OK, so you drive a 150k car in Japan yet decide to visit Spain on a 3.5k monthly budget, in order to try the night buses, cheap accommodation, and dodgy areas you obviously enjoy so much. Lots of weird input on this thread, I didn´t pick up yet on Spain not knowing about 1 day delivery, but it is another one of your wild claims, Amazon Prime works fine in Madrid. As of French highway fees, they are the same for the locals, but sure it adds up to oone's journey.
Owning a large house and having money doesn't automatically make me squander nor narrow me to a small plot of so-called posh area within a geographically large country that you square yourself into. I could as well have spent a year in la moraleja and trick myself into believing it is a cross-section representative of spain. I like getting out of my social class and to feel what's it is like in social classes 1-2 below to get a sense of what a society is like, which in spain turned out to be ugly. maybe you enjoy boxing yourself inside your class. You can as well live in the most posh expat condo in nigeria and say it is a safe country, or live in a penthouse in beverly hills and claim there are not many non-whites in LA. You like spain so much yet don't seem to be willing to get out of that little madrid enclave nor to be involved in public systems such as education that supermajority of the population rely on. Anyways, there is almost one generation difference, so what i expect is different from you. I like technology, intellectuals, social mobility, all too little to be found in spain. And yes, my travel budget is around 3-5k/mth which hasn't changed for many years despite my wealth has grown 10x, as i see most of the luxury hotel blah blah as noise
Sure, you had to look in the woods 30kms outside Madrid to find a detached house, but that was part of your curiosity towards the lower rungs of society, not a budget issue, interesting. Besides we saw how your open mindedness came out through your observations in Spain. And you are losing it, trying to lecture a South European (at most 10 y older than you it seems) who grew up in similar areas and through various social classes on how little idea he has of life there (not that I find poor areas any attractive ) But thank you for your input on Spain, it is most realistic. Good luck with emerging Asia, it is also clear you haven´t checked much into the non expat area there, maybe the lower hotel rates helped getting you rid of your curiousness of how the prols lived there. You should look into a mirror while mentioning Nigeria and feeling safer in an expat hotel, plus congratulation on your intelectual capacities if you see similar risk levels in Spain than in Nigeria. Next time you are in Spain, don´t be afraid of how you are gonna fill the tank while back in Japan and rent a car or hire a driver ( mydaytrip.com works fine in Spain for long distance travel ime)- but avoid the night buses. At you age, you could have known that much. Btw Spain is one of the countries in Europe with least students going into public education (68% according to the link below), but than, by now, we´ve understood how reliable your input on Europe is. https://www.eldiario.es/sociedad/Espana-Europa-escuela-publica-concertada_0_618388327.html
least % of students is still supermajority of population in public systems otherwise it wouldn't be called public. and a reflection of locals distrusting the public systems. I never said I liked emerging Asia, I only mentioned the small-open economies like HK, Singapore. But yes I would choose EM asia over spain if I must for the growth and potential. China is a different and contradictory play, despite being anti-china, I like the growth-at-all-cost atmosphere and ambitions of its people. 10 years later, I must say something very different
Nah, you mentioned Malaysia (I´ve been there many times) below and Thailand (spent years there) in another post. And now mainland China (spent years there, horrible country) . Good luck with the elusive Mini Musk in those pure and beautiful urban landscapes... 68% being a supe rmajority is a personal judgement, I wouldn´t touch public schools in Europe in poor areas but would mind way less in wealthy districts (again many top schools are public where I´m from and I´d avoid poor areas altogether to live in). But you don´t need to appear even dummer than you are suggesting my english speaking kids should go into spanish public education, nor meaning I´ve been defending the spanish public service (incidentally my exerience with the private sector is overall better than yours), you are all over the place now. Try to take your bicycle and go for a ride. Imaginary Panameras are cool, but going for a ride in them might not quite do the trick.
Uh, public education means it is paid for by public funds, not that the majority of the population studies there. In the same link I posted above, you could have noticed less than half of pupils frequent public schools in Belgium, https://www.eldiario.es/sociedad/Espana-Europa-escuela-publica-concertada_0_618388327.html
I mentioned Malaysia and Thailand not because I find them better than spain and of course they are not. I mentioned them because I see ambitions in their people and there are good schools in KL that feed into oxbridge. Put it this way, one very important criterion for me is how easy it is in a city to find hungry and sharp young people wanting to quit their jobs and start companies. Despite not liking to live in china and EM asia, I find them good in that one criterion. In HK, Tky and SG, you find a boatload easily. I will live in Singapore in H2 2020 btw. Also, I went to spain after attending a fintech conference in LA and saw many people fishing for a living which I initially thought was a joke in today's world, i am not talking about commercial boats with radars etc but small little boats and completely manual fishing. I also imagine how my life would be like if I hypothetically started my career in a city/country, and my simulated result in spain gave me an ugly output. I started with a healthy body, decent undergrad degree, and above-average ambition, and DM asia gave me a platform to be a millionaire in early 30s; i imagine it could be much better if i started in the west coast or london, but still can't complain, i highly doubt the probability would be meaningful in southern europe and all spanish colleges are shits to begin with (i attended an english-speaking monetary economics seminar in whatever Juan Madrid university, the professor was full of shits) and please don't google some el mundo news saying there are top colleges in spain
Went to the Porsche dealership in Madrid a few days back when looking for a car and Panameras in exhibition were around 150k indeed (i needed a car fast, so something they had in stock). Cars there carry a lot of options usually. In China it is more expensive. Noteworthy is the guy let me leave the garage with a Porsche Cayenne for a 24h test drive (120k, again lots of options). I´m happy now stock market was bad those days (it doesn´t change much in the grand scheme of things as I mostly buy and hold now but I´m still much keener to spend when the portfolio value is going up) and I ended buying a cheap family oriented SUV, in which trunk the boy's bike fits easily (lost quite a bit on 150k usd Model X in China, nice car but I drove it maybe 1500kms per year- driving quite a bit more in Spain as it is neither that congested nor unbearable to drive among locals. will probably need to buy a new car soon though, but would rather Mrs get her residence permit appointment first Saying you enjoy high end cars but don´t mind flying eco or travelling in night buses nor care about hotel quality doesn´t make much sense though, especially if you dislike the experience. A piece of advice would be wait to make money to buy expensive cars and start travelling in ways that won´t feel so miserable. 80kusd for a 7000km Panamera sounds very cheap, I d need to check the prices in Japan, in Spain the not too old second hand Panameras I saw were over 100kEur Besides I wouldn´t argue much with what you wrote above ( Spain has had top ranked MBAs for years although no top university) but that´s different from the ravings you posted earlier https://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/mba-rankings/global/2019
i have one but never said I 'enjoy' highend cars. Porsche is one noise somehow slipped into my life and not finding it much different than my old mazda. never said money sucks but see it as augmenting options rather than narrowing myself to luxury. Was considering cayenne but by chance got a panamera and now regretting as not working well for snowboards, surfboards etc. my dog doesn't like it much. dude if you claim IE spain is a top school then we gotta disagree with everything in life, I do know a few dumb friends that attended IE etc