Dordogneshire - ghetto aimé?

[Tresco]

[quote user="Patf"]The reason is that when  immigrants outnumber the  indigenous population this is a recipe for trouble. [/quote]

No need to outnumber them. Around 6% is enough to get people rattled, apparently. Well it was about 20 years ago in England, and we all know France is 20 years 'behind', so...[;-)]

We are certainly part of a very small minority in our immediate locality.

[Teamedup]

JK, I have always had a problem. I knew when I was 17 and off on my first holiday with friends that I was NOT going to the Costas, like everyone else. No way would I have gone anywhere full of brits. 35 odd years further on and I still feel the same. I went to Spain for the first time when I was 40, and we went to a very spannish place, I wouldn't have had it any other way.

I really do not see the point in holidaying with my compatriots and no way would I want to live near them when I live abroad. I am really happy when I am home in England and have no trouble at all with being amoungst my own. I love it.

Truth is that I have never ever considered visiting the Perigord. I do visit the perigord stalls at all the food fairs I go to, first stall I look for, but going there, no, we would always be going somewhere else if we were 'there'. And I may have passed through, I know that we haven't stopped there. As there are no mountains and no sea, so no skiing and no sailing and from what I can gather it was dying when we first arrived, just a job wouldn't have lured us. We were only prepared to move for a decent job and sailing or skiing, otherwise we wouldn't have moved.

I take it that our priorities are rather different to most people's anyway. How many move to France with little idea as to how they are going to make a crust, or if they know what they want to do and then find themselves working darned hard as an artisan with an income that is not great. Or run a B&B, now that sounds like very hard work to me and involves too many jobs I just don't like doing.  I'm afraid so much wouldn't have suited us at all, obviously lots of things don't suite us.

Views are not everything either. We have views around here that are breathtaking and I am saying this after all these years, they still can make me 'wow' and yet I want more out of life than views now.

[Jacqui Too]

[quote user="5-element"] The few (French) family members I still have who live around the area, bemoan the way it has... gone to "Les Anglais", which means according to them, that property prices have shot up so that no French person can buy a house in the Dordogne anymore. Not strictly true, of course, but still worth mentioning.

[/quote]

Do you think that the French and Brits are buying the same sort of property? I don't. I think in the main we are looking at different markets, so I don't think that in general they can say that its the foreigner who is pushing up prices, unlike in Wales and some other parts of the UK where 'townies' are pricing out the locals! We live on the Welsh /English border and you don't have to go far into Wales to find 'second homes' everywhere! now if they were buying homes that no-one wanted that would be another matter. Where as in France I think that many of the properties that the Brits, Dutch ect, have bought in the past would still be forsale or fallen down! 

As the old saying goes 'one mans meat is another mans poison'  and I think that speaks for the whole thread!

Chipie

[5-element]

[quote user="Chipie"]Do you think that the French and Brits are buying the same sort of property? I don't. I think in the main we are looking at different markets, so I don't think that in general they can say that its the foreigner who is pushing up prices, unlike in Wales and some other parts of the UK where 'townies' are pricing out the locals!

Chipie

[/quote]

I am no property expert, Chipie, so I don't know really know the answer to your question. I am reporting what I am hearing from some French locals. 

But I do have younger relatives who are buying exactly the kind of houses which appeal to the British market, and they renovate it themselves. You are right insofar as their parents' generation did not go for that kind of property, they usually preferred to buy a plot of land and have their new house built on it. Now for  the younger generation it seems very different. Maybe it is the only option left to them to own their home: buy a ruin, and do it up.

And I don't think this is confined to Dordogne either. I have younger French friends here in Languedoc who are doing the same thing.

[cooperlola]

Our house was bought from a French couple.  When they bought it, it had no sanitation, electricity etc and was just two rooms and a tap - lived in by the same old lady for donkey's years.  They did it up (with varying levels of success, I might add).  We have bought it and continued the work.  The house opposite was very similar.  It has been bought by a French couple with two young children. They are converting the loft and doing many improvements.  Aren't the French like us?  Some want to spend money on old properties and do them up - some want to buy new and relax knowing they have no work to do.  We are all different - thankfully - no matter what our country of origin.

[Cat]

In the area where I live there is no real industry, and work is hard to find.  Because of this many people have moved elsewhere to find work. The area doesn't attract people seeking work, and so that leaves us with a lot of retirees, and second home owners (British, Dutch and from northern France and Paris mostly).  There is also the usual smattering of teachers, gendarmes, shop keepers and workers, etc, but the main employment here is in the building trades or hospitality.

A lot of people say that they bought an old ruin that was standing empty for years, and that no local people were interested in, often though the reason is that asking price of the pile of stones is way beyond the financial grasp of those born and bred here.  There is an element of greed involved, naturally, the high prices are not only due to what people will pay, but also to what people are asking.

The same could be said of many rural areas here or in the UK, rich incomers outpricing the locals..  Luckily the younger people here that work in the building trades are able to build their own houses, working evenings and weekends, with help from their friends and families.  If not for them, and the fact that we have a school and college here, I don't think it would be too long before the incomers outnumbered the locals.  

[bryansmith]

We live in Lot et Garonne in a very rural setting.We have been made extremely welcome by all the locals and are very happy here. We do have some English friends (although not exactly neighbours) who we have met since living here and they too find the French very welcoming. We have made a great effort to integrate with the local population, made easier because we both speak French as do our friends (or they are taking steps to do so).

Perhaps Dordogneshire has been unfairly categorised although when we have visited Eymet we do seem to hear more English spoken than French even when people are buying on the lovely market. Not everyone wants the same things out of life but for us living in France with the French population is proving a very satisfying experience. We have only been here for 18 months so perhaps that may change but hopefully it will continue to make us happy.[:D]

[Suze01]

[quote user="bryansmith"]Perhaps Dordogneshire has been unfairly categorised although when we have visited Eymet we do seem to hear more English spoken than French even when people are buying on the lovely market. [/quote]

Eymet is a small town in a very large region and is fairly unique in it's ratio of Brit population so saying that the region has been 'unfairly categorised' hits the nail on the head.

[Mark]

[quote user="Tresco"]

 Around 6% is enough to get people rattled, apparently. [/quote]

Just read this from Tresco as "Around 6% is enough to get people ratted", which I suppose is true if one drinks immoderately.  Freudian misread OR WHAT??  Must check into a 0% clinic.

Back on topic, I live on a mountaintop and there's a flipping English family here AS WELL!  It's like Sarlat on market day, I tell you.  Tsk. 

[TreizeVents]

[quote user="Teamedup"]

It is an anathema to me that people move abroad to somewhere full of their compatriots. I realise that it isn't especially a british thing, most people's do it, I wouldn't and simply do not like the thought of it.

[/quote]

Hi Teamed Up,

It is important to look at the history and patterns of immigrants everywhere to realise that what the Brits do, what you don't like much, is totally normal and utterly understandable.  Think of the immigrants to America, or Britain.  Do you think that an immigrant who might not know the language, the food and the culture of another country would voluntarily move into an area where none of their compatriots are.  No way.  They move into neighbourhoods with a few or many of their own folks, start food and goods stores with products from the home country and gradually over a few generations things change.  Although to this day there is a Chinatown and a Little Italy in New York, just to give one example.   They help each other out, construct defenses against the native folks (who usually make some kinds of attacks eventually), help each other understand the strange ways of the dominant culture, and generally try to make thier way in the new land.  Think of the Turks, the Irish, the Maghrebins, the Pakistanis, the Gujaratis, the Chinese .... and the Dordogne.  Not to mention the difference between the older immigrants, and their children who might be raised in the dominant culture.  But you still get people wanting to live with their own people, speak their own language and eat their own food.  What on earth is not totally understandable about that?  What's not to like about it?  The French have such a strong thing against it with their total suspicion of communitarism.

The people I think are dreamers and unrealistic are those that think that the French actually will allow anyone to be really truly integrated  if they are not "really French".  No way.  Unless maybe you speak French totally and your partner is French, then maybe.  Otherwise, immigrants everywhere act the same.  Mostly.  I concede in advance there are exceptions, but not many.

By the way, if you think of people as immigrants, rather than "moving abroad", it will help clarify things.[I]

[Russethouse]

>>By the way, if you think of people as immigrants, rather than "moving abroad", it will help clarify things.<<

That probably has some bearing, as I understand it TU didn't emigrate as such, she just moved abroad, she always knew that they would return to the UK.

There is something a little contrary though - if you like your fellow compatriots so much you can find lots of them - at home[:)] Surely people move abroad because it offers something different ?.

[Suze01]

[quote user="Russethouse"]

Surely people move abroad because it offers something different ?.

[/quote]

Exactly,  the majority of Brits moving to the Dordogne (or any other part of France) do so for the qualities of the region and not because there are some fellow compatriates there. 

"as I understand it TU didn't emigrate as such, she just moved abroad, she always knew that they would return to the UK" as I understand it TU moved to where she is because of OH's job offer and the skiing. Moving abroad/immigrants: I don't see a difference.

Can we stop bashing the Dordogne or maybe look closer at some of the other regions that haven't yet aquired a 'reputation'.

[Russethouse]

Suze, this may be personal to me but if someone emigrates I expect it to be with an intention of it being permanent (as much as anything can be) where as I don't think that was ever TUs expectation.

Hopefully people move because they are attracted by some aspect of where they are moving to, but I guess we have both seen posts from people who seem as if they are running to/escaping from a place (usually the UK).

I wonder how the centre of Brittany compares with Dordogneshire number wise ?

 

[Turnip]

No one is "bashing" any area. It is simply a fact that immigrants ( to America, Canada, Britain, Italy, France etc) do tend to gather in groups ( look at Bradford in the UK). The British abroad do likewise despite those who piously claim to spurn English speaking immigrants. The Dordogne is still a beautiful area regardless of the languages spoken in its' various corners.

[TreizeVents]

I went to a gathering today, of many nationalities.  I was speaking with a British woman who has been here 18 months.  She said she had heard twice, and was repeating to me as a fact, that there were 2,000 Brits living in Lodeve, a town about twenty-five minutes from the gathering and fiftenn from where she lived.  The total population of the town is 7,500.  There are, in the phone book, 45 names which are obviously Britsh.  That's quite a bit, as our town away has only 14 and is nearly as big.  So there are more Brits there, one reason I thought of moving there.  But can you imagine that there could possibly be 2,000, nearly a quarter of the population?  No way.  And this is how rumours begin.  She believed it, and insisted even when I told her about my phone book research, she desparately looked for possible explanations as to how 45 pohne numbers could result in the population of 2,000. 

The person who said that there must be a crucial percentage of "outsiders", or "the other", before local people get rattled was right.  One or two "others" are just interesting neighbours, or people you don't know.  Usually there are no problems.  Immigrants are happy, accepted by locals, make a few friends, everything is peachy.  When 10 or 20 "others" move into an area, and you can see them everyday on the streets (especially if skin colour is helpful for identification), people notice and begin to comment.  And when the numbers get into the 3-5% area, then you get problems.  But long before that, the tiny numbers, the half a percent or one percent, turns into a "huge invasion" in the mind of local people.  Its like that quite often.