What are the downsides of living in France?

[Spaceman]

I can find a lot of reasons to emigrate to France, but what are the negatives?

What are currently the topics of the day in France (like for example yob culture, the environment and recession seems to always be in the headlines here at the moment)?

If you've emigrated to France, how were you received by the French people? Have you ever experienced hostility just because you are British?

I'd love to hear your comments. It's about time me and my family made our minds up finally about whether we should stay or go and any feedback would seriously help with that decision.

Spaceman, good luck with your search.
If you decide on Caen rather than Le Havre or Rouen I am over there this summer and could also put you in touch with an old friend who Went Native and settled there.
I think she and I would agree that unless you want a Trappist-style level of peace, you should avoid La Ferte-bloody-Mace, as it was known to all Assistant/es in Calvados

marina I think it's after children as you say.

When DH and I were young and child-free, around age 25, we did meet a lot of people but we have increasingly found it hard to meet people of our own age now.

Maybe they are just so busy with family and work although we both work full-time and have young children and would love to be more sociable.

Mind you, maybe we are not so free to take up opportunities/invite people as we we were when a) we didn't have children
b) we lived in the city centre

Hey thanks you two. You've both been really nice. All I'd need to do is meet a few people like you once we've moved and I'd be sorted!

Bumping for you.

Depends on what winds you up. Possibilities include:

• bureaucratic, lots of involvement by the state

• a general sense that there is a 'correct' way of doing things (could be a good or bad thing depending on what type of person you are). French friends have told me that being different/doing things your way often doesn't go down well in France.

• even if your French is perfect and you live there for a long time, you may well always be considered British, even by your closest French friends (this comes from two women I know, both single, who have spent the majority of their working lives in France and despair that they are still introduced as English.

Thanks Chisigirl,

More to mull over. Not sure I'd mind the conformity bit now I'm entering my middle years, but you can't really tell until you're there I suppose.

Any more??

Topic of the day = pouvoir d'achat (purchase power), and lack thereof! This is really the French's major concern at the mo.
That and bureaucracy, long and drawn out processes to do just about everything, most of ot compulsory too, so you just have to grin and bear it.
Having been here just over a year i'm really enjoying it, so it can't be that bad!

Spaceman... i lived in normandy for 3 years in a rural setting.

I would have been totally lost on a friendship and practical basis without my lovely french neighbours.

You NEED to speak good french.

What sort of things do you mean when you say everything is so bureaucratic? Is buying a house worse than in the UK for example?

Hi Manky,

Few questions for you, if you don't mind:

Have you moved back to the UK now then? why have you come back and do you miss France? Why exactly would you have been lost without your french neighbours? Were you lucky to find one friendly french family or did you find that many neighbours were happy to help you out on practical matters? What practical things in particular had you stumped? Would I be okay if I had basic conversational French and then built up my language skills when I was there?

Would love to hear your feedback on the above as am intruiged.

I came back because my relationship didnt work out.

Neighbours helped on a practical basis with local permissions from Maire (local govt), ensuring we didnt get ripped off on the price of animal feeds, best place to get a plumber, fencing, all manner of things.

It wasnt so much that we couldnt have managed without them, it just made life so much easier. And of course you cannot live the french way and really integrate otherwise. Drinking pastisse at 9am, helping to make wine and bottle cider, visiting friends of friends who make their own cheeses etc. all were priceless experiences that we wouldnt have had without an introduction.

Our nearest neighbours were our closest friends but we made more casual friendships with other people we met too. And also with other english of course.

I think conversational french as long as you are willing to learn more is fine. i naively went with no french and found it very difficult at first.

You may encounter some resentment, some french feel that the english have unfairly inflated property prices, have far more disposable income etc. and therefore you can be the target of rip off merchants with regards to building work etc. so beware.

The biggest defence is to befriend them and live life their way.

What makes you want to move there?

Marina... i used to LOVE running round the lake at La Ferte Mace !!!!

I think it's a country that is really hard to integrate into. As others have said, unless you speak French extremely well, have a great grasp of the culture and qualifications that are both recognised and valued by the French themselves, you will find it difficult to get a job equivalent in status and pay to the job you could get in your country of origin.

Thanks for that Manky - it is really interesting to hear you story.

My DH is an electrician and would take the exams needed to enable him to work in France, so I should think that's a bonus as he'd be in the trade from the start and mixing with people as everyone always needs an electrician. He also has an A level in French so he's in a good situation.

We have been thinking of it for ages mainly for the children's sake (I have 4 year old and ten week old baby). We want to escape the rat race, live around more open spaces, spend more time together. I want the kids to have a more structured, traditional education and keep them away from the consumerism and materialism that is so prevalent in the UK. I don't like the way the UK is headed in terms of its increasing population and the government's obsession with progression and change. There are so many more reasons, but of course we have a good social life here and my DH's family (mine are in Cornwall - four hours' away so I'm used to living away from my roots) so there will be sacrifices.

We are very nervous about making the commitment, but I'm 99 percent sure that if we did do it we'd be saying in ten years time that it was the best thing we'd ever done.

We have just bought an appartment here, it went very smoothly, altho having never bought in the UK i couldn't say if it was easier or not. From what I read tho I would say house buying is easier in France, providing again that you have a good grasp of French, or find a 'notaire' that will explain things in english.

Spaceman - my electrician in France is British .

But his wife is French and does all his admin and a lot of marketing/commercial work.

How does your DH think he would find customers in France?

Also Manky, I was worried about the resentment thing as this is what's happening in Cornwall. So many city dwellers buying up second homes and pushing up the house prices. I would feel pretty conscious that I was part of this if we did move.

What is very bureacratic is the whole social security, child benefit agency, unemployment benefit scene. That takes ages, and lots of forms to get properly in place, although when it is you may find that the French state is a lot more generous with these things than the UK (or Belgium where I previously lived).

I have lived in Paris, near Lille and in Strasbourg, so never in a small village.

I would say the downside are:

• racism
• as a woman alone on the street you can get some grief from men, much more so than in the UK
• bureacracy (there is A LOT of red tape if you want to be self employed for example, make sure your husband is aware of that)
• crap TV
• Sundays were dire. Paris was OK because there were still things going on, but in other smaller places everything is shut and no one goes out. I used to find it really depressing.

Oh and I wouldn't say that France is less materialistic or consumer-driven, I think it's pretty much on a par with the UK in that respect.

The education IS very structured though and generally stricter than the UK. I worked in a couple of primary schools - teachers tended to be more shouty and some manhandled the kids in a way that would be unacceptable in the UK. I don't think the education is bad, some aspects are very good, but in my opinion it is not better than the UK.

Yes, house buying is one area where it supposed to be simpler than in the UK.

Re: materialism. Most towns have large out of town shopping centres and people definitely shop for fun rather than just necessity. But smaller towns have way less chain shops. There a three market towns in my area and apart from the supermarket on the edge of town, all the shops are independent.

So all the town feel different iyswim

Don't know if anyone is still reading this, but Spaceman, if you want to escape the rat race, have more open space and a better education system have you considered moving to Scotland? Of course, you'd still have to learn the lingo