I'm not being sarcastic. For decades all I've seen on news reports are high rise apartments.
Do they have suburbs like we have around every city? Houses with driveways, sidewalks, manicured lawns, gardens.
I did a Google image search, all the same. I Googled Eastern Bloc countries, they have suburbs.
Most of my new neighbors do zero maintenance on their house, pay a lawn service to cut grass that I could do in thirty minutes with a push mower, no trimming, weeds grow to the top of the fence, piles of yard waste.
Assimilate? They mow their lawn and keep to themselves so I complain no more.

Not really what I meant.

"وضع حوض سباحة في..."


There are some Middle East countries that do have some "western" style housing, more "European city" and less "suburban styles", but the rich and affluent tend to be more likely to have such housing (emulating western "wealth/status) if anyone has it.

The cultures simply don't follow what we consider "normal", with regard to housing.

Sue to economics, services/utilities and culture.

Cairo


Damascus

Cairo. Satellite dish anyone? Smog? Looks like Los Angeles in the seventies.

quote:

Originally posted by sigmonkey:

There are some Middle East countries that do have some "western" style housing, more "European city" and less "suburban styles", but the rich and affluent tend to be more likely to have such housing (emulating western "wealth/status) if anyone has it...

Several years ago we visited Jordan with a Viking tour. One afternoon they drove us around Amman, saw nice and some REAL nice houses. There may be slums, but we did not see them.

On the other hand, there's Cairo...

Just take a look at aerial views of El Paso. House, tire shop, house, car audio shop, house, house, Pawn Shop, Rentn your Wheels & Tires shop. Repeat in the next block.

quote:

Originally posted by Johnny 3eagles:
Just take a look at aerial views of El Paso. House, tire shop, house, car audio shop, house, house, Pawn Shop, Rentn your Wheels & Tires shop. Repeat in the next block.

Add in a liquor store, strip club, school & church, and you have some parts of inner Houston.

^^^
It's not truly a bad neighborhood until you see check cashing places on every corner.

Bars over windows are a clue too.

Whatever the mid-eastern translation of “Martin Luther King Drive/Blvd/Ave” is, stay away from there.

quote:

Originally posted by Schmelby:
I'm not being sarcastic. For decades all I've seen on news reports are high rise apartments.
Do they have suburbs like we have around every city? Houses with driveways, sidewalks, manicured lawns, gardens.

Every city has suburbs, do they resemble what we see in the US or parts of Europe, generally no. There are single-family homes, usually for the wealthy and well connected however there's not many of them, and generally clustered around various compounds forming walled neighborhoods. If you enjoy overhead map reading, just look for where the embassy's and consulates are for varying countries.

Multi-story apartments in the nicer sections have condos or townhomes, whereas middle-class and lower areas will resemble the standard apartment 10-15 story complex found all around the world. City centers are usually a combination of old, old buildings surrounded by apartment high-rises, interlaced with a warren of streets and alleys that have been around for ages. Whereas further out from the city center there's no old buildings just varying generations of the same 3-4 story design. Go to Cairo, Amman, Baghdad or, Kabul..pretty much the same; biggest differences is the amount of open spaces available for the public, and are the squares available to relax and enjoy a garden or, fountain or, are they overrun with street vendors and hustlers that's made the square into a open-air market. Lawns you likely won't find for obvious reasons unless they're fabulously wealthy in which case they'll be behind wall.

Back when I was living in Tehran in the mid-60's the houses in the suburbs where we were renting were not unlike houses in the US. The difference was that pretty much every one was surrounded by a 8' tall masonry wall, usually topped with broken glass or another deterrent. Within the compound, lawns, gardens, and orchards were cultivated to the taste of the residents. Most of the rentals offered to foreigners had pools and/or other water features. But from the street all you could see was the wall.

Many of these residences had one exterior wall of the house itself right adjacent to the street. There were no sidewalks or other buffer zones. Given the expertise of the typical Iranian driver, cars would regularly crash into someone's house, and walls were built strong enough to resist this.

The thought of leaving one's home open to the world was that it was inviting theft, home invasion, and/or kidnapping. I doubt that it has changed much since then.

"Human sacrifice, goats and camels living together... mass hysteria!"

Bahrain overall was ok, with rough patches. Karachi was a cesspit, stem to stern. The few other backwaters I saw were worse.

None of them came anywhere near the Caribbean for abject poverty and depression. 200 yards from any touristy-hotel was a wasteland.

Countries without much of a middle class don’t tend to have middle class housing.

Most of those countries are ruled by a variety of dictators and have a core of very rich families and the rest of the population is poor.

Then add the effects of constant conflicts and that’s not where nice subdivisions are built.

While in Iraq, there could be palatial dwellings equal to lavish LA entertainers homes, right next to a shack with no utilities
Quickly transitioning to open farmland with a similar mix of decent structures and goat shacks. Interesting was when we got intel to hit a high value target, usually the target location turned out to be one of the nicer houses in the area

Most of the world doesn't have suburbs in the way you imagine them. it's mostly a North American thing, as we're the only ones with the wealth to make such a thing possible and the population to make it necessary.

quote:

Originally posted by 220-9er:
Countries without much of a middle class don’t tend to have middle class housing.

Most of those countries are ruled by a variety of dictators and have a core of very rich families and the rest of the population is poor.

Then add the effects of constant conflicts and that’s not where nice subdivisions are built.

Well, with not much of a middle class, no wonder they're always pissed off.

quote:

Originally posted by captain127:

While in Iraq, there could be palatial dwellings equal to lavish LA entertainers homes, right next to a shack with no utilities

Fried of mine went to India for work for like two weeks and told me the same thing there. Super rich right next to super poor. Also said the number of people just openly pissing and shitting right in the gutters and streets was shocking to him.