Help please - the realities of living in France

Exactly. We deliberately chose people who had experience with horses and Rhodesian Ridgebacks - especially after leaving the dog in a so called kennels on one occasion and discovering when we picked him up that he clearly thought he’d beeen sent to doggy borstal. Given how googleable everything is these days you’d have to be either very unlucky or very stupid to have a bad experience ! Obviously people are strange and can suddenly go loop the loop and start rifling through your knicker drawers but that is just as true of friends and acquaintances as anyone else!

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Maybe not every one has a knocker draw!

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Ha ha - brilliant! Presumably that is where one keeps one’s bras :slight_smile:

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We often have a sort of open-house… when folk wander in and out. Nearly always people we know and/or their friends…but sometimes it will be folk who have heard on the grapevine…

So, for my own peace of mind… we stylishly barricade the staircase with chairs, thus keeping everyone on the ground floor… and I do the belt and braces bit by locking the bedroom doors, just in case someone is determined to go mountaineering…

I do trust folk… but, you never know… :zipper_mouth_face: and I would not want strangers staying here, when I am away… that’s me, bit odd… maybe… :thinking::sunglasses::grin:

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Not at all odd Stella. 3 years ago my ‘partner’ and 2 of his Belgium neighbours ( maison secondires for them) decided to do vide grange chez eux with suitable permission from the Mayor.
He has a very large grange, we put tables up inside and in the lower courtyard as well. Put a chain across the outside stairs that gave access to the house and main garden with a’ private’ sign.
The number of people who said ‘oh can we just go and look at the garden’ was incredible. I would never ask to intrude on a private space, and the answer was a polite no. Sad to say that we did have a few small objects go missing from inside the grange too, as did our Belgium friends.
In all my years in France I had never come across this sort of thing. We did have some lovely people too, and have kept in touch with a lovely French couple who were here on holiday, but all in all it pays to be wary !

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Look Catharine I have been telling every one for years that my spelling and grammar goes
mad some times!

Barbara… you made me chuckle… and, yes, obviously a slip of the pen… but so what… it’s good to chuckle in friendly fashion …

Incidentally…when she was little our daughter used to say “mule-post” instead of newel-post … and we still call it that, some 40 years on… :upside_down_face::grinning:

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good to chuckle!

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Barbara - your exclamation mark led me to believe you were joking! I assumed it was a play on words / autocorrect - either which way it made me laugh hence the smiley face!

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Autocorrect has a lot to answer for… in my opinion…:zipper_mouth_face:

Ladies I know nothing about auto correct I am hopeless in this area.
Ask me to organise an event for you …this I can do…find you vintage china to rent
or rose flavoured lemonade or someone to teach you to cook.

autocorrect is something that can “pop” a word into whatever you are typing… if it thinks that is what you want.

I do NOT have the facility switched-on… but someone (who shall be nameless) switches it On when using my computer…and often forgets to switch it Off afterwards… :zipper_mouth_face:

(he’s lovely really, but, oh dear… it can mess up my documents, as I am often typing, while I look elsewhere or chat with someone… and don’t actually look to see what is going onto the screen… :fearful: )

I have one of those sorts of nameless people who dictates a situation.

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Dear sir,

I am french native, and it is really difficult to give an objective answer. I do not consider my country a role model to follow, I do not consider France the best country in the world. But I am convinced that if you are motivated to embrace a way of life based on wine debauchery, charcuterie depraved meals, and a certain art de vivre where you will have the right to be lazy and just disconnect. Well come here !

You will feel lonely plenty of times during the first months and maybe years. Ask you and your wife, how can you deal with loneliness ? Because french are like cats, it is not easey to catch them. But once you achieve to do it, they will be your friends for life.

My country is really different from yours. Not better, not worse, just different.

Keep in mind that french can be your better dream or worst nightmare. It is a country that leaves nobody without reaction, for the good or the bad.

The cool thing is that you can get drunk everyday with a beautiful bottle of red wine for less than 10€. Yeah sorry I don’t have a lot of good arguments… hahaha

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oh well!

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Hummmmmmm…

It is not what France gave you but what it did not take from you that was important - Gertrude Stein

  • climate :
    Brits tend to live in the southern part of France, which I really understand considering where they come from… brits that just have secondary residence or a country house, tend to be more focused in Pas de Calais and Normandy, to have a not too long commute from home with the ferry. So they will be less involved in the local life. So if as a brit, you are looking for a warm and sweet climate, I would recommend these french departments : Lot 46, Cantal 15, Aveyron 12
    They are in the top ten of lowest crime rate, especially burglary and car-jacking

  • the french are rude and arrogant :
    Yes we are. More seriously, yes you will at leat one time in your life or your week face a rude and arrogant french person. Keep in mind we are a free country and democracy where even scumbags have the right to live and vote… Please, event if it will be a bad experience, don’t attribute one trait to millions of persons from a same nation. It is really more difficult to befriend with us, you will feel more lonely problably than in UK or US. But when your french neighbours will open their door and their heart, it won’t happen everyday but it will happen, they will punch the gendarmes for you and be friends for life.

  • cultural differences
    yes you will be a foreigner, but never try to be more french than the french. Stay yourself and take the good things you like from our culture and mix it up with yours. Don’t try to be someone else

  • bureaucracy
    If you were thinking you were patient, french bureaucracy will challenge you. Even for locals it is still…part of our life and a major reason why we have so much days off. Taking a monday off to go to the Préfecture is really a national sport…

  • the food
    excuse me, I am chewing a peace of rocamadour with a glass of Cotes Roties and the keyboard is dirty

  • the women
    ir you are married, they don’t care, if you are single they don’t care, if you have a big penis they don’t care. Wait a minute, I will ask my french wife…well she said a tartiflette…

  • the clichés to be avoided
    The french coward is really something really touchy, joke about it, but only between brits or americans, never with french people, otherwise you will see how much we can be rude.
    The french being dirty people, no that’s false, except for sex
    The french striking all the time…well…okay, this one you have the right

  • the expat-anglosaxon loneliness lost in translation disorder
    Diane from the blog Ouiiinfrance explained really well. She relocated in middle city in France countryside. And she still has no real friends after many years. Move, go to sports clubs, to associations, to forums like this one, and don’t be afraid to befriend with other anglo-saxons and not trying to be constantly in the search for french integration. Be open to every kind of people and try to not submit to your life

Overall it will be fine

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Suppose it all depends upon how you look at it Mr Maxime but a Brit will never be
more French than a Frenchman and a Frenchman will never be very British. Other tan
that there are no differences.

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I value your perspectives, Maxime, it’s good to have ours reflected back to us by a friendly and sympa ‘outsider’. You will have noticed that there are many ways in which we Brits differ from each other, and not just regionally, but also in many other ways too.

When we arrived here ourselves, we were cautioned to be very careful about getting close to other expatriate Brits, and those who advised us were well-established expatriates who had nothing to gain from advising us in that way; and we trusted them, because we had our fingers burned before with expatriates in Africa, and knew that a significant number of them were highly unreliable, and some dangerous to know.

Some were problematic because they were not able to adjust to life in France, mainly because they neither spoke nor understood French, and this state of affairs is much more common than we expected to find.

We do not try hard to integrate with French people, that would be unnatural and an unsuccessful tactic. Relationships grow organically and within an extended timescale, not “to order”. One has to watch and learn, and to learn by one’s inevitable mistakes. And to keep a low profile, perhaps, whilst building trust gradually.

Our maire in a smallish commune of 3,100 inhabitants with a town of about 1,300 households, many bring sole occupants, elderly widows especially, is a rather aloof character who does not encourage contact with his citizenry except on business, and by appointment, in his office. He is courteous, a man of few words, and a very competent administrator. We asked if we could meet him shortly after we arrived in town, and we were told he did not meet newcomers for social encounters. I think I can understand why. He watches, and learns. I respect that about him.

Anyway, be patient, shrewd and funny, your voice is refreshing, and I welcome an opportunity to broaden your vocabulary, and have you do the same for me, monsieur. :kissing::kissing:

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Maxime you really make me laugh with your comments , you have à British sense of humour , I really laughed at this post :blush: good to hear from your point of view.
Ahhhhh my hubby is French and has the same humour. Thank goodness lol lol :joy:
Nice that you participate in these posts and comments.

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