The politeness of the French
Now this is something I feel I should address, having pointed out a few negative aspects of French society this is something I should have mentioned a long time ago. One of the first things I noticed when I came here was how the vast majority of people you pass say ‘bonjour’. When you walk into a shop, everyone says hello, even the boy stacking the shelves. I noticed that it is something that is drummed into them from an early age. I have lost track of the number of times I have been overtaken on the motorway by a French car, with a snotty nosed kid in the back, face pressed up against the window, snot smeared everywhere, mouthing the word ‘bonjour’ as he passes. And if a complete stranger spies you eating your dinner they are liable to say ‘Bon appetite!’... To which you reply ‘merci’... with a mouth full of food. Of course none of this means they actually like you!!
Foix is a really lovely little town with a real Alpine feel. It looks and feels a little like Morzine (where they do the downhill ski championship... and where I learnt to ski) only on a much smaller scale. I had lunch in town and made an appointment with an immoblier to see some properties at 10am on Monday (its Friday today). I notice that prices are much cheaper here too. The average price of a plat du jour is 7 euro, compared to 12 in other parts.
Bloody dongle!
I also tried to find a spot where my internet dongle would work so I could upload all this new blog but there wasn’t one. I tried a hill over-looking the town but it didn’t even work there. The bloody thing is a waste of space. It hasn’t worked anywhere in 2 weeks and now the 30 day limit in which to use my internet time is about to expire. I paid 150 euro for it and barely got to use it. You can see why in the UK we have the ‘Office of Fair Trading’; they wouldn’t allow this obvious con. I don’t expect they have one in France. As my German neighbour said “of course it doesn’t work... this is France!”. Whereas the UK might not be the model of efficiency that Germany is, we are both light years ahead of the French in many respects and it seems we share the frustrations.
Property crash
I located a second immoblier in the town of Turascon. The lady there explained to me that over the last three years the prices have crashed here due to the aluminium industry closing down and 2000 odd people losing their jobs. Some people have panicked and it’s quite amazing what you can find on their books; A hotel for instance with 18 large bedrooms and a professionally fitted out kitchen for just 299,000 euro!! Also it doesn’t need to be run as a business. You could buy this and use it as your own private residence. Now I want to make an eco house... 18 bedrooms just for me (and any lucky lady I might persuade along) is a terrible waste. It’s a massive bargain for someone thou gh. I mean this crash will recover and that place one day will easily be worth a million.
Whoever is selling obviously needs the money now and must be selling at a massive loss. This does explain one thing though. If you say to the immoblier that your limit is 180,000 euro, the very first place they will show you has a tag of 250 odd. I think that’s how much their expecting the seller to potentially drop by.
So I drove around the surrounding area to get a feel for it. I really love it here. All things considered if I buy in France, this is probably the area. But of course I’ve yet to visit the Dordogne and Limoges. By the end of the day I ended back on the same campsite. Unlike last night though, this time I need electric as my batteries are dead. I was shocked at the price difference. 10 euro without; 22 euro with!! This is quite unusual and I didn’t really get a satisfactory answer as to why. In future if I remember to flick my override switch I can recharge my leisure battery while I’m driving around. Now every penny is counting quite heavily.
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