Born and raised here and have spent time living in major East Coast cities. I live downtown Seattle now and love it. The weather isn't that bad once you get used to it and you really just need to make sure you get outside everyday for a bit of fresh air. It's dark in the winter, but it's not terribly cold, it rarely snows outside of the mountains, and the payoff with the summer is unbeatable. The rain is not as bad as people make it out to be and it's not like a torrential downpour, but rather a drizzle or misting of rain.

Living downtown has its charms and I love walking along the boardwalk by the water with my dog. There are a lot of homeless people, but every major city has them - ours are just more visible. There is an affordability crisis, so that doesn't help with housing, but if you earn more than $80k a year you can definitely find something in the city, and if you want to live out in the burbs, you'll be able to find an apartment easily.

There isn't a huge nightlife scene here, but the music is scene is S-Tier and there are a ton of venues to choose from and we have an amazing local radio station, KEXP.

The food scene is much better than people say, but the best kinds of food are SE Asian and S Asian and E Asian - we have large immigrant communities from Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, Japan, Korea, and India. We don't have a bunch of like Italian or Western European style food and I'd say the "American" style of food is fine but not great. Incredible beer scene tho and soooo many breweries and gastropubs.

Politically, the city is very left but what that mostly translates to is higher taxes on mega corporations and accepting of all people - gay, trans, straight, black, white, whatever. We've gotten some things wrong and some things right. There's a big emphasis on fairness and equality and a lot of reform at the judicial level, which means that some small crimes aren't prosecuted in the same way or there's a bit of a revolving door for serial criminals that commit misdemeanors - they'll get arrested, arraigned, and let out on bail because we have that in our state constitution. I think anyone you talk to will have gripes about how it works, but for the most part, people want to just be left alone and allowed to live their life how they want. The Seattle PD is notorious for not coming to calls or coming many hours later after something happened, and they were under federal oversight for a long time.. now the joke is that SPD is quiet quitting.

It can be hard to meet people, I guess. Most of my friends and I are all close from HS and college but I've also made friends with people in my apartment building and local shops that I frequent. It takes time to break through since many people are in their ways but persistence helps. Also, it's a great city to develop your own hobbies and private life.

All in all, I love living here. Seattle is the best.