Southern Fried French

Shabby and Shiny Chic in a French Village

When we first looked at the house we now own, I almost dismissed it because there is a high bank in a neighbor’s yard which is visible from one side of the garden, and there was an old orange tractor parked there. Though the farmer doesn’t park it there anymore, I’ve come to wish he still did: I now see it as a kind of colorful rural garden sculpture (see photo, left).

The farmer with the most “vintage” tractor in town, whom we shall call Monsieur M., was born in the village, and is even older than his tractor. He speaks the local patois, so he’s difficult to understand. But he and his wife are as kind a couple as they come, and a part of the rapidly disappearing French village life which has been somewhat altered and enriched (or so we hope) by expats. Sadly there’s no commerce in our village, but there once was: when they were young, Monsieur and Madame M. ran a bar in their barn, which turned into une boite (nightclub) in the evenings for dancing. There was a mezzanine in the barn, so parents could sit there and sip their wine while chaperoning les jeunes, dancing to the music below.

The other day Monsieur M. descended from his rickety relic, in his typical overalls and battered straw hat, to survey what is a magnet for a guy of any age or nationality: my elegant French neighbor from Marseilles, Jean-Marie, has a lipstick red Morgan. Of course if you were looking for a bit of French yin and yang, the new France and the old, you couldn’t find a better example than these two neighbors, plus the Morgan and the Tractor. (Both vehicles are brightly colored and both have four wheels, and there the similarity ends.) 

Photo right, the antique tractor.  Love the flowered seat on the interior, below.

You can see below, what happened next: Monsieur M. fascinated by the car, and my neighbor gallantly installing him in the passenger seat, for a cruise about town. Monsieur M. protested, but Jean-Marie insisted, and off they went, both beaming like schoolboys. A bridge between two different French planets. And lucky me, to arrive on the scene just in time for it to touch my heart, and to capture it for yours.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Important news:  Most of you are readers of Kristin's French-Word-a-Day blog.  Due to problems with the server, Kristin is changing servers for her feeds.  If you are a subscriber and are NOT getting her blog in your feed or in your email box, it's probalby due to the changeover and you should re-subscribe.  If you're not a subscriber already, you're missing a great blog!!

In the COMMENTS:  Anne of the Music and Markets blog, good luck on that Aix kitchen reno! And you can keep up with the goings-on in Aix at her blog. And as to buying houses, not everyone makes it as hard as I do: Julie in Dijon, unlike me, bought the second house they looked at! (Be sure and read Julie's very important post on the locks on the bridges in Paris, at her blog, Traveling Through.) Martin has a good point: it's a fact that the notaires have house listings as well as the agents, and it's good to inquire if you're hunting.

Favorite Reads: Herm Meyer is a regular reader of this blog and has his own blog, where he writes poems which he often pairs with photos. He's studies French too--check out his musings on the power of Words.

And other fun stuff:  Loyal readers Kurt and Laurence lived in France a long time, and now import tablecloths, napkins, and other French linens at their site, Occitan Imports, that will sing to you of Provence.  And the prices are VERY reasonable (I actually own a set of the serviettes, pictured right). Christmas is coming (or maybe a gift for yourself?). Check them out here.

If you want to learn about collecting French antiques, or just drool over them, try our reader Lidy's gorgeous site, French Garden House.  Lidy also sells antiques on her site, as well as blogging about them.  I loved her post about collecting French ironstone, as below.

How to Buy a House in France, Part 3

PHOTO, above: I thought it would be fun to show you a sampling of what's for sale at the moment in our area. This country estate , near Mâcon, can be yours for 1.3 million euros.

Since we’ve been talking about the selling of châteaux, it seems a good time to continue our discussion of buying French property. Our first post on the subject dealt with selecting a region, the second with understanding the French real estate agent system, which we think is complètement fou! (absolutely crazy).

So now we will address the question: what sort of a house do you want? And the crucial, related question: what sort of house can you actually FIND?

When I first went to the offices of the various agents immobilier, I always had my long list of criteria, which was this: une maison de charme et caractère; in or just outside of a village; the village should have commerce, like a boulangerie; gorgeous views; the house should be an old, stone one; a quiet location; a little pigeonnier would be nice, and an outdoor terrace and covered galerie; and a good orientation, of course, preferably south.  Oh, and ten minutes from Cluny.

Photo above right: a nicely renovated house in the pretty town of Azé (a wine area), for 335,000 euros. Below: the superb view from the rear of a renovated stone house near Cluny, with garage and wine caves, for 205,000 euros. 

Invariably, I would get the same response from the agents: major eye-rolling, and a French shrug. Some were even clairvoyant, finishing my list correctly for me before I even get to the end. As it turned out, all the expats, and French retirees, had almost exactly the same list. "Everyone wants a house like that, and they are few and far between,” they would tell me. “Where are you willing to compromise?” 

We learned to add something else to our list: no Fatal Flaws. I can’t begin to count the number of  houses we saw that were just perfect, EXCEPT FOR: the electrical pylon looming over the back garden. The TGV that zips by the house every six minutes. The brand new ugly commercial barn, dead center in that nice view. The chicken farm next door. The list goes on. Those pretty photos in the real estate windows? They never show, or mention, those flaws. And sometimes, of course, the Fatal Flaw is the price.  

But not for this one: the cute stone house above right is nicely renovated, and only 85,000 euros. Below, this 'craftsman special' needs lots of TLC, but has 4 bedrooms, a quiet location, great views, a raised garden, and an outbuilding with a garage, workshop, and an old bread oven. 134,000 euros.

The  moral of the story is, there is no perfect house. Be flexible and open-minded, and prioritize that list (but don’t ignore the Fatal Flaws). Often the first thing to go from the wish list is the village with commerce.  Most small villages don’t have any, and ours is no exception. But amazingly, we got most of the other things on our list. And recently, when Nicole told me HER long list for their post-château house, I nearly scoffed. “Hah!” I thought, “they’ll never find all that!”  And yet they got lucky too, and found a house that was (nearly) perfect for them—and we are SO happy about that.

Here’s hoping you get lucky too!

( I'm sure our readers would love to hear the experiences of other expats who've bought or looked for houses here in French--please share!)

One last PHOTO:  north of us, near Beaune, you can get a house right on the canal, for 190,000 euros.

In the COMMENTS:  I was touched by all the lovely comments, many from folks who have stayed at the château. Nicole responded to all with a lengthy comment that (once again!) brought a tear to my eye.

PLEASE NOTE!  As of this week we will go into "winter mode" for this blog, which will come out every 2 weeks instead of weekly.  Please stay with us!

 

The Twilight of the Decade

I don’t quite know how it happened, but almost all of the expat friends we’ve met here, and some of our French ones, moved to southern Burgundy about the same time we did, a decade ago. We all learned French together, renovated houses together; many of us had our first grandkids during this time. And now, a decade later, suddenly there’s another shift. Everyone seems to be downsizing, or heading back home for the winter, or taking a round-the-world trip, or shaking it up a bit in some fashion. Ron has dubbed the transition “The Twilight of the Decade”.

Whatever changes come along, our “tribe” has had a stable center: the château, and Nicole and Pierre. We lived in the castle three years before we bought an old stone farmhouse nearby, but it has always remained our spiritual French home, and a sort of social center for friends.

But even at our 600 year-old castle, things change. Though the château has been in Pierre’s family for 300 years, sometimes it’s just time to move on.Renovating and maintaining a château is a full-time job, and though they’ve devoted their life to it, with some help from our crowd, at some point it’s time to say, Enough. As Nicole says, they are simply guardians, and now it’s time for someone else to carry on the tradition.

 And so, the château has been SOLD! To a fine French couple who will hopefully love it as we all have.

Nicole and Pierre have bought a normal-sized house in a small town nearby, where they can walk to boucherie and boulangerie. Though the house is only 25 years old, oddly enough it has un petit peu of the ambiance of the château.  There are attached village houses all around, but this maison sits back from the road on a nice piece of land, with grand entry gates. There is even a tower!  And, a huge terrace where party-girl Nicole can continue her grand fêtes. It’s still looking for a name: ChateauFaux? ChateauToo? The Mini-Chateau?  Ideas are welcome! Photo: The work crew takes a break.

As you can imagine, tears have been shed. But we are all happy that Nicole and Pierre have found a great new house, and life will be easier for them. 

That is, after they’ve renovated the new purchase, AND moved many decades of accumulated stuff out of the chatêau. Yesterday, for example, was a workday (with pizza for lunch) for our crowd. Even our US houseguests Jack and Emily—visiting us for a few days after their Paris honeymoon—were pressed into service. We packed up literally hundreds of dinner plates, hundreds of dessert plates and glasses. After all, there are four kitchens in the château, not to mention all the other stuff. Photo: Bye-bye to all that.

As I write this, I’m sitting in a café in Cluny with an espresso and a brioche, and there is a harpist under a tree, sending his angelic notes floating around the square. I’m looking at the lovely facade of the 10th century Abbey de Cluny. I think of the blessings this decade has brought, and a tear rolls down my cheek.  

But life must go on, and so will this blog!  Thanks for sharing the journey with me, and we’ll see what the next decade in France will bring. à la semaine prochaine...

 

In the COMMENTS: Harriet, Barney, Sandy, and Rainey, thanks for adding to our French knowledge with more time expressions! Rainey near Uzes sent a link to her daugter's vacation rental site in the same area, which will REALLY have you dreaming of the south of France. Rainey, Uzes is one of our favorite places, we are there often.  Natalia, good point about blanche.  Blanche can also mean to make white or pale, so maybe nuit blanche it's how you look after you're up all night!

 

All in Good French Time

Photo: In Salon de Provence, the Hôtel de Ville has a clock with both 24 hour and 12 hour time.

They say each culture has it’s own definition of time.  From the punctual Swiss to the laid back Spaniards, time has slightly different meanings.

The French are fairly precise when it comes to time (well, unless you’re talking about an ouvrier’s arrival), though there was one thing that puzzled me when we first moved here. If you ask a French person when they can come by and they say au début de l’aprés-midi (start of the afternoon), as they often do, they mean this: right after lunch, plus the time it takes to get to your house. Which to us would be vague, but for the French, lunch is 12 to 2, so this is in fact a specific time.

So if you want to be à l’heure (right on time), then for your French lesson du jour, let’s look at some interesting expressions involving time, French-style.  By the way, in talking about time, the French generally use the 24 hour clock, though they sometimes use the 12 hour clock time as well.

--We all know à bientôt (see you soon) as a parting expression, but you often hear à toute à l’heure (literally, “at every hour”). Which is even sooner, like “I’ll see you shortly”.  It can also mean “a little while ago”.

--Le quatre heure, 4:00, is the universal expression for snack-time for kids (OK and maybe some of us adults).  

--L’heure cruese is a quiet or dead time, when nothing much is happening.

--Les heures de pointe are high traffic times, as with cars or trains.

--Les dix minutes de politesse, or “the 10 minutes of politeness”, means you should arrive between 5 and 15 minutes late to dinner to allow your hosts to get their act together.

--Quand c’est l’heure, c’est l’heure is an expression meaning: the moment is right, just do it!

--Chercher midi à quartorze heure (literally, to search for noon at 2:00) means to make something difficult, to make it harder than it has to be.

--Il était une fois is how the French say “Once upon a time…”.

 And when it comes to sleepy-time:

 --Une nuit blanche is a sleepless night, or maybe you never got to bed.

 --Faire la grasse matinée means to sleep late.

 And finally, take care if you toss this expression around:

--Le cing à sept (5:00pm to 7:00pm) refers to the period when illicit affairs take place, that little tryst between boulot and dodo (work and sleep).

We came up with the expressions above in my French conversation group.  We'd love to hear them, if you have more!

 

In the COMMENTS: Does anyone have a great house rental in Provence to recommend to Debbie?  Natalia, aioli would be great with a bouillibaisse.  And Jane, that meal will inspire envy--so fresh, so French!

Favorite Reads:  Jeff Steiner has a very useful website called  Americans in France, and I had such a laugh this week over his newletter post, called "12 Things to do in Southern Burgundy That You Can't Do in Paris".   And book lovers and collectors, if you haven't discovered the book I'm reading, and loving, at the moment,  do check it out: The Bookman's Tale: A Novel of Obsession, by Charlie Lovett.