Isolation and fraternité

Roquetaillade is only about five miles from the edge of Limoux, the market town which serves as a commercial centre for a large number of villages. Limoux only has a population of just over 10 000, but it has four supermarkets, and a good range of shopping outlets. All the main banks have branches, there are lots of estate agents and so on. For us, this trip into Limoux has seemed a small journey, which we tend to make once or twice a week.

On our way back from Limoux yesterday, we stopped to pick up a man from our village who was hitch-hiking on the outskirts of the town. After conversation on the journey, a number of things struck me . . .

Hitching is still common in this part of France. I did it a lot as a student in England, but that was nearly 40 years ago. I can’t remember the last time I picked up a hitcher in the UK. Here, people of all ages seem to hitch on quite short journeys, and they seem to be successful. The reasons for this are simple, but they reveal some interesting insights into French village life.

There is no public transport linking Roquetaillade, or any of the neighbouring villages, with Limoux. Roquetaillade has no shops, no post office, no doctor and no chemist. The villager we picked up had been into Limoux to collect a range of medicines for the various conditions from which he suffers. He told us that his car was no longer roadworthy, and as he couldn’t work any more he couldn’t really afford to get a new one. Quite a large, and increasing, proportion of the 200 or so inhabitants are at or above retiring age, and many don’t have any transport. The French welfare and medical system is excellent, and we know that some villagers get a lot of support in the home. Nevertheless, people like our hitcher need to rely on the spontaneous generosity of others to get into town and back. And it works. There’s a real sense of ‘fraternité’ — you do stop to pick up people looking for lifts, as a matter of course. In the same way, if someone needs help with a problem, it seems natural and expected that anyone will give a hand. We recently got waved down by a driver whose van was stuck in mud alongside the road into town. Could we pull him out? Of course. Tow rope attached, spinning of his tyres, and the Land Rover does the job. Brief handshake and we go on our way. There’s not a lot of money around in the village, but it is a community, with shared obligations. Of course, this doesn’t mean that there aren’t feuds and petty rivalries, but that’s another story!

Getting into Limoux takes just over a quarter of an hour. By British commuting standards, this seems a very small amount of time. However, when we were talking to local estate agents, they suggested that our house was too far out of Limoux to have widespread appeal, because of the journey. It became clear that this linked to the traditional French working day, which has a two hour lunch break and then (despite the famous French 35 hour week) finishes much later than in the UK. If you have a two hour lunch break, you need to go home, and you don’t want to spend 30/40 minutes travelling there and back. So, the French residents of the village tend not to be commuters (what a difference from England) and most work, or used to work, very locally. Mobility is not high, and most villagers can trace their origin to five or six families.

In this context, it’s perhaps surprising that we have not felt rejected as incoming foreigners. Certainly, I don’t feel accepted as a true villager, but the spirit of neighbourliness has embraced us. It will be a wrench to leave.