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I moved out here from LA a few years ago for a job and am having a difficult time getting to used to the life over here in DC. Just wondering what other CA people out there are thinking. For me, it comes down to realizing that while there are things to do around here, most things get old quickly. I sometimes feel like I'm living in a giant outdoor mall. You see the same mall type stores and eateries everywhere you go.
I don't know. Doesn't SoCal have lots and lots of chains too just like anywhere else in the country? Sounds like you need to change what you're doing as far as the crowd you're hanging with or the things you're doing for fun. Are you in the burbs or the city? I myself don't think the District itself has that many chains particularly when compared to Northern Virginia.
Not only in the District, but there's a lot of great mom/pop ethnic restaurants all over northern Virginia and Maryland. Generally speaking, DC has some of the most interesting suburbs I've personally experienced. That's why I'm curious where s/he lives to be missing all these places. If one thinks there's only Au Bon Pains everywhere, then one is only commuting into downtown and leaving after work to some forsaken strip mall land. Doesn't sound like that's the case with o.OO, though. Sounds like they're making an effort. Hopefully we can help.
I live in DC around the Cleveland Park area. I guess I'm trying to get used to the idea that you need to travel outside DC to get some variety. Maybe I got a little off track on my original post by commenting on the mall chain thing. I was trying to get an idea if people who moved to DC can see themselves living here in the long term. It seems like the typical thing here is to do your career thing for a few years and move on or meet someone, get married and move to the burbs to start a family.
It is true that it's not like LA where you'll find a smorgasbord of cuisine in one city. You'll find some decent everything in the city of Washington, DC but to find the real gems of, say, Chinese food you'd wanna head up to Montgomery County (especially around Rockville). Great Korean is found in Virginia.
It's not awful IMO, it only takes me about 30 minutes to drive from Bethesda to, say, Old Town Alexandria in good traffic.
I've lived here for nearly 16 out of my 19 years alive, and apart from things like the weather and the high cost of living and housing prices, and the occasional world-revolves-around-me moron I love it.
Still not sure where you get this idea that you have to go to the suburbs for good food / entertainment. Seems to be an inexhastible number of unique restaurants in the city for you to choose from in all the major neighborhoods. Certainly LA relies on its suburbs a great deal more to flesh out its cultural offerings.
To your newer point about people leaving, it is a transient city built to house a government. Given the nature of government appointments, contracts, and connections to local regions, not sure that's ever going to change.
It's the pace of things that kills me here. It's so cliche, but SoCal really has the intangible laid back atmosphere thing going on. DC is all gogogogogo, where the most important questions are "what do you do?" and "where did you go to school"? I miss people coming into work late because the surf was really great at 7 am that morning (and that was a justifiable excuse!)
I've yet to run out of things to do though. There's a lot in the area, and if the traffic to get somewhere doesn't make my blood pressure shoot through the roof on the way there, I'm doing well.
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