Here we are again: Advent, with its Christmas markets, Christmas concerts and – er- festive fare. Pedantic Digression: The use of fayre is an abomination second only to the instrusive apostrophe. According to The Free Dictionary website fayre is ‘a pseudo-archaic spelling of fair, fare‘.For my previous musings on Christmas in the Morvan click here. … Read more
Years ago, a friend–a smart guy…a guy who’d been around the block…done business all over the world–engaged an attorney to help him structure his holdings to mitigate his global tax liability. My friend spent more than US$100,000…didn’t understand the structures he ended up with… Didn’t want to ask more questions, because they led to more … Read more
This is not the typical expat mother story. The one where she abandons her career to follow her spouse half way across the world and feels empty. The one where she has a hard time adapting to the new culture and speaking the new language, and can’t wait to go back home.You see, when I … Read more
Research shows loneliness is on the rise in general, but for expats we can find ourselves struggling with loneliness more than most. Loneliness is not the same as being alone (although it can be). Loneliness is what happens when we don’t get as much satisfying social contact as we want.We are all different in how … Read more
I get this question a lot. I’ve been living outside the States for 18 years, and, to answer the question I’m so often asked, I’ve never felt more American than I do today. Living in the States (I lived in Baltimore, Maryland, for my first 35 years), we Americans take being American for granted.Every year … Read more
Benvenuti to all my lovely Loyal and New Followers, Well, here we are again reflecting back on the previous month, which in this case is October in beautiful Chianti.As I write this column in mid-November, it is hard to think back to the early part of September. Central Italy was devastated by ongoing earthquakes whilst … Read more
My husband Lief and I sat in the lobby of Barclays bank on rue de l’Opera for two hours our last visit to Paris, awaiting our account manager. We wanted to obtain debit cards for our accounts. We’d inquired by email but had been told we’d need to come in person for this request.“You would … Read more
How To Afford To Retire Wherever You Want Could you afford to retire how you want wherever you want? The opportunity for you to do just that could be greater than you might imagine.The most important thing to understand when trying to determine how much retirement lifestyle your retirement budget will buy you is that … Read more
Hallowe’en is a non-event here in the Morvan. Look up Hallowe’en in the big Harraps dictionary and you will find La Veille de la Toussaint, together with an explanation in French, as if Hallowe’en were an esoteric Polynesian custom chronicled in National Geographic. Aldi and Atac, our local supermarkets, have a few packs of supposedly … Read more
Sometimes referred to as the “Other South of France,” Languedoc-Roussillon sits between the regions of Provence-Alpes-Cote d’Azur to the east, the Midi-Pyrenees to the west, the Auvergne to the north, and Spain to the south. The region is divided into five departments: Pyrénées-Orientales (close to the Spanish border), Aude, Hérault, Gard, and Lozère.The regional capital … Read more