homes and real estate travel and life abroad: big city life lodging
by SIF
23 comments
Our most uncomfortable living arangments–ever.
How I learned an important lesson about where to live–the hard way.
Given my cheapskate nature in some areas, you may not be entirely surprised to learn that I’ve had some interesting living arrangements. The worst ever? Marseilles, 2003. We were intent upon finding a place to rent within a certain budget. Better safe than sorry, we thought. Our plan was to live on the cheap as we settled in, because international moves are hard enough–without money troubles.
Marseilles: not such a bad place to live--with the right accommodations.
When we found a small, clean studio near the beach in the budget we’d decided on, we were thrilled–in spite of the fact that the view from our window was a seven story building complete with odd neighbors staring at us while they stepped out for a cigarette. We were prepared to make a few concessions in return for such a reasonable rent.
The first night in our new ‘home’ we realized that we were going to have a very intimate relationship with our neighbors: all seven floors of them, in both buildings. At dinner time, I kind of enjoyed the experience of hearing all the families sit down to eat, their spoons clinking on their plates, quiet conversations floating through our open windows on the sea breeze– or down the rusty old pipes.
After the evening meal, our neighbors would head to the balconies that overlooked our inner ‘courtyard’ (an auto shop in fact). The acoustics were so excellent that neighbors from one building could converse with their friends in the other building from the comfort of their own balconies. All of this struck me as rather folkloric at first. It was something like living in a vertical village stretched over seven stories in two buildings.
Things didn’t really start to fall apart until our next door neighbor came home from vacation.
We hadn’t met her the first few weeks we’d stayed in our apartment because she was staying with family. When we first spotted her exiting her apartment sporting silver hair and a smart skirt and towing a tiny suitcase and equally tiny poodle, we were charmed. When we exchanged ‘hellos,’ she gave us us a glowing smile and closed the door to her apartment behind her. That afternoon, we noticed that she must be slightly deaf, the old dear, which would explain why she kept her radio nostalgie turned up so high. No doubt.
Night came, incidentally, the night before my husband’s first day of work. We awoke to a strange yelling and ranting coming from next door. It sounded like the tiny old woman and her dog had a visitor. . .a loud, slightly deranged and belligerent visitor. I envisioned a large, middle aged nephew. Our other neighbors in both buildings were opening their windows and yelling for silence. Yes, yelling for silence–in Marseilles this is rather common.
Ok, this isn't THE actualy building we lived in during 2003--the real one was much worse.
Fearful for our tiny, helpless neighbor and afraid to knock on the door due to the rather scary sounding visitor, we decided to phone the police. Later, when we told our story to friends who’d lived in the city for some time, our call to the police sent them rocking with laughter.
The police did in fact come (which apparently is rather amazing for Marseilles) only to discover that our neighbor had no visitor whatsoever. Kindly old woman by day, holy terror by night, she’d overdone the pastis a bit. Needless to say, she easily sent the young police officers back to where they came from. (We heard the entire conversation of course, through or paper–thin walls.)
Eventually, she must have passed out and we were able to sleep for a few hours–until our early rising neighbors, still bitter from the night before left for work. Each one rang her doorbell several times as from the landing outside our building, I assume out of vengeance for their lost sleep. Our vertical village was, in fact, in the midst of a long and painful civil war.
Lessons learned:
After this rather unusual experience, we drew a few conclusions.
- Investigating the building you’re moving into is as important as investigating the part of town you’re moving into and checking out the apartment. In the future, we’d take the time to get some word of mouth information about a building before we move in. Particularly given the relative ‘intimacy’ of living situations in France.
- Smaller is better–both in terms of buildings and cities. And more importantly: DH and I are not city-folk . . . in France or the States.
- Sometimes paying 200 euros a month more in rent to avoid certain ‘discomforts’ is a really good deal.
Have you ever learned a similar lesson?
Am I the only one who has learned the value of a carefully-chosen home the hard way? Or do some of the rest of you have similar experiences? Has anyone else had the experience of living close to neighbors and having things go slightly awry?
Sophie–thanks for getting in touch. I’m not so familiar with the 02–although I just checked for it on the map. Your neighbor sounds about like ours. I won’t even repeat some of the stuff she said since it was a bit inappropriate in any language! I have to admit that someone singing, “Je suis malade” does not make me want to visit. But it’s a funny story to hear now! It’s hard dealing with neighbors who are too close by! My husband and I are going to be in the 04 next year and are even considering living in a really small village . . .we don’t like noise either.
Thanks for sharing your story. Is the 02 a pretty populous area?
Wooha! What a funny story! It reminds me of our flat, which we too took to save some extra money until we found something to buy (it cost us half what we had been paying previously). Well, all seemed well until we discovered that you could hear our neighbor blowing his nose – like an elephant (!) – on cue, everyday, at 7am and 11pm! Those lightwells carry sound like crazy! People slamming patio doors was a big problem too, and my husband lost it one day and yelled at the neighbors to stop slamming the f**ing door! Only he said it in Italian, and we live in Spain… 
Tracy–that’s hilarious! I can totally picture someone losing it and yelling in his mother tongue at all the mystified neighbors . . .why might have been able to understand him somewhat! A little torture by noise can make you crazy. I’m glad to know I’m not the only one who’s roughed it in a cheap apartment. (And in Barcelona, I bet they have some real gems. . . a little like in Marseilles). Thanks for sharing.
Yes, we definately learned this! We were lucky to have a quick out when we learned of our mistake. We had just moved to a cheap rental house in the country. We were assured that an old man lived next door and would pay our water bill since he ran the hose into his trailor next door. Well the day after we moved in, the old man died and his son moved into the trailor. The man’s son would constantly knock on our door drunk, sneak up on me while I was doing laundry in our outdoor laundry room (I refused to go outside to the laundry by myself after a few times of this), and actually caught our yard on fire once! We got a job in a different city and moved after six months.
In Toulon, we were the crazy neighbors. There were four of us 20 year-olds, living across the street from the Stade, near the port. We thought it was great fun to throw paper airplanes across the street, to see if we could land them on the roof of the Stade. I don’t know how a bike helmet went over our balcony, but the (very patient) downstairs neighbor brought it up. “How did you know it was ours?”, we asked. “De temps en temps, on recoit des petits avions en papier.” Without a hint of recrimination. They did, however, ask us to put out the small bonfire we got going on the balcony one time. I don’t know how they put up with us.
Laura–yipes! A laundry creeper. And a pyromaniac one at that. Good thing you were renting!
Robert–oh, now I’m laughing. It’s funny how some people in France (and probably most countries) will get super angry and yell at a situation and some are just extremely cool. The response of the neighbors was classic. I once had some youngsters burning something below my balcony when I lived in the US. I just calmly stepped out, smiled down and said, “Hey, you guys aren’t burning that are you?” They said, “No!” and quickly scuttled off. It was fairly hilarious for me–once the fire hazard subsided. People are funny sometimes.
best thing i ever had was an old, rather strange smelling neighbor in an very old, run down house in Berlin who knocked at my door some days after i moved in: he told me he just hung a picture on the end of the long nail i banged through the thin walls from my side of the wall into his appartment
later on i made it a rule to visit possible new blocks/appartment complexes on different times of the day – if that´s possible it´s very helpful and a real eye (ear-) opener…
claudia
Ah yes, the perils of cheap rent. Yours came with loud neighbors, mine came with quiet “co-occupants.” I thought I’d made a shrewd deal renting a huge studio just block from work for $200 a month when prevailing rents were closer to $600. It took only a few days to realize that the place was infested with roaches. The landlord was too cheap to fumigate the entire complex and would just chase them from unit to unit with half-measures. I quickly repented that decision. Now days, I probably pay a premium for the house I rent, but it is such an oasis of quiet and security that I do not regret the added cost.
Claudia–oh, how funny that your weird neighbor came by to tell you about the nail poking through to his wall! I think your idea of stopping by often at different times of the day is an excellent one. We should have tried to view our apartment closer to dinner time. . .and also, we should never have picked the place in Marseilles in July because everyone is on vacation! Two weeks after we moved in, the noise increased dramatically. Thanks for stopping by to share. Berlin sounds like a fascinating place to live.
Maus– oooooh, cockroaches are not fun to share with. I’ve had that happen during my travels–cockroach visitors–including one that landed on me while I was showering in Mexico and another in Madagascar that woke me out of a dead sleep because it was flying around noisily! I don’t consider myself squeamish about bugs, but I doubt I could live very long with cockroaches. And I bet when your landlord sprayed them, they’d just crawl down a drain or something and wait to come back. (Shudder)
I have neighbors like that in my dorm, just horizontally instead of vertically! Our doors are paper thin, and they’re all a bunch of loud-mouthed drunks. They have parties in the hallway at 2am occasionally. (Half the time when I have work the next morning!) I’m just thankful that the cockroaches are only on the 8th floor.
It had to be absolutely awful to have to live like that, though it so reminds me of medieval things.
In our own way we are living this nightmare right now. About a year after moving into our house we were kept awake one night by loud music. We assumed a party across the street. After an hour or so my wife commented that every song was by The Eagles. Where they playing live across the street?
No, turns out a new music venue opened just over a mile away. Because of its orientation and our house being on top of the hill there is a direct shot from their speakers to our bedroom windows! Loud enough to irritate us, quiet enough that we don’t feel like we are getting free entertainment!
Kerry–I think I repressed the memory of college dorm life. I only did that one year and I have this vague, sleep deprived feeling come over me every time I think back to it. I was actually one of those weird people who went to college because I wanted an education . . . plus I had a job, so weeknight benders always made me mad too.
LeanLifeCoach–oh no! Although it would be kind of cool if you could actually hear the Eagles, the background noise is obnoxious. It’s nice to be close to places where there is entertainment, but sometimes the noise gets to be too much. When we lived in Marseilles, there was a bar on the ground floor of our building and during OM soccer matches, we basically just didn’t bother to try to get any sleep.
Hello again,
Yes it is populous…
We arrived there because I wanted to live far away from my family and because we like rural areas. The problem is rural people. Now I don’t talk to anyone. Anyway I commute to Paris every day, so I don’t see many people from 02.
I have read your whole blog, really enjoyed it. I love a blog written in very good English as it helps me practise as well.
I hope you have a great day!
Sophie, I know what you mean about rural folks. My husband and I want to live in a rural area someday (we think) but we’re going to chose our area very wisely. I’ve been in some villages where people are completely friendly and nice to outsiders. . .and others where they just stare at you as if to say, “What are you doing here?” In a small town getting along with neighbors is really important! I’m glad you like the blog, by the way. It’s great having someone French reading and taking part in the discussions.
I so know what you mean!!!
We had people coming to us and asking us what we were doing here.
Also it took them 6 months to figure out we were lesbians and not sisters. We don’t correspond to what they’ve seen on TV and some said to us “you’re the first i’ve met. Who’s the man in the couple?”
Now that we are settled and not undergoing harassment, we’re not moving. But hell, what will happen when they discover lesbians can have babies???
I hope you don’t notice all my mistakes
Sophie–I think you shouldn’t worry about mistakes–everyone makes them, especially in the comments section and your English is very good! You know, I always get very stressed out by people questioning me and scrutinizing my lifestyle, so I can imagine that I’d probably be annoyed at the comments of the locals (especially the ‘who’s the man!!’ one). But someone I met from a small village was telling me the other day that having people come in from the outside is like a breath of fresh air for people in some rural communities. They probably didn’t mean to offend you and were genuinely curious–it’s probably a great experience for them: meeting people from other places with other ways of doing things.
It’s a good idea when house or apt. hunting to not only check out the space itself, but the neighbors, too. A friend of mine who once helped me look for a condo encouraged me to knock on the doors of neighbors and introduce myself.
At first i felt a little foolish doing it, but people readily spoke with me. Armed with a few key questions (what are the 3 best things about living here? and what are the 3 worst things about living here? you can learn an awful lot that no realtor could tell you.
Fern–great points. I’ve never thought of asking the neighbors, but you’re right. I’d especially be inclined to do so if I was thinking of buying, because then it’s harder to leave. Your questions are great ones . . .and if the neighbors growl at you and refuse to answer, that tells you something too!
[...] Here is a great list of interesting reads for your weekend enjoyment: Our most unusual living arrangement — ever. [...]
Bonjour,
My name is Sophie and I live in Département 02- Aisne. Do you know where this is? I live in the very South of it, actually I am stuck between 77 – Seine et Marne and 51- Marne. Just so you can locate me…
I have a funny story too about a neighbor in our old building next to Paris (where we lived in 2005). In the middle of the night she was singing/yelling this song you must have heard: “je suis malaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadeeeeeee, complètement malaaaaaaaaaaaadeeeeee”. Ask your husband if you can’t figure it out!
I paid her a visit in my pyjamas at 2:30 am.
I am sensitive to noise and even my neighbors’kids are difficult for me to bear when they’re playing in the yard.
Hope to discuss sometime!