12 December 2008

Money, Money, Money

Inevitably, when I tell people that I am retired, they immediately ask what I do with myself and then ask if I miss anything about work. I don’t mess about when answering the first. I don’t say that I’ve taken up oil painting, getting involved in the local dog’s home or running for the local council – I simply say what I do, which is a bit of gardening, reading the papers on the internet and losing money on the stock exchange. Nothing special there. It’s what I want to do.

Similarly, when answering the question about what I miss with relation to my old job, I don’t pontificate on missing the intellectual stimulus of major contract negotiations (which I don’t) or the buzz I got when a new project started (which I don’t). Nope – what I miss from corporate life is having a good old booze-up with my mates, Steve and Dee, after a particularly busy day and…..the monthly pay cheque.

As Xmas approaches and present lists seem to appear from nowhere, each one with more and more expensive designer items on it, I look at my bank balance and shudder. I took a conscious decision last year that as my pension is paid in Sterling, I would not mess about with monthly transfers, I’d bite the bullet, take a decision on the exchange rate and transfer a whole year’s money in one go. That money then has to be sufficient, no matter what.

It was a good plan at the time and although I am pretty good at managing my finances and I do believe in keeping a little contingency stashed away, the ‘extraordinary’ costs which just appear from left field almost defy belief. It must’ve been different this time last year and I suspect it was because I was still benefiting from a bonus I received from BT which I didn’t know I was due. Alas – those days are long gone. The only bonus I get these days is if Angie next door feeds Shadow and I don’t have to buy any dog food!

So let’s look at the sort of thing which just arrives and which costs a fortune.

The wedding. Ah yes the wedding. My wedding or should I say, my wife’s wedding? Despite stringent budgeting and cost control one just cannot legislate for one’s youngest son taking a €400 bottle of spirits from the drinks trolley in the hotel and disappearing with it.

Then there was the ‘honeymoon’ in Florida and New York which ran pretty true to budget until we discovered the ‘outlet malls’ in Sarasota and the Apple Shop in New York. Major damage was done to the credit card which fortunately meant a sterling hit rather than a run on my Euros.

A huge and unexpected hit was a €2,500 bill for taxes which I simply did not think would arrive this year. Along with a huge uplift in our other taxes, it completely screwed my budgeting for the latter part of the year.

Then, having been relatively healthy for years, I suddenly managed to suffer some medical problems which cost me an arm and a leg (get it ?) and although I have a French Health Card, the bills just mount up.

J wanted her eyes lasered. I didn’t see that one coming (get it ?). Major expense.

Then the cat died. How it costs more to treat a dying cat than a living being I don’t know but it does. The bill nearly killed me (get it?).

The home PC was knackered. It’s being fixed and will cost more to repair than buying a new one. I would just have dumped it but it has loads of pictures on it which we need to retrieve. New technology costs less and less each year but the repairs cost more and more.

So, when people ask me what I miss, the monthly pay cheque has a lot to say for itself. That reassuring ‘thud’ as the electronic pay slip hits your inbox is something I miss dreadfully. Especially at this time of year. Ho Ho Ho !

    

11 December 2008

Wind and Sails

I was thinking about proverbs today. You know – a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. The sun shines on the righteous. The cat who’s got the cream etc etc etc.

I was wondering where they came from and who first thought them up and then I discovered a web site which gives the origins so my wondering goes on no more. But then I got to thinking about an old mate of mine (Jeff Thomson - if you read this please get in touch) who made up his own sayings which were absolutely hilarious. Unfortunately they are too rude, even for this blog, so I’ll have to chuckle without sharing them with you…..but they invariably included dockers, badgers, witches breasts and the like so I’m sure you get the idea.

The reason for the proverbs occupying the few brain cells I have left was that I went into my bank today determined to tell them in no uncertain manner just what a bunch of robbing bandits they are, when….the wind was taken completely out of my sails  …..although I have since learned that that saying is an idiom, not a proverb  – whatever.

Going back a bit in time, I opened an account with the local village bank in Tourrettes. Some ten years ago actually. In all that time, they’ve never given me too many problems except for the fact that I object to their small monthly charges which they appear to levy for the privilege of keeping my money (and investing it for their profit) and providing me with a bank card. They gave me a loan when I wanted one and over the ten years, I think I’ve only had one or two small problems.

And then last year we decided to open another account for and with my eldest son. Just a plain vanilla, ordinary current account with a cheque book and a card. No problem. A few testimonials, a few signatures and we were up and running.

As he is registered at my address, his statements come here and as it’s my money which goes into the account I take a passing interest in what state his account is in….just in case there any problems.

And then the charges started. €3 a month for this. €2.94 a month for that (apparently normal) and then I spotted a quarterly debit of €9.20. This was for the privilege of taking the bank’s magazine called the Dossier Familial, which arrives in the post box, is never removed from its plastic wrapper and goes straight into the fire.

I thought this was a complete waste of money, so went into the Vence branch, said I was representing my son and could they stop this magazine and the associated charge. ‘No problem’, the lady said and that was that…or so I thought. This was 3 months ago and four weeks later, the magazine turns up again. I looked at his statement and there it was – another debit of €9.20. Another few weeks pass before I get the chance to go into my local village bank but when I eventually do so, as usual, there’s a new face behind the counter. A youngish guy who was very sympathetic, took down the details and said he’d do what he could. I said this was not good enough – I wanted it stopped. He then gave a reply which floored me. He said that even as an employee of the bank, he kept getting the pesky magazine and he had trouble stopping the €9.20 debit too! Anyway, I left hoping that he’d fix it.

And then yesterday – yup, you’ve guessed it – another magazine and another €9.20 debit. And so it was today that I stomped into my village branch determined to sort out these bankers. I practised my French relentlessly. Looked up the word for ‘refund’ and sorted out a sentence which would leave them in no doubt how utterly pissed off I was. I walked briskly up to the counter and was about to let rip when ….there she was, a vision of absolute beauty. Young, stunningly dressed with a sweater hanging off of her gorgeous shoulders (both of them). Blonde hair and a smile which would have melted Greenland. I muttered that I was sorry to trouble her and it wasn’t a big problem and could she possibly help me with a little issue and I’d be terribly grateful etc etc etc.

The wind was taken completely out of my sails. Wot a wazzock!

 

10 December 2008

Rendition – It’s Extraordinary

J and I watched a film the other night. Nothing unusual in that? Well there was actually. I was already watching the football on my PC and our movie tastes are at opposite ends of the spectrum, but after the first few minutes I was hooked and decided the football could take a back seat. Although it was an English game, the transmission was coming from Russia, Iraq and finally England in ten minute chunks, so it was rather difficult to follow anyway. And so I settled down to watch the film.

Let’s put me in the frame. Let’s imagine my name is Khan. Although I’ve worked in the UK for over 20 years I was actually born in Egypt and I obviously have a middle-eastern appearance. I’m flying out to the US on business for BT (my employer). My wife has dropped me off at the airport and knows she’ll get a call when I get to the office or my hotel……..but after 3 days no call. She contacts the airline who confirm I was on board. An in-flight credit-card transaction shows that I must have been on the flight but there is no trace of me. What my wife does not know is that the American CIA intercepted me at JFK, put me onto a ‘private’ flight to Egypt where, when I arrive in handcuffs and blindfolded, I am treated as a suspected terrorist because there’s a mobile phone record which shows that a known terrorist group has called my number.

I protest that there are millions of Khans and that I’m always getting wrong-number calls but it does no good. My job as a senior researcher into electro-chemical transmissions gives me the profile of a bomber and so I am tortured until near death.

In this case, the guy was rescued, but at the end of the film J was quite disturbed by it and even more so when I told her that this sort of thing goes on all the time. Indeed only a year or so ago, there was a furore in the UK when some of these CIA ‘extraordinary rendition’ flights were stopping in the UK to refuel before carrying on to some country where torture is something of the norm.

And all because the unfortunate guy got a call from a terrorist group by mistake. It’s easily done – wrong calls or texts I mean. In these days of pay-as-you-go mobile phones, did you ever think what happens to the number after you’ve finished using it? After a period of time, it’s given to someone else. I’ve had texts sent to me for the person who had the phone number before. So all you need is the ‘right’ job, have the ‘right’ background and appearance but the wrong phone number and you too could end up being tortured in some Egyptian basement.

Of course, no government acknowledges that these renditions actually take place but the EEC council believes that over the last few years, 100 EU citizens have been ‘renditioned’ to places where they can be tortured. Places which do not recognise the Geneva convention.

So beware. If you start getting dodgy phone calls or texts – well I was going to say ‘run’, but it wouldn’t do any good. They’d get you.

It’s a long URL but it’ll get you to the story of the film.

http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.criticsrant.com/Images/criticsrant_com/Movie_Rendition/rendition_xlg.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.criticsrant.com/archive/2007/10/21/RENDITION-A-Wild-Ride-With-A-Bumpy-Ending.aspx&usg=__2JdAVEd10zvKkOq1ufn_JmRDD98=&h=1186&w=800&sz=801&hl=en&start=1&sig2=Uc94Nq3TSaz-Q9bkUW0p0Q&tbnid=9ta_wuiXM_OTcM:&tbnh=150&tbnw=101&ei=U0k-ScDcEpygQfPnueMP&prev=/images%3Fq%3Drendition%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG

9 December 2008

The Great Debate

Nope, it’s not about President Sarkozy’s diminutive stature which the French ridicule almost as much as we do. The fact that he wears Cuban heels with high insoles is not the problem. The problem is that he married a 6ft ex-model who has to wear flat shoes when she would look great in high heels. That’s the crime.

It’s not about the credit crunch either. France keeps its problems pretty close to its chest. We (aaaagh – we ???) don’t shout about it like Gordon Brown does in a vain attempt to lift his flagging stature as a statesman. OK, the housing market has slowed, but that’s mainly the Brits who see their pound losing value by the day and who are waiting to get €1.40 to the pound before they come back into the market.

Nope – it’s about the ‘yellow vest’.

France, it seems to me, passes laws on a whim. A couple of years ago they passed a law which said everyone with a pool had to have a fence around it. If you didn’t do it you could face a fine of up to €40,000 by the secret police, so everybody (except me) went out and bought a fence. Despite the fact that there were no real specifications about the fence you needed, multiple firms managed to sell hundreds of thousands of fences to the unsuspecting, attempting-to-be-law-abiding public. A few years later the specs came out and yes, most of those who bought a fence had to change them because they weren’t up to spec! Good ol France !

Then, this year we had the ‘yellow vest law’ where each vehicle had to have a yellow, reflective vest and a red warning triangle in the vehicle. The vest had to be kept inside the car (or truck or whatever) so that, in the event of a breakdown, you had to put on your vest before you got out in order to place your warning triangle 30 metres behind the car. On the face of it, a good, sensible law but one I suspect which had more to do with the French economy getting a €250 million boost overnight than any attempt at motoring safety. It’s all very well being protected by a bright yellow vest when you break down but what about the idiots who travel so close to you that you think you’ve got a trailer attached? They don’t do anything to stop that. I’ve now devised my own method of sorting out these idiots. In daylight, I gradually slow down until I’m almost at a stop and it really gets up their gallic noses. In darkness, I simply switch out my lights and imagine the panic which goes through the idiot’s mind as the car he (or she) is trailing simply disappears – dangerous but hilarious! 

So- the big debate. It’s about the fact that thousands upon thousands of yellow-vest drivers now put their vest on the spare seat like you would hang a jacket on it to stop it getting creased. It doesn’t really bother me – I just think they’re stupid but this is what the debate is about. It was even brought up in the Time’s French Correspondent’s blog the other day. There are numerous on-line forums protesting about the practice. It’s a big talking point.

I reckon, for those who do it, it’s a way to try and prevent the police pulling you over for a check to see if you’ve got a jacket, the rationale being that if the Police see one hanging over the passenger seat, they are less likely to stop you and ‘do’ you for having bald tyres or no MOT.  But I’m sure reverse logic applies here. If I was a Policeman and I saw some pratt with a yellow vest showing, I’d simply assume that there was something wrong with the car and I’d pull them over.

It’s almost as hilarious as the law in California where if you have a passenger in the car you can use special lanes which are less congested, and so each Californian went out and bought a blow-up dummy to try and convince the highway patrol that there were two people in the car. Being California, of course, there was no shortage of retailers selling blow up men or women!

And so I have my vest, tucked away in the underseat compartment and my triangle in the boot. J says however, that some of my sweaters and shirts mean that I have no need of a bright, yellow vest! Bah humbug!     

8 December 2008

Murder, Mystery, Intrigue and €500m

We were invited to lunch yesterday at a friend’s house which overlooks the bay in Villefranche and no, it isn't the house in the picture. It was a lovely sunny day and the view from the terrace was spectacular, overlooking the prime real estate area of Cap Ferrat. I’d passed Cap Ferrat in a taxi some 28 years ago as a brand new, bushy-tailed and ever-so-enthusiastic salesman for IBM and I thought, without knowing anything about the area that it was definitely a place I would buy a house if I could ever afford it. I didn't know it then, but it is THE place to have a house on the Riviera.

Much  of the talk on the terrace was about a large property, surrounded by acres of land which stood in the distance, almost acting as a gateway to the Cap. Even from our vantage point a couple of miles away you could see the manicured lawns and lines of Cyprus trees, but it was the vast extent of the grounds which defied belief. Our hosts told us that the house had recently beeen sold (true) and that it was Bill Gates who had sold it (untrue). Here is the real story of Villa Leopolda.

Until recently, the house (it’s almost a crime to call it a ‘house’) was in the hands of the Safra family who have provided one of the most intriguing stories on the Riviera for the last 10 years.

Edmond Safra, of Lebanese Jewish origins, along with his father, founded a number of banks. It’s strange to think of individuals owning banks, it’s normally corporations, but the Safras opened banks in Switzerland, Brazil and the US, where, at one stage their bank was number three in the New York area behind Citi and Chase. So they were worth quite a few bob.

By the mid 80’s, Edmond Safra had taken over the reigns from his father and was now king pin and living in Monaco and worth some €2.5b. Monaco was just right for the Safras as the principality is virtually crime free (well visible crime) and you don’t pay taxes. It is a highly secure environment with cameras everywhere and so Edmond Safra and his wife, Lily, lived in safe splendour in their hugely expensive apartment block. Edmond developed Parkinson's disease and had eight nurses and several other servants at his beck and call, looking after his every need, however, on Dec 3rd 1999 a fire broke out and Edmond died in the blaze. One of the nurses, a Ted Maher, was charged with starting the fire and a lengthy legal battle started. It took 3 years for him to come to trial and eventually he confessed. It was dubbed as ‘the trial of the century’ and there are still stories about the trial being ‘fixed’ and the dubious nature of Maher’s confession. In any event, Mrs Safra became an extraordinarily wealthy widow with a fortune now estimated at some €3b.

One of the assets she ‘picked up’ was Villa Leopolda, which is the house we stared at from our friend’s terrace. It is probably the best property on the whole of the Riviera and if money was no object (and you like that sort of thing – see picture at top), it’s just the sort of pad you’d go for…….as a wealthy Russian did in August of this year. Although there are rumours to the contrary, he reputedly slapped €500m cash on the table and poor old Mrs Safra had no option but to take the money and run. Now the villa is probably worth no more than maybe €100m, or at a stretch €150m, but these Russians just don’t want any of those nasty little gazumpers coming in and spoiling their deal and so the ‘rather generous’ offer was made and accepted, which made Villa Leopolda the most expensive 'house' on the planet.

The thing is – nobody had ever heard of this Russian. Well nobody down here. He wasn’t in the papers. He didn’t own a football club. He was just a nobody with the odd €500m to spare.

And Mrs Safra? Well she’s probably sitting in one of her other properties hoping another ‘generous’ Russian, with more money than sense will turn up at the door with another wad of dosh.

http://www.overseaspropertymall.com/regions/european-property/french-property/is-villa-leopolda-the-most-expensive-home-ever/