Travel Advice

[Chicken Neck Nelly]

So I am in the preliminary stages of preparing to move abroad from North America by making dental and vision appointments, ordering a bunch of useful shit, etc. Already lived in Europe for 2 years. I work online for a giant tech firm and I wanna move somewhere that is cheap, always warm, and relatively safe. Would also prefer to live in a small city or somewhat rural setting. Got it narrowed down to Panama or Vietnam, but I can't make a definitive choice and am open to suggestions from fellow Kiwis who are digital nomads and travelers; I would also just like to hear some travel stories in general if you are in the mood to share some.

 

[sasazuka]

Within Latin America, there's also Costa Rica, which is the safest country in the region for foreigners and the capital San Jose has neighbourhoods full of white ex-pat English-speakers (although, yeah, that's also true for Panama City, which still has Americans from the Canal Zone days). There's also Belize which has the added benefit of English being the official language.

 

[Tookie]

Panama has more of a crime factor than Vietnam and is a lot more costly if you are around Panama City. Vietnam is worse in the pollution/general chaos factor. Vietnam will be a lot more of a culture shock compared to Panama if you care about that sort of thing as well.

Personally, I would go for Vietnam but I would recommend visiting there first since expats tend to have polarized opinions of the place and either love it or hate it. Panama is meh to me and I would suggest Costa Rica as well or maybe quieter corners of Mexico like Chiapas if Central America is what you're looking at.