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California Born Pak-American Male moving to DFW. I work remotely. Very much into Basketball and Cricket. A few questions below:
#1. Community: How is the Pak community in DFW? I understand there are more Indians in DFW compared to Pakistanis. In Houston, it's the opposite. If someone knows of the good Halal Pak restaurants in DFW area and community.
#2. Mosques: What are go to Mosques in DFW for Friday prayers?
#3. Sports - Basketball and Cricket: Are there any leagues or pick-up games for Basketball and Cricket during summer? If yes, please advise.
#4. Hail: I have heard from many friends that Dallas is notorious for it's hail and wind. How does one overcome this?
#5. Natural Disasters: What other natural disasters outside of the massive Tornadoes does DFW get?
#6. Map Out DFW: If someone can please help me understand how the DFW area works. So far, I understand Northern Cities like Frisco are the safest in DFW. How about the Western, Eastern and Southern Cities of DFW - what are they known for? And Fort Worth? What cities to avoid? Unique cities?
Also made the drive from CA to TX some time ago and spent most of my time in Houston. Visited Dallas for a few days. Have now decided to test out DFW for 6 months or more. Will either stay in DFW or move down to Houston or somewhere else after testing DFW period.
Welcome to Texas
Plenty of 1st and 2nd generation Pakistani's here.
Plenty of grocery stores and restaurants.
Plenty of mosques....biggest ones are probably 14th Street in Plano and Esters Rd in Irving, but there are many depending on where you live...Frisco, several in Irving, Colleyville, Coppell, Carrollton, Richardson, several in Plano and probably many more.
Basketball is everywhere, cricket probably less popular. However a group has purchased the old minor league baseball stadium in Grand Prairie. Home of the Texas Super Kings. https://www.visitgrandprairietx.com/...ricket-Stadium
Basketball probably centered around city rec centers with leagues.
Hail...get a garage. Park in the garage. Common. Watch the weather, get an app from the local tv stations. Normally afternoons around 4-5pm if it happens. If weather looks bad, don't go out. If you go out, keep an eye out for the weather. If things start to heat up quickly identify covered parking...car wash, office buildings, Sonic, gas stations. If it starts hailing it will be too late.
Tornados...don't worry. Nothing you can do about it. Less common than mud slides, earthquakes, fires, and all the natural disasters you have in CA. So rare you will probably never see one in your lifetime.
My personal opinion is don't live in Dallas or Ft. Worth. Dallas is about 1000 police officers short. Light traffic enforcement, lucky if you get them to respond at all. Friend this year in Ft. Worth witnessed gang shootout in their parking lot. Called 911 immediately. Took cops 2+ hours to arrive. By that time both cars all gang members gone. Maybe not any different than any big city in CA.
Probably the safer places are Frisco, but plenty of other good cities too. Like in many/most cities, north seems to be safer than south. However 90% of violent crime is not random. Be careful who your friends and family are. Don't put your self in bad situations. Mess around with bad people, bad things happen.
All things equal based on some things you say, I'd probably look at Irving/Valley Ranch maybe Richardson/Plano, maybe Addison.
Definitely get a garage, or at least covered parking. Leaving a car out uncovered is asking for hail damage.
DFW doesn’t get “massive tornados” on a regular basis. They are very rare and most of us who have lived here all our lives have never seen one. (If you live in Oklahoma, that might be a different story.) Download a good weather app with severe alerts and keep it on your phone.
Remember the DFW area is as large as the state of Connecticut. Drive times in heavy traffic are a real issue here.
What’s your budget for housing? I assume you’ll be renting since you’re only looking short term.
Welcome to Texas
Plenty of 1st and 2nd generation Pakistani's here.
Plenty of grocery stores and restaurants.
Plenty of mosques....biggest ones are probably 14th Street in Plano and Esters Rd in Irving, but there are many depending on where you live...Frisco, several in Irving, Colleyville, Coppell, Carrollton, Richardson, several in Plano and probably many more.
Basketball is everywhere, cricket probably less popular. However a group has purchased the old minor league baseball stadium in Grand Prairie. Home of the Texas Super Kings. https://www.visitgrandprairietx.com/...ricket-Stadium
Basketball probably centered around city rec centers with leagues.
Hail...get a garage. Park in the garage. Common. Watch the weather, get an app from the local tv stations. Normally afternoons around 4-5pm if it happens. If weather looks bad, don't go out. If you go out, keep an eye out for the weather. If things start to heat up quickly identify covered parking...car wash, office buildings, Sonic, gas stations. If it starts hailing it will be too late.
Tornados...don't worry. Nothing you can do about it. Less common than mud slides, earthquakes, fires, and all the natural disasters you have in CA. So rare you will probably never see one in your lifetime.
My personal opinion is don't live in Dallas or Ft. Worth. Dallas is about 1000 police officers short. Light traffic enforcement, lucky if you get them to respond at all. Friend this year in Ft. Worth witnessed gang shootout in their parking lot. Called 911 immediately. Took cops 2+ hours to arrive. By that time both cars all gang members gone. Maybe not any different than any big city in CA.
Probably the safer places are Frisco, but plenty of other good cities too. Like in many/most cities, north seems to be safer than south. However 90% of violent crime is not random. Be careful who your friends and family are. Don't put your self in bad situations. Mess around with bad people, bad things happen.
All things equal based on some things you say, I'd probably look at Irving/Valley Ranch maybe Richardson/Plano, maybe Addison.
Dallas and Fort Worth are large cities. Some of the best and worst areas in the metroplex are within the City Limits of both of them.
Not really relevant to the OP, but just had to point that out.
Thank you all for responding. Greatly appreciate the responses from each and every single one of you.
Yes, I will be renting short-term. A few follow up questions:
#1. Weather Apps: What are some good weather apps to download?
#2. Map out DFW: Can someone help me understand the various cities within DFW? I only know the Northern Cities and Dallas. What are the rest of the cities like? Maybe a website of summary of the various cities in DFW would be good.
#3. Gyms: What are some good 24-hour gyms? Back out West in California, I used to go to a gym which was open 24/7/365.
#4. Insurance/Health Coverage: What are some of the top of the line Health Insurances around DFW?
#5. Nature/Hiking/Biking: What are some great places to see nature. And what are some of the great DFW Hiking/Biking areas?
#6. Malls/Shopping: What are some great places for shopping? For example, in Houston it's The Galleria and Memorial City Mall. Also are there any good outlets around DFW?
#7. Theme Parks: What are some great theme parks in/around DFW?
#8. DFW Name: DFW stands for Dallas-Fort Worth yet no one hardly talks about Fort Worth. Usually only Dallas. Why is that? Again, as mentioned above in #2 a summary of the various DFW cities would be nice as there are literally 100+ cities within the DFW Metroplex.
Thank you again.
Last edited by LakersWon310; 05-04-2024 at 06:29 PM..
#1. Weather Apps: Accuweather's radars are my favorite. Bing's weather is the best if you want timing but representation of the actual weather is meh.
#2. Map out DFW: There are a lot of cities lots, lots, and lots of cities of all sizes. You could split up the metroplex in to well know areas: the Alliance area (any cities near or NW of Alliance airport), the mid-cities (H-E-B and the surrounding area), southern Dallas region (any of the cities south of Dallas and East of Joe Pool Lake) but it won't really help you as cities within these areas can be quite different from one another.
#3. Gyms: What are some good 24-hour gyms? Back out West in California, I used to go to a gym which was open 24/7/365. Anytime Fitness, Planit fitness (the majority of them), Workout anytime and a hand full of small/independent gyms. FYI 24 Hour fitness is not 24 hours.
#4. Not much of a help here.
#5. Nature/Hiking/Biking: What are some great places to see nature. And what are some of the great DFW Hiking/Biking areas? Nature like you might see out in California will need to be a long day trip or an overnight stay some where. The area south of Dallas has the best hiking and biking although the trails around Grapevine lake are nice as well. My favorite hiking close by is down near Cleburne.
#6. Malls/Shopping: What are some great places for shopping? For example, in Houston it's The Galleria and Memorial City Mall. Also are there any good outlets around DFW? There's the Galleria north of Dallas. Most of the best shopping is in the same general area, but you'll find malls and plenty of shopping all over the metroplex.
#7. Theme Parks: What are some great theme parks in/around DFW? Six Flags! A bunch of medium sized water parks everywhere with Hurricane Harbour being the main water park. I'm sure someone on here will tell you all about the universal park they're building or planning on building, but I don't know that area of the metroplex.
#8. DFW Name: DFW stands for Dallas-Fort Worth yet no one hardly talks about Fort Worth. Usually only Dallas. Why is that? Again, as mentioned above in #2 a summary of the various DFW cities would be nice as there are literally 100+ cities within the DFW Metroplex. Well you are on the Dallas forum and plenty of people on here tend to just stay in there little section of the D/FW. What would you like to know about Fort Worth and it's suburbs?
1.) I use weather.gov. I might as well put those taxpayer dollars to use.
2.) The easiest thing to do is look at a map or Google it. Street View is beneficial. There must be thousands of cities. Most of the developed areas are in Collin, Tarrant, Denton, and Dallas counties, but things are pushing out in all directions. Some cities are large with good and bad areas, and other cities are smaller and more homogeneous. It really depends on what you want or don't want to be around. Regardless, anything further north is usually going to be more well-regarded, at least on the Dallas side.
4.) Health insurance, if not provided by your employer, would need to be purchased yourself. Regular individual policies are all very expensive, and none are very good. You pay probably thousands per month for catastrophic care that will still cost you thousands if and when you need it.
5.) Other than possibly the Dallas Arboretum (to which I haven't been in over 30 years), there really aren't any good nature areas. It's flat and brown. Some areas have a few trees, but those are dwindling due to development and bad weather and soil conditions. There are no natural lakes, and the lakes we do have look like dirty swamps. Be sure to bring your bug repellant and a pair of pantyhose for those chiggers. I think the chiggers all know me by name.
6.) Northpark Mall and the Galleria are the main malls. For outlet malls, there are lots of options, but Allen Outlets and Grapevine Mills stand out.
7.) Six Flags in Arlington is the main one I know of, though there are others.
8.) There is a separate forum for Fort Worth. This is the Dallas forum, and you can ask and find more about Fort Worth on their forum. Fort Worth, while still a very big city, is more sprawled out and less developed. It's called "Cowtown" for a reason.
1. I use the “Fox 4 Weather App” from the local Tv station. The radar works nationwide.
2. As we’ve said, the area is huge. Where you live really depends on what you’re looking for, and what budget you have.
4. I use the health insurance my employer provides, so I’m not much help with individually-purchased insurance.
5. Hiking here really isn’t a favorite pastime due to the summer heat, but people will walk for exercise in the mornings and evenings. There are lots of paved walking trail systems such as the Trinity Trails in Fort Worth, River Legacy in Arlington, and Campeon Trail in Irving. Grapevine also has its own trail system. There are several state parks near the metro area. https://tpwd.texas.gov/state-parks/parks-map
8. Each city in the metro area is independent, and they all have a different vibe. If great public schools are important, there are several with outstanding public schools. If you’re wanting to be close to nightlife, or in an urban area with public transit, there are cities with those, too.
#1. Community: Most of the dense Pakistani communities you will find will be in pockets. I'd say East Plano, Murphy, Wylie, Sachse due to presence of large EPIC mosque and various other ones in that area. Communities are very much involved in the masjids here. You will find minimal Hindus in this area compared to Frisco. There are a tons of halal Pakistani food options in DFW. My favs BK Khan, Al Markaz, Mai Colachi to name a few. Many recently opened up around Ramadan times. You can follow Dallas Halal Restaurant Reviews on FB for a complete guide/list.
#2. Mosques: In the areas I've mentioned there you have EPIC and Sachse mosque are the two big ones there but there are many other ones. Frisco has Frisco Masjid and nearby Quad Cities Masjid depends where about in Frisco you are...
#3. Sports - Basketball and Cricket: Don't know about Cricket, I'm sure that's everywhere here but as for basketball checkout Ramadan hoops on IG. Most of us really play at Lifetime fitness or Masjid basketball courts here. I was a part of league here as well where you can go on tournaments 3-3 etc..
#4. Hail: Hail/Wind/Tornado comes and goes but is not that much of often. But if you happened to be that 1% impacted. You have home/car insurances to back you up.
#5. Natural Disasters: Already addressed above
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