18 February, 2001

Hello! First, a link to the pictures. However, I recommend reading everything first so you know what you're looking at:

Slideshow of Hossegor (not our pictures, but will give you a good idea. We've six rolls of film waiting for the spare money to get developed).

First, I apologize for not updating sooner. Until I sat down to write, it really seemed as though not much had happened since the middle of December. We hadn't done too much, we still hadn't decided where to live, etc. etc. However, a lot has happened, and besides we've accumulated lots of little observations to entertain you with. So, we'll start with some observations about France. French friends, please realize that we write the things that we notice, knowing that it's just culture shock. Still, it makes us laugh because it's so different from where we're from:

At dangerous intersections, of which there are many, they have signs that say "danger". It dawned on me last month that it would make more sense just to put them around the borders of France. Wherever a road enters French territory, that's where they belong.

Driving to Auron, a ski area an hour north of Nice, we found long stretches of highway that are divided into three lanes, separated by dotted lines. The middle lane is used by either of the outside lanes, whoever gets there first. There was no way to tell who would have the right of way should two cars meet in the middle. It never happened while we were on that road, so we don't know.

It is still strange after 5 months to see giant signs on street corners that read "Pain".

Despite all my remarks about Ferraris, very few people own sportscars here, because it's not possible to drive them fast due to traffic congestion. You could put a lawnmower engine in a Porsche and no one in Cannes would be able to tell.

However, the many people who do love to go fast despite the traffic own very powerful motorcycles, which they drive at absurd speeds everywhere except on the actual highway. Driving down the coast on a Sunday is an experience of being passed every thirty seconds by a (very loud) motorcycle going twice as fast as us, on a narrow windy road. Driving across all of France we saw two motorcycles in 12 hours.

It took a while to realize it, but the population of Cannes is definitely on the elderly side. 89% of the population is over 55, and that doesn't even include all the people that are almost 55. It definitely has an affect on the feeling of the city, and once I knew the percentage I really looked around. You can see why the city is called "Cannes" which is French for canes.

I really realize that I am not in the United States every time I pass the police station and see a car parked diagonally half on the sidewalk in front of it.

We got a 300 FF ticket for having custom license plates left over from the previous owner. The police didn't care that I was going pretty fast over the speed limit, and they were very polite and helpful. It was as if they were protecting me. Completely different from any experience I've ever had with an American policeman. In general, the police have a protective quality here that's really nice. I've never seen a policeman be rude -- a really nice trait of France.

Having said that, I got pulled over again for the same offense. As per the instructions of the first officer, I explained that I had already paid the fine and that I was going to change the plates when we move in a month. Then, I proceeded to drive slowly behind the police officer through downtown Cannes. Two different motorcycles blew through red lights within ten feet of the police, and the police did nothing at all. And I'm not talking about being late for a yellow, either, but really and truly just not stopping at a red light.

Cannes has cured me of wanting to be a jet-setter. I am reluctant to admit it, but when I (Andrew) decided to move to France, I really wanted to go somewhere where there were lots of rich people, Ferraris, etc. So that was a big part of why I wanted to come to Cannes. I'm sure this is no secret.

However, after living here for a bit, and having seen lots of Ferraris and many rich people, I am completely cured. Part of me still wants some cool shoes and a leather jacket, but I was walking down the croisette one day, surrounded by people who looked cool (hundreds), and I just didn't like it. I realized at a deep level that I do not want to be a star on Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. It sounds silly, but it is an important thing to realize, and I expect that I can get on with living a normal life now.

Two things that have helped us keep our ties with our mother country. Listening to NPR (you must have RealPlayer) on the web and checking the University Bicycles web cam (no particular software needed).

It is a big concern here that there are many cults. There was an article in the paper about a wonderful engineer who was on the eve of getting married and taking a job with a successful high-tech firm. Someone came to him with stories of personal growth and spiritual development, and now he's given up all that and retreated into a "cult" in Nice.

I wish I still had the article, because you'll never believe that that was really the way it was written.

Some things we've done for fun in the last two months: a wonderful day trip to a ski resort in the Alps next to Italy called Auron, with some friends from the International School here. We had a fantastic lunch, and it was striking how much more friendly people were than in Cannes.

Okay, I think it's time for the big admission. I think that we really picked the single worst place in France to move to. It's like Newark. It's full of really old people with a really bad attitude, and the air is really polluted. It's served well as a starting place, but I sure don't recommend visiting it. When we drove back into Cannes after a few days in Hossegor (see below) it was amazing how terrible it felt, and how plain mean the drivers are. I needed to make a three point turn, and a woman behind me tried to pass me in the middle, knowing that all I had to do was pull out of her way for her to get by. 

Enough. Back to the subject at hand. We've also driven out west a bit from Cannes, to the Gorge du Verdon. It was a beautiful, and really deep canyon, which is referred to, even by the French, as the "Grand Canyon of France". It's cool because at the end of the gorge is a cliff with plains at the top going on forever. Whenever we get our pictures done I'll put them up.

We've also taken boats out to the islands in front of Cannes. They are really beautiful, and no cars are allowed. Just gentle pine forests. It's nice to be able to get away so close. If the sea were dry, we could ride our bikes to them in 10 minutes.

One thing that I've gradually realized about the French is that they don't have the same attitude towards "cute" or simple wisdom that Americans have. For example, many people love the book "The Little Prince" in the U.S., and I think that a fair number of people read it as adults and think that there is an element of wisdom in it. In fact this holds for children's books in general.

In France, people are much more likely just to think that "The Little Prince" is kind of dumb. I've also had experiences working with a French businessman in which I propose names or phrases for an idea, and something that's kind of cute in English, like a new product called "silly food", is just considered childish here. Please note that this observation is under construction and is based on only a few experiences.

Okay, I think that that's enough of the lighter side of living in Cannes. First of all, as far as how we're really doing here:

I (Gia) have met a wonderful bunch of English people who are into healing and who live along the Cote d'Azur. Alison, who is a massage therapist, has referred a client to me who is dealing with depression. I hope to find another group that is just as conscious in the Hossegor area. When Andrew and I were in a grocery store in Hossegor, there was a sign up on the bulletin board with a british flag on it with a request to form a discussion group in English. And it also looks like just another opportunity to get better at speaking French!

To make a long story short, we have really been struggling financially. We moved to France assuming that I (Andrew) could keep working the same way with the same people. However, for a number of reasons it hasn't worked that way.

The problems we had with phone service and the "evolving" American economy are two reasons, but I think that the biggest one is that I just did not take into account what it would mean to be 8 hours off from my clients. It's nearing the end of my day when they're getting into work, and I become absolutely useless when it's the early afternoon for them.

In order to remedy the situation, I realized that I need to change what I do somewhat. Since the bulk of my work has gradually shifted into internet stuff, I needed to rebuild my own site to reflect what I can really do. In addition, I'm opening a web-based store selling pre-designed web designs. Both of these efforts have meant a huge amount of unpaid work to bring them to a finished state.

So, I want to let you know that web pages are for sale at: www.andrewswift.com/store (note this has been discontinued 11/15/01)

just in case anyone you know is going to need a business web site. Please don't feel that I'm trying to sell you something. I only just want to let you know what I'm doing.

The web store serves two functions: it gives me a grounds for calling people that can use my services, and it also means that I can do more design work with less administrative and communications overhead. This means that it will be less important that I am on the same energetic wavelength (time zone) as my clients.

In addition to doing things to strengthen the American side of business, I've been gradually making French connections. I've been negotiating with a French man about helping him start a web design and hosting company here, and I've met several programmer and webby types of people at Sophia Antipolis, the local high-tech park. I don't have any concrete paying work in France yet, but the energy is building quickly here.

I am not really trying to pursue the French side of things because my French is not yet good enough to work in it, and also because I have not decided how to set myself tax wise. Every American I know who works here gets paid as an American company in America, and not as a French business. That's how I'm going to proceed for the time being, but I need to find out more.

Probably I should have put this next bit first, but anyway here goes. We now know where we're going to move to. We've never been able to decide, and we've gone back and forth many times. Last fall I asked Fred where we should go and explained what we were looking for: a place that was calm, had recycling, healty food, nature, etc. He suggested Hossegor. Since it is on the opposite side of France:



we never visited it. It just seemed like such a long way away. A couple of weeks ago, I realized that it would make me well and truly crazy to have to live in more temporary apartments. So Gia and I decided that we would spend all the money we had, which was about $600, and make a 4-day whirlwind tour of the places people had suggested we visit.

We weren't going to visit Hossegor because it was so far away, but finally I thought: "If we don't go see it, we'll always wonder if it was a good place or not." The other places we planned to visit were Perpignan, Montpellier, and Toulouse. Since they're all in a sort of line from here to the west coast, we decided to drive to Hossegor and then work our way back.

We drove to Hossegor a week and half ago, on Friday. Driving into that town was an amazing experience, because it was so different from Cannes. It was a gentle town, full of lovely pine trees, without much traffic. They have nature reserves and walking/riding trails through the forests. Also, they have bike lanes there, which have never been heard of here. They have giant recycling areas scattered around town. They are friendly when you talk to them. They stop to let you by when you're driving.

When we went to the hotel, they asked me for my last name, and wrote it down. That was the extent of our conversation. Every day I went down to the bar and said "ce soir aussi, je pense" (tonight, too, I think). And the guy said "okay" (okay). On the last day he added up my bill on a slip of paper and told me the amount ($37 per night), and I paid cash. It was great.

I feel like I should write something about Hossegor, but frankly I'm not sure what to write. Basically it's a tiny French town that has 3200 full time residents, and serves as a minor resort in the summer. It's near Biarritz (see below), so it's nice because it combines the peace of a small town with a nearby urban center.

The main thing I want to say is that the sea is really incredible there. I'm sure that people who've been all over the world have seen much better, but I was really blown away. It is so big and spread out, and the beaches are so huge, that it is physically impossible to take a proper picture of it. None of the pictures we looked at even remotely prepared us for the actual feeling we had. Gia started to cry and I started to laugh when we stood there because we both knew we had found our place.

Unlike Cannes, the entire coastline is not built up. There is not a highway directly along the coast, and although there are a bunch of hotels in one spot, most of the coast is wonderful high dunes.

The waves are really serious. They have major world surfing championships there in the late summer.

So, it was great. We are a little concerned about living in another place that has a resort orientation after Cannes, but it's so much nicer, and I think that it will be fun to have some of that summer party thing happening.

The second day we went to Biarritz, which is about 20 minutes away by the road we definitely did not take, and that was another amazing experience. It feels a lot like Seattle. If you can imagine Seattle with amazing beaches, built on cliffs, with giant rocky appendages reaching out into the ocean, and a view of Spain, you would have some idea of what it's like.

Again, the scale is so immense of the landscape that it is just not possible to take a picture that communicates the experience of standing there. Maybe IMAX would work.

We liked Hossegor enough that we basically canceled the rest of our trip. We stayed for three days and it was very clear that we were going to move there.

When it was time to return, on Monday, we decided to drive to Perpignan, just to see if we were missing something really special. We'd already driven by Montpellier and through Toulouse, and although they may be great cities, the landscapes on which they were built did not feel right for us to live on.

It may come as a surprise to you, and it certainly has to me, but it is very important to me to live in a place in which the landscape matches me somehow. I never thought of myself as someone to whom the land is so important. Probably because I've been surrounded by people to whom it's so important that I never really saw myself clearly that way. It is.

So Monday, we drove down to Perpignan. It is really southern, on the east coast below Cannes, but just north of the Spanish border. It feels like Texas. It has the same dried out, wide open quality, lots of horses. It feels really Spanish, and I think that that contributes to the Texan quality, since the Spanish were there too.

However, we definitely do not want to move there. We drove through the city, then drove over to the ocean, and then 6 hours back to Cannes.

Driving through Perpignan caused me to realize the most bizarre thing yet (in my mind) about France. In France there are NO pickup trucks at all. I never noticed until I started thinking about Texas. They have lots of sport utility vehicles, lots of trucks, etc. No pickup trucks at all. I've never seen one. Not a tiny Toyota, and not a big Dodge or Ford. None. Can you, who live in Colorado, even imagine such a world?

Driving back to Cannes was an interesting experience. South of Marseille, driving northeast, the drivers started becoming really nasty. There was a marked change in how people treat each other on the highway, and driving went from being a relaxing experience to being a tense one.

When we drove back into Cannes, it was bad. I'm glad we're moving. If any of you want to move to a foreign country of whose geography you have only a very sketchy idea, be prepared to make major mistakes. It's worth it, though.