Why did you leave England?

[PaulFM]

I was sitting at a restaurant table tonight with my wife moaning about all the things that I felt made it impossible to live in this society any longer. Having finished my rant I felt that either, my views were extreme, or I was in a majority of one. Walking home I began to think of all those who had actually left and moved abroad, leaving their cultur, family and friends. France being the escape of choice I thought it would be an idea to canvas those who had left to see what it was about their homeland that made the thought of relocation such an attractive idea; if only to make myself feel better. Or am I alone in my views?

Paul Firminger.

[Lepoulailler]

OK, I'll probably get burgled or the car pinched now I've posted this, and I don't live in a city centre, but here goes...

Don't need to lock the door, doesn't really matter if from time to time you forget to take the car keys out.  The neighbours stop (sometimes a little too often when you are trying to work, but what the heck) to pass the time of day, and I am chastised if I don't do the same ('since when was it right for the old to have to go and visit the young'?!).  Everyone knows everyone else's business, in the nicest sort of way - a real sense of community, none of that living next door to someone for years but only knowing their occupation.

Our children are a part of our social life.  They know how to behave at the table and I would no longer consider asking whether we should get a babysitter if we are invited out, even if it is until three o'clock in the morning.  Heavens above they even eat langue de bouef, andouille, and camembert. 

I may be a bit perverse but I felt that a friend was totally right when he physically clipped his son round the ear because he passed an old man in the street (who the child did not know) without saying 'Bonjour monsieur'.  Old fashioned values that have long since disappeared in the UK.

Everything stops for lunch (still takes a bit of getting used to) and a bank holiday is a bank holiday. Sundays are for getting together as a family and going out somewhere (remember that?). Family - yes, it is dead important here.

I can drive without miles of roadworks or millions of potholes in the road.  If I or those close to me are poorly I know that I can count on them receiving a first rate health service - and alternative therapy is mainstream over here, not thought of something wacky.  I actually believe in (most of) the education that my (now completely bilingual) children are receiving.

My kids play out like I used to.  They go for bike rides and picnics on their own, and have a den.  They can tear around their own fields on their pony - god forbid most people could even afford a field in the UK.  Aside from a weekly 'activity' each they don't have the stress of never ending after-schools clubs. If we do need out of school care, the garderie is open from 7.30am to 6.30 pms, requires minimal notice and costs around 65p per child.

Oh yes, and plenty of space, space, space, green fields, fresh air.

Of course there are downsides (yes, really), but you wouldn't drag me back kicking and screaming.

Peta

www.lepoulailler.net

[Richard-R]

I got feed up seeing my taxes being spent on centres for one legged Albanian lesbians and other fringe groups and not making any inprovements to my quality of life.

[Lizzie15]

I agree totally with what has been written,however..."home is where the heart is  " isn't a bad saying.I like a foot in both camps.Uk has good things too ( what about culture?),I don't think we should forget that too quickly

 

[David_Janet]

Here are just a few of the reasons we sold up and moved to France. The initial reason for the move was that we had both become fed up with our jobs and were only about 5 years off retirement. We had spent many years touring France on holiday, with each return to UK becoming more and more difficult. The housing market in UK meant we could afford to sell up and buy outright, although we didn't have much left over!

We are Mr and Mrs very average, living in a 3 bedroomed house on the fringes of a lively village. All our neighbours are French and have been friendly and welcoming.

As an enthusiastic amateur cook I love the fact that food is still taken very seriously here.

The sense of politeness which means acknowledging anyone and everyone you pass in the street. It still amazes us that teenagers and children smile and say bonjour.

Children eating en famille in restaurants - happy to eat whatever's put in front of them and behaving nicely.

The emphasis on family - when our neighbours discoverd our children weren't able to come over from UK for Easter they insisted we went to them for lunch with their family. 9 adults and 6 children - what a lovely occasion. They couldn't bear the thought of us being on our own!

So - although the housing market enabled us to move here, it certainly wasn't the reason for coming. We've met people whose sole reason for coming to France seems to have been to cash in on their UK house and make money on the move. All I can say is that they don't seem very happy!

Hope this gives you an idea and encourages you to start making plans ....

Janet

[zeb]

We didn't escape from Britain, we really love the UK - the hustle and bustle, the multi- cultural society, pubs, Tescos, family and friends etc - but we also love France - the people, the food, the change of life-style and the fantastic cities and countryside.

We bought as a holiday home and didn't intend to move immediately but circumstances changed dramatically and here we are.

Three years on we have a successful small business and are settled in this tiny community. However there are still lots of places we want to see and things we want to do with our lives. We will sell up or rent our home out and do VSO for a couple of years before we retire and then, who knows........Maybe go back to Colchester or maybe Botswana!!

But whatever you do, don't think you are escaping the UK for paradise. France has it's problems too, many the same as the UK, but so many people who have moved here with their little pot of money haven't a clue what's going on here politically and socially. We've met them, the folks who complain all the time about the UK. Very sad..

[Cjb]

For us it wasn't a case of having to escape the UK, rather a case of trying something different. My wife's French and we'd already spent four and a half years together in the UK, so we decided to give France a go. We said initially that we'd give it two years, to see if we could find jobs etc... Well those 2 years are nearly up and we'll certainly be staying as we've got a lovely daughter, I've got a good job and we've bought a house. (My wife's also got a fulltime job but she doesn't get paid for it!!)

We both like the UK and France.

My wife says that she misses the good manners of the English and their sense of humour (even though she still has my good manners and sense of humour!!).

We both become infuriated by french administration and the fact that those that work hard are not rewarded for their efforts and small businesses are unable to employ more staff because of the "charges patronales." Hence 3 million unemployed, widespread benefit fraud and a culture of welfare dependency. 

We greatly prefer the quality of life that we have here in the South of France.

I think if we were both being honest we'd have to say that if the UK were cheaper and the climate better we'd opt for England, but then again I'd be missing out on the adventure that is living abroad. I'm sorry if that sounds like an uncultured view of things, but let's not forget the richness of British culture and the fact that we actively encourage other cultures to coexist with ours.

No need to knock the UK in an attempt to convince ourselves that we've made the right move by coming to France!!

[SaligoBay]

We got offered the chance, and we took it.  It just happened to be France.  If the offer had been Sydney or San Francisco or Shanghai we'd have taken that too.

I reckon CJB's said it all really.  All the problems that exist in the UK exist in France too.

The 2 main differences between our lives in the UK and our lives in France are that the weather's better in France, and we have a lot less money.   Sure, the Boy can run about in the woods with his friends, but I do have a little twinge of envy at UK friends who are jetting off to Thailand and the like for hols!

And so it goes.   

  

 

[Boghound]

[quote]I got feed up seeing my taxes being spent on centres for one legged Albanian lesbians and other fringe groups and not making any inprovements to my quality of life.[/quote]

If you are paying tax over here...you will find the French Government....like most governments around the world....are still paying out for the comfort of "one legged Albanian lesbians"...the difference is...the French don't shout about it..like the British do.

 

[Teamedup]

A whim, the adventure, could have been anywhere.

[ChezShells]

We had done a lot of travelling over the past few years, we had our UK house up for sale and the one we wanted in the UK sold before we got an offer on ours so after my partner having a bad time at work we both decided to pack our jobs in and give it a go in another country, Italy was too expensive (where we wanted), no way i'm trying Bulgaria and we have always liked France.

[Miki]

CJB said "......No need to knock the UK in an attempt to convince ourselves that we've made the right move by coming to France!"

That sums up many folks here, it seems that they have to permanently knock anything British thinking it is all brightness itself here. A lot of the time their life in France can consist of no more than they did in the UK, except once in a while they can "do lunch" sure it can be really nice here but I know I could do all or most anyway that I do here, in the UK.

The problem, as has been said many times before, it is all too easy to judge moving from a city in the UK to a small commune here and then judge that as the difference between the UK and France. The large towns here suffer from many if not all, the same problems that the UK has.

The lovely country villages in the UK are as beautiful as here. We have drugs, alcohol and all other the problems associated with living today but being deep in the country masks what many French see as the real life in France.

Which brings me nicely to the statement of "Real France" where is it?

Is it living in ones "dream home" surrounded by fields or is it, as it is for millions of French, living in town and for many, living in municipal housing or is it purely glossy magazine talk, for selling a broken down dump in the country ! (been there, so don't attack me on that score !)

We moved here to France, as we had known it for many, many years and thought we knew how to live here and have a different way of life but ecky thump, we were not prepared, either linguistically (strangely enough our holiday French seemed perfectly OK for moving here as well !)nor commercially ! Those first few years of cotisations and regulations certainly made us sit up a bit !

For us, I would say it took at least the first 7 or 8 years to almost come to terms with it all and even now, we can often struggle with the whys and wherefores of the French way itself ! We are always being shocked as to how it all works and how the French can react on occasion. One small example is the need to learn to argue and swear but to ensure you keep etiquette firmly to the forefront, even remebering to say "vous etes tres gentile" even after the b******s have just stitched you up !!

I shall leave the "tiny" problem of SAV to others who have more patience than I to deal with it all!

[Lepoulailler]

I agree wholeheartedly with those of you who pointed out that it is not all roses, but the original question was why we moved here in the first place...!  (By the way, we lived in the countryside in England too)

I'm not knocking the UK.  I just have to spend a day or two there to know that I really don't miss it at all.  Sure, I miss family.  I still hanker for takeaways, ready meals, British foods, curry & spicy food (I can still cook my own though), internet and Sunday shopping.  Whilst I admire how they patriotic the French are are in terms of buying French and standing up for their rights, I also find many of them(without generalising) are frustratingly blinkered and miss out on many of the wonderful things of other cultures. 

French bureaucracy drives me nuts, setting up a business over here is incredibly complicated, (and god forbid you should want to run two businesses at the same time), they like everything to fit into neat boxes, taxes and social charges are high.  I don't find that the cost of living is much (if at all) cheaper than the UK, but I have met few Brits who are financially better off in France than they were in the UK...

As for the language, it takes several years and lots of hard work to be able to really communicate in the way that you could do back in the UK.  How many intelligent people that have worked hard all their lives struggle to find jobs out here.  It can be very isolating. 

However, when all is said and done when I weigh the pro's and con's my personal set of scales fall heavily on the side of living here in France.

Peta

www.lepoulailler.net

 

[Cerise]

I find it interesting that most people say 'why did you leave England' rather than 'why come to France'.  I never consciously thought of wanting to 'get away' - simply wanted to try something different.  We thought about going to Greece, but my husband thought the language would be just too difficult, whilst I already spoke French and he had a smattering.  3 years on we feel we have made a good choice, but not necessarily forever.  I have never moved anywhere and thought 'this is for the rest of my life'.  I enjoy my life here, we have made good friends and we have fun. Sure, the administration drives me mad and there are many things politically that bother me - but no more, or less, than in the UK.  This is something we are doing now, in the future we may want to return to the UK or move elsewhere.  What I do know is I'm glad we gave it a go.  There is good and bad wherever you live, but the most important thing is to live life, not just dream about it.

Maggi

 

 

[Iceni]

I left because I no longer liked living there - neither the place it has become nor the people (the English that is). We now live in a hamlet reminiscent of England 40 or 50 years ago.

John

not

[Ian Hoare<br>All the best<br>Ian<br>La Souvigne Corrèze<br>http:www.souvigne.com]

Hi,

I guess we moved out here earlier than most of you - back in August 1989, so our reasons may well be very different. I'd also say that we spent a year researching every aspect we could, before we finally moved out, so we had no bad shocks. We also speak French (Jacquie was a French teacher), which is almost essential, I think, if you're going to make a successful move. How can you contribute to the local society and integrate with them if you can't communicate?

Anyway, for us, the motivation was very much two fold. We'd fallen in love with the Correze (we'd bought a holiday home here) and were home sick for it whenever we went home to London. At the same time, I/we love(d) my country, and was a fervant supporter of the work my wife was doing as a state school teacher in a deprived area. I HATED - no, we both hated to see what was being done to education, especially in poor areas.

The UK was becoming a country where selfishness and greed was considered normal, where prurience was considered acceptable (the hypocrisy of the Mirror in publishing the Charles & Camilla tapes, for example), where dog-eat-dog seemed to be Government policy and we were living through changes in education designed - it seemed to us - to create an uneducated, divided & subservient workforce.

When we left the UK, we predicted that in most inner city schools, the best that would be offered by 2000 would be containment, (absence of riots) rather than education. I don't think our analysis was that far out, by the way.

I have always been someone who fuly accepts such basic christian ethics of "look after the helpless and widows", "love your neighbour as yourself" and so on and so on.  I saw policies being implemented that were tearing apart the structure of support for the least capable in society, and encouraging the ruthless to exploit the weak. It broke my heart, quite frankly. And before you think I'm indulging in ill disguised party political propaganda, can I say that I've not much more time for Mr B. than I had for Mrs T. and I'm most certainly NOT any kind of communist.

I hated the demolition of pensions, of the progressive weakening of the NHS. You name it. I no longer felt that I was in the England I loved. In the Correze I found and still do find more of the virtues that I see as being typically British, tolerance, acceptance, mutual support and so on.

I was a freelance chef and wine consultant - with a sideline in computer programming, when I lived in the UK, so food was always important. It goes without saying that our access to top quality ingredients at reasonable prices is infinitely better here than in the UK. Restaurants are better and cheaper, it's SO easy to find good vfm french wine (don't start me up on the BAD side, which is french chauvinism). Our medical system is unrecognisably better. We have better wild flowers, better butterfles, less traffic and best of all, wonderful generous friends.

These are the things that matter. To us anyway. Sure, we might have been financially better off if we'd stayed. But I'd probably be dead of a heart attack, (my mother died at 45, my brother had one at age 56, so it's in the family) because they probably wouldn't have found out that I was a cholesterol factory until it was too late.

Would I move back? No, not for a million pounds, not for 10 million, if I had to stay there all the time. Do I visit? Yes I do, and I have a whale of a time visiting my favourite restaurants and shops, chatting with my friends, and enjoying what the UK does have to offer. But after a fortnight, I'm longing to get back here and BE where my roots now are.

[Tresco]

[quote]We didn't escape from Britain, we really love the UK - the hustle and bustle, the multi- cultural society, pubs, Tescos, family and friends etc - but we also love France - the people, the food, the ch...[/quote]

Thought i'd nick the first part of Zebs post as the views correspond pretty much with my own.

We came because MOH wanted to retire very early, and we could sell up and buy outright in an environment we would not have been able to afford in England, not with this climate anyway - there is no way I would have gone anywhere without improving on that score. (Ireland, too wet, Spain, too hot, Charente Maritime, just right)

France is close to England, geographically and culturally, though we all wonder sometimes don't we? If I need or want to get back to England, it's pretty easy.

tresco

[Quillan]

Children have no respect.

Immigrants taking over the street were you live.

Native language not spoken in local supermarket.

People come and use the medical services without putting anything in or back.

Immigrants arrive in BMW's or Merc's yet get a free house and loads of benifit.

Feel like a outisider in my own country.

These are not actually my words but that of my guests last night which sound somewhat familiar. The difference is that they were Belgian.

Personally I left for health reasons (3 heart attacks), for a less stressful life and not to mention the red wine which I drink in abundance because my cardigan consultant said it was good for the old ticker, hic.

[Tresco]

'These are not actually my words but that of my guests last night which sound somewhat familiar. The difference is that they were Belgian'.

Somewhat familiar to what, The BNP?

[SaligoBay]

Somewhat familiar to what, The BNP?

And/or the Front National, who say exactly the same about la belle France! 

[Quillan]

[quote]'These are not actually my words but that of my guests last night which sound somewhat familiar. The difference is that they were Belgian'. Somewhat familiar to what, The BNP?[/quote]

The 'Brit Pack' that sit outside a bar in Quillan on Wednesdays (market day) drunk.

[Tresco]

Too true, SB. I got talking to a guy in a restaurant near Villebois Lavalette in 16. He told me there was a commune nearby where over 60% of the houses were English owned, and mentioned that sometimes there where more English people in the restaurant we were in than French all shouting away in English - he wasn't a happy bunny at all. Felt 'his' 'culture' was being eroded, and at 60% English in this commune I can believe it. 

No mention of Mercs and Beemers tho, and I bet even he would like it if someone, even a foreigner, opened a minimarket which stayed open till 10.30, or even 9 to 6

tresco

[0BRIAN WOODHEADI,m here in franceddMMyyyy0Falseen-USI,m here in franceTrue]

The reasons for moving to france as various as anyone could think of.That said some people marry in to a french familly and choose to have baby no 1 in france, shows who wear the pantelons dans la masion.

Tesco august was it?he could be right school hols n`est pas.

[Tresco]

Yes of course outcast, you are right about the multitude of reasons for living here. For me this forum is for anyone who is interested in France, whether they live here or not, 'rose tinteds' or otherwise.

As to your baiting Cjb (presumably), well that's just daftness.

I'd just like to add that I for one did not move here to escape from immigrants, and while I do understand the concerns of people, both French and English, who may live in areas which literally are composed of 60% immigrants, I don't share their fears and concerns, nor can I personally relate to the basis which often forms them.

tresco

[Cjb]

[quote]The reasons for moving to france as various as anyone could think of.That said some people marry in to a french familly and choose to have baby no 1 in france, shows who wear the pantelons dans la mas...[/quote]

I thought pantelon was always singular!!

Sorry, Outie, I've been away on a school trip working 24 hours a day for no extra pay! The fact that my wife fell pregnant in France and that we'd already been here 6 months might have some bearing on the fact that baby no.1 was born here.

I'm touched to see that you've missed me!!