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I've heard it's quite boring there yeah. Trying to figure out if they're willing to make it worth our while. This would be a maximum 4 year thing North Carolina at least had trees and rain. Total absence of mosquitoes is a huge plus though I have a high school friend who has been there for 9 years now that I reached out to and she's been quite happy but I think she is the type who is very happy living in corporate housing, stacking bills for retirement 4" rain per year is pretty bleak tho
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Apr 23, 2024 08:01
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I lived in Kuwait for half a year and by the end of that I'd had enough and I really needed to go home. Sometimes I wonder if I could do it again. I think if I'd make enough money to take a longish vacation somewhere nice every few months and still have more left over than I would at home, I could do it. I lived in the embassy where I also worked as an intern, though, so my living situation back then was nothing like what I would get as a "real" worker with real pay
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Apr 23, 2024 12:50
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If you’re adding an order of magnitude to current income, that’s where I start considering it as a DINK couple. I would not want my kid to grow up in that environment so the ME number is gone now that I have a kid. Have you spent much time in the ME? A week was enough to convince me that I really did not want to live in Dubai let alone Saudi.
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Apr 23, 2024 13:46
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Gucci Loafers posted:Are you single and comfortable with living in some fake but decent suburban community that's really corporate housing? Riyadh is like 7 million people now with 100 miles of light rail. There's a lot of new fake stuff but it's still a full size city. Dubai is just outside investors trying to build XYZ and yes I agree that is very fake. Same with Abu Dhabi next door. From what little I've seen. KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:If you’re adding an order of magnitude to current income, that’s where I start considering it as a DINK couple. Somewhere in that general direction. With a goal of significantly paying down the mortgage. KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:I would not want my kid to grow up in that environment so the ME number is gone now that I have a kid. This is a large concern for me. We just moved out of the city to a neighborhood with a very good public school district. As I understand it Riyadh has gated expat communities and expat schools so I think you can kind of dial up and down for as much uh, local flavor you want from day to day. I haven't talked up anyone who's actually lived there though so I'm just guessing based on Internet anecdotes. My friend I think lives near one of the oil fields "three hours away" so her experience isn't really comparable. Hadlock fucked around with this message at 18:47 on Apr 23, 2024 |
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Apr 23, 2024 18:43
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Hadlock posted:Riyadh is like 7 million people now with 100 miles of light rail. There's a lot of new fake stuff but it's still a full size city. Dubai is just outside investors trying to build XYZ and yes I agree that is very fake. Same with Abu Dhabi next door. From what little I've seen. I don't know your background but Riyadh is a city in the Middle East. And it's not as international as Dubai. Granted, it is still a city with tons of history but you are in incredibly different world. The only way I'd considered it is if I was in a ton of debt or made something >$150k/y+ with expenses paid.
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Apr 23, 2024 18:56
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Gucci Loafers posted:I don't know your background but Riyadh is a city in the Middle East. And it's not as international as Dubai. Granted, it is still a city with tons of history but you are in incredibly different world. The only way I'd considered it is if I was in a ton of debt or made something >$150k/y+ with expenses paid. Dude add a zero. Anyway Riyadh may be big but the number of places you will be welcome as a foreigner is quite small. I would consider Dubai at the right price or maybe Qatar but I would say hard no to Saudi. Edit: I cannot stress how much you will not be welcome outside of expat society.
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Apr 23, 2024 22:55
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I had someone tell me after a week working there that there's no amount of money he would go back there for.
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Apr 24, 2024 00:00
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A buddy of mine spent a couple years in Saudi teaching at a school that was close enough to the border of Yemen to be able to watch the ongoing battles in the war there. He left after some hardliners tossed grenades into the school he taught at because they allowed women to teach. He was on a flight the next day and has sworn off ever entering the Kingdom again. Your mileage will most assuredly vary.
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Apr 24, 2024 00:49
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Whenever I've had a short layover for a day in Doha, i couldn't quite shake a general feeling of unease. Talking to a very honest Nepalese Uber driver there didn't make me feel better. I imagine Dubai might be better, Riyadh worse?
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Apr 24, 2024 02:11
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I'm sure Riyadh is worse than Dubai but even Dubai looks pretty bad. Presumably as Americans you still get taxed on your income so... why would you do that? I am looking forward to heading to Chicago in a few weeks, my work buddies have booked us into a very nice looking restaurant https://guide.michelin.com/us/en/illinois/chicago/restaurant/alinea and my mate is opening a new Hawksmoor so I'll go to a friends + family soft opening there. I guess I should eat an Italian beef sandwich and some disgusting pizza while I'm there. Anything I'm missing?
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Apr 24, 2024 07:12
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Chicago dog, thin crust pizza, malort
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Apr 24, 2024 12:23
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knox_harrington posted:I'm sure Riyadh is worse than Dubai but even Dubai looks pretty bad. Presumably as Americans you still get taxed on your income so... why would you do that? Have some drinks atop LondonHouse, dump piss on the Trump tower building, go for a run along the lake, go to the observation deck in the Hancock building for a nice view if it’s not cloudy. E: a friend moved his family to Abu Dhabi for 4 years while he worked for the Cleveland Clinic there. Apparently they paid him very well, but they also paid for everything, so rent was paid, cars were paid and both of their son’s $25k/year schooling (each) was paid by the company. They put everything on credit cards and flew worldwide for free on points for years, going on vacations and following their kid’s international (American) football games. They’re back in the US now and from their social media posts, you can tell they miss it. Cacafuego fucked around with this message at 12:41 on Apr 24, 2024 |
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Apr 24, 2024 12:36
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Hadlock posted:Not sure where to put this I had an offer to go work there in 2017 as an instructor for the Saudi Air Force. They offered $90k and obviously the whole free housing thing. Despite being single I opted out of it, mostly because I had already spent six months in Qatar stuck on Al Udeid and figured Riyadh would have been the same. It sounded like most of the contractors working on base stayed in their base housing and didn't get out much. Also the general wisdom from anyone who was ex military was to not take a job over there if it was less than $100k. Also also I had just started a new job in Minnesota and didn't feel like burning bridges just yet, although I left that job and the state less than a year later, I'm sure I would have been just as unhappy in Saudi In more current travel news my first business related bit of travel since that deployment to Qatar in 2012 is a two night trip to... western Kansas, heck yeah
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Apr 24, 2024 12:59
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in a well actually posted:Chicago dog, thin crust pizza, malort Yup
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Apr 24, 2024 15:16
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If you’re in Chicago, go to Kumiko. Also ya have malort but do it after
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Apr 24, 2024 15:31
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I don't know what these things are but will do my best
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Apr 24, 2024 15:37
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knox_harrington posted:I don't know what these things are but will do my best You will know of Malort.
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Apr 24, 2024 21:43
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sellouts posted:If you’re in Chicago, go to Kumiko. Kumiko rules and has a great cocktail program if you can’t swing a full dinner. Enjoy Alinea! If you’re staying downtown the architecture foundation’s tour is great. Taking the train in to the loop MAY be faster than taking a cab from the airport, depending on traffic. I’d check when you land. Also, you don’t have to buy a CTA card for the buses or trains, just use any tap to pay credit card.
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Apr 25, 2024 01:02
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Just got back from Chicago and they are working on the express lanes of the Kennedy so the blue line is faster in from the airport basically 100% of the time.
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Apr 25, 2024 01:57
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