It occurred to me that it is several years since I last visited the UK. I tend to follow UK news feeds. Two of my children stil live there and it’s where my pension originates. And I still watch English language TV as well as French. But recently the UK seems more and more remote. I see it on TV and don’t recognise shop names or products in the adverts.
I know I owe the UK a debt fo giving me a decent education and making it possible to retire at age 52 with no debts and two properties. Not bad for a lad from an immigrant family whose parents lived almost their entire adult lives in council housing.
But when I look at the chaos that is now Britain I know why I emigrated to France back in the 1990s .Over the years my sister and two of my sons have emigrated to Canada and the US. I am almost ashamed of what is happening to the British people. How they have been betrayed by the politicians and become so gullible.
Sort of. My background is very similar to yours and I was lucky to be able to retire at 56. I still have very strong links to family and friends in the UK and am the only one of my very large family to have left the UK. I agree about betrayal by this awful government and it’s predecessors of the same party. Not so sure about the gullibility. Successive Conservative government made promises based upon false information and then did not live up to those promises. The Brexit debate was deliberately polarised and many promises were made that could not be kept.
It’s very easy to say that people were gullible to accept the promises made, but most people just could not really judge who was telling the truth and who was not. In the end they had to make a decision based upon who they believed and unfortunately, skilled con artists can be very believable.
I think we have to be so careful not to be sucked in to the distorted world of the media which always goes to the dark side. I have two lots friends who have gone back to the UK in the last few months for family reasons and are loving being back. They do not recognise the stories that are being repeated by the media and by friends still living in France. Maybe they are fortunate, or maybe they are living through another (more balanced) experience.
I’ve said it before. From my own experience, many years ago - I was living in Battersea and one night my mother phoned me in terror because the news on TV was reporting rioting and chaos where I was living - and I was blissfully unaware of anything. Both perspectives were valid - neither was the complete story
My UK TV system comes via Eire, only name I recognise is Lidl but I know what you mean. Like living anywhere in the world, day to day is what you get used to and know and previous life in the UK becomes more blurred and distant along with some of the language now as well.
As SuePJ says, there is a presentation of life in the UK I see reflected back by some here that’s just not real. Life goes on as it always has, and probably a lot better than it did 50 years ago, apart from feeling very overcrowded.
Possibly feeling overcrowded as having been in France for so long rather than actually being overcrowded as the number of people hasn’t grown enormously- despite what some politicians may say.
Have just returned home after a 2 week stay in England with our daughter. She lives in same area that I lived for 54 years before moving to France.
The England I remember is still there albeit crowded out by new development which invariably changes the whole landscape with industrial and housing estates around almost every corner.
Fast food outlets everywhere and anywhere and the rubbish they generate litters the country. Walking our dog around streets and rural paths was a nightmare with broken glass, litter and doggy doos everywhere and for those considerate enough to use a poo bag why do they then hang the package on a branch of the nearest bush or tree?
Some of the changes I witnessed were good and others not so good but the most vivid memory of my visit is the amount of litter created by modern living.
Of course France creates litter too but it is not evident on the streets and roads as in England which is perhaps because English councils can no longer afford to employ street cleaners whereas France seem to be able to or perhaps its citizens are more caring of their environments.
I am grateful to England and the life it gave me for 54 years but my home is now in France as is my heart .
Since I’ve never stopped being resident in the UK , I can clearly see the difference. Vast new estates, fields disappearing underneath, new bigger supermarkets more crowded than before, heavier traffic and busier roads from the new estates. And there is a housing shortage.
If the population hasn’t expanded then there has been a massive redistribution over the last 30 years.
Tony Blair has to bear some responsibility for his turning almost technical college into a university and encouraging young people to undertake worthless degrees and saddling themselves with debt.
The latest tranche of Tory governments are more about themselves and staying in power than a ything else.
It does seem that the British electorate is somewhat gullible, but then Corbyn was not a valid alternative.
The UK has one of the highest population growth rates in Europe but this hasn’t been matched by a similar rise in the investment of basic services such as housing, healthcare, education and transport infrastructure etc.
I’ve been back several times recently and sadly JohnBoy’s experience matches my own and I can’t see that changing anytime soon unless the new Labour government go on a massive investment spending spree.
Maybe I’m spoiled by having bustling Bordeaux on my doorstep, but when I was back in the UK I noticed that the town centres both where I previously lived (Swindon) and worked (Newbury) were badly affected by what I presume were the Covid lockdowns.
Many shops in both town centres were still boarded up, even large places in prime locations like John Lewis, Argos & Debenhams were left empty. There seemed to be lots of charity shops, betting shops and Greggs, but not much else.
Both had struggled for a long time due to out-of-town retail parks and especially the “designer outlet” in Swindon, but the lockdown seems to have really hit them both hard. What used to be lively town centres were now quiet - almost desolate - places.
Town centres in the UK suffer from ,IMO, the obsseion with eradication of the motor car ie pedestianisation and excessive car parking charges, is it a wonder that the “out of town store” with free parking takes customers away from the town centre.
Very very much this. Covid gave an unstable situation a gentle nudge, but town-centre shopping had been wobbly and unstable for a long time. Shop owners in Oxford have been complaining for many years about the councils approach to making the city centre hard for motorists to enter without providing an easy alternative. Both Banbury and Bicester - my 2 nearest towns - also have had a very high turnover of central stores, and now have many empty shops, while seeing major shopping developments out-of-town.