Evianers

You know...... we heard a very interesting thing the other day. An English friend of ours herabouts told us that "Rightmove" in the UK will market your French house for a pitiful sum if given six months to sell. So far so good. Not only that, but apparently [and this has not been verified by us] if they do not manage to sell the house within six months, they give you a further six months free! Yippee. Hooray. Hope this is true.....it is passed on in good faith.

Thank you for this, Quillan.... quite interesting, although some of the facts vary slightly from what Jean Overton Fuller originally wrote regarding Noor-un-Nisa and her treatment. Whether or not "Renée" is in fact Renée Garry is open to conjecture - it could be so but in those days people were very careful about not revealing their proper Christian names, so it may well be a pseudonym for someone else. It seems likely that we shall now never know for certain. And yes Russethouse - A Life in Secrets makes fascinating reading. The book which aroused my curiosity in the first place was "Death Be Not Proud" by Elisabeth Nicholas, which I managed to track down to a second-hand bookstore in Sydney, presumably because no-one there wanted it, or knew what it was about. Diana Rowden was one of the eight women [with Noor] who were transported to concentration camps in Germany.

Personally, from what I have read, it doesn't seem like to be Renée Garry, although her husband "Phono" = Lieutenant Garry had just been arrested at this time. It was definitely a woman though who betrayed Noor Inayat Khan. However, it was subsequently established that Henri Dericourt was a double-agent who was responsible for the capture of many of the SOE operatives, not the least Madeleine Damarment who parachuted straight into a waiting German reception committee. Very, very sad.

The person's name is not disclosed, but she was female, very close to Noor, knew where she kept her radio, knew where she kept her codes, and knew where she was to be found amidst the 4/5 different places she used when transmitting. Yes, one wonders....... especially whether this female could live with her conscience afterwards. But then people were starving and would [and did] do anything for 50,000 francs. An Indian author has recently written another biography of Noor. Perhaps more details are explained in her book. My research comes from the book by Jean Overton Fuller [for which I had to pay A$20 plus postage, as the out-of-print edition is apparently very sought-after]. PS if anyone has any additional information which I could use in my talk, please feel free to post it here. TIA

Sorry, but we estimate the talk to be over 1 hour long - can't be done [and in any case, wouldn't have a clue how to do it]

Thank you everyone for your vote of confidence. The talk will be a Powerpoint presentation accompanied by an indepth explanation of the workings of SOE with the emphasis on the many courageous women who participated in clandestine activities, the most notable [for me personally] of whom was Noor Inayat Khan, who was kept chained hand and foot in prison with not even her chains taken off to eat - [this because she had had the audacity to try to escape from 84 Avenue Foch with John Starr and Col. Faye]. Thankfully the humane governor of Pforzheim prison eventually allowed her to spend some of the time out of chains. Needless to say, along with most of the other SOE women, she was executed in the most babarous fashion. It was only recently whilst I was researching the matter for the talk that I found out that Natzwiler-Struthof extermination camp is in France and not in Germany! Unfortunately, because of the nature of the presentation, it will not be suitable for publication. Sorry, but thank you for your support.

Yes good question; and the answer from our point of view is..... tell us a long, complicated sob story regarding obtaining planning permission for a house next door to the apartment we were planning to buy and meanwhile taking 10% as a deposit from us. Oh and by the way, he just happened to own the apartment on the next floor. Upshot was, after one year when the agreement to purchase ran out, he called to say that permission was not going to be granted, and here is your money back - er, less 12 Euros costs for the "dossier". We vehemently objected to this and finally got the 12 Euros restored [it was the principle, not the money - cost more in telephone calls] but of course, in between the value of the apartment had risen considerably. What's the betting he bought it for himself? Jaded outlook perhaps, but once bitten..... Would like to name and shame him but don't think it's allowed.

She certainly was a larger than life character. I am giving a talk on the SOE women on 31 August to an international club: these will naturally include Odette Sansom [Churchill], Violette Szabo, Noor Inayat Khan and Nancy Wake. Additionally, I shall point out that Eileen Nearne died last year in almost total obscurity and penury, having had her British pension stopped in 1956. Three Nearne siblings were active in SOE, as well as two from the family de Baissac.

Anyone else seen this? http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2019056/UK-immigration-Speaking-English-requirement-breaches-human-rights-claim-couple.html

[quote user="sweet 17"]Er, Evianers, I have mentioned his father at least twice in the thread "So nowhere is safe" and there has been no comments so far.  Also, pictures, etc of father's house, occupation etc on that thread. Would be good if you kept your comments there as it might be good to read it all in one place. How can one be responsible for one's children? [/quote] Fine, 17, but I looked before posting, and have looked now in the postbag, even did a search under "nowhere is safe" and could not find your thread - hence my new one

IF, one can believe what one reads in that Anders Breivik's father has been estranged from his son throughout his life [separating from his mother when AB was 1 year old and only having seen him intermittently during his formative years], then is he in fact qualified to pass judgement on his son's activities? Just a thought.

Thank you to all concerned - Varnish partially worked, then I put washing powder on each of the 5 stains, and now we have white patches where we had curry-coloured before. Will have to go for the dylon option probably. Thanks again.

Doesn't Switzerland come pretty high up on the list too - or is that the suicide rate there?

We decided to use the left-over meat and make a curry for this evening. OH is a dab-hand at this but whilst stirring all the various ingredients, he managed to get splashes of curry on his beige trousers. That'll teach him to cook without a pinny!!! Anyway, the only solution now is to buy one of those coloured dyes which one puts in the washing machine. Could some helpful and friendly soul please inform us what these are called in French? Ta ever so....... let's hope the curry tastes good!

[quote user="old car nut"] The scenery changes from state to state as does the climate, it has a lots of natural wonders, but as a civilisation our history is only a couple hundred years old. Cheers mate.[/quote] Not if you are part of the original indigenous population, it isn't

... and Antwerpen has possibly the best range of beer in the world Oh.............. definitely And from what I heard, some of the nicest diamonds too. Not that I'd really know! Oh.............. definitely not! They are mostly industrial and look like gravel! But I must admit, I did see some lovely ones, very carefully guarded which were of the E. Taylor variety.

We were transferred from Perth [the Oz variety] to Antwerpen in Belgium - we were never happier than when this transpired, despite the atrocious weather in the latter. We shall leave you all to draw your own conclusions.....

We live in Evian-les-Bains and it is absolutely wonderful. Cannot recommend it highly enough. Not too far from where you want to be. However, winters are very long [if sunny] and it is a very different way of life, but I am certain you understand this already. The HS is a super place to live: all right, so it is expensive which is probably because it has such a great deal to offer, as well as it's proximity to Switzerland. If you need any additional help or advice, please send us a pm as we have helped many people over the years, one family last year who were all set to go and live in CH but ended up hereabouts and have taken to the whole environment like the proberbial ducks to water. Bonne chance!

[quote user="Sprogster"]Evianers, that was twenty six years ago and I don't think you would recognise Australia today with its booming economy. [/quote] Point taken and of course you are quite correct. Only thing is, it does not alter the extremely unpleasant experience, one which we vividly remember to this day. Added to which, we had to return to finish a contract three years ago, so we are more or less up to scratch with what is going on there.

During our interview in Pretoria at the Australian Embassy which took place on 02/09/1985, the accumulated points system already being in place at that time, the very aggressive and unfriendly official who interviewed us [grilled us]? and who was filling in points in the margin, suddenly looked at OH and noted "Oh I see you will have a birthday in three days time". When the answer was in the affirmative, he crossed through 12 points he had already marked and re-entered 10!!! We did subsequently qualify with a sufficient number of points and emigrate to Oz, but - and this is entirely our own personal point of view - wished we had not. Please do not ask why.

[quote user="old car nut"]Hi we are considering a change of lifestyle for a couploe of years, and looking at up and moving to france, i just found this site and looks helpful. We only have australian passports (yet to use them). we been looking for info on how to go about it all, i would need to find a job, and a place to live for family (wife & 3 young kids). From what i have found out its a complex process getting a long stay visa,as you have to have booked plane tickets etc, before you find out if can get Visa to get there!?. The other possibility lies in that my Father in law is a pom, but been in oz for 35 years, but still has family living in England, so that might be a easier way in?[/quote] Methinks you are looking through rose-tinted spectacles [binoculars]? and need to do a great deal more research before you even think of coming here with 3 children [kids, as you put it]. Do you speak French? Does your wife? Would you know how to fill in a French tax return? Do you understand the workings of buying a house, signing a lease? It's not easy without sufficient preparation and hard work. We moved from South Africa to Australia and found that a tremendous culture shock [no further comment] and it was with a common language. Maybe you should think again?

[quote user="nomoss"][quote user="Evianers"] We are opposite Lausanne and a cleaner there earns between CHF25-30 per hour - that's more like it! [/quote] The Swiss must be pretty wealthy to be able to pay cleaners 22 to 26€ per hour - that's 40 to 50,000€ per year. Our daughter is living in Basel and trying to find work as an artist. Maybe I should suggest she'd be better off as a cleaner   [/quote] Yep. She'd probably earn more, but then job satisfaction would not be quite the same.

Just read on another website that a gite owner in Germany pays her cleaners between €7-9 per hour: not only that, but a similar person resident in France says that €9 is the minimum wage paid to cleaners. Is this correct? If so it is pitiful. Bet they would not undertake such arduous work for that amount. Poor cleaners must be desperate. We are opposite Lausanne and a cleaner there earns between CHF25-30 per hour - that's more like it!

For golf fanatics, don't forget the women's Evian Masters takes place this coming week....... well, we hope it does. At the present moment it is absolutely tipping down with rain which would undoubtedly make the whole tournament a total wash-out!

Here in the HS, there is a free website called Matootik.fr not sure whether it applies to other regions though