The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: thenovice on May 25, 2013, 06:26:39 pm
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Sadly, I find myself becoming more and more annoyed and frustrated about living in Blighty. Where have common sense, consideration and thoughtfulness gone? I never thought I would say it, but im being drawn toward France and the relaxed, peaceful way of life. Of course I may be looking through rose tinted glasses, so I wondered what your experiences were as ex pats? Wouldn't move for a few years until the kids are older, and might buy a wreck and restore before making the big move :thinking: (that's if I can save any pennies , which I doubt, but one can dream!)
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I think the main problem with doing it is the lack of employment opportunities in some of the rural areas, plus the high taxes if you work above board. Other than that I think many people would do the same! My parents have lived there for many years and have an enviably lovely time!
I came to NE Scotland to find peace and courtesy, and found both :-))) but the weather isn't so good as France....
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I'm with you novice. Think a lot of people will feel that way this year, last time we had a good summer was when we left Edinburgh in 2006, rubbish since.
MAC doesn't work I'm sure, but he may not come on just now he's on holiday in Cambridge by the look of the posts.
Tell us all ex-pats, warts and all please.
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Does Germany count?
We moved to rural North Germany nearly 4 years ago, with 3 children. My wife is German, so that helped a lot, but for me it a mixed thing.
On some sides it is wonderful - We have a home, garden and land that we'd never be able to afford in the UK. We have made super friends and feel very welcomed into the neighbourhood, being invited to all wedding anniversaries, birthdays etc. etc.. The sense of community is much stronger than I experienced as an adult in England (much more akin to the villagelife of my childhood). Our children can now identify the over 50 species of birds we get in the garden, in both English and German. My 6 yr old complained that her toy lamb has the wrong number of teats, as we now live/work with real sheep. Excellent freshly baked bakery breakfast bread culture. Steiner schools are state supported. Last Christmas was +10 degrees.
On the other side it is hard - living in a foreign language makes life shallower, particularly if you are not really fluent (like me). I miss(understand) a lot of what goes on around me and cannot express and share my emotional world. When I make word jokes people correct my error instead of laughing. Employment - very hard to get the same kind of salary/position I had due to qualifications not being recognised. Bureaucracy (maybe better in France, but here OMG!). No PG Tips!!! Embarrassed that my children correct my German. Often being nearly run down due to looking the 'wrong' way on crossing the road. This Easterday was -2 degrees with snow.
On the third side (not sure if good or bad). The bank closes for 1hr 30 for lunch. Half day closing. Many shops do not accept credit cards. Everyone knows/observes what the 'foreigners' are doing.
Overall it has been a move that has given us a much better life. It has come with a deep cost for me, as the least flexible, most English of our family. I have no sense of history or politics here, no sense of social culture. These are deep losses for me.
Maybe the/an answer is to try it out for a few years.
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Thankyou for your candid reply. 100% with you on the PG tips (work on the building), nothing worse than grey washing up water tea, you got to be able to stand the spoon in it! Trouble is, I love this country, but the people living here are ruining it. Never thought of Germany, and I do speak a bit of the language. I expect property isn't as cheap as france?
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France is a beautiful country ..and the only way to mix in is with the french..but!!! they do have as many rules and regs as we do....
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Hello Novice,
We watched a number of programmes some years ago, maybe 10 yrs now, strange how fast it goes, called "Living the Dream" which encouraged us.
Prices. Well it depends very much on where you end up. From a value point of view we swapped our 3 bed semi in fairly central Gloucester (okay but not quite Cheltenham you know) for a 4 bed, barn, pigsty, huge triple garage, total 7000m3.
www.bluehomes.com (http://www.bluehome.com) can give an idea, and some nice dreams.
We were very motivated by a poem accredited to a guy called Goethe called "Begin it now".
Good luck.
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I seriously considered france; even more seriously considered slovenia (made two trip to look at property and even got as far as bidding on one.
I've ended up in wales but then I managed to save enough to find a place here.
If I were looking overseas now I would consider Ireland (Irish prices were high when I was looking at Slovenia, but I understand they've dropped a lot since the crash), as there's less of a language barrier (and I'm guessing less regulation than france - though I could be wrong).
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It may not be as relevant but we returned to the UK last year after spending nine years abroad - 4 years in Sweden and 5 in Switzerland. Not smallholding, just living. But my thoughts are much the same as Laurieston. We are both British and I don't think I'd have ever felt truly at home in either. In Sweden I worked and made a serious effort to learn Swedish but I never spoke much better than a five year old. It takes a long time to get to the point of being able to express yourself as well as you can in your mother tongue (even those who are 'fluent' find that). Plus you don't have the cultural grounding and that takes even longer to get familiar with - for me with young children it was all sorts of child related things (how do the playgroups work, songs, nursery rhymes, even things like Santa Claus are all different). People just assume you know how things work because they don't realise it's done differently elsewhere. Don't get me wrong, we had a lovely time but it was much like being on holiday for years - I never got into anything deeply enough for it to become meaningful - and after a while you yearn for something deeper.
As an adult without children, I think it would be even tougher to integrate and you'd probably naturally be drawn to other expats (from wherever). At least with children, you meet other parents through school or whatever and you have a point of commonality.
It is also tough being away from family and friends. Who will take care of aged relatives? Are you prepared to make the effort required to keep up with friends?
You need to look further than the price of houses and land and the utopian vision, imho,
H
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I always find it very interesting to see why people leave the UK.... After all, there are so many of us foreigners coming here to live, and I think most of us are not economic migrants! I'm pretty sure I'd be better off (financially) if I'd stayed in Germany. Whenever I go back - not very frequently - I find that everything, from food to rents and public transport, is cheaper (while wages are roughly the same), you are considered a human being with the right to survive on the road if you cycle, and you seem to have more rights as an employee and a tenant, too. They even seem to treat the unemployed fairly decently (not like here, where you are made to feel like scum), and you get proper help to get back to work, not just a load of words and hassle. Goodness knows why I am still here... ::)
I also spent some time in France, admittedly in the late 80s, so not a recent experience. Less regulations? You must be joking... I worked on a goat farm with dairy - we had environmental health inspections every two weeks. I would never want to live there, simply because I'd never be able to speak the language fluently. And yes, you do have to do that if you want to feel at home, and not be a life-long expat. I've spent more than a third of my life speaking English, and for whatever reason have always felt more at home in my chosen language. (And still make mistakes - but then I realise that a lot of indigenous folk make even more mistakes...) My theory is that there are so many people wanting to move to the UK because English is the first (often only) language they learn at school - that's not their fault, that's a hangover from "the Empire". If I hadn't learned English from the age of 9, I might have ended up somewhere else.
So anyway - my advice to all who want to move to a different country - learn the language first, and not just how to order a pint of beer. And make sure you understand the dialect in whatever part of the country you are intending to move to.
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I have been thinking more and more about escaping the way this country is becoming, but then I wonder if it is truly better elsewhere? I don't know. But I think if we were ever to move abroad it would be somewhere like Australia where the culture is similar and there is no language barrier.
My Dad works for a french rail freight company and for a while commuted to France from London everyday but a year ago he bought a house outside of Calais. Its not a smallholding, but it is rural. He loves it there, loves the little village, the peace and quiet and he has made quite a few English friends! He has made an effort to learn fluent french and i think he is pretty adept now and I'm sure this makes a big difference. Although I am always surprised at how well people speak english in the EU, not that this should be an excuse not to learn the language but it makes me a bit ashamed of my poor attempts at french and german at school!
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My parents now have pretty good French for everything day to day, however they do find it very useful that Mums best friend is a Parisian lady who married an Englishman, as she can be deployed in situations where Mum and Dad are suspecting they are being ripped off or can't understand something. Like most Parisians she is a lovely charming lady but can be very steely with officialdom or dodgy tradesmen!
So that would be my recommendation, find yourself a Sophie!!
(she is lovely too, she always refers to me as the Babeee Girrrrrrllll' as I'm the younger of two children. :-))))
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We had wonderful neighbours.. they where a gay couple , one was English and the other french...
you could not have wished for better......they helped us with the language and sorting things out like water, electricity etc etc
every time we returned from england..they would always ask us to bring some cheddar cheese and baked beans :roflanim:
they are now buying my place....
it is a fantastic country.... but we would have struggled if it wasn't for the lads
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First chance we get, we are off to New Zealand. The only thing holding us back is my fiancé works as a consultant engineer in the oil industry so spends a lot of time in Aberdeen and Norway. NZ don't really do oil. Awfully long commute........ But if Scotland becomes independent we will be off like a shot regardless, before the country collapses.
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we have been seriously considering moving to france recently. i lived in australia for 3 yrs and lived in germany and ireland as a child and as i have no extended family we have nothing to hold us to any particular area or country.
after researching the schooling i have decided its best to just buy a holiday home in france with a thought to moving there when the kids have left home. this is due to the fact 2 of my older children are 10 and 14 and i cant afford to pay for private eduaction and neither speak much french. also one child gets extra tuition at school due to dyslexia and apparently france isnt so flexible with situations as this. - (this is what i have found out by researching on-line anyway)
with a view to moving there at one point, we have all started leaning french. try the website
www.busuu.com (http://www.busuu.com) (it is excellent) and i intend to start french gcse shortly.
currently we live in scotland which is beautiful but as i moved countries alot as a kid, i feel like i dont actually have a "home".
i find england used to drive me mad with all the overcrowding and expensive house prices and i cant see myself ever moving back there.
i like the idea of moving to southern france so italy and spain are closer to explore. but i get a lot less for my money than in scotland there, coastal propertys are out of the question - budget wise.
has anyone bought a holiday home in france? and who do they get to manage it when renting it out to 3rd partys ie cleaning /handing over?
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Just a point on many of the posts here:
I am living in scottish borders where I wasn't brought up but my OH was, we moved out of Edinburgh 6 years ago. I've found it very difficult to settle here and although we have a really wonderful place here, it's not home and I don't ever think it will be. I could leave it tomorrow. My family (siblings only) are scattered so there is no base (no parents).
So what is 'home'? I think most people look to 'click'. I think if you move abroad (which I love the idea of) if you could do it with extended family then there is more chance of you being satisfied with your life and putting up with the cultural differences perhaps and eventually the notion of it being a long holiday would disappear but who knows.
Some people are home birds, some like globe trotting and the excitement of new turf. It can depend on your age / time of life I think too.
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My son is getting married next month and he and his fiancee have been living in southern France in a holiday house belonging to her parents. Their work takes them all over the world and, before they met, they always went back to parents between jobs and for breaks but they want their own place now, understandably. They have decided to settle in France. They are looking at houses in the £5000 price range so they don't need a mortgage. It seems incredible that you can buy a house for that price. It will be one that needs work doing on it but they can do a lot of that themselves as and when. Having made the decision, they then went on a month-long French speaking course which was very intensive and tiring but has given them a working knowledge of the language. It should also help them fit in better.
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Herself and I considered several other countries before we moved a few hundred yards down the road......
Germany as I have been working there for getting on towards 9 years.
France because I worked there for several years and we often holiday there.
Sweden, yup, guessed it, I worked there for 18 months.
(I've spent 80% of my life since leaving University working around the world).
However, Germany is just too regulated. think the UK laws are stringent then have a read around a forum called ToyTown Germany and have your eyes opened. things like being unable to wash cars at home (although a number do in rural areas) or cut your grass after (IIRC) 7pm, my friend wants to extend his patio but needs permission from local Govt as it will then leave a smaller area of grass than is designated in law, same where he wants to extend his 4 foot high fence.
it's a great place in many respects but, once you start to delve, it can drive you nuts ;D .
France appears similarly regulated and, in smallholding terms, the cotisations (spelling??) seem to be finacially restrictive.
In the end our "Positives and negatives" list made us realise that we had all we wanted where we were, Skye. OK, the weather and midges can be a pain, literally at times, and we have no boulangerie. but all the other things, the village life, the sense of community, the "belonging" and being left alone to get on with life. They are all here. In fact all the north and West Highlands seem to be like that (others such as L&M have more expreince of the East).
We will continue to holiday in France and may even retire there but, for living, the Highlands is the place to be. What the heck, might even open a boulangerie myself :roflanim: !
However, good luck with whatever you decide.
Rgds
Sskye
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I think home is a mind set... your upbringing, friends, family....each and everyone of us id different
I was born in Devon and have returned... my children all live in hampshire..
we are ready to move again..wales looks like the likely destination
I believe , you get out what you put in... not always easy for everyone..and i don't mean that in a bad way
as the song says..where ever i lay may hat, thats my home
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However, Germany is just too regulated. think the UK laws are stringent then have a read around a forum called ToyTown Germany and have your eyes opened. things like being unable to wash cars at home (although a number do in rural areas) or cut your grass after (IIRC) 7pm, my friend wants to extend his patio but needs permission from local Govt as it will then leave a smaller area of grass than is designated in law, same where he wants to extend his 4 foot high fence.
Most of these regulations have an environmental background - and yes, Germany is miles ahead of the UK in that respect. They are very well aware of what sealing the ground does to promote floods, for example, which is why you can't simply extend the sealed area of your property - and that includes patios and tarmac on your driveway. I think this is the right way to go - unlike here, where you can just put your entire property under concrete, if you like - and then everybody complains about flooded towns...
The same with no lawn mowing (or other loud noise) at certain times of the day. That is to protect you and your family from being kept awake (kids in Germany seem to go to bed earlier). I still don't feel right getting the lawnmower out at lunchtime, or on Sundays. These rules are not just for the point of having rules, they are for everybody's well being. I think it's absolutely bloody brilliant that most shops are closed on Sundays, for example... Here, it's stress 24/7, with no let-up! Unless you are lucky and live in the country with no near neighbours.
(Just to give you a different perspective. Think of some of the Western Isles, for example. No ferries on Sunday and nothing else, either - apart from church. It's nothing like as bad in Germany!)
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I've moved around Scotland quite a bit. The place I felt least welcome was the Borders. they are very suspicious!! Hangover from the Border raids. The Highlands has it all I think, lots to do good schooling etc weather can be dodgy but just dress for it. Think I would miss here after a fortnight abroad!!
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So what is 'home'? I think most people look to 'click'. I think if you move abroad (which I love the idea of) if you could do it with extended family then there is more chance of you being satisfied with your life and putting up with the cultural differences perhaps and eventually the notion of it being a long holiday would disappear but who knows.
Really not sure about this. If you can't feel at home an hour or two from where you were brought up, living somewhere that the culture is similar and the language the same, why would it make it easier when everything is different? Many of my friends are married to locals, speak the language fluently and are 'abroad' for life but they all miss home to some extent.Then it's really tough because you know you'll never live at 'home' again. And most people do have a notion of where home is.
Having been brought up in one small town and lived there for eighteen years, I've since moved eight times (six to different parts of the UK and two abroad). I see a strong differentiation between moving within the UK and moving abroad. I still have a quiet inward chuckle to myself when friends here tell me how hard it was to move down to Kent from London. Yes it's different but you can walk into the shop and ask for help, you can join local groups and chat away freely, you can chat to your neighbours, you know how everything works - the health system, the education system, the social security, the post, the telephone, the banks, how to pay bills etc.etc. Every single one of those things is different when you move abroad and you can't even ask how they work if you don't speak the language. We were also lucky to have friendly neighbours who would help out with translating until we got fluent enough to cope and without that it's very easy to drown.
Clearly this part of it is only the first year or two - there does come a time when you know how things work (although the Swiss tax system to still eluding me now) and you start to get to know people. A lot depends on how social and confident you are too - you have to put yourself out there, risk making mistakes in the language and bounce back from knock-backs.
But there is still the longer term thing that it's just not what you're used to. Some people are prepared to live with it for the sake of the better lifestyle - be it a better income or just a better quality of life. Some people have to live with it because they're married to a local and for whatever reason, it wouldn't work the other way round. So it's always a balance if you choose to move abroad for the lifestyle and I guess you don't know until you try it how you'll really feel. I've never expected to 'click' anywhere - I know it takes time to make genuine friends and feel settled wherever you move - but in both our foreign moves we have got to the point of having lots of lovely friends and feeling a proper part of the community but still not feeling that it's 'home'. After a year back in the UK, I feel properly settled and like I could live here forever.
I think a holiday cottage it a good idea - you can get an idea of how things work locally (and an insight into the bureaucracy) without having thrown everything in the UK away.
H
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So what is 'home'? I think most people look to 'click'. I think if you move abroad (which I love the idea of) if you could do it with extended family then there is more chance of you being satisfied with your life and putting up with the cultural differences perhaps and eventually the notion of it being a long holiday would disappear but who knows.
Really not sure about this. If you can't feel at home an hour or two from where you were brought up, living somewhere that the culture is similar and the language the same, why would it make it easier when everything is different? Many of my friends are married to locals, speak the language fluently and are 'abroad' for life but they all miss home to some extent.Then it's really tough because you know you'll never live at 'home' again. And most people do have a notion of where home is.
I've never felt at home anywhere - not even in my parents' house. But that's a personal thing. Not that I like it...
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Morning Ina,
Totally agree with you Re: DE and some of the laws. Re-cycling here is also miles ahead. Pfand on the bottles (which we had in the UK when I was a child....then it vanished!). It was really to point out that that, when moving to another place, especially overseas, there needs to be a lot of research done in order to make sure you know what awaits.
Here on Skye there is a generally held view that Sunday is quiet, even though we are not a Wee Free Hot-Bed ;D . I'll do a little quiet work on a Sunday but power tools etc. are a no no. We are not religious or church go-ers but many are and do not work on Sundays. It is nice that Sunday is still a special and quiet day.
Do like the Germans though. I will be leaving a tiny wee piece of me here.....or, perhaps, bring a bit of DE with me.
Rgds
Sskye
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I think there often is a lack of understanding why things are different in other countries. That you can only get by learning the language to a high degree, by delving into the history (and not just the bl**dy war!), and by asking around before criticising.
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Ina, I wasn't saying that it would be easier abroad, it's just that home is where the heart is and that is usually with your loved ones, it's bonding people look for.
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Ina, I wasn't saying that it would be easier abroad, it's just that home is where the heart is and that is usually with your loved ones, it's bonding people look for.
Yep, you are right - well, my "loved ones" are not in this country and are increasingly becoming unloved anyway, so just as well they are far away... ::)
Right, I'd better stop right here! :(
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Regulation:
As pointed out there is indeed a lot of regulation here in Germany, certainly more than in the UK; right down to responsibility to keep the pavement in front of your house swept of snow. This means that a lot of things that might be, or might have been considered 'good neighbourliness', are now legislated for/against. (Such as not poisoning your neighbour's ground water with your carwashing chemicals). Maybe such regulation is not required in the UK today, and there is now such a consideration shown to the communities in which people live, that all these good neighbourlinesses (sp?) are common practice. Maybe pigs fly too.
I am not saying that in Germany voluntary good-neighbourliness is much better than in the UK, but with the backing of leglslation it gets a higher profile and is easier to enforce.
As ever it seems a shame that we (and that probably includes me) are too selfcentred to really support and cherish community.
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I'd advise anyone considering moving to France to rent for a while first and keep ownership of a UK property. Don't expect to live a 'British' life in France. It's a very different culture.
Yes, property is cheaper, but generally speaking most other things are much more expensive (white goods, or Artisans for example).
Two essential things required: a healthy bank account, and a good knowledge of the language.
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I am not saying that in Germany voluntary good-neighbourliness is much better than in the UK, but with the backing of leglslation it gets a higher profile and is easier to enforce.
As ever it seems a shame that we (and that probably includes me) are too selfcentred to really support and cherish community.
You are right. Most of what is regulated in Germany is simply common sense - and is aimed against selfishness.
Here in Scotland, in many areas nobody clears the snow off the footpaths, for example. Result? Lots of people, especially the elderly, are prisoners of their homes in winter. For the council, it's always more important to keep the streets ice free. Ordinary folk who can't afford cars - well, they can stay at home, can't they?