Five great reasons to be an expat
Looking at recent posts on this blog I can see I have been grumbling a bit too much, and not talking about the great reasons for being an expat in France.
So to stop readers thinking I’m a miserable old fool or that France must be a terrible place to live I thought I’d be a bit more upbeat today. It’s not hard to think of great reasons to be cheerful at the moment:
1) the south of France had the longest, best summer I remember (not the hottest ever, but temperatures over about 35 degrees start being a bit too much anyway), which is now being followed by the perfect autumn.
There’s been almost no rain since the end of April. Yesterday was about 22 degrees and sunny, today looks like being the same.
We had thought that autumn would be a disappointment since summer was so dry – in face the leaf colours are more impressive this year than ever before and Lot et Garonne is looking even more glamorous than usual.
2) taxes and social contributions this year appear to be a bit less than expected (fingers-crossed), so we can still afford to feed the children.
I’m not so sure about buying them a Blackberry and a flat-screen television each for Christmas, that might need to wait a while – in any case who likes spoiled children…
3) Usually my cycling ability has gone downhill by the end of October as fatigue and rain start getting in the way and I start slouching in front of day time TV instead.
This year because of the good weather I am still getting out on the bike quite often. Combined with my new lightweight bike this means 2010 should be a great year for cycling.
4) I haven’t commuted anywhere for eight years. No standing on a platform at Paddington train station for hours because a lorry has hit a bridge and all trains are cancelled, and no battling to squeeze onto the London underground at 7.30am.
Likewise I haven’t had a boss for eight years. In my experience there are plenty of good bosses, but sooner or later a company will always track down an obnoxious idiot who is obsessed with working long hours and put them in charge of the department instead.
5) I’m pretty sure (but not absolutely sure) that it was 25 years ago today that Mrs B and I had our first date. Since most people seem to find me rude after 25 minutes she should be congratulated on her stamina for tolerating me for so long. Little did we realise that we’d end up living where we do now, and I can’t help wondering where we might be in another 25 years.
OK so that’s not really a reason to be an expat unless our happiness is due to the sunshine and fine wine we would otherwise have missed, but I thought I’d include it anyway.
So you see, although I grumble about poor service and high taxes and dodgy plumbers I am a secret Francophile and on balance the great reasons for living here far outweigh the trifling day to day issues that sometimes dominate my blogging.
Have a nice day!
Back to grumbling!!! Weather-wise France has been really mixed this year. It’s easy to forget that in summer loads of places in the south were flooded, rivers bursting banks etc., yet elsewhere there were forest fires along the Med. due to drought conditions.
Non-stop sunshine = drought, which is what we’ve had this summer on the border of Normandy and Pays de la Loire. Until last week we’d had barely a drop of rain since early June!! Good for tourists, not so good for those who have gardens or make a living from the soil.
Enough grumbling! On a positive note the weather finally turned last week, we had a few decent falls of rain, the grass is green again and everything looks so fresh. Warm and sunny again until the end of this week, but that’s okay after the rain.
Hi Phil,
We seem to have avoided flooding but did at last have a good downpour a couple nights ago. I let a couple of Mrs B’s plants die from lack of water when she went away which didn’t go down well, and I started a bonfire that spread rapidly across a field and also incinerated a nearby clump of bamboo which also got me in trouble. Otherwise things are looking good in the garden.
I just received an inexplicable bill from URSSAF so normal grumbling will be resumed as soon as possible.
PS I just noticed your website – I tried to book a room for Mrs B with you when she was away in September but you were already booked up (I tried to book for the same day so perhaps not surprising!)
Aw, come on. I can think of at least 20 reasons to love living in France.
Of course, most of them have to do with food…and I’m still in the honeymoon stage with this country. And, I’m easily amused. 
But still!
I’ve been using your site for my son’s homeschooling stuff, and today I saw someone linking back to this on twitter. Keep being cool. Love your site.
It would take me a long time to think of 20 – although we do have a baker that says voila about 10 times when you buy a loaf of bread and always gives us a laugh so I should have thought of that one.
Another? TV programs like Desperate Housewives are now broadcast simultaneously in ‘version original’ as well as French – and strangely they sound much more like intelligent programs in French translation than they do in English.
Glad to hear I was twittered – hopefully I had gazillions of visitors during the 60 seconds before I dropped off the bottom of the page!
France is a great country to live and is by far and away my favorite. I do envy your life style and the lack of population. However having spent our life either moving in Britain and various other Europien countries. when it came to retirement we chose to stay in England. we have been very happy with our choice as it is an unspoilt part of Norfolk with few people and tourists.
We are about 2 hours from London and 25 mins from the North Norfolk coast.
Today it was a sunny mild 17C. We spent the morning continuing on the garden autumn clear up. Mrs N has just got 2 painting commissions so she has been busy painting, one of a spindle tree and the other for fungi. She is a botanical illustrator so they take ages to do.
So i can get on with the old bee hive restoration.
It is so good to hear about your lives in France we so very nealy did it as well.
I am involved in our local village museum and we are opening tomorrow to help a family trace their relations so they can add to their family tree.So that should be interesting.
Had a spin in next doors restored Mk 1 land rover 1955 in fantastic condition 60.000 genuine miles and they are only the second owners. he still uses it over the fields for shooting.it has had a few modifications including the device that in very cold weather you plug it into the mains overnight and it circulates the radiator water and keeps it warm.So it starts easy and is as warm as toast in seconds.
Ah well quarter past midnight.
Thanks for sharing your story Johnny, you are describing a village life that I suspect a lot of people think doesn’t exist anymore – I’m glad it does!
I guess we are all just looking for the place where we can ‘belong’ and it doesn’t matter much whether it’s France, England or anywhere else – it’s not the country that matters so much as finding a lifestyle we enjoy.
We were able to help the family trying to trace their roots. We had photographs of some of their family members a photograph of the family home, ( still standing) and various grave plots. They are comming back next summer to continue their search for their old family.
There are some photos of our museum on my blog here,
http://johnnynorfolk.blogspot.com/2009/04/litcham-museum-norfolk.html
ignore my political views.