French Bureaucracy – a big issue?

May 19, 2013 by
Ah! The French....

As any student of France will know, French bureaucracy is legendary. France has the highest proportion of a population working in what are essentially government-funded jobs of almost any country in the world. Of course, if you are French, then this is as normal as your daily baguette. However, for the rest of us - and for the expat community (actual or potential) in particular - all this bureaucracy is a never-ending source of wonderment. Oh, and frustration, head-bangingly, mind-mashingly, all … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Living, Why Not?

Move To France Reading French Guide – or my top five ‘move to France’ expat books

March 3, 2013 by
shutterstock_41523439

I'd love to move to France and I’m more than happy to admit to being a French fantasist; I’m a sucker for ‘A Place In The Sun’ and ‘Little England’ (heck, I even watched Monty Don’s recent BBC series on gardening because he was touring gardens in France – and very good it was too, even though I’m not really a gardener). Equally, I am quite happy to soak up the sunshine from my monthly dose of French porn (that’s ‘Living France’ magazine by the way). Deluded, rose-tinted … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Living, Resources Tagged With: , , , ,

Move to France for a French honeymoon – or why I need a break from politics

February 7, 2013 by
young couple holding hands

So just what has politics got to do with a move to France? Well, politicians - love ‘em or hate ‘em - like death and taxes, in the modern, media-rich world, they can be hard to avoid. In my youth, I used to be quite a keen (entirely amateur) follower of British politics. I guess this was when I was still idealistic and hadn’t been touched by enough experience of political failure to realise that, actually, politics, while a better way of getting things done than dropping bombs on each … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Living, Why? Tagged With: , , , , ,

Learn French the dirty way – Dirty French by Adrien Clautrier & Henry Rowe

January 13, 2013 by
Dirty French book cover cropped

Let’s face it, when you are trying to learn French, most formal French language learning tools (the excellent Paul Noble (which I reviewed here) or Michel Thomas audio CD courses, for example), while providing both beginner and intermediate learners with plenty to get stuck in to, don’t often go very far into the more colloquial ways of expressing yourself in your favourite second language. In short, they don’t teach you everyday slang or how to swear. I spent my formative years living … [Read more...]

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Move To France blog: Fifty Shades Of Grey – And Nothing To Do With Sex

December 27, 2012 by
grey sky

I know this is a blog for those that want to move to France but just bear with me a little and think about Eskimos.... There is a widely held, although often disputed, idea that Eskimos have a large number of different words for snow. Whether or not it is actually true, it’s not hard to understand why it might be the case; where they live, it tends to snow a lot so it is probably a topic of very regular conversation. Here in the UK, unless you live at the top of the Cairngorms, the Pennines, … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Living, Why? Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,
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