I’m starting to plan for the long-term with the idea to move out of the US, eventually. Having watched a lot of urbanist content, I get the impression that Amsterdam is the ideal city. However, I think other European cities get overshadowed. Specifically, Scandinavian/Nordic cities. How do Oslo, Copenhagen, Stockholm and Helsinki compare to Amsterdam and other Dutch cities? Can I get around with just walking and cycling? What’s the public transit infrastructure in those cities like?
Additionally, I’m of Cuban descent, so will I face any racial discrimination? I’m pretty sure that Scandinavia as a whole isn’t racist, but I don’t doubt that I will have isolated encounters.
It’s one of those things where as a tourist, you’re completely fine and don’t really notice the racism. And you probably won’t get assaulted because of your race.
But the foreign sounding last name on your CV halves your chance of getting hired, servers at a restaurant will address your white friends first when taking an order, your chance of getting the apartment you applied for is lower (unless it’s in the one part of town where all the foreigners live, since they don’t get white applicants) etc. And a lot of europeans are completely oblivious to this.
And you still have police shooting unarmed black people, that kind of stuff, it’s just way less prevalent and the media does not talk about it and there’s no huge protests.
France made including portraits on CVs mandatory so they can legally exclude racialized people from jobs