Ask HN: Anyone lived/living in a war zone/instable country?
Are there some HNers who lived/living in a war zone/instable country and still working in tech ? How was/is life ? Could you share some tips and tricks about working in tech while in war zone?
16 comments
Lived and worked in Israel way before current hype.
And had my share of sitting in a basement listening terrorists rockets blowing up above and falling in neighboring areas. The best tech working experience of my life so far.
Even though many israelis get used to the permanent state of war - it is not for free.
Average stress level is very high, you can see it and feel it everywhere. Depression, anxiety and other symptoms are over the roof.
Anyway,
Tip #2: try living in big cities (lower street crime rates than in safest US states) farther from territories.
Tip #1: learn from locals about all these and other issues.
And had my share of sitting in a basement listening terrorists rockets blowing up above and falling in neighboring areas. The best tech working experience of my life so far.
Even though many israelis get used to the permanent state of war - it is not for free.
Average stress level is very high, you can see it and feel it everywhere. Depression, anxiety and other symptoms are over the roof.
Anyway,
Tip #2: try living in big cities (lower street crime rates than in safest US states) farther from territories.
Tip #1: learn from locals about all these and other issues.
curious: why was it the best tech working experience of your life?
Because of the concentration of brilliant people (both book and street smart) mostly. And low level of toil and bureaucracy in comparison to other countries and to other Israeli sectors as well.
The current hype of genocide you mean?
The current hype of media disinformation and antisemitism, don’t be ignorant fool please
I’m sure a great deal of HN readers live and work in Israel.
It's more complicated than that. While Israel is a tiny country the average Israeli doesn't have the daily "living in a war zone" feeling.
Rockets were fired at cities but that's a rather rare occasion and there are shelters almost everywhere, so take cover for a few minutes and continue with your life.
There big exceptions to that- the few 100k's people that lived until Oct 7 near the south and north borders had to leave their houses and live in temporary places, mostly hotels, in quiet and safe places. The other are people on reserve duty, many of those had to go for a few months of active combat duty leaving their families behind.
There big exceptions to that- the few 100k's people that lived until Oct 7 near the south and north borders had to leave their houses and live in temporary places, mostly hotels, in quiet and safe places. The other are people on reserve duty, many of those had to go for a few months of active combat duty leaving their families behind.
[deleted]
Because all the Gazan HN readers have already been murdered by the Zionist state.
It's the same as anyone else living in a war zone. Rocket attacks anywhere from every few days to multiple times a day, depending. Power blackouts, utilities go down. You keep emergency water and batteries and headlamps and food. And hope that one of the rockets don't land on you or even worse someone you care about. You hate them for doing this, relentlessly. You carry a ball of stress in your stomach that only goes away when you're in a country they're not attacking.
May include Ukraine, Soudan, Syria etc.
Yes, Kyiv, Ukraine (lived there for family reasons). Air strikes are very common, mostly during night. I live and work in 11th floor (self employed, mostly full remote), which is not a good choice, as it's the drone flight level height. Life and business is somehow "normal". There are not really shelters, and even in my quite central district it's 25min by foot to the nearest metro station. Kyiv is very very large. Most "shelters" are just rooms here and there, which is quite useless most of the time as we have the "2-walls minimum" rule to protect against harm but it's physically nonsense too. It's dangerous to use the elevator during attacks (power outage + potential fire / system breakdown), and the staircases are OUTSIDE of the house, so it's always a spicy task to go down to the building's basement to sleep on the (stone) floor, usually on a yoga mat, with some food and my macbook ;)
High rise office buildings, high rise apartment buildings, 5million people waiting for the bus, buying at McDonalds, sitting in coworking spaces, it's exactly like in Paris or London, just with rockets and drone swarms crushing into this densely populated city. The supermarkets have most stuff, the subway works, water, electricty and heating works surprisingsly well, but that's because Kyiv is well defended against airstrikes now, a privilege most eastern cities dont have.
Landline internet and mobile signal has outages (due to russian attacks) but works in general much better than in my origin country Germany. Contactless payment and wifi is very common and works very well in urban areas, even during attacks. All ukrainian ISPs have an agreement now that they try to keep the system up and open for everybody, regardless of your provider.
Lots of native ukrainians are so "done" with it that they jsut sleep through the night / attacks, not giving a f* anymore. Also masses of children everywhere. Working from cafes is wild too, as lots of school children usually stay there during the raids. Lots of laptop workers 60+ too, surprisingly (it's more a younger people thing in my german culture).
Tricks: Don't hope, don't pray, just be well prepared, and hardcore realistic. Have a stack of everything, fill everything you have with clean water, have energy for days and keep your devices loaded. Have a stash of warm clothes, multiple shoes, wet toilet paper, food that doesnt need a fridge or fire and all that "survival" stuff. Assume the worst case, and prepare for this. Dont take risks, it's a warzone, even simple things like losing your keys can be a desaster. Have a backout plan (car) in case things go very bad. Connect with everybody, we are all in this together. Dont tell customers / clients you are in Ukraine, it will just complicate things. Have a laptop of course, to be able to work from everywhere, as you might leave you apartment often due to air raids. Have a one-click hotspot on your phone to work with the laptop.
How close is the war? You can hear explosions all the time, it's a wild mix of air defense working, air defense hitting incoming stuff, or missiles / drones hitting. In 2 occasions, apartment blocks in the 500m radius were hit heavily, one time i was even filming it (sent clip to BBC, they never published afaik). Didnt see any dead people, but lots of smoke. At night i saw a wild thing, a swarm of drones flying into electric wires or so. Sirens all the time. One time a hypersonic missile was shot down or hit something over/in my disctrict, was the loudest thing i ever heard, so fast there was not even air alarm before.
Disclaimer: I am currently not in Ukraine anymore
High rise office buildings, high rise apartment buildings, 5million people waiting for the bus, buying at McDonalds, sitting in coworking spaces, it's exactly like in Paris or London, just with rockets and drone swarms crushing into this densely populated city. The supermarkets have most stuff, the subway works, water, electricty and heating works surprisingsly well, but that's because Kyiv is well defended against airstrikes now, a privilege most eastern cities dont have.
Landline internet and mobile signal has outages (due to russian attacks) but works in general much better than in my origin country Germany. Contactless payment and wifi is very common and works very well in urban areas, even during attacks. All ukrainian ISPs have an agreement now that they try to keep the system up and open for everybody, regardless of your provider.
Lots of native ukrainians are so "done" with it that they jsut sleep through the night / attacks, not giving a f* anymore. Also masses of children everywhere. Working from cafes is wild too, as lots of school children usually stay there during the raids. Lots of laptop workers 60+ too, surprisingly (it's more a younger people thing in my german culture).
Tricks: Don't hope, don't pray, just be well prepared, and hardcore realistic. Have a stack of everything, fill everything you have with clean water, have energy for days and keep your devices loaded. Have a stash of warm clothes, multiple shoes, wet toilet paper, food that doesnt need a fridge or fire and all that "survival" stuff. Assume the worst case, and prepare for this. Dont take risks, it's a warzone, even simple things like losing your keys can be a desaster. Have a backout plan (car) in case things go very bad. Connect with everybody, we are all in this together. Dont tell customers / clients you are in Ukraine, it will just complicate things. Have a laptop of course, to be able to work from everywhere, as you might leave you apartment often due to air raids. Have a one-click hotspot on your phone to work with the laptop.
How close is the war? You can hear explosions all the time, it's a wild mix of air defense working, air defense hitting incoming stuff, or missiles / drones hitting. In 2 occasions, apartment blocks in the 500m radius were hit heavily, one time i was even filming it (sent clip to BBC, they never published afaik). Didnt see any dead people, but lots of smoke. At night i saw a wild thing, a swarm of drones flying into electric wires or so. Sirens all the time. One time a hypersonic missile was shot down or hit something over/in my disctrict, was the loudest thing i ever heard, so fast there was not even air alarm before.
Disclaimer: I am currently not in Ukraine anymore