“Like California without the Bullshit”
Is Barcelona the new Austin?
As a native Californian, I take umbrage at this framing, but still it was illuminating to hear Noah Kagan sing the praises Barna.
If you don’t know who Noah Kagan is, he’s a pretty major creator and the founder of AppSumo and wrote the book Million Dollar Weekend. His backstory is that he was Facebook employee #30, but then he sort of kind of accidentally leaked some information and got kicked out. He’s obviously recovered and doing just fine.
I was listening to his interview with Tim Ferris, and this bit about Barcelona really struck me.
From the episode:
The prices are amazing. There's a beach right there. It's basically California without all the bullshit and a lot cheaper…and so I just started going there every single summer. And now this year I spent 143 days. And it's just amazing.
What's wild is my girlfriend…was saying that the life experience there expectancy of Spaniards is actually higher than Americans.…you have fresher food. Everything is walkable. So you're like going downstairs, you're like, well, I'm going to go get a tomato. And there's a vegetable store. And then there's a meat store and a cheese store. [Yes, this really is how we live in European cities!] You have community there.
[When] We're here [in Austin] where she comes, she lives in my house here.She's like, do you see anyone ever? Do you ever talk to anyone? She's like, where is everyone?
And so all these factors combined, plus the cost of living is cheaper. It's just been where now we're spending at least half You just see more cohesion and, at least it seems… less self-imposed isolation, right?
He goes on to predict that Barcelona will be a new remote working hub
you go to Barcelona, I get a co-working spot, you go to one co-work, but there's so many out there. 500 bucks a month, you get an awesome desk, you get really, really fast Wi-Fi everywhere. You can use UKIO.com, U-K-I-O dot com. It's like Airbnb, but even cheaper. Hmm. Super sick apartments…
…then you know, you can go to all these amazing cities in a weekend…you got like Putradal, which is like better than Lake Tahoe. Bigger mountains, not as crowded. You've got Costa Brava, which is California coast. But even better, it's like European style. You have naked beaches. Both genders, so whatever you want.
This interview is two years old (I found it when I was on a Noah Kagan tear) so not sure if his proclamation still holds. But I always love hearing when other Americans discover what it’s like to live in Europe.
