Culture clash

You've got to laugh really...

Reading the BBC News page this morning I came across this:

The reality of Paris does not always live up to the dream. A dozen or so Japanese tourists a year have to be repatriated from the French capital, after falling prey to what's become known as "Paris syndrome". That is what some polite Japanese tourists suffer when they discover that Parisians can be rude or the city does not meet their expectations. The experience can apparently be too stressful for some and they suffer a psychiatric breakdown. Around a million Japanese travel to France every year.

Many of the visitors come with a deeply romantic vision of Paris - the cobbled streets, as seen in the film Amelie, the beauty of French women or the high culture and art at the Louvre. The reality can come as a shock. An encounter with a rude taxi driver, or a Parisian waiter who shouts at customers who cannot speak fluent French, might be laughed off by those from other Western cultures. But for the Japanese - used to a more polite and helpful society in which voices are rarely raised in anger - the experience of their dream city turning into a nightmare can simply be too much. This year alone, the Japanese embassy in Paris has had to repatriate four people with a doctor or nurse on board the plane to help them get over the shock. They were suffering from "Paris syndrome".

It was a Japanese psychiatrist working in France, Professor Hiroaki Ota, who first identified the syndrome some 20 years ago. On average, up to 12 Japanese tourists a year fall victim to it, mainly women in their 30s with high expectations of what may be their first trip abroad. The Japanese embassy has a 24-hour hotline for those suffering from severe culture shock, and can help find hospital treatment for anyone in need. However, the only permanent cure is to go back to Japan - never to return to Paris.

Now, the rudeness of the Parisians is legendary - from my experiences in Burgundy I can confirm that a lot of the time my family have been made more welcome than the average Parisian because even the rest of France can't handle their arrogance. It says it all that the recent change in the format of car number plates in France was largely put in place to make Parisian cars less easily indentifiable because they were apparently being vandalised when they ventured out of the capital. So, come the Angevin Revolution, the entire city is going to be sent to an upper-class British Charm School for a thorough lesson in Good Manners (where, hopefully, they will also be taught to clear up the dog-poo littered pavements which is the first thing which comes to mind whenever Paris is mentioned...). BUT... if that makes my gentle readers think I have any sympathy for the Japanese they couldn't be more wrong.

I was at Oxford for my post-grad and I needn't tell anybody with even a passing familiarity with the place what a royal pain in the bum the Japanese tourists are. They are quite happy to bang on about respect when it suits THEM, or indeed when you visit their country, but you don't hear much about it when they're scampering all over the place trying to find the best angles for their interminable souvenir photographs. Summertime was positive torture - air conditioning being virtually unknown in most colleges, to get any sort of relief from the heat you had to open your windows. OK if you're on the first or second floors, but if your room was at ground level this was viewed by the Japanese as a golden opportunity. I can't count the number of times I was minding my own business in the MCR, reading the papers and having a swift coffee, only to discover one of the little pests had shoved their camera in the open window and were merrily snapping away. That wasn't the worst of it - as some of the showers were half-underground at my college, and therefore had small windows at ground-level, I have also been snapped whilst at my ablutions. And yes, as a result I have unbounded sympathy for incarcerated animals in zoos, because that is how it felt. It was absolutely pointless putting up 'No Entry' signs if there was an private area - in fact these almost had the opposite effect, one might as well have erected a 'Come and look at this very special thing with your ten cameras, why don't you?' poster instead, such was the total disregard for the quality of life of anybody actually living in Oxford. Where's the respect there, my little Nipponese pals, huh??

So, in short, I think BOTH the Parisians and the Japanese, for varying reasons, need to have a kick up the jacksi. Unfortunately I can't see that happening any time soon...

OK, this time I really DO have an excuse...

... because things have been a bit busy at Chateau Angevin!

It's a bit of a long story (what isn't with me?!) but, fingers crossed and touching every piece of wood I can find, it looks as though La Famille Angevin will be living pretty much full time in France from this autumn as we are trying to buy this truly brilliant, wonderful and generally fabulous property.

The reasons for this are, in short:

1. Troll is out of the UK for at least 9 months of the year and has been officially resident in France for years, France having a fully reciprocal arrangement with the country where he works most of the time. Despite all this, the thieving monkeys at HM Customs and Excise sent him a nasty letter last year querying his tax status. Troll's accountant sent a strong response back, and they seem to have gone away... but I have a suspicion they will be back...
So... when this property, which is only about 10 miles from our existing house in Burgundy came up, it looked like a message that we should bite the bullet and get out of the UK now, when we can do it OUR way, rather than wait to be pushed.

2. The grasping monkeys at New College, Oxford, who retained the barn immediately opposite the house I have been renovating for the last 13 years when they sold said house to me, are once again making noises that they want to develop said barn into a residential property. Now, in principal, I don't have a problem with this - I don't mind people living there. However, you only get one crack at a project like that and I just KNOW it will be done badly, with the only consideration being to the financial bottom line rather than to a real love of the building. Which will leave me looking at the cocked-up, aesthetically unpleasing result forever.
The fact this happened to the last house I lavished seven or so years of love upon prior to moving here leaves me little short of despair. At least the place we hope to buy in France has literally miles of open land in front of it which cannot be built upon.

3. I am increasingly distressed by the state the UK is in. Not just the economy, which frankly, we've all seen before and sent the T-shirt to Oxfam, but by the general downtrend I see in the PEOPLE. Everybody seems to be running around at breakneck speed for the best part of every day, with no time for very much other than scraping shekels together or being rude and obnoxious to everybody around them. Nobody has any time for anything I consider worthwhile any more.. and I can't see that situation getting better any time soon, frankly. I've come to the somewhat depressing conclusion that the UK I loved and cared about hasn't existed for 40 years or more... and I don't want to be part of what it's become.

So... the fact we are having to do a fair amount of work on the two houses we have in Burgundy already (because we have to sell them to form the deposit on our new place) wade through the 13 years or so of crap which has accumulated at Chateau Angevin and pack up what isn't being skipped, deal with agents in France both regarding the sale and purchase of everything, find a tenant for Chateau Angevin, get the various animals chipped, jabbed and generally certified for removal over the Channel and probably a million other things I can't be bothered to type about means I haven't been able to blog very much - my rant organ has been totally exhausted in Real Life...

I will attempt to keep you all posted, however...!