THERE are lots of places in France where you can buy a villa or a condominium suite. There’s Paris of course. Of course, Paris is congested and most of the flat suites here are just that, flat and narrow but they are definitely not boring. All flats have the amenities of cable television and the really fully-furnished ones include upon purchase an LCD TV monitor, subwoofer sound system, HD-DVD system, Xbox 360 and high speed Internet wireless connection. They even have a panic room and the whole unit is wired into a central alarm system.

In the French Riviera and in Cannes, there are also beautiful villas but none can surpass the beauty in the city of Agde. In the city of Agde, get to own your own manor because right by the beach is the largest nudist resort in the world – Cap d’Agde. Cap d’Agde is a shopping mall but everybody is nude – from the fastfood waitresses to the window cleaners. You will really have a jolly time there.

In this country where the Roman Catholic patron saint is Joan of Arc, everything is a contrast. President Nicholas Sarkozy, himself a proclaimed conservative, lives a promiscuous and very lavish life with Italian fiancée Carla Bruni. French citizens have imitated their First Couple by going to church every Sunday morning and staying at nudist beaches the whole afternoon till sundown. They live such a weird life – the French – but beyond the peculiarities, you will find that snippets of the country are amazing.

For instance, the French are known to be both intellectual and romantic. Foreign students in the University of Paris can surely attest to that. They find French people easy to woo and easy to love of course. Dining at an elegant rooftop restaurant right across the Eiffel Tower overlooking River Seine wouldn’t hurt. That is surely one way to capture the elegance of the country. Is everything seemed to be a paradise already? Then go ahead, find some house for sale so you can settle down with your Parisian girlfriend.

The road to buying a house must be taken carefully though. One must not rush things up. There are lots of things to consider. First, you have to hire your own English-speaking French real estate lawyer who can well represent you as a buyer to the real estate agent. Then together with your French fiancé or fiancée, you can start scouting for houses. Once you have sighted one particular property, it’s time for the professional home inspection. A professional home inspection scrutinizes the holistic aspect of the property. It includes scrutinizing whether all the documents related to the property are in order i.e. the property is titled, all property taxes are paid on time and whether the new owner inherits the old debt associated with the property. For the physical home inspection, you will have to assemble a team composed of an architect, a plumber, an exterminator, an electrician and a home decorator.

TO any place, its biggest asset is usually the people. And France has said to have the most romantic people in the planet. It’s not just because French (which has a Romance etymology) is said to be the most poetic and therefore the most romantic language in the world, it’s because the people in France are the most intellectual and the most intellectual people are usually the ones who can concoct things up on how to be romantic. Of course, there is no one in France who is more romantic than its president himself, Nicholas Sarkozy, who is set to marry his model girlfriend this year. So romance is definitely in the air the whole 365 days of 2008 here in France so it’s really nice to have a vacation here whether during summer, spring or autumn. The Mediterranean coast of France is very nice to live in since diet there is restricted mostly to seafood sautéed in olive oil which is the healthiest cooking oil in the world due to its low fat content. Aside from that, the Mediterranean coast of France has Agde, the largest nudist resort in the world. It is not just a beach resort, it is also a shopping mall but all the staff is in the nude. Isn’t that lovely?

But the thing I look forward more this year in France is the annual Cannes film festival. It will be held sometime in May. In this weeklong festival, it is not just the abundance of movies that you’ll get but the abundance of food as well. Binge around local stuff like cod dipped in garlic sauce, sea bass in lime, beef fillet dipped in foie gras and wild boar. This is the essence of French elegant dining.

Meanwhile, the French government has joined the bandwagon in calling for the preserving of the environment which was first launched into worldwide attention by the former vice president of the United States, Al Gore, in his film An Inconvenient Truth. Sarkozy, the French president, is having skepticism in nuclear energy and genetically modified crops. These may be ticklish subjects but the French government has started to take care of the environment in its own little ways such as preventing overfishing. In maintaining all the beach resorts in France clean, it has tapped the help of the European Union as well as the Swiss hotel school industry. The European Union is periodically inspecting all beaches in France to conform to environmental standards while selected Swiss hotel schools are training their students on how to be environment-friendly and churning out these graduates to the French hospitality sector.

Because of their nationalistic pride and tourism status, the French are now more confident not to adapt foreign languages. In fact, all English programs in the state-owned television network have been scrapped at the turn of this year. This is indeed a testament on how France handles its policies elegantly. Kudos to the French!