Okayama or Osaka?

4 comments

1. You should visit yourself for a few days. Very different places in my opinion.

   If you have to live in one of the two, I would choose to live close to but not in Osaka.

   Okayama is wonderful but too quiet for me.

2. I’ve lived in Okayama and spent a lot of time with family in Osaka. Osaka would always be my preference since I prefer all the things to do in big cities and being able to get around without a car. In saying that, Okayama wasn’t a bad place to live.

   In Okayama, I found a nice community of friends whom I miss a lot, and good opportunities for work (teaching). But every day life bothered me: having people stare at me in the supermarket, no nearby parks around my home, needing a car to go to work/the shops, few meet-up events, still a small living space despite being in a more rural area, etc. I’m quite an anxious person so I really disliked standing out as a foreign resident there, something I haven’t really felt in Tokyo or Osaka. I also often had friends/family visit Japan and they all of course wanted to visit Tokyo/Osaka, so being in Okayama wasn’t so convenient for those times. It was nice, however, being able to enjoy Hiroshima, Shikoku and other surrounding regions on long weekends. Okayama itself did seem to feel boring quickly, in the sense that there aren’t an endless number of attractions and shopping centres. Perhaps if you find peace in fewer attractions and a bit of a slower life, then you’ll be more suited to Okayama than I was.

3. There is fucking nothing to do in Okayama

4. Rising a family? Okayama. Looking for someone to raise a family with? Osaka.

   Really depends what stage of life your at.