Which is the best country in terms of things like rich culture, kind people, and the least corrupt government? I will work on practicing Portuguese and Spanish and also learning more French!!
Is there any kind of experience you are looking for?
I’m French… go to Spain! There’s incredible architectural diversity and the people are generally very good vibes (I guess they’re anti-touristy nowadays, lol, but still!), plus things are at least 20-25 percent cheaper there. Oh, and also the Spanish government is the only Western country (correct me if I’m wrong, and hypocrisy like the UK saying something nice and then intervening for Israel doesn’t count…) who has made any sort of anti-imperialistic remarks regarding Gaza! I’d like to believe it’s a reflection of today’s Spanish population. 👍
Ireland as well?
I’m sorry, I forgot about them!
Its very common to see Gaza flags in Spain.
As a Portuguese person, I’d advise you boycott Portugal at the moment, or at the very least avoid AirBnBs entirely — sadly, they’ve increased to the point where, in many locations, the price of renting a house is higher than minimum wage. Furthermore, even in hotels, many staff get paid minimum salary — a lot of them are immigrants, so they’ll take anything. This means that, through tourism, the Portuguese people lose: rent becomes much higher, companies are incentivized to pay much less, and all of this is supported by the current government, which has refused to regulate AirBnBs and the like.
I do apologize about this rant; it just seems that you value morals & ethics more than average.
I feel like Portugal got caught off guard by its recent spike in tourism, but it doesn’t want to completely quash it yet due to the relatively poor economy without it.
Oh my God, thank you for telling me!!
This sort of thing is a problem in many places, such as my nearest major US city. Unfortunate to hear that it’s a problem where you are too.
I feel like rich culture and kind people exist everywhere, and every government is corrupt.
But France. The Spanish and Portuguese hate tourists.
The French had a massive protest in Paris regarding over tourism.
Yeah tourism sucks the life out of every city, and personally I never understood wanderlust but I was forced to move around as a child.
Should go to france. Spain and Portugal are both done with tourists and you may have a bad time after all the summer caos
I’ve seen several articles about protests against tourists in Spain. I didn’t bother to read the articles, but I think it’s about housing prices being driven up because of air bnb. So maybe stay in a hotel if you go there?
A flight to Barcelona is usually very cheap. So Spain is a good place to start. Barcelona is beautiful. Flights in Europe are fairly cheap so getting around once there is easy, trains as well! San Sebastián is beautiful. Porto is beautiful.
Not France, on account of the French.
On a serious note, I lived in rural France for a few years and the ridiculous bureaucracy, the lackadaisical attitude to everything, and the 4 hour breaks in the middle of the day drove me insane.
Almost none of that seems relevant for tourism. I also as a tourist in France on several occasions never noticed anything shutting down middle of the day, but I was never in rural France. I assume OP may not start their adventure in rural areas either.
4 hours breaks in the middle of the day? I live in the bad part of France it seems, I’d love to have that.
This was St. Mathieu in Haute-Vienne. Most days everything was shutdown from around 11am until 2.30 / 3pm.
It’s… in the middle of nowhere. Not the kind of place you go to have a busy life 😅
But low key that sounds like an amazing place to take a relaxing vacation.
All have a rich culture, all have kind people (though there will be jerks and how you act will matter), all have some level of govt corruption. Plan your trip around things you want to do or see. Festivals, places, etc.
They’re all just different. As a citizen, though, (dual, live elsewhere) I’m going to have to recommend Portugal.
Ahhh. Thank you! Portugal seems awesome!
Spain.
