For all those coming to France

[frogblogger]

Bev that's true for minor stuff, but I personally know someone who thought he could get away with this and is currently some £350,000 out of pocket as a result, and the proud owner of a large hole in the ground, despite having pleaded his case before everyone from the Maire to the DDE to the Prefet over the past four years.

[pavot]

Originally Posted by dcat

Thanks Keoni, I will tell my husband what you said. He seems convinced that the French are horrid.

dcat

I have traveled in the south of france quite a bit, and am coming over for a year in the spring. I speak poor french, but all of the french people have been very kind and helpful to me, and work to understand my fractured french. I am continuing to work to improve it, of course. I do think you will find friends in the south, both english and french speaking.
pavot

[dcat]

Originally Posted by pavot

I have traveled in the south of france quite a bit, and am coming over for a year in the spring. I speak poor french, but all of the french people have been very kind and helpful to me, and work to understand my fractured french. I am continuing to work to improve it, of course. I do think you will find friends in the south, both english and french speaking.
pavot

Thanks for your reply. We were in France for two weeks in October-November and had a very good experience. Lots of friendly people. My husband has softened.

[mamageffriaud]

Bonjour Bev! What brought you to France in the first place? My husband is French and misses his country and family and he is currently looking for a job so we can move there. I am excited and nervous about the idea. I have a one year old and we are expecting our 2nd in August, so I worry about being a new mom in a new country... My French is good, not great, but if people speak slowly I understand almost everything and I can get my point across easily, although not always very pretty. My experiences traveling around France with my husband and studying there before we met have been wonderful. I've always felt, since I was little, that I was born in the wrong country.

[mamageffriaud]

my husband recommended to me that I find a job teaching English for a company. My father-in-law's company has hired someone to teach any interested employees since English is considered so valuable in the work-world. As an elementary school teacher myself, that did not sound SUPER interesting, but he said they pay well and I'd be teaching...
Just an idea... Good luck! Let me know what you find, maybe it will help me when we move there!

[Bevdeforges]

Originally Posted by mamageffriaud

Bonjour Bev! What brought you to France in the first place? My husband is French and misses his country and family and he is currently looking for a job so we can move there. I am excited and nervous about the idea. I have a one year old and we are expecting our 2nd in August, so I worry about being a new mom in a new country... My French is good, not great, but if people speak slowly I understand almost everything and I can get my point across easily, although not always very pretty. My experiences traveling around France with my husband and studying there before we met have been wonderful. I've always felt, since I was little, that I was born in the wrong country.

What brought me to France? Moving in with my (now) husband... but they wouldn't give me a visa, so we figured if we got married, they'd have to. (Wrong.)

Your French will get better only when you're on site and HAVE to use it. But it will go very quickly from that point. The telephone is the worst, but you learn to simply tell people either to speak more slowly or (my favorite) that they aren't speaking very clearly and to please enunciate.

One guy got very frustrated with my "poor" French on the phone and suggested, somewhat sarcastically, that perhaps we should speak English or German. I actually speak German pretty well and suggested to him that maybe it would be better if we were both speaking in a "foreign language" so we'd be on an even footing. Boy, did he change the subject in a hurry!

Having kids is an excellent way to get integrated quickly. Once they start school, they'll pick up the language and just about force you to mingle with the other mothers of their little friends. (While you wait outside the school to pick them up or drop them off.) Or look for just about any "jeunes mamans" activities.
Cheers,
Bev

[Hound Dog]

Originally Posted by Hovian

Hi Bev, Yes I fully agree with you. I am moving to France fairly soon but am having difficulty finding the right location. I intended to move to Herault on the outskirts of Beziers but have decided to look elsewhere also. Can anyone help me? The weather must be fairly warm in winter and the summers hot. My friend has a place near Bergerac and he says it is a lovely place. I want to be near transport as I shall not be driving and will need to get to my daughter in Cannes. I would like to be near English people but my main wish is to be able to establish myself into the french community. I shall be going on my own so you can imagine how daunting it is for me but this is not something that I have taken lightly even though my french is very basic so now I am teaching myself and will also take lessons when I move. I have heard that Saint Foy La Grande is lovely, can you or anyone help, I am going to Bergerac and Chalais.

DO not expect any place to be warm in the winter in France. I am French I can tell you that whereever you will go in the winter there is cold weather. The Mediterranean coast has more sun some places rarely have a deep freeze but they are not war. Provence inland is wonderful but the winters are pretty cold and the summers two or 3 month dry and warm to hot. The springs and falls can be pretty rainy- The Atlantic coast is wetter, it does not get as cold as inland but it is pretty cold too. as it is wetter as a rule. The summer couple of month can be warm and more humid than in the Southeast.
My cousin lives in LaRocelle and she had -2 to -5 when my mother in the Loire Valley had-10. It is all cold to me and this is why I moved to Mexico.

One of the reasons I chose not to retire in France is the weather. Good luck at finding a warm place there.
B][/B]

[Hound Dog]

Originally Posted by dcat

Hi Bev,
Thanks for the good introductory information. I am an American and have been living in Catalunya (Spain) for seven years. I am married to a Catalan and I speak Catalan. We are now thinking of moving to Provence -- somewhere near Avignon or Arles. I have visited both and like them a lot. The reason for this move, if it happens, is because I find France more aesthetically pleasing than Spain (landscape, houses, restaurants and bars, less garbage everywhere, everything), I want to live in a town where I will have more cultural opportunities and will not have to rely on a car for my everyday routine (we live outside any town in an urbanization and have to drive to buy groceries, see friends, or catch the train) and also because we are looking for a less expensive property and life than what we have now. I am 60 and my husband is 77.

One of my concerns is making new friends. When we lived in Barcelona, all my friends were Catalans (I did not meet them through my husband, it was actually the reverse). Now they are mostly British. Because of the small-town, family orientation, it is harder in the area where we live now to make friends with Catalans than it was in the city.

My husband warns me that Catalans are far friendlier than the French and that I may be friendless in France (what a sentence -- I should become a poet!). I figure that I will take classes or join a group and I will meet new people. But the French do have a reputation for not being very friendly. If I speak passable (it will never be perfect) French, how are people likely to react? Because I learned Catalan rather than Castilian (Spanish), the Catalans were very warm and receptive to me, although they still keep a social distance.

Thanks,
Dvora

Why don´t you move to the Languedoc where some French Catalan is spoken, you will impress the hec out of the locals and will pick up the local dialect pretty quickly. (I know Catalan is a language not a dialect..)

The old part of Avignon or Arles are pretty nice. Both cities are nice and not too large.

[frogblogger]

Hound Dog's spot on with the weather summing up - it's a myth that the south of France has 'warm' winters, mild is the best you get and that's stretching it a bit. The 'mild' weather - which simply means rare frosts - is along the Med coast mostly at the Nice end, but as soon as you go a few miles inland you lose a few degrees.

The SE does get hot summers though, usually in the high 30s through July and August. The Med at this time of year makes the coast slightly cooler than the Provencal hinterland. Often when watching weather reports you see the hottest summer temps in the likes of Carpentras in the Vaucluse (dept 84).

As the days get shorter, the nights cool down a little towards the end of August and into September. It usually remains warm well into October. Even November can be ok - sometimes.

December to February it's usually pretty cold (except along the SE coast up to say 50 miles inland where you've got those extra 4 or 5 degrees, the Med effect). Even so, I've been able to eat lunch outside where I live (Vaucluse) on a sunny day, sheltered from the wind. You have to get the timing right though, because the temperature plummets from about 3pm.

From March to May it's usually pretty pleasant in the south-east... plenty of sun, mostly nice warm temps during the day. My favourite time of year in the Vaucluse.

But right now, January, it's cold, and not even sunny. The wood fires have been burning non-stop for weeks now. I live near Vaison la Romaine.

[Bevdeforges]

I had to check back to see where in the US the poster is from. Georgia is pretty mild by US standards (though they occasionally get some vicious ice storms).

But even the north of France has much milder winters than most of the northern tier of US states. In the Paris area, it rarely stays below freezing for more than a few days at a time (ok, this year was the exception) and when it snows (which isn't often) the snow generally melts the next day.

What's tough about the winters in France is the rain and damp - plus, being farther north than the northern US states (Boston is on the same parallel as Madrid) it seems much darker (and I guess the sun sets earlier and rises later in mid-winter). I never had trouble with "seasonal adjustment disorder" when I lived in the US, but over here, I start taking St. Johns Wort in October until the end of January or so. It really does seem to help!
Cheers,
Bev