Urban life? I crave the simple life

This week marks my second business trip to Norway (the first was with my previous company of employment). Norway ranks among the richest and most developed countries in the world, and was voted the Best Country To Live In for five (5) straight years.

One thing I have come to realise while being here for just a few days, is that a society's high degree of maturity does not necessarily equate to a high degree of urbanisation and development. Norway is at the forefront of a multitude of echnologies, ranging from biomedical to industrial technology.

Here I am in Mo I Rana, one of Northern Norway's industrial hubs. And yet, the residents - numbering just under 30,000 - lead a simple and straightforward life, free from the trappings of high-strung urban development so characteristic of Asian cities and industrialised regions.

Families still live in cosy cottages along the hillsides - not in high-rise, densely-populated condominiums. Weekends are spent taking the children to picnics, hikes in the forest, or even ski-ing - not to crowded and air-conditioned shopping malls, theme parks and arcades. Children complete their education, settle down with their high-school sweethearts and start their little families early - not get caught up with the paper-chasing, and the complicated, stressful and multi-geographical career paths that inevitably lead to multiple-failed relationships and settling down late, if even at all.

Asian urban life makes for a complicated life. I certainly do crave for the kind of simple yet developed lifestyle that the Norwegians here enjoy, while retaining the good parts of Asian culture. Regretfully, such a perfect balance does not yet exist in Asia, at least to the best of my knowledge. Where I come from, a comfortable life still requires the trappings of the paper-chase and high-strung corporate life. And all at the expense of a simple and happy life.