How much do restaurants cost in San Miguel de Allende?
Ivy Del Pozzo
I was starting to think that restaurants in San Miguel de Allende are expensive until I visited Los Angeles. When I go back to the United States, I realize that the restaurants here are much more reasonable. From an expat’s perspective, I am eating at more of the more highly “trafficked” restaurants than the Mexican restaurants and part of that is because I had an experience when I moved to Chiapas many years ago so I am now kind of cautious. But the restaurants that...
I was starting to think that restaurants in San Miguel de Allende are expensive until I visited Los Angeles. When I go back to the United States, I realize that the restaurants here are much more reasonable. From an expat’s perspective, I am eating at more of the more highly “trafficked” restaurants than the Mexican restaurants and part of that is because I had an experience when I moved to Chiapas many years ago so I am now kind of cautious. But the restaurants that I would recommend to any tourist are places that I know in which they would not have any problem.
Here in San Miguel, you could eat breakfast for around 60 pesos (around $3.25). Lunch is around 75 to 120 pesos (around $4 to $6.50) or even up to 180 pesos ($10) depending on what you want to eat and where you are going to eat. San Miguel de Allende was named as one of the top restaurant dining destinations in all of Mexico. So you can eat dinner here as reasonably as 90 pesos ($5) all the way up to 350 to 650 pesos ($19 to $35.50) since there are all kinds of wonderful culinary experiences here in San Miguel de Allende.
For 90 pesos ($5), you can buy enchiladas for dinner or something similar to that at a regular sit-down restaurant. I don’t recommend anybody to eat on the street. I am hyper-cautious because I was in bed for 3 months with typhoid fever when I was in Chiapas when I did work in the jungle for Indian human rights and reforestation. I got very sick with typhoid, which is a disease that comes from contaminated food. I was medevaced out when that happened. In comparison to San Miguel, Chiapas was a much more rural area and that was about 25 years ago so things were quite different then. But it is still the same in many places. You could still get salmonella and the people selling on carts on the side of the streets do not have the ability to have everything be sanitary. However, the food smells fabulous and I think it is probably some of the best tasting foods in Mexico but unless I am in a financial situation that I couldn’t afford to eat anywhere except on the street, I definitely wouldn’t because it is risky and our systems are not acclimated for it. My housekeeper does not eat on the carts on the streets and she is Mexican. It is just an extra cautionary measure.
In comparison with the cost of restaurants in Los Angeles, it is about 40% less to have a fine dinner at restaurants here in San Miguel de Allende. We have some restaurants here that equal some of the finest restaurants in Mexico City. We also have restaurants in San Miguel that have been opened by people from Mexico City, so consequently the prices get a little higher. That is why sometimes I say having lived in Mexico for 25 years now it is becoming expensive but when I go back to the United States, I realize that it is really not expensive here at all.
In general, you get what you pay for here in San Miguel. The quality of food, the aesthetics of the food, and the food presentation is really four or five star dining in many restaurants.
(Dining out with Ivy del Pozzo, San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, pictured.)
How much does it cost for a gardener in Cayo, Belize, including San Ignacio and Belmopan?
Franklin Syrowatka - Better Homes Belize
The salary of gardeners in Cayo depends on how skilled they are. A helper or a beginner would get around $30 to $35 Belize (US $15 to US $17.50). A skilled gardener earns around $60 Belize (US $30) per day.
There are lots of skilled and motivated people here in Cayo but after all, we are in a Caribbean country. Part of the Caribbean culture is being laid back so you should also expect a laid back attitude with lower productivity than you would expect in...
The salary of gardeners in Cayo depends on how skilled they are. A helper or a beginner would get around $30 to $35 Belize (US $15 to US $17.50). A skilled gardener earns around $60 Belize (US $30) per day.
There are lots of skilled and motivated people here in Cayo but after all, we are in a Caribbean country. Part of the Caribbean culture is being laid back so you should also expect a laid back attitude with lower productivity than you would expect in North America. The quality of the work varies on a case-by-case basis. You have to search for a while for someone who does good quality work. Most of the time, your first gardener won’t be your last one.
Usually, you would have to supply the tools that the gardeners need to do their job. Some of them bring have their own tools, but these gardeners are usually the ones who charge more.
(Overlooking the gardens at Vanilla Hills Lodge, Cayo, Belize, pictured.)
How's the nightlife and entertainment in and around the Panama City, Panama suburb of Fort Clayton / Clayton?
Nelson Vega
This year, The City of Knowledge (Ciudad del Saber), located in the Clayton area of the city of Panama, will hold the Panama Jazz Festival from January 13 to 18.
This is one of the most recognized jazz festivals of the region. It used to take place at Casco Viejo but this year it is moving to Clayton, which brings a great option for entertainment and a nice cultural event for the area.
This year, The City of Knowledge (Ciudad del Saber), located in the Clayton area of the city of Panama, will hold the Panama Jazz Festival from January 13 to 18.
This is one of the most recognized jazz festivals of the region. It used to take place at Casco Viejo but this year it is moving to Clayton, which brings a great option for entertainment and a nice cultural event for the area.
What do I need to know about living overseas and retiring abroad?
Kristin Wilson - Orbis Relocation
One of the things to know about living abroad is that life is going to be different, so you should be open-minded and non-judgmental about it. We're flipping sides here. We're going from being in our comfort zone, in a place where everybody looks like us and we’re going to be the minority in the new country. We're not going to fit in 100%.
I was actually having this conversation the other day with somebody who owns a very big blog about living abroad. ...
One of the things to know about living abroad is that life is going to be different, so you should be open-minded and non-judgmental about it. We're flipping sides here. We're going from being in our comfort zone, in a place where everybody looks like us and we’re going to be the minority in the new country. We're not going to fit in 100%.
I was actually having this conversation the other day with somebody who owns a very big blog about living abroad. They're saying that, once you leave, you aren't going to fit in a 100% in a country that you're going to. You’ll always a little bit of a foreigner - an outsider. And when you come back, you aren't going to 100% fit in America or the country that you're coming from, because you have changed. You have opened your eyes. You have had an experience that is not the norm and you have evolved. You’ll change in ways that you can't really expect but it's always in a good way.
(Pictured to the right and above: teaching orphans to surf in Costa Rica.)
So you just kind of end up with maybe one foot in Ecuador and one foot in America or wherever you're from. You're never going to fit in 100% in one place. That's okay. People might not even notice when you come back to America, but you don’t notice. They'll start to notice the way in which you're different and you'll start to appreciate it more.
Another thing to know about moving abroad relates to planning. It's really actually quite good to have somebody on your team to help plan, because one of the most common things that happens is when you don't have clear plan when you move, a lot of well-meaning people will try to help you, but also a lot of people try to take advantage of you. You might attract situations and people that don't have your best interests in mind. For example, if you look different and you're moving from a different country they might assume you have money. You don't want to just take advice from the first people that you meet when you get to your new country. Sometimes, even on forums, people have their agendas in mind and their best interests, not yours.
You want to get an objective perspective. It could be anybody who has experience in that country that you're moving to and has positive reviews. That's really important because I can't tell you how many times I’ve been on an airplane and heard someone sitting next to me or behind me or in front of me, talking very loudly, giving advice to someone who's coming to Costa Rica or Mexico for the first time. The person giving the advice seems always to be a foreigner who's been there for maybe a year or even less. In some cases they've been there like 3 months or 6 months. In any case, they are giving really bad advice and very wrong information to an unsuspecting person who's sitting next to them on a plane. That's where it starts. It starts there and it doesn't end while you're in the country. People want to share their information with you but you can't be the judge of whether or not it's good or bad information.
(Pictured to the right and above: working in Punta Pacifica, Panama City, Panama.)
When people move to a new country, they tend to be very much more trusting than they would be at their country of origin. In a normal day, when we go to work, for example, we get in our cars, we drive to work and then we go off to where we work and we see all of our co-workers. We don't tend to ask any strangers for life advice or any type of advice on the side of the road or inside of a restaurant or just anywhere. What happens when people go abroad is they don't have any close connections; friends, co-workers or any family members so the first people they meet become their comfort zone. You want to be able to have some selection of who those people are and not just the first people you meet.
For example, a lot of people move to Costa Rica, for example (and this can happen anywhere) and then they want to have social gatherings, so they might invite people to come over to their home who they met in the first month or so or even in the first year that they've been living in a place. They invite a lot of the locals, like local surfers, used to tell me that these people are their friends. They come down every year for a few months and they tell me that they see them every year. Even if just one of those people is not well meaning that person could tip off somebody that you have a flat screen TV or whatever you have that has a value in your house. Somebody could break into your house and know exactly where to go to steal something because one of your acquaintances told them.
This is true especially if you're going to a country where the income is low, in Nicaragua for example, where their per capita income is one of the lowest in Latin America, just above Haiti. When you make more in a day what they can make in a year, they could be really good people but they could be in such a desperate need that they would steal or something like that to get by.
I wish I could tell every expat moving abroad, just keep a little bit of that filter and barrier and self-awareness. Before you invite people to your home and take people's advice, you really need to get to know them. If you can come from that approach where you know that these other things are possible (even though they are not necessarily going to happen to you but has happened to other people), then you can choose your friends and your inner circle with more care. If you do this, you'll end up having a more positive experience and you might even end up realizing sooner rather than later, these people are not really nice friends.
(Pictured to the right and above: overlooking Mayan ruins in Mexico.)
Your caution should extend to other foreigners as well. There are foreigners who have been in the country for a long time. Maybe they are business people. They might also be there for the wrong reasons or not have your best interest in mind when there’s a business deal, real estate transaction, or other similar events. You have got to think like this and take caution wherever you go.
In Nicaragua, Mexico or Ecuador, you’re probably not going to be able to depend on the local justice system for anything when something goes wrong. It's not realistic in most cases. You really have to be your own judge of everything. I don't want it to seem like a dire warning but I have seen people who move abroad completely drop everything and just want to be friends with everybody at the same time and make decisions that they would not make back in California or Colorado or New York City. I would just say, keep your head on and stay smart.
On the other side, you should enjoy the place you’re moving to. Wherever you go, get to know your surroundings very well. A lot of people, because they do research on the Internet, will pick one place, move there, and then end up in their daily routines. That's great, but then they miss out on a lot more of the country. Take advantage of where you are. Usually the cost of traveling is lower once you get down there. I when I lived in Costa Rica and Nicaragua, I think that I literally drove all around the country multiple times. I don't know if there's any stone I left unturned. And I was surprised at how few of the locals or foreigners had ever been to most of the places I visited, and how people tended to just go to the main places. You really get to see the local culture and the beauty when you go off the beaten path.
In Nicaragua, for example, I went to most of the beaches between San Juan del Sur and the tip of Nicaragua, up by El Salvador. And then, one day in 2008, (I had a driver at the time that I paid US $100 per month) I decided to explore some of the towns in the towns in the mountains. I was in a little town called Aposentillo, about 45 minutes north of Chinandega. I drove from there to Estelí, Jinotega, Matagalpa, and many very small, mountain towns. Some of them didn’t even have hotels.
Along the way, I got to see a lot of beautiful pottery. Some of the towns didn’t even have a restaurant, so instead of eating at a restaurant, I remember eating at someone’s house. The locals were very surprised, even though I speak fluent Spanish. They wanted to know who was this blonde haired, 25 year old girl, driving a blue Xterra, coming into our town to walk around and visit. It was really cool. I love doing things like that, and have done similar things in every country I go to, even, for example, in Thailand, from which I just returned. I highly recommend expats do it as well.
Slow travel is better. If you can, I recommend that you go somewhere for several months or even a year and really explore the entire country and then decide where you want to live. In my experience and the experiences of my clients, that is the way you’re going to find where you would feel most at home.
Take advantage of being in a new place. You will be surprised. You’ll end up going places that aren’t really on the tourist map.
You can indeed buy or you can create a business in Portugal. If you buy a business or create a business and you create a certain number of jobs, you will also be eligible for the Golden Visa.
Businesses in Portugal are transacted regularly. My perception is that small businesses don’t tend to be bought by external investors. Sometimes external investors will make an investment into a business but they wouldn’t tend to buy a small business. Large businesses, however,...
You can indeed buy or you can create a business in Portugal. If you buy a business or create a business and you create a certain number of jobs, you will also be eligible for the Golden Visa.
Businesses in Portugal are transacted regularly. My perception is that small businesses don’t tend to be bought by external investors. Sometimes external investors will make an investment into a business but they wouldn’t tend to buy a small business. Large businesses, however, including state-run businesses and utilities, have been increasingly put up in order to obtain foreign investment. We have a lot of Chinese investments into what are essentially state-run businesses and private partnerships in the energy sector, the health sector, the transportation sector, and the power distribution sector.
You can buy businesses here in Portugal. It is very transparent. It is market-lead and you could buy or start a business in many ways in the entire country.
These three words are enough to strike fear into any news watching / Internet reading American. We are led to believe that we would either be kidnapped or just plain murdered within minutes of crossing the border. Even Mexicans who lived in the US advised us against driving in Mexico.
So, in order to add some firsthand experiences into the mix, and at the risk of contradicting...
Once Wee-Yiong Fung obtained his education in the US, he headed back to the land of opportunity, the place where his immigrant parents from China and Yugoslavia found hope: Panama. Along with other visitors to the Best Places site who were treated to a video of a narrated car ride Wee-Yiong provided as part of his answer to the question “What's it like to drive in Volcan and Cerro Punta, Chiriqui Province?” Jet now takes us on another journey with Wee-Yiong, one that is marked...
This was a special day for my friends from Alabama. They had wanted to go visit the Janson Coffee Farm for the last two years. This was a great day for slow drive to Volcan. It was a cool, rainy, gray day but the smiles and laughter made it feel warm and happy. All along the way there was an air of excitement from the two of them. I heard stories about the times they rode horses with the Janson family, picnics and weekend outings; all the memories were so pleasant. Along the way we...
I was starting to think that restaurants in San Miguel de Allende are expensive until I visited Los Angeles. When I go back to the United States, I realize that the restaurants here are much more reasonable. From an expat’s perspective, I am eating at more of the more highly “trafficked” restaurants than the Mexican restaurants and part of that is because I had an experience when I moved to Chiapas many years ago so I am now kind of cautious. But the restaurants that...
The salary of gardeners in Cayo depends on how skilled they are. A helper or a beginner would get around $30 to $35 Belize (US $15 to US $17.50). A skilled gardener earns around $60 Belize (US $30) per day. 
One of the things to know about living abroad is that life is going to be different, so you should be open-minded and non-judgmental about it. We're flipping sides here. We're going from being in our comfort zone, in a place where everybody looks like us and we’re going to be the minority in the new country. We're not going to fit in 100%..jpg)
Another thing to know about moving abroad relates to planning. It's really actually quite good to have somebody on your team to help plan, because one of the most common things that happens is when you don't have clear plan when you move, a lot of well-meaning people will try to help you, but also a lot of people try to take advantage of you. You might attract situations and people that don't have your best interests in mind. For example, if you look different and you're moving from a different country they might assume you have money. You don't want to just take advice from the first people that you meet when you get to your new country. Sometimes, even on forums, people have their agendas in mind and their best interests, not yours.
This is true especially if you're going to a country where the income is low, in Nicaragua for example, where their per capita income is one of the lowest in Latin America, just above Haiti. When you make more in a day what they can make in a year, they could be really good people but they could be in such a desperate need that they would steal or something like that to get by.
You can indeed buy or you can create a business in Portugal. If you buy a business or create a business and you create a certain number of jobs, you will also be eligible for the Golden Visa.
Driving… 
This was a special day for my friends from Alabama. They had wanted to go visit the Janson Coffee Farm for the last two years. This was a great day for slow drive to Volcan. It was a cool, rainy, gray day but the smiles and laughter made it feel warm and happy. All along the way there was an air of excitement from the two of them. I heard stories about the times they rode horses with the Janson family, picnics and weekend outings; all the memories were so pleasant. Along the way we...