3 ms·

As an outsider from a small village in New Hampshire who loves visiting cities, its quite shocking to me just how bad it was. San Francisco I fear may be the mo

As an outsider from a small village in New Hampshire who loves visiting cities, its quite shocking to me just how bad it was. San Francisco I fear may be the most overrated city on earth. Astonishingly lifeless to walk around for two days compared to Boston, Paris, Lisbon, Montreal. A network of disjointed suburbs, blocks of nothingness vaguely stitched together, even the places with alleged "culture". Food and weather were the only redeemers. (note I have been to SF only twice now, in 2010 and for longer in 2018). Maybe I spent hours and hours sauntering through all the wrong parts. I could have totally missed the worthwhile bits of the city, just as I can imagine a visitor to Paris doing. But I'm starting to think that the people who live in San Francisco are, in some sense, kidding themselves. Or at least they don't travel much. (For Europeans, I'd compare the lack of interesting-ness to Geneva, maybe.)

skibidi 8y ago
Once planned to spend 2 days in Geneva, left after 3 hours. Dullest city I've been to. Lake was a nice sight but that's pretty much it.
beetwenty 8y ago
I've been in SF most of my life. The city has been heavily impacted by tech ever since the dot com era, but it's built on some robust cultural foundations: Waves of arts and landscaping projects dating back to Adolph Sutro, the nearby academic influence of Berkeley and Stanford in addition to smaller local institutions(for example, the Exploratorium - a great place for kids, and still fun for adults), a variety of social movements that have swept through the city from the Gold Rush era onwards, multiple ethnic immigrant cultures, and access to nature. These are things you appreciate and can grow from by living here in the long term, but are easy to miss if all you do is walk around and see low-rise buildings and homeless people. There are far more exciting cities in terms of bustle and grandeur, and more livable, well-maintained, inexpensive cities for everyday activity.

skibidi 8y ago

Once planned to spend 2 days in Geneva, left after 3 hours. Dullest city I've been to. Lake was a nice sight but that's pretty much it.

beetwenty 8y ago

I've been in SF most of my life. The city has been heavily impacted by tech ever since the dot com era, but it's built on some robust cultural foundations: Waves of arts and landscaping projects dating back to Adolph Sutro, the nearby academic influence of Berkeley and Stanford in addition to smaller local institutions(for example, the Exploratorium - a great place for kids, and still fun for adults), a variety of social movements that have swept through the city from the Gold Rush era onwards, multiple ethnic immigrant cultures, and access to nature. These are things you appreciate and can grow from by living here in the long term, but are easy to miss if all you do is walk around and see low-rise buildings and homeless people. There are far more exciting cities in terms of bustle and grandeur, and more livable, well-maintained, inexpensive cities for everyday activity.