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If you don't travel much, just use Google street view
( Yandex Panorama for Russia ) and see it for yourself.
Rural areas are pretty much everywhere poorer than urban.
I have heard that is unlivable outside of those cities. I heard Alexei Navalny state Moscow is the only livable place, and everywhere else is extremely poor.
I haven't been to Russia for a decade, so grain of salt, but unless I had a very good job that necessitated living in Moscow I would say quite the opposite. Moscow is the most developed city, yes, but along with that comes a lot of expense, crime, crowding, disparity of wealth, etc. I found Petersburg to have just as many amenities while still being less expensive and just generally more agreeable...fewer urban ills. I had a nice flat in Petersburg that I could never have afforded had I lived in Moscow. Many of the other cities I spent time in to seemed to me to have a good balance of convenience with lower cost of living...I found Kazan and both the Novgorods to be especially pleasant, at least as a visitor. Of course you need to be in a professional field where living-wage work is locally available, but isn't that the same anywhere in the world? Where I live now in Alaska there are only like four things a person can realistically do for a living and be financially comfortable.
I haven't been to Russia for a decade, so grain of salt, but unless I had a very good job that necessitated living in Moscow I would say quite the opposite. Moscow is the most developed city, yes, but along with that comes a lot of expense, crime, crowding, disparity of wealth, etc.
How livable/unlivable is Russia, and all its territories outside of St Petersburg, Moscow, and Sochi?
I have heard that is unlivable outside of those cities. I heard Alexei Navalny state Moscow is the only livable place, and everywhere else is extremely poor.
I been checking out YT channels for cities in the arctic regions of Russia/Siberia. They dont seem all that bad given the circumstances. They are no SoBe, or San Diego. But there are places like that in America and Canada like Fairbanks, Happy Valley respectively
Keep in mind that some of the places are highly polluted. Places like Norilsk, Omsk, Chelyabinsk, Krasnoyarsk, Karabash, Novokuznetzk, Magnitogorsk, and Achinsk are to be avoided. Murmansk and Vorkuta are clean, but a nasty places.
But there's life outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg. Belgorod, Kazan, Sochi, Ekaterinburg, Gelengik are some of them. Many others are improving. These are Vladivostok, Samara, Nizhny Novgorod, Kaliningrad.
OP, it's a cliche that no place outside Moscow is worth living in. Ignore.
Russia has many beautiful cities and fascinating regions. Personally, I like the Lake Baikal region in Siberia, Buryatia in particular, but Kamchatka is also nice. The climate in Petro-Pavlovsk Kamchatsky is milder, somewhat similar to that in Ketchikan, AK, though not as rainy. Khabarovsk also is nice, though it's very hot and humid in the summers. Well, much of Siberia is hot in mid-summer, too. Novgorod and Pskov are also nice; very old, historical cities.
Do you speak Russian? That would make a huge difference. The QOL in Russia improves exponentially, when you have friends.
OP, it's a cliche that no place outside Moscow is worth living in. Ignore.
Talking about cliche and myths, I remember my huge disappointment the first time I visited LA in 1992 coming from Sydney Australia (I grew up in Italy and at that time I was working Down Under).
The LA of my dreams after watching TV series after TV series and movies, from CHiPs to Baywatch....that's it?? This is it?? Is this really Malibu?? Especially coming from a gorgeous city like Sydney and its beautiful beaches....it was hard to believe....
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