Couple plans to return to the US after their dream life in France became a ‘nightmare’

This lady is hilarious. I like her!

[quote] While they were relatively happy during their first few months there, Joanna was continually bewildered by the rules and regulations when dealing with seemingly simple things, such as setting up a French bank account.

[quote] The fact that she struggled to pick up the language — Ed has learned some French since they’ve been living there — didn’t help matters.

[quote] “I have been so busy packing, unpacking, assembling furniture etc. that I haven’t really found time to hunker down and start (learning French),” she admits. “It was always on my list but (I) just couldn’t find the time.”

[quote] And although France is renowned for its famous cuisine, Joanna quickly came to the realization that she wasn’t a huge fan of the food in the country.

[quote] “People go, ‘Oh my god, the French food is so fabulous,’” she says. “Yeah, if you want to eat brie, pâté, pastries and French bread all day long,” she says. “But who eats like that?”

Even the French struggle with French bureaucracy. It’s something else, it infiltrates every layer of life.

Americans always think that life is better in another country, but it never is.

The USA really is the best, easiest and most convenient place to live.

The problem is that most of us are just spoiled.

[quote]The USA really is the best, easiest and most convenient place to live.

No it’s not, ya fuckin’ goanna.

The difficulty of setting up a French bank account may be due more to US bureaucracy than to French. US reporting requirements make many non-US banks unwilling to set up accounts for US citizens.

She seems rather naive for a septuagenarian. She kept their US apartment. Why didn’t she spend three months at a time in France under a tourist visa and see it how it went.

Ils doivent mourir dans un incendie de graisse

Wah wah wah

What a pair of idiots.

France really does sound like a nightmare.

I'm totally on this lady's side.

[quote] She’d eagerly looked forward to cooking meals in France beforehand, but Joanna says that she had trouble finding quality produce to cook.

[quote] “You go to the supermarket, and the produce is terrible,” she says. “You pick up a piece of celery and it falls over. It’s so limp. So old and so horrible. Who would eat this?”

[quote] According to Joanna, her enthusiasm for living in France wavered considerably at the beginning of this year, when she and Ed tried to arrange for their car, which they’d left behind in San Francisco, to be transported to France.

[quote] “I read so many things that said, ‘Yes, do it,’ or ‘No, don’t do it. It’s a nightmare.’” says Joanna.

[quote] “Then, ‘Yes, you can do it. It’s not a problem.’ Well, it wouldn’t be a problem if their systems were consistent and made sense. But they just don’t. You can get five different answers to one simple little question.”

[quote] This frustration proved to be something of a pattern for the pair, who also had issues attempting to find a doctor in Nîmes.

[quote] “You have to find a general practitioner who will take you on as a patient,” says Joanna. “Well, we went to like six doctors. (They all said) ‘We don’t take new patients… ‘We don’t take new patients. We don’t take new patients.’

[quote] “What? ‘Where’s the list that tells you which ones do and which ones don’t?’ They don’t have that. You’ve just got to figure it out yourself.”

This is COMPLETE bullshit:

_________________

“People go, ‘Oh my god, the French food is so fabulous,’” she says. “Yeah, if you want to eat brie, pâté, pastries and French bread all day long,” she says. “But who eats like that?”

She’d eagerly looked forward to cooking meals in France beforehand, but Joanna says that she had trouble finding quality produce to cook.

“You go to the supermarket, and the produce is terrible,” she says. “You pick up a piece of celery and it falls over. It’s so limp. So old and so horrible. Who would eat this?”

________________________

She is probably shopping at some crap grocer for working class folks. All European countries have industrial food in the offer. But not only that.

A friend is a medical student in Paris. His class is constantly meeting with university administrators and protesting about the sorry state of their education.

[quote] She’d eagerly looked forward to cooking meals in France beforehand, but Joanna says that she had trouble finding quality produce to cook. “You go to the supermarket, and the produce is terrible,” she says. “You pick up a piece of celery and it falls over. It’s so limp. So old and so horrible. Who would eat this?”

Yep. My friend goes to farmers markets on weekends out of necessity, because supermarket fruits and vegetables are so bad. Like Aldi bad.

[quote] “You have to find a general practitioner who will take you on as a patient,” says Joanna. “Well, we went to like six doctors. (They all said) ‘We don’t take new patients… ‘We don’t take new patients. We don’t take new patients.’

Very real. My friend was diagnosed with a heart murmur and couldn’t find a cardiologist for 11 months. Not only that but his GP didn’t recommend anyone.

They sound insufferable.

If they had bothered to make just a few simple inquiries they would have found that few countries have a more massive bureaucracy than France. Anything dealing with the French government is made far more difficult than it has to be.

Yep, know another gay couple who sold everything they had in LA to move to Spain. Less than a year later, one of them is making boring armature YouTube videos about "what expats don't know about moving to Spain". As if everyone else is so delusional as they were. The funny part is they thought it would be a lot cheaper. That's all they talked about before they moved.

Now they realize it's only a lot cheaper if you live in the middle of nowhere. If you live in a big city, the food prices were almost the same as they paid in LA. Medical is cheaper, but bureaucracy is 3 times worse than in the U.S. Everything has a VAT tax, and Amazon is really, really expensive with import costs, customs, and other taxes.

These CNN longform articles, this one and the one about the fundie parents, are so BLOATED.

R11, do you shop at Aldi?

The produce there is quite good.

Their rent control apartment!

They sound impulsive and stupid for their age. Like they didn't do any research besides just plopping themselves into the realtor's office in Nîmes. They moved to France and expected to "make friends" but they don't speak French and never put in the time to learn?

They honestly sound like idiots. I lived in a non-English speaking European country (Netherlands) for 4 years and you can't live somewhere if you refuse to put in the effort to learn the language.

The Netherlands is also super heavy on bureaucracy and as long as you research what you need before hand and have it all ready to go - I found dealing with banks, immigration, local government etc. was very smooth and simple. These people obviously thought that because they were American they would get special treatment and the French people would speak English to them all the time.

French restaurant food often falls far below its reputation, but complaints about French supermarkets I don’t understand at all. The selection is ten times that of most US supermarkets, and I have never noted the quality problems she mentions. If she doesn’t like supermarkets, farmers’ markets are far more plentiful than in the US.

Moving to any country 1) in your 70s 2) when you don’t speak the language is going to be challenging. It’s a sign of how welcoming France actually is that she was able to function in English there. Trying surviving in the US on French alone.

Sounds like her dreams of being a septuagenarian Emily in Paris were a bust.

[quote]Sounds like her dreams of being a septuagenarian Emily in Paris were a bust.

Bang on R20.

Americans have a naive and romantic notion about France, which NEVER lives up to expectations.

We go to our local boutique wine shop and buy a $200 bottle of Cabernet along with a variety of expensive cheeses, and we imagine ourselves living in a French Chateau, sipping wine and eating brie all day long.

But when fantasy turns into reality, our dreams are often crushed.

Because the reality is that France SUCKS.

The couple is ridiculous.

Nimes France has a fabulous farmer's market and supermarket chains like Carrefour are high quality.

You can't complain about bureaucracy and the inability to make friends if you don't speak the language.

I lived nearly 4 decades in Italy. I know her type.

I have known many long term expats from the US and the UK who are so happy with their lives in Italy. Perhaps France is a more difficult nut to crack, but this lady seems clueless.

Im confused about the food issue too. Perhaps the city they chose is small and outside farmers markets they only have one grocery store?

Nevermind, sounds like R23 knows the city. Where the hell are they shopping?

Stay away from here please!

These two don't know that Europe rapidly industrialized and centralized food production over the last 25 years. So every country has several tiers of quality. But a city of 150K is large enough to have sellers of all the different tiers. In France, as in Switzerland, Germany, Netherlands, the quality food is the local/national food which is expensive, even though it is also subsidized to maintain all the agriculture and food production - old world style. So you can go to the shop for poor folks, or folks who don't care about quality, and the eggs are going to be industrial as will many of the vegetables, shipped in from the one country that is producing it. So you have to move up from industrial to better food. You can get the most sublime chicken in the world in France, but you'll pay through the nose for it.

[quote] So you can go to the shop for poor folks, or folks who don't care about quality, and the eggs are going to be industrial as will many of the vegetables, shipped in from the one country that is producing it. So you have to move up from industrial to better food. You can get the most sublime chicken in the world in France, but you'll pay through the nose for it.

This is why we have Wal-Mart in the US.

To cut through the bullshit.

Love it or hate it, Wal-Mart has good quality for low prices.

This is why so many Americans shop there.

I don't care for Walmarts produce myself. It looks gross.

They had the wealth, international travel experience and years of wisdom to know to do their research before moving yet they obviously didn't. Some people can't be helped.

I think the crux of their problem is that wherever you go in life you (unfortunately, in this case) take yourself along.

Americans are just spoiled, because we have so many more options than people in other countries.

People forget that we have the largest economy in the world, with the third most populous country in the world, behind China and India.

Of course we are going to have more choices and options for food, and doctors, and everything else, than anywhere else in the world.

There really is no comparison.

When you leave the US for another country, your choices and options will be greatly diminished.

LOL R31. You may be onto something there.

I cannot imagine moving to another country without learning the language first.

Apostrophe

This sounds like a THEM problem and not a France problem. I've shopped in France, Switzerland, Belgium and Scandinavia and French markets, even Aldi, and yes - Carrefour - are great. If she got some shitty celery that's on her for not trying that hard. Didn't have time to learn French because was unpacking/settling, FOR MONTHS? What about online programs and immersion schools? Surely the state dept might be of some help in getting her a liaison for the banking system. Or see if there is a financial advisor/power of attorney who could help that is bilingual.

Full stop.

Farms market.

Seriously R36. I studied a language with a small-class teacher for half a year just to go on an immersive 3 week vacation! And it paid off so much.

To put their complaints about medical in context, I have a friend in Lubbock, TX , just diagnosed with cancer. Finding one of the handful of Oncologists in West Texas, able to accept new patients is a real challenge. Access to medical care in non urban areas seems to be a global problem.

Non

She needs to [italic]get her knockers out [/italic]and return to that bank!

Doesn’t she know the lecherous French frog tellers are waiting for her to BLOW THEM??

I studied French through high school, college, and after. I've forgotten most of it now that I'm in my dotage but traveled in France a fair amount in my 20s and 30s.

I found that the French were much more welcoming when you started conversations in French. Although moving to France sounds so romantic, it's foolhardy to do that without studying the language first. French, and other languages, are even harder to learn the older you get. Many old brains don't have great memory retention for language. I found that out when I studied Spanish a few years ago. I got to a point where I simply could not remember new words. It shocked me. Funny thing, my French started to come back as I studied Spanish.

I read the article on CNN online and the comments were harsh. One criticism about the couple is that they sublet their rent-controlled apartment, which the commenter said was cheating the landlord. It does seem unfair. Buy a place in France while subletting a rent-controlled apartment elsewhere, especially when they planned to move to France permanently.

Learning a language n your 70s is pretty improbable so I forgive them for failing in that. But that does mean they shouldn’t have tried to live there full time. .

[quote] Of course we are going to have more choices and options for food, and doctors, and everything else, than anywhere else in the world.

Do you honestly hold this delusion? Have you ever set foot in a European grocery store? US grocery stores offer the most meagre variety of food imaginable.

[quote]Of course we are going to have more choices and options for food, and doctors, and everything else, than anywhere else in the world.

You really, really don't know what you're talking about.

They sound insufferable and living in an insufferable country.

r18 They had visited France before. So they had some familiarity. Although they should have seriously learned the language before.

I am seriously considering retiring abroad within the next 3 years. I'm down to 3 cities (Porto, Lyon and Gent). I'm fluent in French (lived there before), can get by in Dutch, and doing Duolingo Portuguese. Languages come easily to me as I have also picked Turkish and Chinese when I lived abroad previously. I would never move anywhere without having at least an A2 language level. I realize that as an American who has lived abroad and speaks multiple languages, I am in a much better position for success than these rubes in the article.

Our next plans are spending at least 2 weeks in each city with my husband and seeing how he likes each. We will try and shop in grocery stores, explore neighborhoods, take local transportation, look for physicians and specialists, etc. Try and live the life we would if we lived there.

Yes, bureaucracies can be a nightmare especially in a foreign language. You can also hire local attorneys/relocation specialists to handle the rough stuff for you (getting residence permits and visas, local IDs, negotiating rental leases, signing up for utilities, finding you an English-speaking CPA to file taxes in both home country and the US, etc).

After we decide on a city, we will live in a metropolitan area for at least a year to continue to improve language abilities and explore the region more. A smaller market town may make better sense in the long-term, but that is after we both can get by in Portuguese, French or Dutch.

R32 that's a very slanted view. In fact I benefit from such better public facilities and services, and amazing qualities of food, in Switzerland, versus USA, which in many areas feels like faded glory.

Didn't know a "relocation specialist" existed as a job.

R48. Visiting is different from staying. They should have done some long-term stays before going for a long-term visa. They could do two three-month stays in a year in vacation rentals to see what it’s really like to spend every day in a country whose language you don’t speak.

R28: You must live in the South, where produce is terrible and bakery/deli stuff isn't very good. Walmart is awful.

R51 WE CAN TELL YOU ALL WHERE TO GO.

Who are these people?

They sound like idiots. Bureaucracy is a problem in every country. There probably are any number of resources online and in print (in English) for expats in France. They exist for just about any country of any size. It doesn't sound like they found them. It sounds as though they figured they could just helicopter in and they never visited long enough to disabuse themselves of this. My sterostype of Bay area types is that of self-absorbed people who can't do anything practical and I suspect that is them.

They wanted to live in Europe full time and thought their only choices were London or some random French city of 150k. That's their main problem. London is outrageously expensive not what I'd call a typical European city. They should have tried a different city in the UK or given Ireland a shot. I also don't understand why they would need to open a French bank account or import their US car all the way to France. It seems like these two are self-sabotaging.

[wuote] Joanna says that securing a visa proved to be complicated.

What did she expect? Does she think getting a long-term visa for any country, including the US, is like buying a movie ticket?

It’s gotten challenging to get medical care in NYC. I’ve had two primary care physicians quit their practices in the last four years and wait times for initial appointments with specialists can be months long. I tried to get an appointment for an annual physical with a primary care physician I had seen once before and the wait time was over three months.

It’s probably different if you have a long standing relationship with a primary care physician. I’m actually considering trying to re-establish a relationship with a primary care physician who is outside the city. I feel like my only option if I get ill suddenly is a doc in the box or ER. I doubt the PCP I sort of have now knows who I am. Fortunately I rarely get sick, but I’m not getting any younger so it’s concerning.

If you don't speak fluent French there is zero point moving to France as the French take pride in never speaking English.

They'd have been made much more welcome somewhere like Nerja on the south coast of Spain, which is full of British ex pats, or Mallorca.

[quote] Didn't know a "relocation specialist" existed as a job.

Is that good job - relocation specialist?

I also thought it strange that they wouldn't socialize with the ex-pat community in their town. Here they are, not French and not speaking French but they're too special to hang with other ex-pats? They have probably missed out on a wealth of info that would have eased their transition.

I have a friend who permanently retired to a charming town on a lake in Mexico. Her parents had retired there first and she became fluent in Spanish. She and her partner are delightful and mingle both with locals and ex-pats. They meet interesting people from all over the world and have quite the international friend circle.

The fact that the couple in the article are such snobs shows them to be lacking in the sense and adaptability it takes to plunge into new communities.

I hope they get busted and lose their rent-controlled apartment.

I suspect there's lots of Americans who retire in Mexico and never learn Spanish. But the French are different that way - they expect you to make an effort with French. Seems reasonable to me.

Quelle surprise.

They should hang out with Kevin Sessuns!

[quote]But the French are different that way - they expect you to make an effort with French. Seems reasonable to me.

When Americans do that with English it's considered racist.

A friend moved to England and it was a problem to find a rental. You need a British bank account to rent and a place of residency to get a bank account. I offered to pay it for her but I mustn't because it's against European money laundering laws. (Just as a reminder: if you're OVER a certain threshold, a couple of million, you can transfer any money into the UK - but paying three months' rent in advance: no.) I would guesssomething like that happened. But just as a side remark: Her husband didn't speak French and wore a Hitler stache and expected people to like him? (On second look: sorry - it's just the colour that's unfortunate.)

"because supermarket fruits and vegetables are so bad. Like Aldi bad."

R11 You sound insufferable. Are you a Whole Foods ONLY shopper.

This woman sounds exhausting.

You mean France didn’t take notice and take care of these two Americans for which they anticipated everything should be about them? Quel dommage! 😢

"Purr, purr Joanna!"

She's a former healthcare exec, complaining about bureaucracy !?

Having a great vacation in France does not mean you can easily get accustomed to living there. It's a culture shock more than anything.

The term, It's a great place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there, may apply here. At least for them.

[quote] Didn't have time to learn French because was unpacking/settling, FOR MONTHS?

That part was weird. She was probably looking for decor (Live Laugh Love) for months.

They should just move back to their rent-controlled SF place.

Sounds like the husband managed to learn some French.

I wouldn't be surprised if they are close to divorce, now.

Cheese-eating surrender monkeys.

[quote] I'm fluent in French (lived there before), can get by in Dutch, and doing Duolingo Portuguese. Languages come easily to me as I have also picked Turkish and Chinese when I lived abroad previously. I would never move anywhere without having at least an A2 language level.

You sound like a pretentious, insufferable, obnoxious asshole.

Hopefully, you'll move to Europe sooner, rather than later.

Good riddance!

[italic]Au contraire[/italic], R77. I think R49 sounds fabulous.

Come sit by me.

Shockingly, the comments on CNN.com are actually more savage than here on DL.

They are getting roasted in the comments. I predict CNN will shut it down.

It is like those NYT articles of people complaining they can't find anything "livable" in the UES for under 2 million.

R79 TELL me about it!

Crossing the border into Italy after a year in Nice was such a welcome relief.

R81 Italy really is a very welcoming country to Americans.

Moving to a different culture is extremely difficult. It takes years, even a full decade, to fully adjust. Going to another country in your 70's is just crazy, you're too set in your ways and you just don't have the mental agility to learn another language and understand the culture completely at that age. And Americans don't realize how good they have it until they don't have it anymore. There's no place like home.

Plus, in your 70s, you've got medical issues.

Yes, moving abroad in your 70s is pretty stupid.

Why would they want to send over their car? For all of that cost and trouble, they could buy a used car or a rent a car.

And imagine registering it and having everything to EU norms.

[quote] armature

Oh, DEAR

Yeah, I couldn't understand wanting to ship a car to France.

Also, why not choose a place where you don't need a car? Just rent one, if you absolutely need one for the day.

Joanna needs to reestablish herself in SF among her old friends. She will need them when Ed dies. If left a widow in France she would be eaten by wolves.

I'm at A2 in French and I would never dream of moving to a French speaking country. with my poor language skills-I feel I need to be in B2 for that. I would love to move to France, but Spain seems more hospitable. But I don't want to try to learn another language in my advanced age. If I had the money to live well in SF, I would.

They really sound almost too stupid to function. Why ship a car from the US to Europe? Also there's a huge population of English-speaking Brits in that area of France. They could have got them to help them. There's also no shortage of language schools that mainly cater to English speakers in order to get them some French language proficiency.

I'm half French and grew up in the UK. While I've spent a lot of time in France and speak French, I'd never just assume you could just "turn up" and everything's going to be beautiful. Their idiocy is astonishing.

Well, the French hate everybody so I can’t imagine living there. I might move if they ban cigarettes in US.

California has 54 electoral votes.

PA has 19.

[quote] I honestly don’t think we could have put in any more effort to acclimatize to the French way of life,”

It seems they did essentially nothing.

I agree with the person who said that French food is overrated.

^ How long were you in France?

The both sound like extremely spoilt, overprivileged and lazy cretins who have had everything handed to them in their lives, and have crumbled under the pressure of dealing with merely a few inconveniences, most of which were caused by themselves.

First of all, how arrogant are they to expect to move to a country where English isn't the national language, and refuse to learn the local vernacular? Most people in France speak some English, but pretending to live full time in France without learning any French is just ridiculous. They arrived to France with an imperialistic mindset, expecting everyone to bend backward for them just because they are American, and they've just realized that nobody is willing to fawn all over them just by virtue of being American. Isn't that precious of these two? Some people are sleeping in the streets, so toughen up and deal with situations like adults, you pair of old fools.

Second, Europe has EXCELLENT produce everywhere. I am sure that you can find places that are awful, but food standards are a million times higher than in the US, and anything you can find in a supermarket is very good. If you go to a farmer's market, the quality will be even higher. It sounds like these two didn't want to make the effort of going anywhere without their car, and they've paid the consequences.

Also, they're whining because it took a lot of time for them to be able to bring their car from California? What sort of nonsense is this? Couldn't they have sold it in the US and bought something else in France? What sort of person wastes resources on something so capricious and then crumbles on the floor crying because they cannot get their car from another continent fast enough? Moreover, try to take your car to the US from another effing continent, and see how easy and fast the process is. Seriously, these two imbeciles are beyond exasperating.

Regarding their issues accessing a GP, all of Europe is defunding public healthcare because they want to privatize it, and the ones who are driving this are American insurance companies, which want to increase their power and revenue by exporting their horrible model to the EU. I have heard horror stories from the US healthcare system (long waits, people being refused treatment until they complete forms, people going bankrupt because their insurer refuses to pay for treatment), so I don't get what these two mummies are yakking about. I am sure that if you're wealthy enough you don't have to worry about anything, but the US healthcare system is nowhere near great.

And finally, they're complaining about the food? Do they realize that French people eat other things beyond pâté, baguettes, rich cheeses and elaborate dishes taken from the Escoffier and Troisgros cooking manuals? France is a multicultural, diverse and historically rich society - there are HUNDREDS of different options from which to choose every single day. Seriously, these two idiots must be the most sheltered, overpampered and weak individuals imaginable, and they have an embarrassingly parochial mindset.

I wouldn’t have thought it was possible to bring your personal automobile from one continent to another. Are the fuel formulations the same? Are parts and repairs easy to obtain? Does the car meet European emission standards?

This is one of the stupidest moves I’ve heard of. If the French government accommodated this request, that is surprisingly flexible.

I think it’s good neither achieved French proficiency. God knows what people are saying about them.

There’s much better dick in Spain.

They should have learned some French before moving and she can't find good produce? Really? Not buying it.

They "seem" like idiots?? Have you seen the photos of them? They ARE idiots.

If you wasn’t to change countries on a whim, you also probably shouldn’t have pets.

France's health care system relies on insurance, which is subsidized in various ways. Surely, a health care exec would understand how insurance works.

Beaches are much better in Spain and the sea is warmer. Set up home anywhere that Brits vacation and you'll be made welcome. Spanish people like speaking English with you.

Why did they move out of the country in the Biden administration? They should've split earlier, no?

I didn't read the article, did the car make the return journey?

r98 Give it a rest. Another reason to hate Europeans. Blaming their problems on some mythical Americanization.

[quote] “I think every married couple needs two places to live, because you’ve got to get away from each other,” adds Joanna, who previously worked as a healthcare executive.

They'll get divorced, I think.

Look at the body language (hands) in the photo at OP. They don't really want to touch each other.

I'm guessing that she has more money than he has. She will kick him to the curb.

Like most people, the best produce is in farmers markets-- not supermarkets. I have an acquaintance who has been living in France for awhile, she also doesn't like the food. Food is fresher, but the actual cuisine is mediocre and repetitive.

r98 don't you have an editor

Tomorrow’s headline:

“Couple plans to return to France after life in the U.S. became a nightmare”

I'm taking applications, R110. Judging by the fact that you don't know how to properly punctuate, I will be forced to reject yours. Good luck in all your future endeavours! I hope that you learn to write at some point in the future, as it will improve your professional prospects.

R107, if all it takes to wound your little national pride is stating a few facts, all I can say is that I feel sorry for you. I guess that this is yet another reason to look down on petulant, incongruously arrogant, functionally illiterate Americans. By the way, you shithead: Europe has many nationalities, cultures and languages. We "Europeans" are not a homogeneous mass of people.

You're an example of why these two decrepit old idiots have made a complete embarrassment out of themselves by whining over quotidian inconveniences, like a pair of spoilt little children.

Get a blog R112, R98.

They're not shopping for groceries properly or they're accustomed to overly engineered American produce. They did nothing to learn French. The French hate that. They said people are pleasant enough.. Nîmes is not a big city or international center. I can't imagine making friends there in my 70s with no French language skills.

They said their return would be decided after the election. After tonight, if I were them I'd stay in Europe but will anywhere be safe any more?

If they had multiple houses between them in the Bay Area, they certainly had the resources to hire fixers for all their bureaucratic needs. You can go to immigration attorneys or expat relo specialists who can guide you through the bureaucracy step by step. They know the tricks and pitfalls and often have relationships with the bureaucrats. DIY immigration is nuts.

Having little language skills is obviously a hurdle but not insurmountable, but on the other hand, the processes can be difficult in Anglosphere countries as well. Bureaucracy is bureaucracy, I permanently moved from the USA in my 30s and felt I was almost too old. I’ve lived in France and the UK. I can’t imagine immigrating to France DIY in my 70s. They should have just done the ‘faux-pat’ thing. I have a retired friend from SF who lives the max allowable time in London per year in shirt term lets. He experiences life here on his American passport and without moving all his finances and legalities. It’s the more sensible approach than completely uprooting. You do need special long term travel insurance, but otherwise it seems fairly straightforward.

[quote]Didn't know a "relocation specialist" existed as a job.

Unfortunately it does, R51. "American expats in..." online groups are proliferating with Americans who are planning "scouting expeditions" to find their new home city in a country they have never so much as visited before. And they want to bring two parents in the 80s with significant mobility issues and children with various psychiatric diagnoses and learning disabilities, oh, and two lovably rambunctious Great Danes with extreme allergies.

Planning their "campaign" of ticking off 15 cities in 12 days like a military operation, looking for their "perfect match" city that feels exactly right, shocked that the public schools lack special programs for American expat children who, like their parents, don't speak a word of the language. They want a relocation agent to rent or buy an apartment because 4 hours in the city they fell on love with were not enough to conquer the ins and outs of the local real estate market, and because they are convinced the price for Americans is inflated. They want someone (with faultless English) to orchestrate the delivery of shipping crates of huge American furniture that will not fit in their new home, to arrange private van transfers to deliver from the airport the whole family --and the dogs!-- to their new life....to arrange 1000 details for a seamless transition to a country that shockingly doesn't roll out a red carpet to another group of clueless Americans moving on a whim and expecting to be treated like a 1950s Fortune 100 CEO relocation.

[quote]Americans are just spoiled, because we have so many more options than people in other countries.

[quote]Of course we are going to have more choices and options for food, and doctors, and everything else, than anywhere else in the world.

[quote]There really is no comparison.

[quote]When you leave the US for another country, your choices and options will be greatly diminished.

Weep for the poor primitives in other countries, R32.

I thought the article was badly written. Or maybe I find it hard to believe anyone could be that stupid. They’d been living in London and already spent months in Nimes before moving there so there was some experience. She said the people were friendly. The limp celery quote was bizarre, even a tourist fresh off the plane knows about weekly markets and Nimes has a covered daily market. What was the reason for importing their car vs buying new/used? The writer doesn’t say. Did they apply for a VLS-TS visa before arriving? The writer doesn’t say. Finding a doctor was the only valid complaint but did they have immediate medical concerns? Learning French, well she’d never be fluent but the translate apps are really advanced nowadays. The article had a lot of gaps but it’s easier to frame it as delusional Americans.

Agreed, R119, the article was badly written and would have been much more credible had the author dogged the subjects for some explanation of some of their odd choices. But I believe the couple were exactly that fucking stupid.

Like too many English-speaking immigrants to Europe, I believe they sought affirmation, the way American tourists often seek acknowledgement as though they had some something special for the country they visit (think Carnegie and his libraries in the States, or those GIs at the end of WWII doling out chocolate bars to children. from the back of a Jeep.) They wanted to feel a little special, as though their mere presence was an act of philanthropy. They thought not speaking French would merely be a point of lightly amusing tales, not something that would effectively isolate them from the everyday life they sought to join. A bright and cheery 'Bonjour!' on entering a shop isn't always sufficient to fit in seamlessly and be the talk of the town and those posh Americans who moved in and made such a beautiful garden.

They wanted everyone to bend over backwards offering to help them with the mundane things of everyday and the frustrating in any country need to register and enroll and apply for various things.

They brought over their car because that's what Americans do. Import a monster pickup truck for the US because it's a recent model with limited mileage and will need a couple thousand Euros in modifications and many more thousands in import fees? Shit yeah! The better to drive through some tiny village or pueblo and show them who you are; the better to drive to Costco to load up on super bulk packages of buerre de cacahuète and those big bundles of 36 rolls of Bounty Select-a-Size paper towels and the special toilet paper they like. Too many Americans don't actually want to move to another country because they want to fit in, they move because they want to stand out, and complain bitterly when they can't find they favorite packaged bread stuffing mix for Thanskgiving dinner, or when they find they can't buy Ibuprofin capsules by the thousands but only in small packages of 12 and only after speaking with a pharmacist.

A lot of Americans and Brits move to (Continental) Europe because it seems cheaper, or the sun, or the food, or the people they find so charmingly quaint. In the end, they find themselves lonely and 'homesick' for a place they never stopped thinking of as home, Rather than adapt, they resent every tiny 'inconvenience' as if it existed only to ruin their ill-conceived dream.

If they've got any brains left they'd better keep their asses in France. The French bureaucracy will probably seem like a cake walk before long.

R120 pretty much sums up a lot of expats in many places. I traveled through some expat destinations in Central America and there were lots of sad looking Americans who clearly lived there. When I lived in Thailand, a good place to visit was one that was said to have very few fat, grey-faced, depressed Europeans hanging around.

They should stay put. Who would want to MOVE to Trump's America?

What a stupid bitch is this woman. Note that there is not one quote from the husband.

When you move at such a late age you also gave the risk your spouse will die. If she feels isolated now, how would she feel as a widow in France?

Guess what, given the choice of living with soft green peppers or rotting pumpkin, we've decided to stay!

"Non, vous changez. Je suis américain." That's our new motto!

Love,

Joanna and Ed

If they’re unhappy, move back. They tried their adventure, and it’s ok. It’s a revolving door of Americans where I live.. Over my decades here I can’t tell you how many other Americans I knew who proclaimed they were ‘here for life’ are now long gone. Most are gone by year three. I don’t fault them, at least they tried to follow a dream. It just doesn’t always work out for a variety of reasons including everything from ‘Eat, Pray, Hate’, to family obligations with ageing parents, to relationship break-up, to career prospects. Moving p, especially to a new country and culture, is a life stressor, and many have mental health problems. People often think it’s going to give them a shiny new life, and it falls short. This is the dark side of ‘Emily in Paris’ but with SSRIs. Expat groups are filled with many sad stories.

I thought about doing a partial retirement overseas, in a country where I'd already lived. I expected it would last as long as people came to visit and my health and mobility were in good shape, but then I decided to continue working. Now, even though I'm in good health, I'm not so sure I'd do it, partly because I have family responsibilities and fewer people I know overseas are still around. You can't do this sort of thing on a whim, unless you are extremely adaptable and these people are at the wrong polar end of that.

"If she feels isolated now, how would she feel as a widow in France?"

Especially as a widow who doesn't speak a word of French because she was so busy assembling Ikea furniture for years.

Yes, R129, "Where does the time go?!'

[quote]But they say they feel pretty resigned to the notion that they’ll likely be returning home in the not-too-distant future.

As an American living in Europe for years, the best thing to do is walk away when a fellow immigrant refers to his home in the present tense as the country he emigrated from (exceptions for the freshly arrived and those whose immigrant status is on temporary basis.) They will bore you to tears with comparisons in a search for co-conspirators until you want to smack them as say, 'Just leave if it's a fucking hardship for hyou, if everything is better in your eyes in the place where you no longer live.' Why spend years --or in the case of these two, months-- making which place is better comparisons? The British can be whiny about missing food dishes and products from the UK, but Americans seem to have a gene that requires them to rank everything as if it were a contest, a tallying up that always serves a bigger agenda.

[quote]Americans seem to have a gene that requires them to rank everything as if it were a contest, a tallying up that always serves a bigger agenda.

It's the whole greatest nation on earth bullshit. The myth is in your DNA. You think the world revolves around you. Yes, you have much, but no one thinks they're your servant.

[quote] The article had a lot of gaps but it’s easier to frame it as delusional Americans.

I agree it’s not well written, but they are delusional Americans. There is no context in which importing a car makes sense. There is no context in which it is reasonable to expect obtaining a long-stay visa or bringing in a pet to be easy. There is no context in which you expect an active social life if you can’t communicate with the people around you and you prioritise decorating over learning the local language.

Yeah - let's ship the car across the country and then across the Atlantic. That's gotta be cheaper than the dealer in town.

Why didn't they just buy an apartment in France and go there when they felt like. SF and Nice, for example.

Sure, the US is turning Christofascist and half the population is totally fine with it, but at least the celery isn't limp!

r112 Europeans uniformly are obsessed with claiming they are becoming "Americanized" or claiming "Americanization" when there is anything happening in their country they don't like and want to blame on a foreign source. It is pathetic and bigoted. It crosses all European nationalities, political bents, regions, and demographics.

r130 Self loathing Americans are so gross. All people are going to compare their new city or country. Comparisons is how you assess if you want to stay. You will always have minor differences you can live with, but some are too much. In which case you should leave. I don't see how them waiting out a year before going back to the USA is a bad thing. It is a sign of maturity that they thought they might become acclimated and change their mind.

r131 This has to be a joke. All Europeans/non Americans do is make unprompted rants and lists of how the US is inferior or different than theirs. Americans are far less obsessed with that. Look at youtube, twitter, reddit, etc. The meme of Europeans/non Americans screaming about how they are "baffled" by X, Y, Z or how Americans need to do this/that because they don't understand or approve it (even though they admit they would never "step foot" in the USA ) is everywhere.

My now-late husband and I traveled extensively and often to Europe, and back home would pretend-emigrate.

We "picked" Luzerne, Stratford-Upon-Avon, Annecy, London, and in general Alsace, Devon, and Normandy.

But that was fantasy. If we had really intended to move to, say, France, we would have chosen an expat site such as Antibes.

Preach, r84! Where I live in the Lehigh Valley (PA) has so many medical facilities, from Urgent Cares to Specialist consortia to major hospitals, that you can't swing a dead cat without hitting one!

Speaking of hospitals: Whoever said he was considering Porto, my husband and I had to go to its hospital by ambulance with food poisoning!

I don't know; this couple sounds dopey. Like they absorbed nothing from their prior travels.

I've been amazed at European grocery stores and street markets alike, for example, for the variety of offerings. But these are two dang rich people; they can afford top restaurants!

Maybe they just wanted to write an article.

Their story has made it to the French edition of the Huffington Post, and, unsurprisingly, the comments are brutal. These two are being absolutely eviscerated as a typical example of idiotic Americans thinking the whole world would bend over for them simply because… they’re Americans! That shit ain’t flying in Europe, and especially not in France.

Not to get all sniffy, but French is one of the easier languages to learn. You have some irregular verbs to grapple with, but otherwise, French grammar is mostly logical, and the language has a lot of cognates (e.g., la table) so the vocabulary is manageable.

Agree these people sound, well, kinda stupid.

R136, R137, R138 is a typical American, prickly as all fuck if anyone dares make an observation, generalization, or criticism about his precious USA. Yet not in the least hesitant to dish out his own observations, generalizations, and criticisms about Europeans. He'd probably get along famously with these two temporary expats.

Maybe he could show us on the doll where Europe hurt him?

[quote] Europeans uniformly are obsessed with claiming they are becoming "Americanized" or claiming "Americanization" when there is anything happening in their country they don't like and want to blame on a foreign source

I've noticed this too R36. I think it's what happens to socialist countries. You get so used to Big Daddy Government telling you what to do that when something goes wrong you instinctively look for someone else to blame. They aren't taught accountability.

R143: Americanization is hardly related to socialism. Your point makes no sense. It just seems like AI, bot farm nonsense.

How quickly DL has adapted to the mindset of your new MAGA overlords. Very Vichy.

R144 it makes perfect sense to anyone with a brain. Modern socialist Europeans are not taught accountability.

And you wonder how Trump got elected.

They sound less entitled than clueless... truly naive, which you can mistake for entitled. If you want to throw in a stereotype or broad generalizations, two San Francisco liberals who got this idea that... they do sound really flighty and naive.

[quote] Not to get all sniffy, but French is one of the easier languages to learn.

Really? I found the pronunciation difficult.

I'm fine with the prononciation, but the actual grammar is difficult- verbs have to agree with gender and amount, passe composé vs imparfait (with exceptions), reflexive verbs, asking questions, inversions, remembering all the conjugations of verbs, etc etc. When things aren't logical, they say, "that's French".

There must be something wrong with my phone. I read the whole article and yet didn't get to the "nightmare" part.

Did I miss it? Were are their belongings stolen by the Roma? Did an Algerian gang kidnap them? What happened??

r142 Do you hear yourself. Europeans are far more critical of the US than the reverse. The minute an American says they don't like it or it is not for them--- out come the accusations that Americans are arrogant. There is nothing wrong with someone giving their assessment of a country they are living in .

r143 They blame the US because no one will ever correct or check them on it. Before social media most Americans were unaware how obsessed and unhinged Europeans are about the US. The US is a superpower but we are not that influential. Anything that shames them can be blamed on the USA and they never have to self reflect.

r144 The other poster is saying the dislike of US comes from people from socialist countries. I disagree because blaming the US reflexively for everything happens across all political spectrums amongst Europeans and non-Americans.

Zut alors!

"They sound less entitled than clueless... truly naive, which you can mistake for entitled."

I might buy that if she had even TRIED to learn a bit of French rather than spending "months" looking for and assembling furniture.

Or didn't have their car shipped over.

Clearly this bitch has never watched House Hunters. She would have known that the queen of French real estate, Miss Adrian Leeds always says.....no shopping in supermarkets! Only buy what you need every day in the town square market!

They look like they could end up on Dateline.

R139 did you really explore Luzerne? When you are on the lake, you seem to be in a gorgeous belle époque and renaissance era cosmopolitan dream city. Glorious architecture and grand hotels and majestic elegant apartment buildings. Get on a bike and travel about 8 blocks in any direction away from the lake. That glorious city stops! Sometimes it's just 4 blocks. It's a bit uncanny. The rest is just houses and 20th century little apartment buildings like any pleasant small town in Switzerland.

Yes, sometimes people ship their cars internationally. I know someone who bought a BMW in Germany and had it shipped home. That was decades ago. At that point it was cost effective.

I know someone who was sent to work in South America. The family had their car shipped. I don't know which country. He told a funny story about the car being picked up without the proper bracing (there's some name for this, I don't remember). As the car was lifted, it bent from the weight of the car, thus destroying the vehicle.

I see no logic in shipping an American car to France. I could see it if they were moving somewhere good cars were harder to come by, but France?

JFC Even David Sedaris tried to learn to speak French. You know, when he moved to France, with his French husband, to restore a French chateau. And stopped being funny.

Becoming French will do that to you.

[quote]—Mia F., retired and living in 11 rooms on Central Park West for $2,500

Mia lost her rent-controlled lease on CPW years ago when there was an income requirement, which if you earned too much the lease went to market rate. It's different now, but that's what finally got her out.

R159, I was there at least four times, twice staying in a picturesque half-timbered inn on the lake; once in a private Zimmerfrei outside the town; once in a modern hotel as chaperone of a student group, when I got to experience a Luzerne dance club.

I traveled extensively all around Luzerne specifically and Switzerland in general. Favorites besides Luzerne? Fabulous Zermatt with the Matterhorn; and the Town of Painted Buildings, Stein-am-Rhein.

R98 just sounds like a jealous asshole.

R161 * Me Talk Pretty Someday* is a funny book.

They really should consider staying in France, especially in light of the recent election results.

[quote]when they find they can't buy Ibuprofin capsules by the thousands but only in small packages of 12 and only after speaking with a pharmacist.

That is just bullshit.

But at least in Europe you can still smoke.

They sound like your typical Bay Area twats.

Yes, their idealistic years were in the late sixties and early seventies. They're basically (boomer cultural reference here) a real life Elyse and Steven Keaton, but on a Brady Bunch trip overseas.

Yes, I think it's true that you have to talk with a pharmacist (in France) to buy what Americans consider OTC drugs that you can buy in bulk.

Most European countries, aside from the UK, keep nonprescription pain meds behind the pharmacy counter. It's funny though that you can for example buy CBD products and beer from vending machines in Italy, but have to ask a pharmacist for paracetamol.

French is one of the easier languages to learn but starting from nothing with it at 70+ wouldn't be totally great. You can get a few operational phrases down no problem but more intense conversation? Definitely forget ever sounding local without a French parent or something.

I wonder if Marseille would have been a little better. I found it an easy base for in country travel. 2nd biggest city and there'd have to be a few English speaking ex-pats, no? Emily in Paris needed a Mindy who's also foreign. No accident there.

Actually just found this welcome group that I might have checked it out when I was there. They have a book club in English. English speakers and French people working on their English. Some of them are terrible at it!

Marseille is infested with Muslim pieces of shit.

I've been in France for the past month - Bordeaux, Loire Valley, Paris, Alsace. I know enough French to survive and order food and coffee. Had absolutely no issues at all thus far and haven't encountered any rudeness... in fact, people are surprisingly kind and patient, service people speak decent English - moreso than in Spain, for sure. And in my experience, the supermarkets are amazing. I'm talking about the big hypermarches like Auchan or E. LeClerc, usually on the outskirts of town. In the city centers the stores are much smaller and pricier and definitely not the place to go for fresh produce. But these dummies had a car, so I don't know why it was so difficult for them to go to a proper market.

Obviously living in a place long term is different, and France has its issues like everywhere else. But just because these two couldn't hack it is no reflection on France.

Well, they really did not speak the language. What did they expect?

Marseille has a lot of immigrants and different populations and seemed to have a bit of a bad rep in France. But it has great cultural and natural (Calanques) attractions, lovely buildings/shops/views. And some graffiti covered seediness I last saw in NYC in the 80s! It's fine! Stick to the center!

The movie Stillwater was filmed in Marseille and it looked quite seedy.

Marseille has always been a port city with a seedy reputation, going all the way back to the time it was founded by the ancient Greeks 2500 years ago.

[quote] Yes, sometimes people ship their cars internationally. I know someone who bought a BMW in Germany and had it shipped home. That was decades ago. At that point it was cost effective.

You can still do that today, Mercedes-Benz calls it the “European Delivery” option. Basically you order your car from the local dealer, pay normal freight and PDI, but you pick up the car from the delivery centre at the factory in Germany. It includes a tour of the factory, an overnight stay at a local hotel, and pre-paid car insurance for one month while you drive around Europe. At the end of the trip you drop the car off at the port where they’ll load it on to the ship with the other vehicles heading to North America. It’s actually a great idea if you’re ordering a car to spec and were planning a European vacation anyway. The cost to rent say an MB C-class for two weeks would probably run well over 1 or 2 thousand Euros.

Jacquemus' instagram could get a gay man curious about a night or two in Marseille. And has!

[quote]“You go to the supermarket, and the produce is terrible,” she says. “You pick up a piece of celery and it falls over. It’s so limp. So old and so horrible. Who would eat this?”

And yet somehow they managed to find what look to me as some decent vegetables in a grocery store, in Nimes.

Put the celery in water for 15 minutes, FFS. Unless it's brown and manky, it's fine.

--[quote]“[bold]I honestly don’t think we could have put in any more effort to acclimatize to the French way of life,”[/bold] adds Joanna, who [bold]describes their experience as “a nightmare.”[/bold]

--She was [bold]“frustrated and exhausted”[/bold]

--she says [bold]she was becoming increasingly frustrated[/bold] with the political climate in the US

--Joanna says that securing a visa [bold]proved to be complicated[/bold], as was the process of arranging for their cat Suzette to fly over to France, which cost them an extra $5,000 in total.

--Joanna says [bold]she isn't a fan of the food in France[/bold] and finds it hard to find good produce.

--“We never ever anticipated that this wouldn’t work out,”

--[bold]Joanna was continually bewildered[/bold] by the rules and regulations when dealing with seemingly simple things

--Joanna quickly came to the realization that [bold]she wasn’t a huge fan of the food in the country[/bold]

--her [bold]enthusiasm for living in France wavered[/bold] considerably at the beginning of this year, when she and Ed tried to arrange for their car, which they’d left behind in San Francisco

--This [bold]frustration[/bold] proved to be something of a pattern for the pair,

--As she tried to navigate her way through French bureaucracy time and time again, Joanna says [bold]she became incredibly drained[/bold], feeling as though she was constantly coming up against obstacles.

--“Every single day it was something more [bold]devastating[/bold] than the day before,” she says. “Things are [bold]very difficult[/bold] to figure out here… So I’m too old for this.”

--Joanna [bold]hasn’t managed to “strike up friendships”[/bold]

-- '...there is a not-so-pleasant side of France, and that’s what we learned very quickly.”

Fucking hell, this woman is hard work. And more than a little dramatic. But what do you expect for someone who was too busy assembling furniture for 12 months to take a French class.

I'd like to hear what Suzette, the expensively imported cat, has to say about the cat abandoned for a year during their furniture assembly phase.

All her comments show that France is a real country, not a part of Euro Disney.

As an American, I've encountered in my locale bad produce, less than great food, red tape, rules, regulations, bureaucracy, and fading friendships. The US mail isn't delivered as fast as in the recent past. That's Life As We Know It.

This couple should have tried to fit into France, not try to fit France into them. Learning words for daily shopping interactions, for example, might have helped.

Bah. Why am I spending any time on these fools?

Look - your refusal or 'lack of time' to learn the language is going to make everything 10x more difficult.

Yes, there is a good percentage of French who speak English well - but not even knowing the niceties and culture is going to turn them off immediately and not want to speak English with you.

She sounds like she 'bagged' a tech IT nerd and married in their 50's and now wants to live this great life - but without doing much effort or forethought.

Moving ANYWHERE is difficult - fucking don't do it when you're in your mid 70's.

Marseilles - for when you dare not go whoring in Algiers.

Having lived in California, I'd assume they have some very rudimentary Spanish---how much does that help in learning French?

She could have made excellent salads with cheap French materials - for example the endive behind her in the photo. Roasted. She has her choice of several hundred delicious cheeses and could add a sliced hard boiled good French egg. A cheap French crémant will do just fine. I'd add hand crushed French walnuts.

[quote] Having lived in California, I'd assume they have some very rudimentary Spanish---how much does that help in learning French?

I wouldn't say that living in California --> know rudimentary Spanish.

However, yes, I think that knowing a bit of Spanish would help with French.

Bet they’ll make another go at it since…

The woman sounds like an hysteric: everything is by turns fabulous and a nightmare, and none of it her fault.

The man sounds like...well, we have no clue since he utters not a peep in the long article.

The writer's last line and a few other clues suggest she was appalled by this ridiculous woman and her journey of compound mistakes, each self-inflicted.

English owes a lot to French, from 1066. It's easy and fun for learners to pick out all the vocabulary in English that came from Norman French and also the points of grammar that are exactly French - they acquire those in French easily enough. Native English speakers can usually manage to B1 or B2 without great difficulty. Neither Native French nor Native English speakers can easily master the other accent. Large differences in pronunciation and the sounds are hard to make. Because the languages are similar, communication is achieved at B1 or B2 and they don't bother with pronunciation which takes so much work. Jody Fosters are very rare. Anglophones who learn to speak natural sounding French. And vice versa.

Joanna needs to be posting on DL regularly

[quote]Joanna needs to be posting on DL regularly

Where would she find the time?

R191, Americans don't know your "B1" or "B2" terms except with vitamins.

Having had high school Spanish, I found zero carry-over into French. If you're not looking to be fluent but just to get by as a tourist dealing with directions, menus, and accommodations, French terms are easy enough from scratch.

I mean, "¿Donde esta...?" is nowhere near "Ou est la ..?" And "Tiene usted...?" doesn't resemble "Avez-vous...?"

English has a lexical similarity to French of 27%.

English has a lexical similarity to Spanish of 30% to 40%

French and Spanish have a lexical similarity of 70%.

(These stats were lifted from various sources that borrowed from Ethnolgue, an online register of world languages and analysis of relationships among languages among other things. Theres a paywall for the lexical similarity stats -- but if anyone here knows data contributor Antoine Dusséaux, I would very much welcome the opportunity to discuss subscription benefits with him.)

that is lexical. English grammar is more similar to French than it is to Spanish.

For example English and French are non-pro-drop while Spanish is pro-drop. Rules for article use. Adjective placement. Question forms. Verb tenses and aspects - all closer to French than to Spanish.

Norman French was the mother tongue of every English king from William the Conqueror (1066–1087) until Henry IV (1399–1413). A fair amount trickled down especially into written scholarly English of the time. Norman and of course Latin with the clergy. Obviously the peasants did not speak French or Latin. The result was Middle English.

Qui est cette cunt ?

Thank God they got Suzette out, whatever it cost, because if she thinks the food is bad in France imagine her reaction to dinner in Springfield.

I wonder what they did with Suzette while they were arranging passage. I could imagine that if they had a decent foster family for the cat, she was missing these two not at all.

R194 No?

Isn’t the French verb tener close enough?

$250 Apartment - $1,500 Monthly Budget - Beach Town in Mexico

Looks like a lovely area but that apartment—despite the fantastic price— would depress me.

R203 - Amen! And they renovated it? Fucking depressing furniture - plastic chairs and card table for dining? Neon lights everywhere?

I know their 'renovation' was flooring and other stuff - but that shit looks awful. And it's so easily changeable - paint, art, better furniture.

Sounds like they are on extremely limited funds. They don't talk about health care.

She has lived there for 25 years already, so maybe they just like it simple or she has just lived on an extremely low budget for so long. I guess I'm WAY too picky.

r194, use the familiar "Tu as" and it's closer to "Tiene usted".

I don't know any Spanish, but have a background in Latin and French, and I read and understood Spanish better in Southern Spain than my friend who studied Spanish in college.

I moved my family to Puerto Rico for a job. They were miserable — and we returned to Pennsylvania after just a year.

Well, here's CNNs counterpoint to the deluded couple. This couple moved to Spain and *love* it. They did everything right during the move and felt settled in within a matter of weeks. They made an effort to learn the language, participated in the community, and made friends. Their only regret? That they didn't move sooner.

What a setup by CNN. 😁

Eating dinner at 10:00 p.m. is probably one of those "things they can't adjust to," along with flying insects indoors because of no AC; tapas when dinner should be; mid-day store siesta closures; and bullfighting.

I don't understand the people in R206's article? Are they from there? If not why did they move down there, that place has tons of issues which are not exactly a secret.

R208 - Actually, besides learning (or relearning Spanish in her case), they said that the mealtime difference was the most difficult adjustment since they're early to bed, early to rise. They did mention siesta closures, but it wasn't an issue for them. The others didn't come up.

I think retirement abroad can work if you move early enough and aren’t an idiot about it. Living abroad as a working person, if you can obtain the rights to do it, can be a struggle because of the vast difference in earning potential between the US and the rest of the world. If you are in a white collar job (which is usually the only type you can get a work visa for) you will be earning a lot less.

R204: It is depressing. She also seems a little delusional--people don't judge you? My God, she doesn't realize that expats are probably the biggest source of entertainment there and they probably make fun of her for paying too much rent. The husband seems a little dim and getting dimmer.

France sounds underwhelming.

Because it underwhelmed these idiots?

What can be underwhelming about a country that has everything from beaches to mountains, chateaus, vineyards and forests, charming villages to cities filled with culture and beautiful architecture, centuries of history, some of the best food in the world... I love France.

I love Paris in the spring time

I like New York in June. How about you?

[QUOTE] What can be underwhelming about a country that has everything from beaches to mountains, chateaus, vineyards and forests, charming villages to cities filled with culture and beautiful architecture, centuries of history, some of the best food in the world... I love France.

Rotten lettuce in produce dept, expired items on store shelves.

[QUOTE] I like New York in June. How about you?

I'm partial to Tallahassee in August.

[quote] Rotten lettuce in produce dept, expired items on store shelves.

Things that have never happened in the US or any other country, right?

I've been in France for 2 months and haven't run into this issue at all.

Tallahassee in August would explain the rotting lettuce.

The couple at R207 look younger than the couple who moved to France. Also, IMO, Spanish is a lot easier to learn than French. Also, I'm guessing that the people in Spain have a more carefree approach to life than do the French.

In what way do the French not seem carefree? The land of joie de vivre?

R223, all that bureaucracy is not a carefree way to live.

Also, let's face it, the French are more judgmental re: Americans than the Spanish are.

That said, I respect the French and would rather live in France than Spain.

Spaniards are a lot more "live and let live" while the French give off more uptight vibes.

I've always thought that the closer you get to the Mediterranean, the happier (and friendlier) the people become. For example, southern France/Italy vs. northern France/Italy. I guess Greece is the exception to that rule because the people there seem equally happy and friendly no matter what part of the country they live in.

[quote] Greece is the exception to that rule because the people there seem equally happy and friendly no matter what part of the country they live in.

Come to Greece. We’re nicer.

I never understood the American infatuation with France.

[quote] This couple moved to France and didn’t love it. So we wrote about it. Then came the comments

Vacationing somewhere and living there are two different matters.

When I was a kid my dad's company transferred him to Florida. We had gone on vacation a few times to Florida and always had a great time so I thought living there was fun. But when you have to go to school (or a job) it is not like vacations any more.

R228, I had a reply that addressed your post, but after it disappeared I realized that you seem like a hopeless dope who has never seen a movie, read a book, looked at a work of art or of architecture; who has never eaten a superb meal or drunk a fine wine; who doesn't know geography; never heard of Eisenhower's D-Day or Caesar's Gaul or Robespierre and Napoleon; knows nothing of high fashion; thinks the State of Liberty is American; didn't even watch the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Romance, for r228, is dead.

Fuck them. If you can't figure out France you're an idiot.

This golden girl is happy she moved to France.

At R229 the lady seems very much into her own navel.

The woman at r233 moved to Fontainebleau when she was 70! I didn’t think France would be welcoming to retirees.

Her video isn’t very interesting but she loves it there and appears to have a good life. She’s certainly acquired that French magic where you can wear a white coat and sit on stone steps and not get it dirty.

Adding to ^, a 2 bedroom apartment for €900 a month plus electricity (which is super expensive! like €200 per month) in a modern bldg.

She doesn’t have a French bank account which is really difficult to get but somehow manages.

[QUOTE] She doesn’t have a French bank account which is really difficult to get but somehow manages.

Uh, respectfully, doesn't this just prove OP's point about France being impossible? Why on earth would they make it hard for people to get bank accounts.

[quote]Uh, respectfully, doesn't this just prove OP's point about France being impossible? Why on earth would they make it hard for people to get bank accounts.

Uh, respectfully, you have no idea what you are talking about. As noted previously in the thread, the difficulty American citizens face in getting foreign bank accounts is a result of the compliance burden the US government places on foreign banks that grant accounts to them. If you wonder why on earth it is hard for them to get accounts you should inquire with the US government. (And there is a reason why the US government does want to track offshore accounts.) Sometimes when you think a country is being perverse, you just don't know what is going on.

R229. That video is tragic. Despite all the negative comments, she's still an unrepentant idiot. She didn't realize she would have to file a local tax return when she lived in another country, and she wished she had been warned of that? Filing a French tax return is not inherently more difficult than filing a US tax return. It's difficult for her because 1) she doesn't speak French and 2) it's not the tax system she has lived with for 70 years. I've never tried to register a car in France, but I'll take her claims that it is onerously difficult with a grain of salt given that she was trying to register her personal automobile that she imported from the US for God knows what reason. I have no idea what it would be like to register a personal vehicle bought from France in the US. My premonition is that it would be difficult. I daresay she got more help in English in France with these formalities than a French person would get in French in America.

And, for the love of God, where did she get the idea that French people eat brie and pastries all day? From a Rick Steve's guidebook? Although French obesity is on the rise, there are still enough thin people there to know that that is not what people do. It's like saying you can't live in the US because you can't eat pork rinds every day.

Lastly, why on earth is she so inept at shopping for produce?

The crux of the issue here is that these idiots didn't bother to learn even basic conversational French because they are so self-absorbed they believed the French would speak English to them and give them special treatment because they are American.

And because they couldn't speak any French whatsoever, they were unable to reasonably function in general society and perform basic life tasks in a foreign country.

Absolute morons. This is an excellent lesson in what not to do for anyone planning to move to a non-English speaking country.

[QUOTE]I daresay she got more help in English in France with these formalities than a French person would get in French in America.

💯.

Please give the folks who went to Spain and happily adjusted some acknowledgement. They did everything right and they were rewarded and beyond that have friendships with natives.

This is what we should be hearing about, right?

[quote] This couple moved to Spain and *love* it. They did everything right during the move and felt settled in within a matter of weeks. They made an effort to learn the language,

Spanish is a million times easier to learn than French, because of the pronunciation. Particularly for English speakers.

Spaniards are also a million times more friendly and accommodating than the French, and not nearly as snooty.

[quote] Spaniards are also a million times more friendly and accommodating than the French, and not nearly as snooty.

This is BS. Outside of Paris and maybe the Riviera (haven't been), French people are fantastic.

And have you not been paying attention to all the Spanish backlash against tourists and foreigners moving in???

Spain...so welcoming

[quote]Spaniards are also a million times more friendly and accommodating than the French, and not nearly as snooty.

Absolute garbage R242.

R243, In Paris, as well! On our first full day in Paris (decades ago), our leased car had a flat tire. As we sat and pondered, two young Parisians saw us and changed the tire for us!

But citizens of other nationalities were equally kind to us: A Spanish hotelier made sure we met a matador still in his suit of lights; a Basque family invited us to not only stay in their home during San Fermin, but also to eat dinner with them; a German family whose son we met here likewise put us up overnight, fed us, and gave us wine when we left; a Belgian man drove us gratis from a train station to our friends in suburban Brussels, on the way offering us food from his recent grocery purchase; a Croatian family fed us when we visited as strangers who worked with their American cousin; and for years we exchanged Christmas cards with an E. German couple with whom we had shared a restaurant lunch table. And more.

I'm guessing R246 isn't black.... lol.

^ What dumb comment.

Proofreading needs to be scrupulous if you aim to insult the intelligence of a post.

If you visit or move to a different country and everything is a problem, the problem isn't the country.

Parisians on the whole speak English, but where that couple moved to, I wouldn't assume it. I cannot believe the idiocy. My throuple friends (I mentioned them upthread) who are moving to Valencia are not so worried about the 80 year old (HIV compromised with a liver transplant) not speaking Spanish- since Valencia is a "younger" city, apparently everyone speaks English. My friend , who got dual citizenship has a sister there, so she's easing them into the system. The BF (the moneymaker of the group) hasalready established accounts and healthcare (apparently it's only $100-$150/month for non-citizens).

Can you easily get a bank account as a foreigner in Spain? Wouldn’t the same US rules apply?

I don't blame the Spaniards for being sick of tourists. They've ruined a lot of towns with the hordes of chav trash coming in.

The France lovers on this thread are hilariously defensive.

You know that Spain is better, and most Americans and Europeans would agree.

Spanish people are much nicer, much friendlier, and the language is so much easier to learn.

French pronunciation is ridiculously difficult for native English speakers, because it's not phonetic. The pronunciation of French words doesn't even closely resemble the way English speakers would pronounce those same words.

Spanish is completely phonetic and easy to learn and pronounce.

Spain wins.

I like Spain but that's mainly due to family ties. My grandfather remarried a Spanish woman and she was my second grandmother so I grew up with her cooking and trips to Spain.

I don't even think this is real. An EST dreamed up for clicks. No one could be this stupid or tell such outrageous bullshit. No good produce? In France? All they eat is Brie and pastries? This sounds like what people think clueless deplorables in Flyoverville think of foreign countries? Did they also think all Frenchmen wear berets and striped shirts with scarves and act and sound like Pepe Le Pew?

[quote] An EST dreamed up for clicks. No one could be this stupid or tell such outrageous bullshit.

You've clearly never been to San Francisco or met Boomers in their 70s.

These people are ALL OVER the Bay Area.

[quote] I never understood the American infatuation with France.

It had to do with the war and all those farm boys who'd seen Paree, Audrey Hepburn and all those Fifties movies that built up France as the end all.

Well I learned French in school (even though I’ve forgotten most of it and my accent was always terrible) but I realize most US students take Spanish. That’s why I loved visiting France and never spent much time in Spanish speaking countries.

Because too many American kids study Spanish?! That’s white the DL irrational post of the day.

quite

R247, I am not. You, however, sound stupid.

I wish I had studied Spanish in school. We live in a (primarily) bilingual hemisphere and country. I studied French in college. I can't understand a fucking word of spoken French and had very little use for it.

R254, You are loco in la cabeza!

I spent months of vacation time in Iberia and France. Spain is fascinating, but even so doesn't hold the proverbial candle to France. Indeed, practically the minute we crossed the border from Spain just to Portugal we noted that finally there was some color!

I enjoyed Spain, make no mistake. Madrid, Toledo, Salamanca, Seville, the Prado, the bullfights, Grenada, Santander, Pamplona, Cuenca, Moorish architecture, and more, all impressive.

But the varied geography, the chateaux, the cuisine, the wine, the flora, Paris, the charms of Normandy and Alsace, the cathedrals, etc.---I would tip the scales towards France.

r252, he's worth a few million, so I'm sure that eased the way.

The couple who moved to Spain R206 did it well and were, it seems, well rewarded. A desire to live in another country and to be part of another culture seems key for me. The immigrants I know who thrived in a new country moved because they lived the place, and knew enough about it beforehand not merely to be enamored if the idea of an expat and always with one foot (sometimes more) in a "home" that's where they used to live. Little perturbations trip them up and their unhappiness and resentments about not fitting in swell. They don't live in the moment of where they are but only in the moment of continual and unflattering comparison.

[quote]Eating dinner at 10:00 p.m. is probably one of those "things they can't adjust to," along with flying insects indoors because of no AC; tapas when dinner should be; mid-day store siesta closures; and bullfighting.

R207's comments about dining hours, etc are silly. If you can't move 6 or 9 timezones and change your dining hours, probably it's best to stay in the U.S. Spain has all the window screening and air conditioning one could want. Do you think the Spanish are primitives living without a/c? Tapas in place of dinner? Mid-day store closures? Those are the insurmountable obstacle?

English is clearly not your first language, R266.

I encounter many immigrants who can't speak English (cleaning ladies, construction), and wonder how they get along here in L.A.

[quote] I encounter many immigrants who can't speak English (cleaning ladies, construction), and wonder how they get along here in L.A.

You're joking, right?

Nearly as many people in Los Angeles speak Spanish, as they do English.

You can exist in Los Angeles without speaking ONE WORD of English, very easily.

And even if you're not a Spanish speaker, you will find a community that speaks your language, through which you can easily navigate life in the city.

Korean, Chinese, Filipino, Armenian, Russian.... you name it.

France is not nearly as multi-cultural as the United States.

And even in the urban centers, the majority of the ethnic groups still speak French.

That is not at all the case with English, in the United States.

On top of that, language interpreting services exist practically everywhere in the city, to help with social services, etc.

It is very easy to live in the United States without knowing any English at all.

I like France [italic]precisely[/italic] because the people are insouciant chain smoking misanthropes who bow to no one.

It's all about the downturned mouth, the shrugging of shoulders whilst holding and waving around. said cigarette.

Yesterday's complaints would have been that there are no whole turkeys for sale and the ovens aren't large enough to cook them.

[quote] I wish I had studied Spanish in school. We live in a (primarily) bilingual hemisphere and country.

You can still learn Spanish. IMO, it's a relatively easy language to learn (for an English speaker).

The husband has a Hitler mustache

[QUOTE]but I realize most US students take Spanish. That’s why I loved visiting France and never spent much time in Spanish speaking countries.

Why do your resentments direct your travel?

This lady is a huge bitch. I kind of like her.

R246 You said it buster. And astonishingly welcoming strangers all over Europe have put their big exciting uncut cocks in my American butthole.

Interesting take r275.

[quote]Can you easily get a bank account as a foreigner in Spain? Wouldn’t the same US rules apply?

It depends, R252. Spanish banks don't operate by U.S. rules, but banks in the EU share a layer of common rules.

It's easy to open a bank account if you're Spanish, or from the EU, or from other countries as well. The difficulty for U.S. citizens is that, even if they are dual citizens with Spain (or any other country), their accounts outside the U.S. are subject to onerous reporting requirements to the U.S. Your Spanish bank or French bank or UK bank is obligated by international treaties to report on the account balances U.S. citizens abroad. This stems from U.S. anti-money laundering laws that seek to monitor balances, large deposits, large expenditures of U.S. citizens abroad.

Spain has a handful of huge national banks and various regional and local banks. Within any banking company, an American seeking to open a Spanish account might receive a few 'no's before finding a bank manager who understands the issue and says 'yes'.' It's extra bother for the bank manager, and for the bank to file reports of the activity of its US citizen account holders, but it's generally possible. It means finding a sympathetic bank manager knowledgeable of the rules. It's the same or similar for Americans in France and in other countries in Europe - basically any country subject to the US anti-money laundering reporting requirements.

The not so would-be French bitch gives away her decision about ditching France when she says 'if we decide to go home.' -- home meaning the U.S.

It's always telling when an immigrant constantly refers to their 'home' as being in the country they left -- but never really did. Some people are not cut out for making home the place where they live.

[QUOTE] It's always telling when an immigrant constantly refers to their 'home' as being in the country they left -- but never really did. Some people are not cut out for making home the place where they live.

I've tried in the past to explain to DLers that not everyone is cut out to be an expat, but they were hearing none of it.

Being an expat or immigrant suits me famously, R281. Definitely, it's one of the best things I've done in my life. But I'm a 'home is where you make it' sort who has moved around and travelled a fair bit, and I enjoy establishing myself in a new place. It also helps, I think, to be grounded in the present and the near future rather than tied to the past whether to family, old places, or to old routines or sentiments.

Occasionally I hear the fellow immigrant gripe about not being able to find Bounty Select-a-Size paper towels in the shops, or missing some brand of fabric softener from 'back home.' I take it a sign that their emigration will soon be labelled a temporary experiment and that they, like that California couple, already have a toe already pointed to the airport and a one-way ticket in hand for a return 'back home.' Which is fine. Like taking up the idea of running a restaurant, or restoring a neglected château, it's a big undertaking on many levels, and not all such things fit like a glove once you actually have it on.

The California couple -- or rather the high maintenance wife -- are laughable because her expectations and ability to envision herself surrounded by her new and dear French friends and French lifestyle (less the pesky French food) are grounded in pure fantasy. Any experience while living in London, in other parts of France...it's as though she learned not one thing about living abroad or about herself.

Is living in London really more expensive than living in S. F. ?

Plenty of poor immigrants don't adjust well to their new country and always refer to home as to where they came from. We sympathize with them in many cases.

We just don't expect that feeling to be felt among the wealthy or people who move to a nice part of France like this couple.

Poor immigrants often move as a result of what they see as necessity. It's broadly similar in motivation to war and political refugees. The circumstances are less discretionary than deciding to keep one of your three houses in your 'home country' and move to France and potter about doing French things, thinking French thoughts, striking French poses, bending French celery.

.

Is San Francisco the nation's capital?

I feel bad for them. They were people of means who only asked to live in sane comfort. Instead they were taken advantage of by a hydra-headed bureaucracy that hasn't evolved since 1789.

What a load of garbage R287.

These people did literally nothing to help themselves and expected special treatment in a foreign country because they were American and are therefore better than everybody else.

[quote] Instead they were taken advantage

They confronted their challenges , including the bureaucracy, with apparently willful ignorance and made no effort to understand how it works and should be worked. Instead they turned their backs in ignorance when their ignorance and apparent lack of effort didn’t get their desired results.

[QUOTE] Joanna says that securing a visa proved to be complicated, as was the process of arranging for their cat Suzette to fly over to France, which cost them an extra $5,000 in total.

It costs five grand to put a cat in the overhead bin on French Flights?

Bringing cars, etc in and out of France is unnecessarily difficult. Sally Jessy had the same issue.

[quote]I feel bad for them. They were people of means who only asked to live in sane comfort. Instead they were taken advantage of by a hydra-headed bureaucracy that hasn't evolved since 1789.

That's possibly more ridiculous than this pair of idiots. The 'hydra-headed bureaucracy that hasn't evolved since 1789' seems not to profited in the least.

The special delivery cat courier service that flew Monique (or whatever the cat's name is) from San Francisco to Paris made some nice profit. I've little doubt their neighbors considered that they overpaid for their various lodgings, but those profits went to landlords or house sellers. No doubt they paid a fucking bundle and had headaches galore trying to ship a car from San Francisco to France, but that's exactly as it should be. Every country has its own emission and vehicle safety requirements, inspection certifications, taxes, plus very steep private shipping and auto conversion charges. There's a reason sane people don't assume that it's easier to bring a car to another country than it is to pay a ridiculous sum to a pert courier service. It's highly inadvisable, as much as it's a poor choice to spend €3000 to ship a year old $3000 sofa (yet car-crazy Americans do it all the time, often to find the obvious: that their big honking American car cannot navigate narrow streets or parking facilities in city and town centers.)

To move to a new country and to seemingly have no curiosity about tax obligations and the process to pay them is ridiculous. Who would change countries and not inquire about registering with the city hall as a resident, or about obligations to register a pet, or how to buy a bus pass, or about trash recycling and collection, or parking permits and regulations, or how to get a driver's license, or municipal taxes... FFS, make a friend, ask a neighbor, go to the city hall and ask some questions.

R292 has a French baguette up his ass!

[quote] The French are selling their châteaus for cheap. Americans are discovering why.

Three years ago, when Mark Goff and Phillip Engel had their first viewing of Château Avensac in the south of France, only one thing prevented the California couple from putting in an offer: Was it old enough?

The gate tower, supporting walls, and stone bridge at the estate's entrance date back to the original medieval castle built in 1320. But the main building — a 48-room château with sweeping views of the Gers, the rural, foie-gras-producing region of southwest France — was rebuilt in the 1820s. "The idea of the royals and the nobles, to us, is a very romantic idea," Goff says. "That's why we love 'Bridgerton.'"

In the end, they decided there was "just enough 14th-century château stuff going on" to fulfill their fantasies and make it their new home. The place was certainly big enough to host weddings and artist retreats, a business the couple was counting on to help pay for the extensive renovations that would be required. By the fall of 2021, Château Avensac was theirs for $1.2 million.

That's when reality set in.

The château had exposed electrical wiring, "nonexistent" plumbing, and stone walls that retained moisture. Everywhere they looked, there was something in need of work. So far, they've spent $500,000 updating the château's electricity, heat, and plumbing, fortifying the foundations, and replacing the roof. They've budgeted for $500,000 more. "Everyone said, 'You have to assume everything is going to be double what you expect.' And they were kind of right," Engel says. "We didn't really listen to that part."

All across France, there's a glut of châteaus for sale. While the average asking price is $2 million, smaller châteaus can go for a couple hundred thousand. A few, like the palatial mansion nicknamed the "Little Versailles of the Pyrenees," are even being given away. But there's a reason they're on the market: The properties are huge money pits.

Real estate agents say buyers should expect to set aside as much as 1.5% of the purchase price for annual maintenance, and significantly more if the château requires extensive renovations. And if the place is classified as a historic monument, as some 15,000 are, add to the process a small mountain of French bureaucracy. Plans require approval by the French minister of culture, and work must be done by designated specialists. In all of France, there are just 31 architects accredited to run these projects. What's more, the places tend to be woefully outdated and incredibly isolated.

"It's true, you can buy a château in France for nothing," says Adrian Leeds, an American real estate agent who's been in France for 30 years. "There's a reason for that: because nobody wants them!"

That is, the French don't want them. Americans very much do. "There was a razzia" — a plundering raid — "right after the pandemic," says Gonzague Le Nail, a French real-estate agent who specializes in châteaus. Most of the interest used to come from foreign buyers in the market for a second home, but now, Le Nail says, it's from families looking to relocate to the French countryside and use the château as their primary residence. Half the châteaus around Paris are foreign-owned, and inquiries from Americans are up across France.

The day they signed the deed of sale, Goff and Engel invited over all 74 residents of the town of Avensac and served them Champagne, impressing their new neighbors with the decidedly un-aristocratic sensibility they brought to their aristocratic new digs. A few months later, they hosted a "spooky Halloween" party. "They're very open, very nice, and very low-key," says Mayor Michel Tarrible, who's been a recipient of the couple's homemade cookies.

There seem to be more and more of a trend towards super wealthy gays living the life of reilly. The cat is out of the bag now: the gays have the Midas Touch.

Her glasses tell me everything I need to know.

There seems to be more and more of a trend towards wealthy Americans moving to France and becoming disillusioned once they get there.

Oh, I wish there were a "hydra-headed bureaucracy" in 1789, r287!

This expat lady thinks the requirement to file a tax return is a symptom of bureaucracy run amok. I wouldn’t draw any conclusions about French efficiency or inefficiency from her statements.

[QUOTE] Eating dinner at 10:00 p.m. is probably one of those "things they can't adjust to," along with flying insects indoors because of no AC; tapas when dinner should be; mid-day store siesta closures; and bullfighting.

Everyone I know living in southern Europe has AC. This is a description that applies to the 1950s. Even Londoners are getting AC these days.

R300, It applies at least to the last century, but far later than the 50s.

I didn't "know" Europeans; I just stayed in their homes and hotels, 1973-1999. (P.S. Do you know what "are getting" means?)

And FYI to you and too many others: The HELPFUL, indeed the POLITE, way to quote on DL is to refer to said quoted post simply by its R# [See above], not by a disembodied quotation that requires the curious reader to SCROLL while reading EVERY PREVIOUS POST.

R300 - yeah - but you're hard-pressed to find window screens anywhere in Europe. We had to build them ourselves for a family house we used to have.

It's relatively easy to make - but I don't understand why they want all those bugs in their homes. It will never make sense to me.

[QUOTE] The HELPFUL, indeed the POLITE, way to quote on DL is to refer to said quoted post simply by its R#

Go away, granny - you sound fussy and ridiculous.

R302 We don't have window screens in Europe because they're unnecessary. I've never been in any house in any European country where I've said "omg why are all these bugs in here?". It's not a problem we have here.

As long ago as 1985 we were attacked by mosquitoes in Florence because there were no screens. I remember buying Autin to repel them.

Bullshit, R304.

There are bugs EVERYWHERE, no matter where you live.

Mosquitos, flies, bees, etc.

You just don't pay much attention to it.

R304 I never felt the need for screens in Italy. And I lived decades there without AC.

[quote] And FYI to you and too many others: The HELPFUL, indeed the POLITE, way to quote on DL is to refer to said quoted post simply by its R# [See above], not by a disembodied quotation that requires the curious reader to SCROLL while reading EVERY PREVIOUS POST.

I'd rather see the quote within the post.

R306 If we're able to not pay much attention to it, it's not much of a problem, is it?

OMG!!! I just heard that Ellen and the person she's dating have fled the country! IS THIS THE BEGINNING OF THE EVACUATION?!

R308, I guess you dislike context.

I have spent months with relatives in Southern Italy. No screens and flies everywhere in the house. It's disgusting!

And yes, they all have mini split AC units since that heatwave around 2002 that killed many people. But they never turn them on! Electricity is expensive and AC makes you sick (according to them.)

[quote] The problem is that most of us are just spoiled

And stupid.

R312, serious question, do most people in Southern Italy wear deodorant? My friend visited Spain a few years ago and said it's about 50/50 there.

"The USA really is the best, easiest and most convenient place to live."

lol. Lots of lol

In France, all seemed to breathe free. Life's little troubles just fade off.

Yes, r313, stupid, but not in the context of this thread. Of November 5th, decidedly.

"Spoiled," R#Whatever? So give up some comforts in order to deserve that high horse.

r314, I really only noticed one person with body odor issues. It was a cousin's wife. She would have been about 42 or 43 the first time I met her. On subsequent trips, she still smelled.

It was totally unexpected. They were very wealthy--they owned a motorcycle dealership and a huge house. I just don't understand it, unless her my cousin prefers his wife natural.

To live happily in a foreign country where the language is not English, and the traditions are not similar to America, and be happy for the long run, one must speak the language fluently, and be quite wealthy. If you don't have the money to pay highly placed locals, or have friends there to get things done for you the bureaucracy is going to eat you alive. It's easier if you're young. Young people adapt to new situations more easily. If you're middle age or older most everything is going to be stressful.

I have been to France several times and it's always amazing how much nicer you're treated by the locals if you speak the language. The French are not generally forthcoming for people who can't understand what they're saying. The French enjoy living life to the fullest, and anything or anyone that frustrates them is not well received.

[quote]To live happily in a foreign country where the language is not English, and the traditions are not similar to America, and be happy for the long run, one must speak the language fluently, and be quite wealthy. If you don't have the money to pay highly placed locals, or have friends there to get things done for you the bureaucracy is going to eat you alive.

I would say that´s a bit of an exageration, R319. Yes language is absolutely important. To speak the language fluently is always a tremendous advantage, but fluent in the basic sense of able to comprehend and to express oneself clearly will usually do well enough. Perfection of accent and eloquence of phrase are seen more as bonuses than requirements.

The requirement that immigrants must be quite wealthy is off mark. Of course it takes money to move from one country to another, to secure visas, to start anew in another country all costs something, and likewise to support yourself there as a retiree, for example, but in most EU countries these are not exorbitant costs out of the realm of the quite wealthy. The U:S: is in 6th most expensive country for cost-of-living plus rent (9th place without considering rent). Of European cojuntries, only Switzerland tops this, and the rest fall below, often well below (Germany 20, France 22, Italy 30, Spain 32) and housing costs accentuate this trend, being markedly lower than the US with a coujple of exceptions (Switzerland and Ireland are in the same high cost range.) Someone moving to Europe with even a middling U.S. income, and fairly modest U.S: retirement investments can get by comfortably in many cases without a lot of sacrifice. Every counttry has its own requirements for immigration visas and residency permits, but short of a few golden visa programs that remain for the time, I don't see how it's necessary to 'be quite wealthy.'

As for a 'bureaucracy that's going to eat you alive,' that´s crazy. What´s needed is some initiative and some advice from locals. The American in France put out that no French person knocked at her door to explain French tax obligations is much more a case of her abject stupidity than man-eating labrynthine French bureaucracy. Of course 'bureaucracy' is different. If she moved from San Francisco, California to Boulder, Colorado it would be different. She would be expected to take some fucking initiative and enroll for a new driver´s license, to find out if Fluffy has to be microchipped or registered or provide proof of vaccination, to enquire about local, state, property and other taxes, to not start adding a wing onto the house without asking about permit requirements and process.... The dumb cow in the CNN profile thought that since she never got a Welcome Wagon packet and to-do list, that she could just carry on assemblying furniture, not learning French, and waiting for her new chic friends to show up at the door. You don´t have to be quite wealthy to most to France or most places in Europe, but you do need to take some initiative to ensure that you are dooing things right. In France, in Spain, in Italy and in other countries I´m sure there are lawyers who specialize in immigration issues, in many places there are classes of people who specialize in paralegal functions of obtaining certified translations, obtaining a resident ID number and seeing that you are placed on local rolls for taxes and benefits, arranging utility services, preparing wills, etc, The lawyers are at a small fraction of the cost of their American counterparts, the gestors/directeurs/managers are at a fraction of the cost of lawyers.

lol I wonder how enlightened they will feel living under a Le Pen Presidency 3 years for now.

you don't need to be rich to integrate into another country and culture. You need to have perceived utility. And you need to be curious and open. This couple is old, retired, and useless to the French. Plus they haven't looked beyond their navels to learn the language to a rudimentary but functional level. One presumes you move to another country because you want a fresh experience with everything good and challenging that brings. I know plenty of old folks who are open to change. They move across country after they retire, or to other countries, and sometimes they move AGAIN when very old and infirm, and yet they are still social and open to new settings. It's the navel gazing that did this couple in.

My aunt and uncle (now both 80) have lived on Menorca (Spanish island) for twenty years. They have plenty of friends, all English ex pats like themselves. All the shopkeepers, maintenance people etc speak basic English so they've never bothered learning Spanish.

A very different country to France, much more welcoming. The beaches are far superior too, and the sea in the summer is around 26-28c.

In the winter months when Menorca is often rainy and chilly, they holiday in Cyprus or Egypt's Red Sea resorts.

Spain is sick of expats, nomads, and tourists. There are protests in the news all the time now.

R323 - That’s the safest way to go for many people especially in later life. It’s always easier to make friends with other newcomers versus locals who have had established social circles often since their childhood. This is true whether you move within your own country or to another. They should have moved to Dordogne which is the closest thing to an Anglophone bubble in France. It’s filled with UK retirees….Giles and Gillian wearing a gilet in front of their gîte.

[quote]That’s the safest way to go for many people especially in later life [making a community of friends among fellow expats]. It’s always easier to make friends with other newcomers versus locals who have had established social circles often since their childhood. R235

If you move to a community that's largely expats, it seems fairly inevitable. Brits seem much more inclined than Americans follow this birds-of-a-feather model in Spain. . Popular places for Brits include Malaga and the Costa del Sol (Nerja, Marbella, Estepona), the Costa Blanca and Alicante (Benidorm, Denia, Gandia), and the Valencia and its coast. There are places in the Costa Blanca where restaurants are as often fish & chips as tapas, and where, as R235 notes, you could get along handily without any more than an 'hola.'

Americans make a different overlay on the map. Many tend to favor Barcelona and Madrid, which both have significant international populations and are centers of business, but others seek a wider variety of locations. Americans often overlook the question of how they will make friends, and tend to expect that a warm reception awaits and that they will, of course, fit in easily. Sometimes their confidence is a little naive, like that daft CNN pair that moved to France. In casually following a couple of expat in Spain groups made up of English native speakers, the Brit women can get find themselves missing a favorite Brit food brand, but the American women take it to a different level of heartache over not finding a favorite American brand of laundry detergent as a symbol for missing everything in the US. Of course that'ß an observation about the whiners, not the larger group that are happy with where they live. It could well be, though, that the American tendency to avoid expat enclaves is a factor in the grumblers' disaffection with Spain. Also, it's worth noting that Brits seem more likely to have spent much time in Spain before relocating there -- relative their American counterparts.

To R235's point, my experience has been a happy one moving to a city that doesn't not have large numbers of expats who speak English as their native language. Introductions and ice breaking count for everything in Spain. Simply asking for help can work too. To be introduced into someone's circle of friends is to be welcomed and taken in immediately and fully. In short order you will know the family and the family friends of this circle and meet friends of friends and so your circle/s start to expand. I see and hear English native speakers but only know a few and only as acquaintances; my friends are a mix of Spanish and expats from non-English as primary language countries.

American gays, whatever European country you fantasise about moving to, here are three simple things to keep in mind:

1) Learn the language. It will take years before you become knowledgeable and comfortable enough to use idioms in your daily conversations, but, especially in the beginning, your efforts will be much-appreciated. (Yes, even though many EU-citizens are quick to switch to English because you are butchering their language)

2) Expect a ton of bureaucracy.

3) The cultural differences and expectations can be enormous. But even so, bear in mind that it will not be like a never-ending holiday. Once you enrol into the system, you will be receiving letters from tax offices, government and municipality, etc.

And lower your expectations. While some people might be curious, you will remain “those Americans” forever. Which is fine. But it will take you much longer than a national or even an EU-citizen from another country to really build up a network.

It's possible, but the road in the first 5 years is a steep one.

Joanna and Ed are what the French call les incompetents.

Americans confuse a certain superficial pleasantness with being friendly. Their equally dense in their own country. I quickly learned that Southern cordiality was a about distancing and drawing out a newcomer as anything else.

R325's last sentence: 👏👏👍😚😙

[QUOTE] Spain is sick of expats, nomads, and tourists. There are protests in the news all the time now.

They're not worried about senior citizens, you numbskull. Groups of yobs who just come to drink and fuck are the demographic they want to see less of.

I can't believe they would come back here. Even Healthcare CEOs aren't safe from random crime here.