Socialphy peeps, do you ever wonder what it would be like to live in a different city? Or are you bored of life and feel like being reckless and spontaneous and starting all over again in some place new (sentiments that I feel on a daily basis)? Well, here are five alternative places to live in the world that you might never of considered (courtesy of the guardian.co.uk). I'm already planning my escape route....

Portland, Oregon



It's not somewhere that would ever occur to me to live but apparently it's the capital of liberal, hipster USA. Think vintage clothes and nu-folk music. It's a good place to go when you become entirely disillusioned with the government and the system as most people who live there would like the entire Pacific Northwest to break off from the rest of the US and go it alone. Cyclists are loved, not loathed. There are planning restrictions on crappy developments. Portland has the highest number of microbreweries in the world. Everyone is lovely AND it still remains relatively good value.

The case against: Bit too cool for school. Everyone's like you. Who will you have to hate? Oh, yes, everyone like you. The weather: hot in the summer but cold and dank in the winter

And you don't need to buy one of those large ugly people carrier cars to get around. Unusually for the US, you can cycle and walk freely as it's one of the most bike- and foot-friendly city in the country, packed with proper cycle routes (15 minutes to downtown from the northside). But if you do own a car, you can save it for surf trips to the coast, or a ski trip to the mountains (both 60-100 minutes away).


St Pauli, Hamburg



Forget Berlin, St. Pauli in Hamburg is where it's at.

For a start, it's almost on the Baltic. Plus it's home to HafenCity, the biggest spot of urban regeneration in Europe, bigger even than our own paltry Olympics. Despite stellar architecture and some community-minded planning, I wouldn't recommend moving to HafenCity itself, not till 2023 or so: not unless you like cranes and high-vis jackets. But the old red-light district, St Pauli, just along the Elbe, and to the north around Karolinenstrasse and Schanzenstrasse, have been quietly simmering with revival. This was the hotbed of radicals in the 1970s and 1980s, and it still hums with alternative living. Only there's better coffee. That's progress. It's still seedy, and you may have to bob and weave around the stag parties, but tucked among the porn are artists' studios in old slaughterhouses, experimental theatre companies and great shops. Like Holy Bikes (holybikes.de). It's more expensive than Berlin, but then Hamburg has the great advantage of a vibrant economy and jobs. You'll need them, when all that alternative living palls.

The case against: Ooh, when the wind whistles in from the Batlics: Hamburg in January = freezing. A few too many advertising agencies. For the hardcore beatniks among you, the area may have already "gone".


Northern coast, Maui, Hawaii



Much of Hawaii is overloaded with kitsch. Here, there is none.

What's going for it?

The northern coast of Maui is where you go utterly to detach from reality. This place is so laid-back, much of it has a 15mph speed limit. Don't even think about pineapples and grass skirts (but do think about surfboards; this is where it all began). Much of Hawaii is overloaded with kitsch. Here, there is none. OK, a very light dusting. But, mostly, the northern coast comprises a series of tumbledown, laid-back bars, waterfalls, surf spots like Ho'okipa Beach and Kapalua Bay, lush jungle, and communities of writers, artists and what my gran would have called layabouts. Avocados and guavas are as common as nettles here. As are whales. Everyone will soon know your name (the place is exceedingly friendly and community-minded). But the clincher? This is where the Japanese go on holiday. And if a place can get the Japanese to relax and try surfing, it might even work on me.

The case against: A long way away from anywhere else. A volcano!


Cihangir, Istanbul



What's going for it? I bet guide books blethered on about "where east meets west" when Istanbul was Constantinople. But at least it's finally coming true again. On account of Turkey's wooing of both the EU and east Asia, the past decade has seen the city turn from lovely-if-decrepit museum piece to lovely-if-decrepit museum piece with great bars, economic growth and an OK public transport system. Not all of the change has been for the best. But spots like Cihangir make it all seem worthwhile. This is an Orhan Pamuk kind of neighbourhood. You'll still pass woodturning workshops, button warehouses and old ice-cream parlours en route for that dark, urbane bookshop. It still feels old and ancient and unrestored and a bit shabby. There are still whiskery grocers who'll deliver figs to the door. The dervishes still whirl up the hill at the Galata Lodge. Only now there's a great rooftop bar or six with views over the Bosphorus and a good modern art gallery at the bottom of the hill. What with culture and economics so shifted to the east, this feels like where the world begins.

The case against Earthquakes. They're waiting for a big one, and who knows what horrors lie within those teetering apartment blocks. Be sure to get a very, very good structural survey. Those views come with a price: exceedingly steep hills, which turn into white-water-raft courses in rain showers.


Santa Cruz, Tenerife



Santa Cruz's neighbourhoods mostly date from the 1890s to the 1930s, all pastels and gin slings.

Yes, Tenerife. But not the Tenerife long associated with shameful Brits abroad. This is The Other Tenerife. The capital bears no relation to the island more familiar to Brits. Turn a few corners on the coast road and it's like, well, Spain. Santa Cruz is magnificently, sexily exotic. Its neighbourhoods mostly date from the 1890s to the 1930s, all pastels and gin slings, though the long-lost recent economic boom has left its mark, too, with a new art gallery and public square by architects Herzog & De Meuron, and the obligatory "thing" (Is it a bird? Is it a plane?) by Santiago Calatrava. The tourist-free city is big enough not to be dull, small enough to be manageable – about the size of Leicester, only, alas, without its charms, although Santa Cruz does have bright placitas filled with orange trees and dark, drowsy coffee bars full of old men playing dominos, as well as a brilliant food market, Nuestra Señora de Africa. And when it all gets too much, there's a series of great beaches (the Las Teresitas being perhaps the best), a great coastline for swooning driving, and mountains for hiking.


I don't know about you guys but Hawaii wins hands down for me. I don't even care if it's a long way from anything else. If the world goes crazy this year, that's where you'll find me.