full of people off their tits on weed and bloody stank of it as it's legal there.

No point moving here if she wants to live in some sanitised bubble of perfection. Sure she could go to Tunbridge Wells and try to avoid any vaping oiks that stray in, but really, why bother? I'm all for safe and scenic, but you don't genuinely get buzzy unless there's a mix of people and it's the real world she'd have to live in, not a chocolate box cover. Might as well stay put.