In the beginning of February 2020 our search engine for neighborhoods has grown from the City of Turku to the neighboring Kaarina. Kaarina is a coastal town with a population of around 34 000. Curiously enough, it promises to be the best place to live. It is quite a claim! So, I answered appropriately, and moved to Kaarina for March to see if it stands the test. At the same time I will be testing how our search engine really works.
Walking a mile in the movers shoes - Does Know Your Hoods really work?
Since our collaboration with the City of Kaarina and Kaarinan Kehitys Oy (commercial collaboration), Know Your Hoods has been offering information about Kaarina’s neighborhoods. And as I am responsible for the development of our service, I decided to look at our search engine through the eyes of somebody planning to relocate. Can the service actually recommend me the most fitting place to live, and do the descriptions and other contents in the service give the right picture of Kaarina’s neighborhoods?
In addition to checking out the effectiveness of the Know Your Hoods search, I’ll also test Kaarina’s claim that it is the best place to live. There are three topics I'll pay close attention to during my stay in Kaarina. These things are something that I personally appreciate, and that Kaarina, for example, considers to be its strengths. At least it has been rewarded for one of them.
- Closeness to nature
- Great location and connections
- Entrepreneur friendly environment
I actually made a video about these, but it is unfortunately only in Finnish. If you'd like to practice your English skills, you can change the language settings from the right upper corner to Finnish and find the video from the blog post.
So, where did I move to?
Kaarina has a variety of different areas to live, starting from the modern apartment building complexes to the low-rise areas surrounded by nature. Not far away from the center you can find some countryside too. In the previous blog post I’ve been mulling over different traits of the neighborhoods and where I would want to move in the city. Kaarina is also popular among people who'd like like build their own home, so I checked out the lots for sale as well, just to be sure.
I realized I’m not quite ready for a land ownership yet, so I’ll take advantage of my freedom to choose. I’ve lived the majority of my adult life close to the center of Turku, so to minimize my leap into the unknown, I decided to move for the first two weeks to the center of Kaarina. The rest of March I will spend in Meri-Piikkiö, so deeper “into the woods to grandmother's house”, as the known fairytale goes. That’s what our Know Your Hoods suggested to me for 'by the sea' and 'by the fields' search criteria.
At this point I should mention that people around me seem to be quite unfamiliar, to say the least, with the countryside lifestyle. My friend commented on my relocation project saying, 'oh, so you are going to the country to lasso some pigs?'. Only time will tell, what really awaits me. :D
What should I do in Kaarina?
Even though we are carrying out this relocation experiment in collaboration with the City of Kaarina and Kaarinan Kehitys Oy, we haven’t agreed on what I should do or participate in, neither on what I should write. My goal is to live a normal life in Kaarina, although I will observe and report on it in a very abnormal way for me.
That’s why I want to hear from Kaarina residents, what should a new kaarinalainen (a new resident of Kaarina) see and do in Kaarina to feel at home? Suggest your own favorite places and things to do in the comment section, and I’ll try to do all of it as much as it is physically possible. Follow our social media on Facebook and Instagram, if you want to follow, how my life in Kaarina is going.
Come by and say hi!
-Susanna
If you also have a move soon, try Know Your Hoods at and give us your feedback on how well did we manage to find the neighborhood that suits you best!
