Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Yu_Bum_suk]

With Vancouver location is everything. If you're not close to a Skytrain station, public transportation can suck. I'd recommend trying to get a cheap basement suit in the Kitsilano area, which does have very regular buses to the city centre as well as UBC / Wreck Beach. If that's still too expensive and / or you want something more suburban a basement suit or small apartment near any Skytrain station would do.

[coffeeman]

I've never lived in Vancouver (but have visited). I get my info from a friend that does. As I said earlier, if you want to live there, you should probably forget about teaching English for any more than 6 months cause you'll need to get into something else or go broke and be on the next plane back to Korea.

I have a question for robot and others who have lived there. I lived in Toronto for 3 years and noticed a curious (and discouraging) phenomenon, people having 2 part-time jobs in addition to their full-time job. I've always heard that Torontonians are workaholics, but I also think that Toronto is so expensive that unless you're a corporate worker, you need 3 jobs just to survive. I have a feeling that if I move to Vancouver, I'll be trying to get all the work I can. True?

[mindmetoo]

Where did I read something about the pot trade keeping prices on real estate, errr, high? The unemployment situation has changed, mind you, but it worked something like this: for a city with a 9% unemployment rate, the prices of condos was incredibly high. The reason was there was a booming underground economy and that economy was pot. Everyone and his brother had a grow op or was dealing or whatever.

[TECO]

I lived in Vancouver for about 10 years. I went to university in Vancouver and after graduating I got a job there. It was a lot of fun living in Vancouver.

I lived on Burnaby Street in the West End. I could walk everywhere. I loved it. What a convenient place to live. I payed about $650 a month for my apartment and even though it was old and quaint, it was still nice. I miss it actually.

As for night life, well...it's okay. I mean, I've partied in Bangkok, Tokyo, Seoul and night life is pretty good in these cities, so I don't think Vancouver is all that geat in comparison. But since I left Vancouver, the bars are now open until 4:00am or something, arent't they.

Two things that really piss me off about Vancouver:

1. Tipping. Restuarant staff are ignorant in that they put tremendous pressure on people to tip. Doesn't matter if you walk up to the bar and ask for a pint. If you don't tip, they tell you off. I was in Vancouver a little over a year ago and it wore on me. Everytime I ordered a pint or a sandwich in a pub I had to tip. I even got into a few arguments with people about it. I hate the tipping culture that exists in British Columbia. And the servers attitudes disgust me.

2. Hypes running around Granville Street. I saw so many addicts and criminals running around with bags of stolen electronics and harrassing people for money and screaming that it freaked me out. I wasn't used to it. Very unsettling. I've been gone for about 8 years now and one thing I notice are all the heroin addicts running around stealing and beggin for money and harrassing people.

Another negative is the rain. It just rains too much in Vancouver. However, as mentioned, the winters are milder. I was in Toronto last January and it was a real eye opener for me to see how cold it gets for people back East. I decided quickly I couldn't live in Ontario or any other place that gets that cold and has 6 months of winter.

The most friendly people I've met in Canada, though, are people from the prarie provinces - Saskatchewan, Manitoba - people tend not to put on the airs that Vancouverites do.

Never been to Montreal but plan to visit soon and have heard great things about it from friends who went to McGill University.

[coffeeman]

How hard is it to find a decent job in Vancouver? Some people say it's bad. Others say no worse than other places in Canada.

[mindmetoo]

[coffeeman]

[funkywinkerbeans]

Vancouver is an expensive city, especially if you want to enjoy the city. It amazes me how some of these Eastern dips are experts on the city when they only lived there for a short period of time. A cheap basement suite in Kit's? Give me a break unless you're talking about an absolute dump!It rains a lot and especially in the winter despite what Robot has to say. You wake up in the morning and it's raining and is still raining when you go to bed. This is not a soft rain as I've worked outside in it.

As for jobs in Vancouver, at the moment lots of jobs in construction so shouldn't be that difficult to pick up something in that field especially if you have some skills. Many other jobs are attained through connections. I've got several of my jobs in Vancouver through that method including a government job. You can get on sub lists for teaching in the Vancouver area with no connections, but you'll have to be certified for most districts. It's also not guaranteed and the interviews are extensive.

Hope that helps. Vancouver's a great city, but I'm not sure I would ever move back there as the city's become too large and expensive. This from a person who was born and raised there. As another person stated, the okanogan is great, but they destroyed Kelowna by building one of the ugliest strip mall sections on the highway heading north. It makes King George highway in Surrey look like heaven.

[princess]

[coffeeman]

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[funkywinkerbeans]

Again we have someone yapping off about " My friend had a place..."

Kits is expensive and the placesto rent all the way out to UBC can be expensive. My buddy at UBC rented a house with other students on Dunbar and the place was your typical student dive. If you want to rent for reasonably cheap, the best way to go is to look for a house that is looking for a roomate.

Getting your own basement suite is going to be more expensive than you think. Another buddy owns a house 2 blocks off the drive and he rents his basement for 750 a month. It's nice basement suite, but only one bedroom. Extrapolate that to Kits and you'll have an idea what you'll pay in that area.

Don't listen to yu Bum Suk as he has no idea what he's talking about.

[Endesu]

As a foreigner who has lived in Vancouver, I was able to compare to a few other cities. Honestly I didnt enjoy it too much when I was actually there, but after seeing and living a few other places, I must admit that Vancouver comes out pretty much on top!

It has everything u need in close proximity, its fairly safe and clean, and for me as a Scandinavian, it was even quite cheap! I know that wont apply to most other people though...

I also loved all the great food available there. Thai, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, whatever u felt like, it was there.

Also a lot of hot women (met my wife there), although the Canadian chicks tended to freak me out with all their issues and problems.

To me, the nightlife sucked. But then again, Im not an "indie" type of guy, so I guess it depends on what you call a good time.

[RACETRAITOR]

I think the problem with Vancouver's music scene is that it's much smaller than it proportionately should be. Its music scene is fragmented into many many smaller bits, and the main reason there are good musicians is that they tend to gravitate there to make it. Even then, there are too many people doing too many different things and people are spread too thin.

If you ignore Quebec, the two cities with the best music scene are surprisingly Edmonton and Winnipeg. Calgary is doing something right too judging by the amount of garage bands coming out of there. Toronto just sucks.

[khyber]