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French Wedding, well no not quite.


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We have some guests who are here for a wedding down the road in a big house with massive grounds. The bride is French and the chap English but really thats by the by. The point is that even though the people who own the house are Brits and they run weddings there in their 'woodland' setting everything is brought over from the UK, from the butter to the wedding cake and the booze in between. Even the catering company has come from the UK as have the waiting staff. Even my guest said although it was very nice how terrible it was that no French people were involved. We have had a wedding in our grounds and everything has always been locally sourced. If I were French I think I would be a bit upset (to put it mildly) with this lot. The guests by the way were 50/50 English and French.
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Quillan - I have very strong feelings about this subject too, we see it too often here. Even though many things are cheaper imported from the UK.

It also covers driving british reg. cars for years in France and escaping fines and penalty points.

Bringing over british workers who aren't properly insured or registered.

But there are also many british people living here who think it's the right way to live. So I keep my mouth shut.

The thing is, then the french think we're all like it - does it really matter what they think? I believe it does.

Then there's another group who argue "but the french are always trying to avoid regulations too".

To some extent it's understandable to want to have our familiar products, but when it goes as far as taking the Mick out of the french way of life ......

.....it's not right.

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A Huf Hous and some of the other prefab houses available re a slightly different thing. You could also say, along the same lines, of how many people in the UK actually drive a UK built car for example.

What I am talking about is basically somebody coming to France for a French wedding but the venus they choose buy not only the goods but the services as well from the UK. Turns out the only two people who were 'used' that were French were the priests and then why there were two I don't know but that may be something to do with the French system.

 

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Are you serious?

Why not pay for a service/goods/food you like and trust. Who are you to say what people should spend their money on? We have French and Spanish cars, a UK Laptop, Chinese SatNav and we like some English food which we buy in a French supermarket.  When we travel to the UK by car we book using the Brittany Ferries English website because the French site is a rip-off. We travel on Ryanair because it is cheaper to the UK and KLM (Dutch) because it’s cheaper long haul.

If we lived in the UK, or anywhere else for that matter, we would still drive a French car, drink French wine and eat French cheese because that’s what we like.

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I agree entirely with you Quillan. And I feel strongly about it, more so since we have lived here and learned how important it is to be fully involved with the local community.

The owner of the chateau you mentioned might well need to get some of his/her products and /or services from contacts back in UK ........but surely not ALL of them , or anywhere near approaching a large percentage ???

How on earth do they get on with the local community and their neighbours ? Or do they remain locked in their mansion and merely have English visitors ?

It may be that they are not fluent in French and therefore lack the confidence to venture forth into the local community and to include local products/services in their "business".

They will never become fluent-----or even liked-----if they do not communicate. And the only way to become fluent in the first place is by constant contact with French people on a daily basis. It is my experience that English who are not fluent in French after a year or so are the ones who stay within an ex-pat community or keep to themselves; and eventually give up and go back to Blighty [:(]

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[quote user="Jay"]Are you serious?

[/quote]

Yes I am, very. Look at it this way the bride and groom wanted to have their marriage 'blessed' in France and to hold their reception here. They got married in a registry office in the UK then looked through the Internet to find a place that would arrange the 'blessing' and reception as a whole package. What they didn't know in this case was that with the exception of the priests everything the venue gave them came from the UK where as they thought they were getting an authentic magical FRENCH wedding and reception. Many of those invited came from all over the world apparently also expecting the same. Imagine their surprise when it turned out everything was bought over from the UK and was English (possibly with the exception of the wine). It is not as if they were given a choice or told where the food was coming from, they were just given a selection and asked to choose what they wanted with no reference as to where it came from.

The second issue of course is that the local French are missing out on supplying the food, waiting at tables and bar plus the band for dancing. I personally always use locals where I can because it spreads money around the locale.

By the way you may find your 'French' car is not even made in France, mine was made in Belgium, I do see your point but this is different I believe as did many others apparently.

 

 

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The longer I live here the less I get wound up by people exercising their freedom of choice and sourcing people, products, services, whatever from any country whether it be the UK, France, Germany, Poland.

It's an international world. If these people think their profit margins are better and / or they provide a better service - by going totally < insert nationality of choice > I'm not going to get worked up about it though I'd hope they are registered here and paying their taxes.

If this was a French company operating in the UK and importing all the produce and people from France, I really don't believe British people would be outraged because no British people were involved. They wouldn't give a... Immigrants to France take offence on behalf of the French too often, I think.

Signed,

Totally not disgusted of Tunbridge Wells [:D]

ps: [quote user="Quillan"]...they thought they were getting an authentic magical FRENCH wedding and reception. [/quote]

And how does President butter add to an authentic magical French wedding in a way that Anchor doesn't? [:P] Buying at a Leclerc or French Lidl doesn't make the wedding experience more intrinsically French or authentic or magical.

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Authentic french wedding.

Was it in any way authentic. With the vin d'honneur during the afternoon and then the actual reception going on all night long, or almost all night long, cake being cut in the early hours, or is that at dawn?

I never got away with french fetes. Weddings, Reveillons St Sylvestre/Noel, even when I was young I couldn't hack it, maybe because I wasn't brought up with it. My neighbours didn't like it either, so we usually spent St Sylvestre with them, eating all finished by about 10 and after seeing the New Year in  home for the guests and bed for the hosts.

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Perhaps I have over complicated it so lets try it this way.

They thought they were getting a French wedding reception in France. What they got was an English wedding reception in France because the owners of the venue went to a UK based event company that supplied everything including the staff never even thinking of telling the bride and groom what they were doing. The only French people used were the priests. In short they might have just as well held the reception in the UK which may have been cheaper because of reduced transport costs.

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Well maybe the fault lies with the couple who wanted an "authentic French wedding" whatever that may be? but didn't bother to check what they were paying for; and what they were getting for their money. If I go into a French business and they offer me Chinese goods and I don't want them I speak up and say no thank you.
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Maybe the hire for the wedding was a one off organised by the English company, perhaps the chateau owner had no say in things other than providing the venue?

I expect if you look deeper whoever made the decision to bring over the goods, services and personnel from the UK had probably used French companies before and vowed to never do so again, remember it is les vacances, how many people would actually want to work? Would you really gamble the good reputation that you have worked so hard to build up on French local businesses at this time of year?

You can bet your bottom dollar that they wont be paying more by sourcing from the UK despite the huge transport and accomodation costs, it shows the cost of local services for what they really are.

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I agree that you do seem to be having trouble with what is a clear point you originally made : wedding guests thought they were getting a French "experience" and they get nothing of the sort ( presumably even the "big house" could have been in England).

If I had behaved like that when I moved to France, I'd have never made local friends, I wouldn't have felt "right" about not contributing to the local economy-----and I would have been showing extreme bad manners ( something which I find the French feel strongly about, and quite right too).

Oh-----and if I'd clung to English "trappings" , products, services, visitors etc etc, I'd probably have given up eventually and returned to sad old Blighty [:(] without ever have becoming fluent in the most beautiful of languages[:D]

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'ere Q you are a fine one to talk about buying in France........

What about I bought a steam cleaner via Google from Germany cos it was cheaper - and the other recommendations. Your money went in to Luxembourg and the goods came from Germany - wonder how France profited from that [6]

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[quote user="PaulT"]

'ere Q you are a fine one to talk about buying in France........

What about I bought a steam cleaner via Google from Germany cos it was cheaper - and the other recommendations. Your money went in to Luxembourg and the goods came from Germany - wonder how France profited from that [6]

[/quote]

Very true and I bought my vacuum cleaner the same way on the recommendation of other forum members but I didn't go round passing either off as French. [:P]

My French car is made in Belgium as are all of its model so even the French pass things off as being French when they are not.

As for Amazon and Luxemburg well that’s another matter but then you probably don't buy things from Amazon on principle.

 

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[quote user="Quillan"][quote user="PaulT"]

'ere Q you are a fine one to talk about buying in France........

What about I bought a steam cleaner via Google from Germany cos it was cheaper - and the other recommendations. Your money went in to Luxembourg and the goods came from Germany - wonder how France profited from that [6]

[/quote]

Very true and I bought my vacuum cleaner the same way on the recommendation of other forum members but I didn't go round passing either off as French. [:P]

My French car is made in Belgium as are all of its model so even the French pass things off as being French when they are not.

As for Amazon and Luxemburg well that’s another matter but then you probably don't buy things from Amazon on principle.

 

[/quote]

That is very true but my principle only applies to 'if I can get it cheaper elsewhere' [:D]

And yes a little faux pas (that's French you know) and should have typed AMAZON and not GOOGLE

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Only if you want me to Betty and if you ask with a warm smile to welcome a newcomer to the Forum, someone who has come to a beautiful old farm to escape the ever-present curmudgeons who seem to frequent UK more and more [:D][:D][:D][:D]

[quote user="You can call me Betty"]Are you going to work a comment about your "fluency" in French into every one of your posts from now on, Mr Bolus? It certainly seems like it.[/quote]

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To go back to the original subject (I know some people dislike thread drift) I think it depends on how the wedding package was advertised, and what the couple asked to be provided. Surely they discussed all the aspects of the wedding; menu, music, flowers, wines etc? If they specified that they wanted cucumber sandwiches and pork pie then it can't really be the fault of the owner of the venue if that's what they got!
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Even if the cucumber sandwiches example is what happened in this case, I got the impression from original post that it would not have been unreasonable to expect at least some sort of French "theme" or at least a few French products, etc. The French can make cucumber sandwiches ----they can also provide staff to serve them.

And wouldn't they taste nice in baguettes [:)]

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