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If a Clojure developer from the UK wanted to relocate to the EU, what places (counties, cities, towns, rural) would be nice to live and work? A nice place could have some of the following • a willingness to have people migrate from the UK (no excessive restrictions especially on age, although visa and local registration is expected) • cycle friendly and efficient public transportation (bike friendly preferably), ideally with cycling clubs or cycling as a common activity • public health service usable by immigrants • reasonably priced housing / renting options • green areas to live in where you can still get okay broadband • companies providing energy from 100% renewable sources (wind, hydro, tidal, solar, green gas) • support for learning the local language (e.g. a helpful expat community or night schools) • companies in the region using Clojure at least in part of what they do (or companies happy with remote working) • a Clojure community (or interest in having one) Any other interesting characters of the location or social dynamics are of interest. Please reply as a thread so suggestions are not missed. Thank you
I can't say it ticks all the boxes but Copenhagen ticks a lot of them. No idea about immigration issues though :(
A whole bunch of Clojure developers I'm Berlin and companies with Clojure jobs ans remote options. Lot of my colleagues migrated from non-EU to Berlin, seems doable 😉 All if you like living in a huge city. (Caveat: I don't live there).
Copenhagen also has bunch Clojure devs, been there for a project a couple of times over some years. Cycling is great there, bet no mountains 😱 😛 (maybe ask @reefersleep if considering that town)
Oslo, where I live, ticks many of the boxes (but certainly not the one about reasonably priced housing). Small, but welcoming and active Clojure community here. I don’t know about immigration from UK after Brexit, you could check with your embassy here, maybe. I’d be willing to hop on a call to give you a realistic sales pitch for Norway if you’re interested.
Copenhagen is built for cycling, lots of wide cycling lanes and biking is generally faster than public transportation (which is also pretty good, though!), but it also has a lot of people who don’t know how to behave on the road - perhaps because it’s built for cycling? So people don’t get a driver’s license and are not forced to learn any rules or conventions of traffic. Also, lots of expats/foreigners, and I guess cultural differences also account for clashing behaviour in traffic sometimes 😛 I’ve never looked, but it would be weird if there weren’t cycling clubs. But, as for biking as transportation, that’s the norm. I don’t live in CPH anymore, btw. You should be able to find Danish tutoring/night schools easily, I personally know people who’ve learnt Danish after moving. • reasonably priced housing / renting options Heh. It’s really tough to find a place to live in CPH, and things are getting more expensive all the time. Don’t know if it gets easier as you move farther away from the city. There’s a small Clojure community. The slack channel is pretty dead, #copenhagen-clojurians , and I don’t know the IRL status, as its been years since I met up with them. • green areas to live in where you can still get okay broadband Ah, so we’re talking out of the city. idk 😕 I think broadband is generally fine in Denmark, but I’ve always been envious of Sweden and their fiber (and low pings when I played Q3 😄 ) Dno about immigration currently. All in all, CPH is nice, I think. I just want to go live in the country, far away from people and noise, so it’s not for me anymore.
Sorry if that was a bit rambly. It’ll be interesting to follow your adventure, wherever it takes you!
I love Copenhagen! Lived there a few years ago. It’s among the best places in the world for cyclists. But living is expensive there, as well.
I migrated from Amsterdam to Aarhus :flag-dk: last year. So far it’s been great: Aarhus hits the sweet spot for me in terms of ‘city-ness’: lively but not crowded and the nearby lakes/forests/beaches form an easy escape. I cycle a lot (~170k/week) and was pleasantly surprised by the hills here (ie 800hm in 85k). The scenary is simply stunning; level ‘WinXP wallpaper’. I believe there are quite some options wrt training-groups, haven’t checked them though. Government seems to not shun vision (as the Dutch these days), and apply that to the energy transition (among other things) see e.g. ^1 (not that they haven’t done anything yet ^2). Immigration process was painless (coming from EU that is), as was starting a business: all done online. Lot of official resources online ^3, ^4. Free healthcare is included once you get your citizen-card. Language classes are free within 3 years of arrival (Danish is my new fav language, no pesky parentheses 😜). Though getting around without Danish is absolutely fine as everyone speaks English. Had a chat recently with some Clojure developers from gomore - they used to organize the local meetup. Maybe we can bootstrap it again. Housing is expensive but not as crazy as CPH I heard (coming from an already very expensive city helped in this sense), but looking at the amount of cranes visible they’re working on this :) Happy to chat if you have questions @U05254DQM [1]: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=danmark+kan+mere&ia=web [2]: https://nitter.42l.fr/AlexanderNL/status/1510541804483100672#m [3]: https://www.nyidanmark.dk/ [4]: https://international.aarhus.dk/coming-to-aarhus/citizens-from-outside-the-eueea-taking-up-residence-in-aarhus/
@U04V6FEES nice move! I didn't know that
housing is affordable, it's great for kids, it's not all unicorns but generally it's not bad
I was considering a move to Gothenburg because a friend of mine told me about housing there being much more reasonable
Thanks everyone, really interesting suggestions. I may have to stay in Germany initially but Denmark sounds very appealing. I enjoyed living in Amsterdam at the end of the 1990s, for about 3 years. A part of that involved worked in Nijmegen (actually Boxmeer) which was very peaceful and a few trips to Rotterdam. I may have eaten too many broodjes kass whilst I was there, but I could never get enough bitter bollen, delicious. Just don't tell me what is in them 🙂 It will be a while before I move, so plenty of time to scout around for nice locations.
Copenhagen also has bunch Clojure devs, been there for a project a couple of times over some years. Cycling is great there, bet no mountains 😱 😛 (maybe ask @reefersleep if considering that town)