[gasteven]

im 21 moving to the uk from australia need help deciding to move to manchester or london!

[Lilly93]

Originally Posted by gasteven im 21 moving to the uk from australia need help deciding to move to manchester or london!

London is more expensive, but I prefer it. I'm moving to London, hopefully this August.

[victorfoxtrot]

I'm from London, so i am biased and would say London. Manchester is nice though. To be fair, if you don't like London, you can head north to Manchester easily enough - it's about 3 hours by train last time I checked.

What are your plans and what are you looking to get out of the move? Might help us to know what you are looking for in terms of a place to live, what you are leaving behind etc. If you are looking for a cosmopolitan, crazy busy but vibrant city, bursting with history then London's it, and with this summer's Olympics the city will be in all its glory. Go and soak it up!

[Brigette]

Excellent thread! I would love to hear the answer to this question as well. I think I've gathered a great deal about Manchester from this board (thanks to everyone who responded) but now I would love to hear about London as well. Broad I know (lacks specificity about what part of London), but I'll wait to see what kinds of response this thread gets.

[gasteven]

I'm leaving sydney behind and I love big cities! I love it here, but its time to try something else. My parents are european so visa is not a problem. I haven't found any flats, but I'm still looking. I got about 10,000 GBP. Cant wait

[Bermudashorts]

I am born and bred Mancunian but also lived in London for a long time. I worked with many Australians in London and seemed like they had a strong support network, shared houses with other Aussies and generally seemed to be having a ball.

I don't remember the same in Manchester, although I didn't spend much of my working life there and perhaps you are not particularly bothered about finding a group of Australian's to be friends with anyway; but when you are all new arrivals in a country there is that common bond that can help with making friends.

Maybe what you do for a living and what you hope to do for work in UK will help with a decision. I am an accountant and so the Australian's I have worked with were pretty much all accountants too and there would typically be a lot more work opportunities in London.

I think both are great cities, London always has been and Manchester perhaps more so in recent years. I have no particular desire to live in Manchester again myself, whereas London is my favourite city in the world and always will be. So that's my pick.

[brits1]

Originally Posted by gasteven I'm leaving sydney behind and I love big cities! I love it here, but its time to try something else. My parents are european so visa is not a problem. I haven't found any flats, but I'm still looking. I got about 10,000 GBP. Cant wait

Hi good luck with your travels it sounds really exciting and travel does broaden the mind. Have you thought of having a look around other European bases as well before you settle on either London or Manchester...not that I am putting you off these two wonderful cities but if you have not been to Europe before it might be a good idea, we did that with Cities in Aus before we decided on Perth, W.A and that did surprise us.

[MarylandNed]

I've lived in both and have a soft spot for Manchester as I went to uni there, started my first job there, met my wife and got married there.

However, if you like big cities, then it's got to be London IMO. London is the capital and the biggest city. It has world class entertainment and attractions. There's a large network of Aussies there to help you settle in.