Amsterdam Vs Thailand

For almost a year we live in the Amsterdam suburbs now, after 5 years in Bangkok and one year in Phuket

My wife is Dutch, I’m Dutch-speaking Belgian. The Netherlands feel familiar, while Thailand was a foreign country

Every couple of days a thought comes up of what I like and disliked

This article is to keep track of these

It's purpose to help us make choices for the future

Because we do know, that Amsterdam isn’t our final destination...

Infrastructure

I love infrastructure

The Dutch infrastructure is amazing: The public transport is not Swiss or Japanese, but it’s close; The bicycles paths are the eight world wonder, safe and convenient, there is no comparison in the world; The highways and public roads are in perfect shape and continuously improved.

Public playgrounds are ubiquitious and challenging, for our kids, and at moments even for me!

Counterside is that a small part of the population seems to enjoy trashing playgrounds, trains, buses and public spaces overall. In some parts of Asia, eating and drinking on public transport is prohibited, it keeps at least trains and buses spotless. But the real problem lies deeper.

Optimism

Sometimes I wonder if people have no hope in Europe, and hence trash everything. There is an overall lack of optimism. Sometimes even apathy.

People feel they have a 100 reasons to be fearful, so they don't smile.

The Dutch population, and Europe's population overall, is old. An abundance of older people takes the life out of a society. I'm well aware I'm not the youngest myself anymore, and soon will be part of the problem. Until that point, I would like to live in an environment which exudes energy.

This is a also a problem of living in popular tourist destinations like Phuket. They are full of old people. It's not their fault obviously, but the skewing demographics are not a good thing.

One of the strongest driver of deciding where to live should be where we find young couples like us, with kids the same age. Neighborhoods full of kids are hard to find here.

Moving to Asia won't solve this, as this is becoming a global phenomenon. Upcoming third-world-countries aside.

Moving somewhere else will solve something else: finding like-minded people. Foreigners living abroad are there with a purpose, not by coincidence, they tend to have better stories. From all the criteria in this list, people and community are one of the most important.

Easy

I don't know how better to express this, but life was EASY when it was thirty degrees every day. I walked outside and jumped on the bicycle or motorbike, the kids played outside.

People were more enthusiastic. Image being spontaneous and enthusiastic when you're huddled into your collar against darkness, wind, rain and cold. I tried it and it takes an active effort to walk upright when the whether is bad.

But! For me it was too hot, at least 4-5 months out of the year. My wife will disagree, but the warm season, when the sun burns vertical on my head, is unbearable for me. Climate change will probably exacerbate this.

Own Goals

Europeans like to bitch (as I'm doing in this article).

We try so hard to focus on consuming less:

less energy, less travel, less food waste, ...

We celebrate people who use as little energy as possible, who don't use a water cooker, who suffer through the heat rather than using the AC.

We shouldn't!

We have only one path forward: to create more abundance, for everyone. Yes there is a risk we kill ourselves in the process, but the alternative is standing still, which means a life of decay.

To create abundance, we need to believe in more energy, more travel, more diversity, more innovation. We need that ambition to believe we can do it all.

Appendix: Where to Go

The perfect location doesn't exist, but the places below are on my radar. This list changes every month, but I feel I have to write it down somewhere.

• Sydney and Cape Town are early cities. I love early cities. Try getting a coffee in Amsterdam before 9am. Sydney is too far though. Cape Town is more realistic.
• I've never been, but Curacao sounds great. Overall the Caribbean sounds great. Though most islands seem to be inhabited by old rich people.
• Cambodia: because the population is young. It's corrupt as hell though
• India: because that's the real remaining frontier I guess. And it's young and dynamic. And it's growing, it's an interesting bet on the future.
• Costa Rica: just because ...
• Kuala Lumpur: more green and clean than Bangkok, more modern, less touristy.
• Taiwan: Efficient society with relatively good weather. A society under threat performs better.

This is a never-ending article. I started May 12 2025, my latest update is June 2 2025