treskillard

It can be very hard to get away from the English language living here can't it? Around children and school it is obligatory but that can be cut pretty much down to pleasantries. For those who don't have children and aren't working in a French environment it is so easy to fall into speaking English nearly all the time and 'don't have children and aren't working in a French environment' as a description accounts for most of the British people here.

At times I feel like I'm still in England. Of course I know I passed a frontier and that people around me speak a different language but still I wonder how much many of us leave where we come from and how much we bring it with us?

Le Chant

Good question Tres!

The difficulty we have is that our place seems to attract mainly Brits, through no fault of our own. We advertise on French, Belgian and Dutch sites too, but they're all useless at booking early, so the Brits get in first! So, it can be a bit 'Little Britain-ish' here at times. The only chance we get to be normal is when our boulanger delivers in the morning, or if friends pop round. Or when we're out and about.

Our daughter tries hard not to speak English most of the time, working as she does in the hotel industry, but her bosses insist that she deals with les anglais, as no-one else can.

There's a village not far from here (but far enough, thank God) that's over 75% british owned! Staggering!

val50

Nowdays I don't have children or work in a french environment but still don't speak English when I'm here, unless we have visitors from overseas
We made a point of not getting involved in the local expat community when we first moved here, only had french friends, our neighbours don't speak English etc. I think that's why I'm having such an identity crisis at the moment - I just don't feel like I fit in anywhere. On the other hand, that makes me pretty unique so maybe I'll stick with that thought

treskillard

I live in a row of four English occupied houses in the countryside. When a French person comes to the door here it is more often than not to deliver something or to repair something. Even then most of the upkeep is done by Brits. I've no complaint about this situation but I think it does leave me in England.

Val you are I guess pretty mixed up from all that moving around and OH being in Canada (not to mention the effects of having to phone Novo ).

Feeling like I'm in England does not mean to me that there is a little Britain feeling - I take that as negative. I just mean that in my house in my world and the social round I share with others that I feel like I'm at home. Also - something a few people say - it makes me realise with great force how it is that people who come from say Kashmir end up never learning English and appearing after years to have only just arrived.

For me the 'difference' of being in England (the real one!) and England here may be more marked when I am back home (the real one!). This will highlight the cultural differences and pace of life etc.

Hope you're all well

Le Chant

I wonder what the French think when they turn up at your door Tres? Not of you personally, but of the fact that you're in a row of four English occupied houses? Do you think they mind? What do your neighbours speak? French or English? Has it always been the case that they've been English occupied? It interests me that there's a block of four houses in the countryside - did they all decide to live there because of the Brit neighbours, or was it coincidence?

I find demographics fascinating, personally. Sad lad, I know.....

treskillard

It is a single conversion of an old farm that was originally owners plus gites but now (as the gite business is so hard!) have now been rented by the year.

I had a builder knock at the door the other day. He spoke English to me asking for one of the neighbours houses. I thought he was Russian ! turned out he was French.

For the French it's a sort of enclave I think.

val50

Sounds like where my friend lives (close to Le chant). Think out of 7 or 8 houses in a small hamlet, 4 are owned by English. They can shout to each othe over the fence It wasn't planned like that, just happened. I'd hate it. We get English registered cars in town but on the whole, think this part of Normandy has always attracted the American's rather than the British, so we don't have areas like yours Tres - definitely everything around here feels very French, which is why I probably feel like I'm accepted as they like anything that is a bit eccentric

treskillard

It's not that everything around here doesn't feel French it's more that some places feel English.

L'Acajou

I've just been to a nearby lycee today, we were asking if there was a French language course suitable for ex-pats. The lady we saw was asking if our friends were English or French, both, I said. Then do you not speak French with them? Well, I would like to but they all seem to prefer to speak English for the same reason we would like (if we weren't so lazy) to speak French, to improve our language skills. So I have promised to speak to my children more in French, they will certainly correct my mistakes

We were also saying how easy it is to spot the Brit tourists (wearing shorts, on a bike carrying baguettes) and how glad we were that we could remain anonymous in our French cars. Sometimes it is nice just to blend in Sometimes if there are a lot of Brits in the supermarket I speak French to my children, maybe it is a I-am-not-a-tourist thing .

My hubby likes to indulge in tourist bating - there is a public chemin which runs through the length of most of the farmland, if he sees a UK registration plate, he drives up on his tractor and watches the look on their faces as he says "bonjour, ça va?" They normally panic (he is quite a big chap) and try their best to answer, then he says, in a broad Lancashire accent - "do you want me to speak English?" He thinks it is hilarious