Since someone mentioned one "best place NOT TO live" I can't help adding the USA. Of course, this is a biased, subjective opinion (like all other opinions) but it is MY opinion and I am happy to share it wherever the fist of the politically correct police does not stifle my mouth or keyboard.
Ten years after having arrived here from Eastern Europe - and having succeeded with the "American dream", opportunity and all that jazz sparkling in popular stories about America - I am so ready to relocate back to Europe, ANY part of Europe!!!, that I cannot find words to describe how badly I need to be back. As a matter of fact, I have come to be weirdly jealous of all people who live in Europe or who have already had the chance to relocate there. I had to conclude that the price one ends up paying for all those apparent American "golden opportunities" - including, in my case, graduate degree, good job, relatively big house in nice (yet horrifically dry and lonely neighborhood, which is the case virtually everywhere), picture perfect family but no community to anchor it in - is a complete f**k-up of the psyche. Let me sum it up, be it with what some may denonce as "sweeping generalizations": no sense of authentic and spontaneous community, a feeling that there's nobody outside of the walls of your home, people so mentally isolated, so politically correct, so locked up into themselves and their own little personal agendas, that no one has any real time available for anyone or any "together-type" activity other than obsessing about themselves. Even when they get together or are in "crowd-type" situations, Americans (which includes immigrants arrived here recently, unless they live in their own enclaves) act lonely and isolated as crap. They are the worst conversationalists the world has ever seen and when I say this I MEAN it and STAND by it. (Don't point me to exceptions to the rule, they are irrelevant).
A nation of obsessed consumers, consumed in turn by a fanatic materialistic and individualistic mentality where nothing has value unless it translates into a sort of perverted, halucinatory individualism that actually has more to do with narcissism than with the individual himself. What's saddest is that once you are here, you can't really live life on your own terms because as the saying goes, you can't p** against the wind. On paper, everything is JUST RIGHT with living in this country. In reality, everything feels horribly WRONG. All that touted FREEDOM I found it to be just a poor excuse for mysanthropy, social isolation, fear of depending on another human being in any way, shape or form, hatred of community or any rapport of reciprocity, including at the family level. I am not sure what exactly the Founding Fathers of this currently freakish sociey had in mind when they talked about "the pursuit of happiness, men being created equal" and all that kitchy philosophy...but I am sure as heck that their good intentions paved the road to the proverbial Hell. Both my American husband and I (plus 2 small children) are ready to move to Europe the moment the right job opportunity happens (or lottery hit - ha!), which nowadays seem almost equally difficult. We will keep trying however, as I find the US a terribly sad and inauthentic place to live. We're ready to take on, and live with, Europe's little "discomforts" (gargantuan in the eyes of regular American folk) - such as:
- living in small spaces and dealing with tight streets (and sometimes uptight people),
- less efficiency in just about everything,
- the perennial obssession with class (as in "whose blood is "blue" and whose is less so),
- higher cost of living (as in "I will no longer be able to go to Wall Mart and buy a ton of China-made junk for almost nothing"; same principle will apply to gas and zipping on highways),
-fussy, gossipy people (with given variations depending on which country you're talking about),
- cliquish society which is particularly adverse to finding a job straightforwardly, with a CV only, and not with "just the right connection in just the right place".
- and finally, discrimination against Eastern Europeans (as I am one).
In fact, at this point I would prefer to deal with prejudice directed at my nation/culture (hoping that I can disprove the stereotypes as an individual) than to deal with this policy of indifferent tolerance promoted in the US culture. After all, the best way to "melt" into the Melting Pot is with a big WHATEVER on your lips. Then back to the "me, myself and I".
Finally, I find it ironic that many non-Americans say "we have nothing with the American people, we just dislike GWB, US government policies, its global actions and the like". I think this is a big blah-blah that hides the reality that only a freakish culture set up by freakish people could have generated such monster rulers and such government policies to begin with. It is easy to point the finger to the "big, bad wolves" and say "it's just them, not the average folk we dislike" but I find this to be disingenuous.
Once you live here long enough and manage to maintain some sort of perspective without trying to force yourself into "melting" into the Melting Pot at any cost, you realize how many things are wrong with the American way of life.
Definitely missing Europe... with all of its flaws, sins and imperfections.