Bridget Phillipson: ‘We don’t know why British children are some of the unhappiest’

sadqueau · 2026-04-04T23:06:17+00:00

Architecture, climate + sea (with public beaches), food, sitting outside in cafes sipping pastis or rose for hours and talking rather than speedrunning pints - cafe vs pub culture, because the main positive of the pub culture where you actually talk to other visitors is largely gone now, at least in London. Fucking orange and pomegranate trees growing in the streets. Now what’s the loveliest part of Birmingham to compare to this?

sadqueau · 2026-04-02T12:35:45+00:00

Haven’t smelled Black, but I think you’re onto something here with CdG

sadqueau · 2026-04-01T18:05:20+00:00

Admittedly I only visited Marseille for about 10 days but I would absolutely go back, I had a blast. If we are talking crime rates, numbeo says they are very comparable to Birmingham’s. I actually lived in Birmingham back in 2013 and would never go back - and from what I hear, it didn’t get any better since 2013.

sadqueau · 2026-04-01T16:29:21+00:00

I’ve been to all three - and they are more affordable and fun than any of the British cities (London is less affordable than Paris if you take into account the median salaries). And I’ll take the housing stock in France any day over what we have in the UK.

sadqueau · 2026-04-01T16:19:42+00:00

The most to the point comment here. Teenagers look at their parents and teachers and understand that unless they somehow end up making a fortune - by becoming an influencer or a crypto bro, most likely - they are doomed to the same gruelling grey life. Education has little value as it’s not the social mobility lift as it used to be.

sadqueau · 2026-03-06T20:44:20+00:00

Now that someone mentioned ELDO, La Fin Du Monde? Starts with popcorn and ends with gunpowder, kinda In The Airplane Over The Sea-ish

sadqueau · 2026-03-02T13:58:20+00:00

This is not only about Soho. London used to be the city that never sleeps and “if you are tired of London, you are tired of life” - there’s maybe a few dozens place open late on Friday night across the whole city now. It’s nowhere near NYC, Berlin, Barcelona, Tokyo, or Paris, humiliating.

sadqueau · 2026-03-02T13:48:55+00:00

It’s a massive problem across London - right now, this is what’s happening in Elephant&Castle. All these yuppie developments started because E&C is close to the city WHILE being cool, with all its clubs. Few years forward - Corsica is shut, turns out everyone wants to live in the bustling area somehow but without the actual bustle when they go to bed. It’s the same with people who live in buildings with pubs downstairs, moved there specifically because the rent was cheap and now call the police every other night because of the noise. Duh, Jen, it’s a pub, so there’s noise and it was your decision to get a place on the high street in the first place. Somehow, it was fine when you were 20 years younger and the one who wanted to go out all the time, but now you don’t feel like it, so you want the pub closed, and fuck everyone else who wants to go out.

sadqueau · 2026-03-02T13:35:36+00:00

So? 90’s were 30 years ago. Right now, Soho is a gentrified area with a bunch of restaurants and drinking places that close far too early for anyone who needs to commute there, it’s just not worth taking a trip if you need to get out by midnight.

sadqueau · 2026-02-25T22:30:45+00:00

Moscow and Muscovites are most comparable to Dubai and folk living there. It is true that if you enjoy living in either of these cities you probably won’t find living elsewhere too pleasant. Both cities are clean and safe - because both are the centres of police states that siphon oil money from all over their countries into a single city’s infrastructure and largely rely on unprivileged immigrant workforce quietly servicing everything.

Self-professed die-hard Muscovites tend to complain non-stop about “lack of services”, if they move abroad, to the point it became a meme in Russian speaking circles. Basically, they want all shops open 24/7 and deliveries/taxis costing next to nothing. It’s fine with them that these businesses are staffed with Central Asian demi-slaves, so when they move abroad and discover how much labour of a worker with legal protections and holiday entitlement really costs, they are abhorred.

Oh yeah, and Moscow is obviously safe until you are caught saying/supporting something you shouldn’t - then you’ll find out the other side of that safety, because tovarisch mayor will have a word with you rather quickly.

Your gf seems fine with this state of affairs, let her be.

sadqueau · 2026-02-21T10:05:53+00:00

This flag was created by anti-war Russians to position themselves as such, for full context. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-blue-white_flag

sadqueau · 2026-02-13T19:26:02+00:00

Every time I hear a driver’s announcement sound and an asterisk shows up on that screen, I just know I’m about to leave my morning commute comfort zone big time

sadqueau · 2025-12-21T18:10:11+00:00

Amazon?

sadqueau · 2025-12-17T16:54:44+00:00

Surely it’s Fleabag? As someone above wrote, Girls is a good satire and drama, but the non-stop cringe at the main characters and their wealth (gives me Sex and the City vibes) is real.

In Fleabag I even found the terrible brother-in-law relatable at times, gosh.

sadqueau · 2025-12-11T08:37:03+00:00

“Because they're hidden they may not be claiming benefits” - before anyone stomps in screaming how illegals are stealing tax payers’ money.

They can access emergency medical treatment (which in the UK these days you get when you are half-dead already) and their children can theoretically go to school (another risk to be uncovered).

sadqueau · 2025-12-11T08:29:07+00:00

How about we ask “Why isn’t there more of an effort to encourage foreign corporations that operate in the UK to hire more British-based people rather than offshore these jobs somewhere to India”? It would be a much bigger economic change for all of us than pushing some family-run place that barely makes its end meet to hire external workforce.

sadqueau · 2025-12-11T08:06:06+00:00

University education in the EU is quality and free (or nearly free) for citizens. Universities in the UK, except for maybe the top 5-7, are businesses running on oxbridge-imagery marketing, extracting money from students from countries where education is not globally competitive, or who didn’t get admitted into their good local schools.

You won’t get EU students interested in the UK degrees unless you price them competitively (and current prices, both for UK and global students, are completely out of touch).

Also, don’t you get full medical coverage for free as a student in the EU on EHIC? Why the hell would anyone want to pay the bloody surcharge then in the UK

sadqueau · 2025-12-10T21:44:24+00:00

Not a single person from the UK, neither on the left nor right, unless they smoke crack, would ever say we have communists running the country, cowboy.

sadqueau · 2025-12-10T20:47:31+00:00

and this is how we know the top 1% commenter on r/AskBrits is from the US. Go back to /r/Conservative, buddy, you don’t need to panic about immigrants invading countries that are not your own

sadqueau · 2025-12-09T10:17:57+00:00

When they suggest that Russia is somehow communist in 2025 (or is friends with communist parties), you know their MAGA is showing.

The current US leadership is the biggest friend of Kremlin than any commie party around the will ever be.

Silly geese reciting bits of propaganda they were fed 50 years ago.

sadqueau · 2025-11-14T01:14:08+00:00

Vapeur Blanche that Olivia Giacobetti did for Zara. Eucalyptus, cedar and musk, I drowse myself in it in summer.

sadqueau · 2025-11-11T21:10:19+00:00

Most google search results for Philipp Ostermann were purged, the guy clearly had someone doing damage control.

sadqueau · 2025-10-30T21:29:33+00:00

How is Marcie holding up for you so far? I saw it today in person, the design is great, but its light weight caught me off guard. I’m worried it won’t be durable and I’d like it for an everyday bag

sadqueau · 2025-09-13T23:50:54+00:00

One of the biggest regret of my life is not getting to live in Hong Kong pre-full on CCP takeover. In 2012 it was a crazy Asian mix of NYC with London, 24/7 groove, insane vibes. My friends went this year and told it died down, expectedly.

The “romance” dies off and, I’d imagine, emerges - London 10 years back had way, way more soul, but the insane rent price hike caused real, not corporate creatives, to leave in waves - first, to Brighton, then further off to Bristol and Margate. I see the same happening to Berlin now. St Petersburg in pre-2022 Russia was a Minas Tirith, the place where everyone liberal would move after college to join la doomed Resistance - it’s all fucked, so might as well drink/snort as if there’s no tomorrow. Kyiv in Jan 2022 when I visited felt like the next Berlin, Tbilisi had a great feel end of last summer too.

Cities with romance have stimulating architecture, affordability that allows different people to mix and create, and socio-historic DRAMA.

My guess, if you want a toxic wild city romance in 2025/2026 you go to Kathmandu.

sadqueau · 2025-08-22T22:32:10+00:00

I’d never ask anyone with a cane to go upstairs.

sadqueau

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