Getting to Know you, the Aroma Fremeire
Our neighbour Claude is not your typical French Farmer for one reason only. He’s actually rather dapper and doesn’t quite smell right. Not for him the usual odour of stale cigarette, old cow, slightly ripe farmer with a sprinkling of something unidentifiable… But in other respects he is rather typical. He didn’t want to be a farmer, but who else would take on the family acres. The countryside has been sadly lacking in farmers wives and we have a number of rather elderly gentlemen, including Claude, who never married because all the young girls saw a better life coming over the horizon and left. As Claude never really wanted to be a farmer he gave the farm up at the earliest opportunity, when at 65yrs old he qualified for his state pension. He rented out his fields and took up his new occupation. Sitting. Yes just sitting; outside his small farm house and watching the world go by. The only issue with this is that where Claude lives about 600m from us no one really goes by. The only thing to see is the odd English couple in the valley. We therefore feel a duty to keep him fully entertained with our madcap building and gardening schemes.
So how do you make new friends in a whole new country with a different language and culture. So many times I’ve heard the middle-class bray of ‘of course we don’t really mix with the expats, all our friends are French’ and ‘where we live there aren’t many English’. These are lies, put about by some slightly deluded idealist expats, just my opinion of course. There are English people all over France, rather a lot of them and Dutch, German, Portuguese, Australian, and ‘Parisians’: and thats just in our village, yep really people do seem to get about. We thought we’d moved to the back end of nowhere. Rural France, as in, far, far, far from everything, no buses, not many cars and just a sprinkling of amusing natives.….the expats just crept up on us, knocking on the door, in the butchers, at the Fete in the village and then the whole on line advice thing exploded. We really could live here and never learn the language, many people seem to get by amazingly well without ever learning a to conjugate a single french verb. Bien fait, thats the french way of saying well done, but on its own its sarcastic rather than complimentary. They all meant to learn French, many tired to learn and some succeed , but not many. Its quite reassuring, not just me thats still has difficulty then.
One day at about week three there was a knock on the door, A visitor! wahoo, our door bell did work! It was one of our expat neighbours Guy, he lives just up the hill from us with his husband Andrew. He heard we were here and had just popped in to say hello and see if we were ok, how nice was that! It was great to see him and he gave us some invaluable advice about making friends and getting to know people. So we invited them for dinner. Feeding people is a great way of making friends.
Guy told us more about the extensive expat community. The one we never knew existed. Most importantly, to be careful what you say about any expat people you meet, everyone knows everyone, it’s like a club, or a village. We certainly didn’t want to go alienating anyone this early in our adventure. Living in the middle of nowhere you need people you can call on when things get tough, when you need some help with a task and everyone has a skill or advice to offer. He told us we would meet people you would never have come into contact with in the UK, it’s so true. From people that knit their own yogurt, to a retired LSD chemist and a renowned artists and it’s amazing the people attracted to the not so simple life. We arrived with the natural wariness of people coming from southern England, where if its not tied down and alarmed anything will get nicked, to a house that hadn’t been locked in 20 years. We are just beginning to relax.
Both Kris and Guy had told us to stop and speak to the neighbours, say hello and get to know them, they are very curious to see what’s happening and they would love to speak to you. They will not knock on your door and say hello. You need to ask them for help if you need it, but if you do they will be so happy to see you, flattered you asked and very happy to come to your aid. Just one more cultural difference to get to grips with. We have embraced this and made some great friends. So early on in our residency I made jam. Quite a lot, as we have orchards and that means fruit. I thought the friendly thing to do would be take some to Claude. My french being, poor verging on dreadful, I knew it would be a difficult encounter. I dually plucked up the courage and marched up the hill. I knocked on the door and out came my lovely neighbour all smiles. I managed to make my self understood, with lots of Ça va, Ça va and held out my gift. Claude declined the gift, but explained that he can’t eat jam because he’s diabetic. His local accent is very strong and five years on I can still only make out one word in three. I skipped home because I’d managed my first conversation with him and I’d made a new friend. I stop, when I’m passing, to say hello if he’s there and we have a conversation about gardening and chickens and the cats. I still understand only a small amount but each time I pick out a few more words. It’s thanks to these conversations and the odd little gifts of eggs, when his chickens had been eaten by the fox that I’m sure have lead to the friendly reception we get from the other older farmers whom we see about.
On one of my early trips into town, probably sorting the insurance, I popped in to the butcher to buy some lamb chops for tea. There was a bit of a queue and when it was my turn I used my very best French. The butcher just looked at me, nothing, I tried again, I think he quacked, it’s the accent ‘quoi’ What? and then the lady behind me repeated what I thought I had just said, he appeared enlightened and chops were duly weighed and handed over.
A slight change of accent can change the whole meaning of something you say, many times I thought that people were being difficult and not making any effort to understand. Now I realise that the slight errors can render a whole sentence unintelligible. Above and below, ci-dessus et ci-dessous, more and less, plus and plus …just whether or not you pronounce the ’s’ and I’m hot, je suis chaud, well you may think you are but you probably mean j’ai chaud rather than I’m sexy! These are the simple ones, everyone talks about, I’ve made many many errors with some amusing or embarrassing consequence, I never meant to talk about his willy it was the christmas tree ‘sapin’ not ‘ça pin’ i wanted to light up!
My rescuer in the butchers then asked me, in french if I was English, and when I confirmed that I was told me she came from Gloucestershire and was Gay. This was my introduction to our next nearest English neighbour Vanessa, who had me in stitches and proved to be another invaluable source of information. She gave me her email address on the spot and lives just up the other side of our valley. One thing I learnt from this encounter is how much I’d missed a good belly laugh. Honestly trying humour in a second language is the final barrier to integration, I’m definitely not there yet, so when I’m desperate for a laugh I pop over and see Vanessa.
We decided for a rather dull couple, who tend not be be that sociable, we should get out and about and meet people. David is very polite and considerate, he’d rather say nothing than upset some one, so generally he says very little and I fill every silence by talking far too much, so it’s better I stay home and you don’t have to listen to me prattling on. But, for our first year we went to every fete, village meals and accepted all invitations; I’m sure we’d have gone to the opening of a barn door it it had been advertised. This way we met lots of people, French, English, young, old and the very useful.
Getting into the social fabric of the vIllage has been a key element in settling into the area. At the beginning of August some one put a leaflet in the post box inviting subscription to the annual village walk, followed by a meal. In the spirit of all the advice we had had, I phoned the mobile number on the paper and had an interesting conversation but I seemed to have got myself on the list. So we set off for the appointed rendezvous at 08.30 am and did a lovely walk with the mayor, his wife, Kris, Steve and various other villagers. Returning to the, salle de fête for an aperitif, we were joined by more neighbours and helped Coco, the mayors wife setting out tables in the car park under the trees.
Bread and bowls of Crisps were distributed and as people arrived, they claimed their places by setting out knives forks plates and glasses they had brought with them. This communal eating is definitely a feature of village life. Bringing your own knives and forks saves anyone washing up. Wine was produced and melon and ham and cooked chickens from the supermarket rotisserie, apparently to go with the crisps. Then slices of cheese served onto the same plate followed up by slices of apple pie. And plenty more wine. A very convivial setting, we felt. By late afternoon we were very content and slightly drunk. Then out came the eau du vie. Michel (the mayor) told us to watch out, as an elderly gentleman produced a bottle of eau du vie wrapped in a large white cloth. Jean’s special eau du vie contains a ‘serpant’ yes really a snake, we avoided that one with lots of laughter. We rolled home feeling truly part of the village.
We had only been here five weeks when we disappeared for a month; so we felt like maybe we’d be seen as some fly by night Jonny foreigners with not a serious intention of staying or being part of the community. Settling into a new life can be a bit daunting and being accepted can take years so we though maybe we should have a house warming.
To enable us to converse with our guests we decided we’d better get started on some French lessons. We found a local French teacher and had our first few lessons before the party. We eventually had about four years of classes with Emilie. We were not the best students, something must have rubbed off, but now we have move on to exploring online learning, watching a bit of French TV and talking to our neighbours or rather listening rather than conversing. David speaks excellent Bricolage french, he knows all the bits of his tractor, plumbing connections and two pronunciations for cement depending how local to us the supplier is. The local accent is thicker than treacle, I’d equate it with Gordie; the older gentlemen rest their chins on their chests and then sort of quack, we nod in what we think is the appropriate place and then later have a discussion about what we think they may have said. I manage the banking, doctors appointments and guest bookings, admin french. There are now many words we use more in French than English, I tell my self its progress that sometimes it’s remembering the English for something thats difficult. We aren’t being pretentious, honest, but we never kept bees in the UK, or chickens for that mater, or had a tractor, digger or trailer for our car.
We though we’d throw our party in that dull bit that’s winter but its not quite Christmas. The 6th December fell on a Saturday, St Nicholas day perfect. I can decorate for Christmas. We invited the neighbours, Claude and the two elderly sisters, who live just up from up the hill. They do knicker Semaphore with their washing. As I drive past I often see the biggest knickers in the world hang on the line in their open barn beside the road. The tiniest ladies and the biggest knickers I ever saw. We invited Alene who was another farming matriarch and keeper of sheep. We made a list, the Mayor and his wife, Jean, of the snake in his eau de vie, Jean Paul, who had been the Mayor, was the dustbin man and was to be the Mayor again. We invited Brian and Marianne whom we had stayed with during our house search, and Yonnel and Christoff who supplied much of our garden equipment. We invited our expat neighbours and French neighbours and hoped someone would come.
The house is big, and at this point we had only the furniture we’d brought with us. Not enough to make it feel cosy. So I decided to fill up some of the space with Christmas trees. We had loads of fairy lights and piles of decorations. So where do you get Christmas trees in France at the end of November, beginning of December? I hadn’t see any. Odd I thought, nearly December, all the shops should be brimming with Christmas trees, but no. Not one. Not real, not artificial. Nothing.
Of course I didn’t realise that Christmas wasn’t a big thing here….really nothing like the Uk. There’s decorations in the supermarket for a couple of weeks in December, but not the volume of glitzy toot you find in the Uk. No crackers, they don’t do crackers, not much on the way of christmasy cards, they don’t do those much either. Christmas is different. Dinner in is on Christmas Eve. Presents are done then too. Traditionally people went to midnight mass, then being Catholic you couldn’t eat before Mass so they ate Christmas dinner when they got home at 1am. This tradition has mostly disappeared and dinner is now eaten during the evening. Christmas day is a more grown up affair, they eat oysters and drink Champagne. Well if you stuffed a five course meal with turkey and chocolate logs and lots of wine, in the early hours of the morning not much room for anything but hair of the dog. I think Champagne is the French equivalent of alka seltzer .
I learnt later that trees will suddenly appear about ten days before Christmas and if you’re lucky you might get one. This first year I wasn’t in on the secret so I reverted the facebook. There’s a site for English speakers in our area. So I asked and up popped an advert for Kingdom Vegetal. A garden centre not too far away from us, owned by a couple of Brits and they were having, of all things a Christmas Faire, with mulled wine and mince pies….yes mince pies. As soon as someone mentioned mince pies I realised I missed them. So I dragged David along to one of those Expat gatherings in search of trees. Success, and while we were there we chatted to Gary about trees. It turns out trees are his thing, we like trees, we really do love trees so this was going to be very handy. They’d been here quite a while and they lived in a mill. Always useful to know another mill owner. So we bought two Christmas trees and sent them an invitation to our housewarming.
The one thing about this bit of France is that in winter it can be a bit chilly. F’Freezing not to put to fine a point on it. We may be a long way south, but its continental weather and there are some mountains not too far away. These big old houses can be a bit cold too. Which explains why the French have been building lots of small modern bungalows like a rash of lego houses everywhere. So we came up with a plan. Hospitality usually involves food and drink. That and good company and I’m happy. So our plan was greet people in the gite, there were big double doors there at the time and the front part had a tiled floor. So we dragged in the garden table and set up a drinks station. We brought in the garden chairs to dump coats on. There was mulled wine, beer and a choice of wine boxes, and juices and water.
We stuck a couple of heaters in the dinning room to warm it up and set up the big dinning table to feed people bowls of chilli, bread, and things to put on the chilli. And I made a selection of Cakes and set up a table with them all displayed. A help yourself, hot wine and hot food to help keep our guests warm in the big chilly mill. We put the log burner on in the living room and an electric heater. The log burner didn’t really seem to warm the room up, unless you sat really close. It’s a big room with high ceilings. It works well now but took us a couple of years to resolve.
Guest started to arrive and we welcomed them at the door. We started to encourage them in with a glass of mulled wine. Our french neighbours came in and were lovely and seemed so happy to have been asked. They brought us gifts of wine and armagnac and plants. Then they sat down in the freezing cold gite and chatted to their friends, as we greeted more guests and pointed them in the direction of the dinning room. It was so chilly by the door in the gite and seemed a bit odd that people were staying there, so I sought advice, how to get them in the warm and maybe nearer the food. Another school day for us. French guests will enter your home to the point to which they are specifically invited, another cultural difference. So we asked if they would like a tour of the house, this worked a treat. Most hadn’t been inside the house since at least 1976 and were delighted to share stories of working at the mill. The french eat their main meal at lunch time but I’d made a very mild chilli and even managed to entice most of our older friends to try some food. Serving yourself is another thing that doesn’t come naturally, certainly the older generation wait to be served. It seems that with a little encouragement most people can be entice to eat cake though.
In all about 50 people came to the house warming, We are working up to a repeat performance, slowly, we know a lot more people now, but the house has changed quite a bit. We worked out how to keep warm for starters. The house warming gave us a great opportunity to get to know the neighbours better and maybe its time to push the boat out and do it all again. A sort of Bollocks Brexit we’re staying party. But then Covid put pay to that…maybe we will wait til year 10….
So what’s our advise on making friends and building a new life in France?
Many people tell us we are very well integrated after such a short time. We really are not that sociable, so if we can do it anyone can. We didn’t leave our natural mistrust and suspicions at the boarder as we came in, but slowly we are beginning to unbend just a little. Not everyone will like you, there are people here who don’t like the ‘English” thats basically any one not French they don’t differentiate between Belgian Dutch German and English, but we are better than Parisians. The thing is we haven’t met them. They tend not to like anyone much, so they wouldn’t come to village events anyway. Did you ever live anywhere where everyone liked you?
Go to village events. All of them, don’t worry if you don’t eat some of the food on the menu, sometimes a veggie option can be ordered when you book. If you are vegan you can even take your own food. About four times a year our village has a meal together, organised by one group or another. The village Fete, in June, the walk in August, Le St Martin on 11th of November, which is a meal for the whole village and all the retired people get it free, that was most of the village when we arrived. Then theres the Mayors reception and Gallette du Roi in January, when we all drink quite a lot and the mayor addresses the village saying a few words about the departed, welcoming the new residents and toasting the baby’s born and we eat the special cake with fave ( a bean, which is usually a tooth breaking plastic toy). The chasse (hunt) have their dinner of many courses of venison and wild boar in about March. These are all advertised by a scrap of paper being deposited in the post box and a requirement to bring your ’couverts’ that it plates, cutlery and a wine glass. You may find it a bit difficult if you are at all fussy about the quality of the wine you drink, but they are very typically French events, very sociable and part of village life. We go and sit with our friends and chat in our terrible French and generally have a great sense of well being as a result, maybe brought on by the quantity of alcohol consumed. We know our neighbours and they know us.
2. Join in There are a few quirky village associations in Samouillan.
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Firstly the Affouarge. This is the village wood cutting. Most villages and towns in France have some communal woodland. This is managed by the forestry commission and the Mairie. In many villages the management of this is now given over to a business who pay the village a small fee. but in our village a group of, mostly men, cut wood and manage the woodland. They wield chain saws at dead trees and cut paths all winter, then chop them into logs for firewood. Each affouargiste gets a share of the firewood. They then pay the tax on the wood, at about 14€ a metre square. As opposed to the local price of about 60€ to buy. The wood is collected, matured and delivered by the team. If some people don’t want their whole allocation it is sold and the profit goes to an association in the village. David joined the team the first year, and after a hard mornings work they stop for his weekly french lesson or Aperitif as others call it, beer or Riccard and putting the world to rights.
The Committee du Fete– every village and town has one, none have enough volunteers so you could join and get involved in village life. It’s a bit like a village fete committee in the Uk but in many villages they run lots of events and it’s worth joining to get to know the people in the village.
Other groups _ There are school associations and quilting circles and village hall exercise classes all to be joined. If there is something you like doing there is probably a group for it. unlike the Uk here they have an open day to subscribe so you can go, in September on a Saturday and see what you fancy joining. Its a bit like Freshers week. Someone in your Mairee will be able to point you in the right direction. Walking and cycling groups are favourites here.
In our village we have ‘Tous en Sam another social group. Our village fete committee only do what they are set up for, so other events and a small voluntary bar are run by this separate association. In my first year here I was ‘invited’ , or coerced into taking on the role of treasurer. The association has in the last couple of years built a small bar, run on Friday nights in summer to add to the ambiance of the village pétanque games and then this has expanded to making meals four times in season, moules frites, saucisse frites, and the like. I make the desserts for these meals too. On average about 50 people come, which is a lot in a village of only 130 people. Profits from the association are used for the benefit of the village. We bought a couple of replacement windows for the church, built the bar and have set aside some money for a new door for the church so its a very effective fund raising scheme. On nights when we don’t have a meal take away food trucks come, with pizza or chicken.
Facebook – Oh yes, there are English speakers groups for all kinds of things, bee keepers in France, English Speakers in the Haute Garrone cycling if you want to you can find anything. Getting your driving license exchange or your car registered there are Facebook groups to join for all those difficult admin jobs.
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