30th June 2008
Are meddlesome bureaucrats sapping France’s famous joie de vivre? If an Englishman’s home is his castle, then what is a Frenchman’s? I think I have the answer: as well as a place to build a barbecue out of breeze blocks, decorate badly and tie up barki …
15th June 2008
French Mistress: Heaven knows they’re misérables now If an Englishman’s home is his castle, then what is a Frenchman’s? I think I have the answer: as well as a place to build a barbecue out of breeze blocks, decorate badly and tie up barking dogs outsi …
30th March 2008
Sordid ‘sex for housing’ deals are just another symptom of the scandalous cost of living in France Helena Frith Powell: French mistress March 30 2008, 12:00am, The Sunday Times The shocking news from France this month is that some female students have …
24th February 2008
Helena Frith Powell February 24 2008, 12:00am, The Sunday Times An hour is a long time in French politics. Two hours feels like for ever, but that’s the total length of time I have been in the business. My husband says the only reason to become a polit …
22nd January 2008
Is France’s liberté going to the dogs? In my next life, I would rather not come back as a French dog. Unless you are a Parisian poodle, life will consist mainly of being tied up in a yard or put in a cage and left to bark for hours on end. (Having said …
9th October 2007
French schools are brilliant at instilling respect and discipline – but individuality is not on the curriculum Liberté, égalité and similarité I have just survived the most trying month of the year in France. September is not all balmy evenings and ros …
14th September 2007
When you buy a holiday home abroad you do it for the sunshine and the peaceful way of life. While Britain seems to be run by gangs of teenage youths, France is a haven. You expect to be able to leave your car in the street without fear of having its ty …
30th July 2007
I was rather hoping that Nicolas Sarkozy might appoint a Brit to his new cabinet. It is true that his Prime Minister, Francois Fillon, is married to a woman born in Wales, speaks English and has even passed several days as a fly on the wall observer in …
In my last column I argued that the only way to save France was to get some Brits in charge. This produced an extraordinary mailbag. “Why don’t you go home to that wonderful Utopia called England and leave the French to organize things their way,” said …
Most people move to France in order to do as little as possible. For as long as anyone can remember, you go to England to earn money and to France to spend it. Once in France working is the last thing on anyone’s mind. How can you possibly do anything …
15th July 2007
I’ve never had it so good In my column last month, I argued that the only way to save France was to put some Brits in charge. This produced an extraordinarily large and rather critical mailbag. “Why don’t you go home to that wonderful utopia called Eng …
29th April 2007
Watch out for the British cowboys – Maybe it’s time we expats started trusting the locals more. When the technician showed up this week to fix my television and install the satellite dish for my broadband internet, I was relieved for two reasons. First …
23rd February 2007
Intellectualism is not a dirty word in a country that revels in its cultural identity There are times when I realise we bought more than just a house in the south of France. Such as when I read in a newspaper that French presidential candidate Nicolas …
15th January 2007
Mon dieu! My underwear doesn’t match Worrying about bizarre concerns is an inevitable consequence of going native I recently read an article about Louise Clarke, the recruitment consultant from Bristol who woke up one morning convinced she was French. …
31st December 2006
“When the gods want to punish you, they answer your prayers,” wrote Karen Blixen. One of my prayers as a child was to spend Christmas day with both my parents. They were divorced when I was three. My mother, a Swede, left my Italian father for an Engli …
13th December 2006
This summer around 250,000 people will descend on the grim concrete holiday village of Cap d’Agde in the south of France for the sole purpose of getting their kit off. When I hear Europe’s largest nudist colony is a mere half an hour away from my house …
A good walk spoiled by rules….. There are at least two places you will find snails on a French golf course. One is in the restaurant, where they will be marinated in garlic and served hot. The other is on giant posters on the course, encouraging people …
It isn’t until the priest begins to speak that I remember I am in France. The ladies look like they are dressed for Ascot. The first reading is the one that begins: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, and have not love” which we have al …
It isn’t until the priest opens his mouth that I remember I am in France. The ladies look like they are dressed for Ascot. The first reading is the one that begins: “Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, and have not love” which we have al …
Food, not so glorious, food National stereotypes die hard. Despite France’s poor showing in a recent list of the world’s top 10 restaurants, only one against the Britain’s four, the French still view England as a place with appalling weather and even w …
George Bernard Shaw once said that “It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him”. In France he doesn’t even need to open his mouth. Forget the French demonstrating in Brittany. The colde …
It’s a funny thing about communication companies, but whenever you want to get hold of somebody, there’s nobody to talk to. Just recently I’ve been very keen to get hold of somebody at France Telecom. And shake them. Then strangle them, slowly. This ur …
When the police appear at a hunt in France, they are there to help the huntsmen and the hounds, not to arrest them. Henri d’Origny, a designer for Hérmes and regular at the Rallye Trois Fôrets hunt north of Paris, says the gendarmes queue up to attend …
There is an organisation that anybody buying a place in rural France should know about: the Société d’Aménagement Foncier et d’Etablissement Rural, or Safer. If you are interested in farming in France, they are here to help: from animal husbandry to gî …
My stepson Hugo will be 13 next year and has been offered a place at Eton. There are two reasons he won’t be going. One, it costs a fortune. Two, almost more crucially, his chances of getting into university afterwards will be diminished if he goes to …
I have had more car accidents in the short time I have been in France than the rest of my life put together. It’s true that one of the incidents did include me backing the car into a tree, but whose idea was it to put giant trees so close to the road? …
Making a living from wine You’re on the 7.40 to Cannon Street. The person next to you is sniffing incessantly. The carriage is littered with foul smelling Burger King bags. The train is delayed and guess what? It’s raining. In an effort to take yoursel …
One of the ways we encourage people not to come and stay with us again is to convince them to buy their own house. Rod and Fee Thompson, for example, have been bothering us for years. They arrive every summer with undrinkable bottles of Cahors which th …
On your bike It was when my husband started reading Vélo Magazine in bed that I finally realised moving to France had its drawbacks. Until then he had been an amusing person to live with, full of wit and charm, and occasional interesting conversation. …
The high cost of French home owning It seems like an obvious thing to do. Buy a house in France and rent it out to cover the costs, use it for your holidays and then end up with an asset once the debts are paid. But how realistic is it really? Tom, a f …
I was doing some late-night admin in my office when I heard Olivia run downstairs. “Daddy,” I heard her say to Rupert, who was watching the news. “There’s a big, big problem.” So far I was still only half listening. It was the next sentence that had me …
12th December 2006
Since I moved here five years ago house prices have gone up dramatically. Gone are the days when £100,000 would buy you a château and 70 acres. Now you’d be hard pressed to get a two-up two-down on a housing estate for less than that. There is one nota …
Pity poor Sting. Half a mile from his 17th century manor house in Wiltshire a small wooden fishing hut has been erected without planning permission. The singer is not so much dancing on the moon as hopping mad. He doesn’t want his Sunday lunch ruined b …
If you’re thinking of buying a property in France you’re probably worrying about how to deal with the French bureaucracy, the language and even the French themselves. But all these pale in comparison when treading the dangerous path of dealing with the …
I’ve been thinking a lot about Marie Antoinette recently. There’s a nice new film about her and I like the costumes. But I also think I am beginning to understand why the French were so keen to get rid of her. She had a reputation for arrogance and her …
It is a truth universally acknowledged that an Englishman in possession of a house in France must be in want of a builder. Brits are famous for buying wrecks the French wouldn’t touch with an extra-long baguette. They then spend years doing them up. Ye …
My husband has a foolproof method for ascertaining just how French our children are becoming. Every Sunday morning as we tuck into our boiled eggs he asks them two questions: What is the best football team in the world and was Napoleon a good bloke? Th …
News reaches me that many of us are going to live to be 100. According to experts there could be 1.2 million centenarians in Britain by 2074. This is extremely worrying for those of us in France. And terrifying for those of us in the far south of Franc …
Summer is here. AS WELL AS PEACHES, FIGS AND LONG EVENINGS BY THE POOL DRINKING ROSE WINE, IT HERALDS THE ARRIVAL OF TWO THINGS: mosquitoes and guests. Both have been hibernating all winter ready to pounce on you as soon as a sun lounger appears or the …
Reports reach me that Brits living in France have been involved in large-scale defrauding of the benefits system. In a £500,000 benefits fraud case in the Dordogne, more than a third of the alleged culprits were said to be Brits. We need to locate thes …
11th December 2006
It is 7.30 in the morning and I am in the courtyard of the Mayor’s office in Pezenas. No, I’m not in trouble with the authorities again, but am here to sell fresh almonds. There is a bustling market in Pezenas on a Saturday and my husband’s latest mone …
I am finally able to compare the criminal justice systems of England and France, having been in police custody in both. The first time was in England almost 20 years ago. The latest, in France. Last week I had an accident, or rather a frenzied French w …
15th January 2006
They have realised their dream of living in France. But many UK expats are determined to create a little Britain once theyre there As thousands of people flock to London’s Olympia at the end of this week for the annual Vive La France exhibition …