What is it like returning to the UK ?

[Miki]

[quote] Exactly that, Price & Location.

 How else would you learn

anything but by talking to your French friends and neighbours, knowing

the state that the country is in is one thing but changing it is

another. I don't think I was trying to tell you how it works here but

you make a reference to a specific group of people here in France that

arrived here as I did 'Price & Location'. Does that mean that you

view them as some sort of underclass? I also do not have my head up my

j***sy, I cannot change the way France is in exactly the same way that

I could not change the way the UK is. I said that had if I had the

money to relocate within the UK that is what I would have done, our

life here in France for the last 4 years has not been without it's

problems but we would rather struggle at times here than struggle back

in South East London. I may be in that ' bunch of Rose coloured

wotsits' but I am happy to be so where as you are apparently not happy

here, would you like me to send you some Rose coloured glasses?

     Never ever trust someone that starts their post by saying "I am not having a pop" and then goes on to do exactly that [:D] [/quote]

You don't do irony then Dave ?

A smile at the end whilst having silly unnecessary digs in the text, means what exactly ? I was joking about the mnay people who often say how well they get on with their neighbours whilst admitting they only say Bonjour etc.......How you going to learn much from a neighbour unless on eor other of the parties has someone to translate, ? I have given up on the number of occasions that people have called me up to ask me to speak to their neighbour as he wants to know what they like to eat.....when speaking to the neighbour, thay merely wanted to know how many children they have and where are they from.....slight difference [:)] (Yes,Yes, it is is a slight exaggeration on real happenings)

The wording head up my

j***sy was simply used to get across the fact that if one wants to live without any knowledge, papers etc (your words), what else would it be similar to....it was not derogatory, just a phrase to use whilst explaining myself....

As for your moving within the UK, please read my post again, I said the possibility of having a place in each country is the best option, I did not say you should have bought in the UK...

Oh cobblers, your lack or reading is(your words) of my post are coming through in your post. I set out with decent intentions to qualify my posting but now to be honest I coiuldn't give two bob what you think......

[LanguedocGal]

[quote user="Bugbear"][quote user="LanguedocGal"]

Bugbear wrote

Love France or Leave it....................................

[/quote]

LG,

If you don't mind a slight correction I didn't write that phrase, I merely quoted it.

[:)]

[/quote]

I've just seen your earlier post.

Isn't there a film with James Cagney and Doris Day called ''Love me  or Leave me''? Perhaps, Le Pen saw that[;-)]

[hastobe]

Sometimes I find it difficult to distinguish between those posts citing how bad France is and how it is now being over run by ignorant foreigners who are just there to cream what they can off the country /system very difficult to distinguish from those with similar rants about the UK and it's immigrant invasion, spiralling crime...  Seems only the place names have been changed...

As has been said before in the context of new arrivals / second home owners in France - if you haven't lived in a country for some period of time it is difficult to make a fair judgement - this applies just as well to those who haven't lived in the UK for some time. 

In the UK we live in an area where there is a high level of crime, doctors appointments are difficult to get, dentist impossible to find, hospital funding is at crisis level and a sense of 'community' is pretty much non existent.  In contrast, our home in France is in a pretty semi rural area where we know all our neighbours, we have little crime and  the cost of living (i.e. the costs to keep a roof over our head) is low.  With that comparison - we fall into the 'prefer France' group - it is a relief for us to go to France.  That doesn't mean we don't appreciate that for those trying to earn a living (particularly those with young families or who left before the house price boom), those living in or near big cities, those  who need a very active social life, or those used to a  more rural or affluent area of the UK won't feel completely the opposite.

There isn't a right or a wrong country to live in - or a right or wrong reason for moving.

Kathie

[Miki]

[quote user="Bugbear"][quote user="LanguedocGal"]

Bugbear wrote

Love France or Leave it....................................

[/quote]

LG,

If you don't mind a slight correction I didn't write that phrase, I merely quoted it.

[:)]

[/quote]

Well how about next time giving the original person the credit, that way you won't have to climb down, or do you back that statement up, I can only guess you do......Now multiply that by the number of French who would love to get out of France and perhaps that would mean a completely different France to the one you believe you know now. Or the same for the UK, millions leaving but sadly for most, who do not have the money you had to be able to follow your requirement in life, they have to stay exactly where they are, even politicians know that, even if you don't but it makes for front page news...oh and elections are looming, how coincidental................

LG,

Excellent post on the subject of those who just want to tell it as it is, without the OTT generalisations that we witness all too often on LF.

Copperlola, that's exactly my point. Makes me wonder when I hear Brits here blasting off about the UK ...guess one has to have sympathy with the Ockers when they call us whinging poms [:)]

As for being put in "boxes" I thought we all had a grin about those clichés a while back and how some Brits still like to use those Americanisms when they come to France and post on Brit forums, looks like it is being revived again. Boxes my ar**...............

[Bugsy]

[quote user="LanguedocGal"]

Isn't there a film with James Cagney and Doris Day called ''Love me  or Leave me''? Perhaps, Le Pen saw that[;-)]

[/quote]

Yes indeed, 1955, wow that's a long time ago.................................[:)]

[Bugsy]

"

[Beryl]

Here goes.

As  newcomer to France here is my perspective for what it's worth.

I know France is not Utopia and has a variety of problems some of which I understand and some of which, I admit I am ignorant of. However, I feel quite distant from many of the problems due to geography, language and the fact that they do not affect me personally or rather that they don't noticebly impinge on my day to day life in France. 

I would expect Miki through virtue of the fact that he has lived and worked here for many years and Teamed Up's quarter of a century here to have a better understanding and a different perspective on French life to me. I suppose I do live in a bubble and I am sure many Brits live in their little bubbles too.

I don't dislike the UK, have a large family there etc but my life in France suits me and at the present I can wax lyrical about how marvellous France is because it is, in my bubble and what happens in my life is my reality.

 

 

[Cat]

Can everyone keep it civil, please.

It's an interesting thread and it would be a shame to have to start cutting out chunks or locking it.

 

[Miki]

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[Miki]

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[Bugsy]

"

[Patf]

I have a theory - based on guesswork I must admit - that the british are a very adventurous nation, because wherever you are you're not far from the sea and can leap on a boat and sail off to pastures new. In another thread fluffy kitten - ?Dick Smith ? quoted some research which showed just as many emigrants in the 1910s as now. In my family. going back generations there were seafarers,  newspaper correspondent in Russia etc, government worker in Lebanon and in my generation half of us moved abroad. It's just part of our genetic makeup and in spite of any dire warnings of " take off those rose coloured specs or else!" we will continue to take risks and look for new adventures.Pat.

[Bugsy]

"

[cooperlola]

[quote user="Bugbear"][quote user="Miki"]

 .................big old Bugbear....................


[/quote]

Excuse me !!, less of the 'old'.....................[:)]

[/quote]We can't tell how old you are when you're wearing a helmet, Gary![:D]

[Will]

I'm not wanting to contradict what Hastobe has to say, which makes a lot of sense, but I do have to take issue with one phrase which people often use to underline how badly they see the UK and how favourably they view France - "hospital funding is at crisis level...". That of course applies equally well to both health systems (which I suppose just emphasises Hastobe's main thrust).

Yes, the WHO (World Health Organization) has said that France has (arguably) the best health provision anywhere, just as the good old NHS has often been cited throughout the world (and occasionally even in Britain) as the epitome of a state health system. But the funding crisis is just as deep in France as in Britain. The main difference is that in Britain it manifests itself as cut backs which in their turn breed long waiting lists and an over-stretched staff at the coal face, and a public outcry at the 'poor service'. France's response to its health service overspending has been, up to now, to keep it quiet, and chuck even more money and bureaucrats at it. The result was a national debt spiralling out of control. The outcome is that - in  grossly simplified terms - we pay 8% of our French income to keep the health service running, and a further 11% (the much-maligned CRS etc which amounts to far more than the current cost of health provision) to pay off its past excesses. Yes, for the patient it's a good system, though not perfect, and likely to become rather less so when the French realise that their national hypochondria just cannot be afforded. But santé comes, just as the NHS does, at a cost. It's a similar problem, but two diametrically opposing ways of dealing with it.

[Miki]

Sorry about editing but I don't see that it made any difference to be honest it just seemed to need it, to make it clearer. It wasn't done. nor did it to change nor alter an opinion.

No I don't know your knowledge and if you don't care to enlighten, I will put you in one of the boxes that I believe you are in.

Listen, anyone who has come here in semi retirement and posts of the material items one has, one hazards a guess that one is fairly comfortable but my point was of your ability to be able to do what you wanted to do, whereas millions and millionsof others here have nowhere near the amount of money to be able to follow suit... So as for love France or leave, the truth is for many, it is not even a player but merely a slogan for politicians to bandy about when required.

So as far as your glib statement of :

[quote] Presumptions, presumptions, nothing but presumptions. If you're

going to be critical please try and stick to what you actually know

rather than what you think you know.[/quote]

It wasn't neccessary to know your exact details, as previously stated why.

Now please, I do hope you are gathering up all my wrongs, it will give me (and others no doubt) endless pleasure I'm sure. And don't forget, the more you find the more certain I am to walk.......

[Bugsy]

"

[Miki]

So why the statement that many of my posts are not correct ?

I thought you said that presumptions are not to be used just a page ago ? But now they appear to be alright, if used by Bigbear then ?

Come on, it's a simple case of back up or climb down surely ? Or are your posts just meant to be ignored as they can contain text that is not actually truthful ?

[hastobe]

[quote user="Will "]

I'm not wanting to contradict what Hastobe has to say, which makes a lot of sense, but I do have to take issue with one phrase which people often use to underline how badly they see the UK and how favourably they view France - "hospital funding is at crisis level...". That of course applies equally well to both health systems (which I suppose just emphasises Hastobe's main thrust).

[/quote]

I agree with what you say Will - but people judge on their experience as a patient.  At the moment you still get to see a doctor pretty quickly in France, my (French) friend's father has recently been treated (like my mother in the UK) for cancer - but their experiences have been very different.  Seeing the two experiences side by side does colour your judgement.  I also see the other side - my husband dealing with the frustration of the continual NHS cuts and, worse still, the manipulations of the business managers introduced to 'manage' the crisis.  Our Trust has had to cut nearly a 1,000 jobs and close a number of wards in the last 9 months.  In this period my OH has lost nearly half of his staff but is still expected to deal with the same number of patients.  There is currently no way he can do this without extending waiting times and breaching national guidelines - even for cancer patients / patients classed as urgent.  So it all becomes a game of politics and statistics - how can management change the way they record things so they don't look as bad.  Maybe the UK way is better - 'cut your cloth' and all of that - it just doesn't feel like it when you or a close family member is the one who is being 'cut'.

Kathie

[Bugsy]

"

[Miki]

[quote user="Bugbear"]

Miki,

I was simply answering the point you raised.

If you can't see that, and my attempt to keep this in a civil context, well do what ever you feel is right.

Oh, and it's Bugbear, by the way.

[/quote]

No come on, you have given us all a quote and then pushed it on to someone else when challenged about it's usefulness to the debate (Leave France etc), you tell me I am often not correct and now you want to simply say you were answering a point I made ?

So now I find it extremely difficult to fathom out why you said I am often incorrect or why you even mention it, if you cannot back that up? As I said, I do sincerely hope this doesn't mean you are now one of the posters who say what they want, then simply swerve around giving an honest reply to an honest question ?

I also never received a PM with reason for my posts deletion, which I can't believe was even deleted but I think that can be taken as read anyway !

[Miki]

[quote] Cor...what did I say, nothing more that I would say to Miki if he was

buying me a pint in a pub in England, maybe even in Sunbury-on-Thames

if we happened to be there at the same time. From time to time I have

been accused of reading too much into posts by others, but surely this

censorship is going a bit far, don't walk Miki, there has to be

disagreement first to have a discussion otherwise NO discussion.....[/quote]

Possibly but if I bought you a pint in my old local Dave and you then said something about how far my head etc, it may end up in something more than a discussion though [;-)]

[Tresco]

[quote user="Deby"]

Hello everyone - haven't posted for a while, though I do lurk quite a bit - had a few password problems so couldn't really post.  Tresco - thank you for nudging me![/quote]

Nice to see you Deby. [:)]

I gave you the 'nudge' because, as Patf pointed out much earlier, the majority of people posting in the thread didn't really come close to fitting Deimos' 'spec'.[:D]

Clearly anyone can answer, but those of us who nip back for a week every now and then don't really fit the bill as far as his request goes.

You, and all the other people who do, (the 'half and halfers', people who have moved countries several times, spend several weeks/months in UK, are in the process of moving back etc etc) seem to be expressing similar sentiments, (which seem to be more balanced and not comparing apples and oranges) and that's very interesting because there is no way I could say you all would agree about other matters.[;-)]

Fascinating stuff.

Edit. Languedoc Gal gets notable exception award!

 

 

 

 

[Bugsy]

"

[Tresco]

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