Give us this day...

Part of the fun of moving to a new country is in embracing all that it offers - and spending endless hours beforehand planning your new life abroad. Needless to say, practical day-to-day stuff dominates (schools, health care, can you get ‘Neighbours’ on freeview - et al), even if it’s just a modest hop across the channel to la belle France.

And all of this is fine, and probably a better approach than settling here because you once enjoyed a trip to Disneyland Paris – but should your wish list really include being able to walk to a boulangerie?

Would you, for instance, base your choice of a home in Blighty on its proximity to the local Tesco metro, kebab shop or Mr Singh’s amazing (& almost always open) grocery store? But let’s suppose you follow your dream and buy your rather quaint stone and shuttered village house just two doors down from the bakery - then discover that the vieille truite behind the till regularly shuts her emporium for weeks on end. And, when she actually deigns to open, you find that from dawn to dusk there’s a constant coming & going of her customers – all of whom are local and share a nostalgic yearning for their post war childhoods of widespread poverty, rationing and, particularly, sawdust filled pain. They’re also oblivious to madam’s unique approach to customer relations – and on arrival park (viz; abandon at 90° to the pavement) their knackered white vans right in front of your house, rendering you either marooned in a sea of rusty Renaults or, if you do nip out, nowhere nearby to leave  your own car.

Happily, village life is otherwise all you’d hoped – and swiftly you hear that the boulangerie in the next street not only is run by a charming woman, but produces infinitely better bread and observes 21st century opening hours. The only irritation is discovering that she also delivers door to door daily throughout the commune - which, had you but known, would have allowed you to buy something slightly more secluded and enjoy your daily baguette fix without getting into the car. That said, if you want a shop, restaurant and bar on the doorstep, you’re in the right place. And as you potter home of a warm summer’s evening both content & replete (having visited all three), you can reflect that your choice of home was the right one all along. Hic.