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Comment by sremani | Hacker News Reader

May be this is a dumb question, I will ask it anyway, Tijuana Mexico is about 500 miles from Bay Area, where as Vancouver Canada is 1000 miles.

Que Canada?

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How are you comparing Tijuana to Vancouver? I have lived in Tijuana. It's one of the worst cities in Mexico. Guadalajara or Mexico City would make much more sense, but even they can't compare to Vancouver. I openly say that the bridge that connects the Tijuana airport directly to the United States is the best thing that ever happened to the city.

I have never been to either of the cities, my question is a question of curiosity, that is why I qualified it with probably being a dumb question.

Going to 'Diet USA' is likely more seamless and convenient. I lived in Canada for several years and I honestly think that's a good description for it, you cannot really tell whether you are in Michigan or Ontario if you don't look at the road signs.

Or visit the museums, where all the exhibits have both French and English text.

As an American who worked in Canada for a summer, I can honestly say that the two countries are so similar you're surprised by any minor differences that do come up.

Have you been in Quebec? Montreal is more like a central European city than anything in the US. I haven't been to Quebec City but I gather it's not much different.

It's also starkly different if you look at share of wealth. Class divisions are smaller in Canada, noticeably so.

Ontarians say "Eh" unironically.

As a Chicagoan, being in Toronto can be a little bizarre. After a while I forget I'm not at home. That said, Canada is fairly diverse. Montreal has no easy American city comparison.

I'm a Canadian who lived and worked in the US for six years, and my impression on returning home is that Canada is the country you'd get if you took the U.S. and removed the extremes of wealth and poverty.

This will no longer be true as the divide in the GTA grows out of control.

Canada has a very small population so you haven't noticed these divides yet but they will only get worse with time unless our government takes a serious stance on ensuring the middle class doesn't shrink.

My obvious thought: YCombinator is in English (based on what I've seen, at least as their primary language) and Canada is an English speaking country.

Also a homicide rate of 2/100k vs 40 might be indicative of other problems one city may have that the other doesn't.

What a great opportunity to make the world a better place.

How would hosting it in Tijuana reduce their homicide rate?

Trickle-down economics.

Also, role modeling.

I'd guess the number of tech startup founders in Vancouver is higher than in Tijuana. Also, no need for bullet proof vests.

Oh boy, I really doubt anyone who stepped on TJ grounds wants to ever come back. Especially not YC people

Other than the language barrier? I imagine its terrible crime problem is a mark against it as well. It had 100+ more murders than often-cited Chicago last year with 1/3rd the population of Chicago!

Also at $15,000 GDP per capita, its not exactly a wealthy place. Vancouver chimes it at 3x that and had all of one murder last year.

Vancouver had more like 12 murders last year (http://vancouver.ca/police/Planning/2016YED.pdf).

Vancouver is one of those places where:

The future is already (t)here – it's just not evenly distributed.

-- William Gibson

Canada has some really great universities, so the talent pool might be higher quality there.

Another reason: despite being closer to the Bay Area, flights to/from Mexico from SFO are actually more expensive (by 100-200 dollars) than to/from Vancouver.

and cheaper than Vancouver

and Mexico's a lot easier to go to than Canada (which now also has an ESTA like system)

also I would guess that people in Tijuana are pretty good with their English

I may vehemently disagree with the eTA program, but let's not overstate, it's $7CAD ($5.18USD) and lasts a decade.

English, and Vancouver is a lot safer/cleaner than TJ.

As a Mexican I agree. Tijuana is not particularly one of the star cities of Mexico.

I'm interested in visiting Mexico, a city not a beach. What would you recommend?

Unfortunately I haven't traveled Mexico much to recommend one from personal experience but my friends who have visited Guadalajara and Guanajuato have loved it.

Thanks!

Maybe YC going there could pump money into the area to improve it.

Probably IP law

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