How do you feel the locals treat you?

[Davey]

Hi there, I was just wondering how everybody thinks they have been treated since they moved to France. Did they make you welcome, or feel unwanted. Do most expats in France live among other expats or do they intergrate in to the local community?

I believe if you are going to retire somewhere, being accepted by the locals is so important. Any views would be appreciated. Cheers.

[Quillan]

Just the same as in the UK except being home and not at work there is more time to 'chat' with the neighbours and meet new friends via activities etc you wouldn't normally do back in the UK if you were working. We, and myself included originally, tend to view France with rose tinted glass's when we first come but there is not much difference from the UK, strikes, unemployment, crime, rising prices, political scandal and a few things you may not come across in the UK (seasonal food, no free banking) etc it's just that many Brits don't bother reading the French papers or watching French news on the telly so are blissfully ignorant of what is going on around them.

Many who have retired love their life in France, they go out to dinner, walk, visit places, pop down the bar etc but then they way well be doing the same thing back in the UK. I think the main difference, and that depends where you live, is things are slower, much slower, but if you think bureaucracy is bad in the UK then in those famous words "you ain't seen nothing yet".

One of the better things is they know how to make a sausage over here, it has meat in it for a start. [;-)]

One invaluable tip I and many others will tell you is to visit France and find an area you like then rent out your house in the UK and rent one here for a year. You get to experience the seasons and find out if the life in France is really for you. Don't burn your bridges unless you are absolutely certain and living here is much different from spending a two week holiday in a Gite.

[mint]

Well, Davey, we have lived in 2 different departments and we have found friends both amongst the ex pat community and the locals in both locations.

When I say ex pat, I don't mean just Brits but Dutch, American, Brazilian, etc.

OH belongs to a table tennis club, I used to (and will again) belong to a rambling c;lub and we both used to (and will again) go to French classes.

We have made no special efforts to make friends but you will find that, in the course of your everyday activities, you will be tripping over people who wish to be friends with you.

In fact, if you tend to be a bit reclusive like I am, you might find the attention a little overwhelming.

[Hoddy]

We were treated with great circumspection at first. We have the great good fortune to have a wonderful neighbour who told us 'how to go on'. For example, he insisted that we ought to attend a funeral that we would not have gone to in the UK. The man who died was someone who we'd never met.The next day his son-in-law arrived to say that our presence had been much appreciated and that if we ever needed anything etc.

It also helped in this country district that we are ourselves country people. When another neighbour's cows got out and we put them back again without a fuss it apparently impressed people. I know it's a wild generalisation, but many French imagine that we all live in big towns in the UK.

Doing your best with the language is also appreciated.

I feel that we are quite well accepted now, but we will always be Les Anglais, but then we are only summer visitors.

Hoddy

[idun]

We lived in a big city for the first two years in rented appts. Then we moved out to the countryside. I always thought that we were treat as being slightly exotic.

We moved to a village without any anglais and none in the immediate vicinity either, deliberately, I was aware that I have no talent for language, including my mother tongue, so knew that I needed to just dive in if I was going to learn french. There were areas with high anglais populations, but not for me.

Our biggest problem was getting people to eat chez nous. They were genuinely frightened of what we might give them, and I confess in the early days I approached invitations with some trepidation too. Anyway, everything went along well really. We made friends, got to know a lot of people and I made enemies with a couple and he is now  the current maire.

I know that my husband's old boss, french, would not move back to the where they were from as they said that the people were not friendly. So sometimes it is not the 'nationality' that counts in these things, in fact a foreigner may get on better with the locals than some other french people in some regions.

 

[mint]

In support of what Hoddy has said, I can recount a little tale that took place when we had been barely here a couple of months in the Dordogne.

Our French neighbour needed a helping hand to put some bits and pieces of furniture into a van to take down to her nephew's house.  She came and asked me whether I would "permit" my husband to help out.

We both went over and helped with the loading and she then insisted that we stayed and had some soft drinks and biscuits with her and the removal people.

I was quite surprised that she had chosen to ask us rather than another French person as we have French neighbours all around.  I came to the conclusion that she must have felt we were approachable and would help.

So....that's all it takes really, just treat people decently and, in no time at all, you are on "tu" terms (they'll invite you when they feel ready) and there is no great adjustment, adaptation or integration efforts needed [:D]

[bettyboop]

We have owned our french house for 9 years now. On completion the lady walked us around the hamlet (6 houses) to meet everyone. Everyone has always been most helpful and pleasant.. getting bread for us when we were snowed in.. pumping up tyres etc. Our french neighbour asked hubby if he could collect his moped from another hamlet as it had broken down the previous evening. We have always spokent to them in our 'petit francais' as we say and with gesturing as well we seem to understand each other.

This is in the Limousin in a very rural setting.... cant wait to go back again

[Davey]

Thanks for the replys. All sounds very friendly and welcoming. I have no intention of moving somewhere and then being trapped in an expat community, where every body has no interest in intergrating in to the local community.

Are there lots of these kind of cliques, within the french expat community, or is how you guys live, more the norm?

[crossy67]

We have only been here a month but we are enjoying the place and the people immensely.  There are a lot of ex-pats from different nationalities in our area, the Dutch are especially friendly and helpful, really nice people.  The locals are very friendly and far more sociable than the UK, we all ways get a bon jour etc off every body we pass in the street.  I do believe it depends on the sort of person you are though.  The old lady over the road is lovely and we get on very well despite her speaking no English and me speaking little to no French, maybe it's because I go out of my way to help her decrepit old visitors across the road and offer to help her if I see her struggling.  I believe you get out what you put in by enlarge.

[mint]

[quote user="idun"]

We lived in a big city for the first two years in rented appts. Then we moved out to the countryside. I always thought that we were treat as being slightly exotic.

We moved to a village without any anglais and none in the immediate vicinity either, deliberately, I was aware that I have no talent for language, including my mother tongue, so knew that I needed to just dive in if I was going to learn french. There were areas with high anglais populations, but not for me.

Our biggest problem was getting people to eat chez nous. They were genuinely frightened of what we might give them, and I confess in the early days I approached invitations with some trepidation too. Anyway, everything went along well really. We made friends, got to know a lot of people and I made enemies with a couple and he is now  the current maire.

I know that my husband's old boss, french, would not move back to the where they were from as they said that the people were not friendly. So sometimes it is not the 'nationality' that counts in these things, in fact a foreigner may get on better with the locals than some other french people in some regions.

 

[/quote]

idun, probably when you first settled here, les anglais WERE a bit exotic, particularly in a rural area.  I believe that, nowadays, les anglais have penetrated even the remotest corner of France and are a known quantity and have therefore lost some of their "strange" qualities.

I have French neighbours now in our house in 17 and I much prefer them to the English ones we had before.  Funnily enough, they tell us that they much prefer us to the French ones they had before!

So, I think it's you as an individual rather than your nationality that determines how well received you are.

We came to live in France, not on a whim; indeed we looked at Italy and Spain before that.  We took 5 years from initial "yes that might be nice" to actually moving here.  We came because we love French classical music and we wanted to learn a new language and live in a new culture in retirement, hoping it would keep us on the ball and dementia at bay.

We looked at lots of different areas, etc and still, we "got it wrong" with the first house in 17 (probably because we rushed it!)  I didn't like where I was living but I found many people to like.  These same people take the trouble to drive here, about an hour away, to visit and we remain in touch.

In the new village, I felt at home almost immediately; in fact, before we'd even moved in full time.  It's a pretty little village and goodness know how many Brits there are but, as in the previous place (where there were only 2 British families), I have French and British friends and people I see socially and others that I just say bonjour to.

I don't think there is any prescribed or predetermined way to make yourself welcome.  You come with the personalities and outlook on life that you already have and it will happen or not, as the case may be.

We know many that have moved back to the UK because of feelings of isolation and being unable to get to grips with living in France.

To the OP, I would say this:  enter into your life here with a will to make a happy success of it, look on it as a new dawn, do not be forever dwelling on what you miss in the UK and do not try in anyway to change yourself in order to "fit in" but be true to yourself and celebrate your differences from the locals.

[Dog]

After seven years in France we get on fine with 4 of our neighbours but rarely see them. they laugh as we know the woods and walks better than them and where to find the mushrooms, wild strawberries, wild lily of the valley etc.

For the first time in those seven years I had to lose my temper with the neighbour that lives behind me he lives in the old monastery and we call him 'Y-Fronts and Wellies' as that is usually what he is wearing as he tends his garden all day long.

He is the local dirty old man and when there is totty in our swimming pool he sneaks by to look.

He told me how he shoots 2 meter long grass snakes and we have seen him taking pot shots with his 12 bore out of his window at rabbits and also at the frogs when they croak loudly in the pond by our house.

I have asked he nicely to refrain from killing grass snakes and from shooting the frogs but last week we heard shots and found him by the pond having shot two frogs.

Big Dave told him to respect nature but he huffed and puffed and retreated back within the walls of his garden - I said please do not kill the frogs they are good for the environment. His reply was that I didn't understand.

It's you that doesn't understand I said it is illegal to kill frogs, toads and newts that live in the pond plus illegal to fire a gun right by someones house in a public area.

He couldn't give a monkeys, so I told him if he did it again I was calling the Cops - he sneaked off then and won't acknowledge me now.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR...

 

[JSKS]

People are people. We don't seek to identify behaviours in our neighbours that validate any stereotypes.

We've found no real difference in the general friendliness in our village than we have in the villages where we've lived in UK and Germany.

On the other hand, we don't act differently because we are in another country. Some good neighbours, some not. Many friendly, some taciturn. None xenophobic (yet).

But if you look for certain characteristics you will surely find them.

[idun]

[quote user="Davey"]Thanks for the replys. All sounds very friendly and welcoming. I have no intention of moving somewhere and then being trapped in an expat community, where every body has no interest in intergrating in to the local community. Are there lots of these kind of cliques, within the french expat community, or is how you guys live, more the norm?[/quote]

 

Believe me there are all sorts of cliques in french villages too and some near wars that have been going on for perhaps centuries. If one is seen talking to Mme X, then it can be assumed that you are 'with' the X tribe, by M et Mme Y. Very hard negociating the murky waters of village life sometimes so integrating can not be exactly as one expects.

When we sold our house we only had serious interest from french buyers and that was to be expected where we lived. In some ways we did keep our exoticness as we were the only anglais in the village and now they have none. 

I was in France for 27 years. When I moved to my village I got on well with my neighbours, really well. Work needed doing on our estate and everyone helped and we had communal meals and everything was tickety boo for years. Truth is for the last few years there are two lots of neighbours I wish in hell, or some such place. And sadly it is not 'my' story to discuss further on a public forum. The other neighbours I continued to get on well with and one neighbour is a very good friend of ours.

[woolybanana]

To answer the basic question, fine.

[cooperlola]

[quote user="woolybanana"]To answer the basic question, fine.[/quote][:)]

In general, as with most of the people I've met in the countries I've visited in my lifetime, I find that if I treat them with polite respect then they reciprocate.  Whether I ever "integrate" with anybody, rather depends upon whether I like them enough to want to make friends with them, or they me.  I've never actively sought to be integrated with my community either here, in Britain, or elsewhere - it's just not my thing.

[pachapapa]

Tit for tat!

No worse than I treat them.

[Patf]

There are several elderly farming couples around us, and we speak to them when out walking - I got to know them first by asking if  it was ok to walk on the paths on their land. We haven't got to the stage of going for meals though. We find them very formal and polite.

Our nearest neighbour and my husband, Eddie, get on well because they help eachother mending machinery etc.

Of course you need to be able to speak the language a bit as they don't (or won't) speak english.

I have one very good friend in the village who is english, but otherwise don't often come across other expats.

[idun]

I am starting to feel very odd on this post. Maybe it was because I was quite young when I got to France that my life was different. Maybe it was 'then' too, no internet or phone at home. Maybe the reasons for our move, to have an adventure made it all different.

I sort of got stuck into talking to people when I got to my village. France was still an alien country to me so I needed contact and simple friendship, I needed to be able to ask questions too,  find out how people ticked and things worked. I can't say I wanted to integrate per se, although I did in my own little way, I did want to understand where I was living and communicate.

It's very nice having a bag of mirabelles left on your doorstep, or a couple of batavia, but that isn't how people or a community 'are', it is just their little ways and only a part of 'life' in the country and in the grand scheme of things doesn't always mean a lot, as the constant 'bonjours' don't always either.

[Patf]

As you say, idun, you were young when you came to France. And then you had your 2 boys, which meant that you would meet other young mothers, and have a lot in common.

There are very few young people here - they all go off to work in Toulouse.

[Judith]

Polite and friendly, if you take the trouble to do the same.  They know you are "not one of them" if only by your lack of French, but are happy to welcome you as such.  But it will vary from person to person and place to place.  Getting involved in a hobby or some such thing where you will meet mainly French people, is not only the best way to improve your French, but also be to accepted as part of the community, foreigner or not.  This speaking from knowledge of three different places (one of which admittedly was a holiday home, but where went for 10 years before we bought our own house and moved over permanently.)

The advice about renting first, is valuable, especially if you are not sure about location, house and "friendliness".

Moral: do as you would be done by ....

[idun]

I think that that is a good moral, however, that pre supposes that the people will be decent and do the right thing in return and that is not always the case either.

ie eventually we got new neighbours that sort of backed onto our house. We respected the regles about working hours and making a noise. At midi just as we had sat down to eat outside our neighbours father started hammering, banging and making a lot of noise. He was off a lunch time and doing a job for them.

When I asked him to stop, the second day, not the first, I got a mouthful from him, nice from a Pappy!

My french friends asked their neighbour, militaire,  to stop mowing the lawn on a Sunday afternoon, and he brought his shot gun round to say that he wouldn't hesitate to use it if they complained again or went to the Mairie. They didn't complain.

We can only do our best and sometimes things come to try us.

 

 In life there are always new things that come along that shock or please us and it would be boring without them.

[Judith]

Idun,

I realise that not all people are decent and think about others but I find a smile works wonders.  There will always be some who do not respond. 

But the two situations you describe are rather more a "French" problem, if I may say so, with the lunch hour and the Sun afternoon quiet supposedly being sacred times when nothing else should happen.  In the UK, lunchtimes are far more flexible, as are Sunday afternoons, so such a nuisance may not seem like such.  I agree that there are people who do not consider others (true in any country) and if you object to something they would bad-mouth you, but in all honesty, picking out individual bad behaviour does not mean all are tarred with the same brush. 

In that respect I feel the majority of French would behave in a decent and pleasant way..... as long as you are decent and pleasant too.

[mint]

Hi, Judith!

We're agreed on this one then?[:)]

What did and does still surprise is just how obliging and friendly everyone is (with the odd exception, of course).

I know for a fact that we wouldn't have got the welcome we have had in 2 departements in the part of Wales where we were living.

[idun]

I'll have to disagree then.

When I want to be, or when I need to be, I am good at smiling at people. I am good at being pleasant. I needed to be at first with my limited french And these days if I get good service from someone I will call and tell their boss.

 

Two examples, well I could give you a lot of examples of how things are in my village in France, how it is where friends live in France. How it has been where I have holidayed. I never found where I lived any 'different' to anyone else's story or what I have found. We were finely tuned in to what to do and what not to do and also the 'rules'. It was out of respect for our hosts, that we were.

Sadly some people believe that the rules don't apply to them. And being pleasant and a cheery smile don't work.  I found that city dwellers in France were more respectful of 'noise' rules than those in the country. When you live in an appt and have lots of  neighbours in close proxomity then  it would be terrible if anyone broke the rules, untenable. 

 

Urban France and la campagne are quite different in this regard, IMO ofcourse. I have done city life and country life in France.

 

EDIT To put it simply, I think that everyone appearing 'nice' is superficial. Appearances can be deceiving. Don't the inhabitants of all french villages have the same human traits as humans everywhere else and there are good people and bad people and all the greys inbetween. That is what I have lived.

 

[mint]

Never done French city life, idun.

Of my previous village and the present one, I have found differences.

We knew an important family in the previous village and OH knew some "people of standing" (headmaster, notaire, landowner, etc) through his table tennis club.

But, where we are now, we knew no one but I find many more greetings and smiles and we have also made a nice lot of friends more quickly.

The present place is a lot more user-friendly but only in comparision to the previous one.  In the old village, we had invitations to quite a few grand houses, completely to our surprise.

Time might produce a change of opinion but I LOVE living here; quite a home away from home....[:D][:P]