Eymet is a beautiful village: Who wouldn't want to live there ?

FOR years journalists and film crews have decended on Eymet in spades to expose the bastide for what they'd like to think it is, a British ghetto.

In the words of Sherlock Holmes, " It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist the facts to suit the threories, instead of theories to suit facts."

And so they leave for the UK having bagged the scoop, hatching such ill-conceived sound bytes as "Dordogneshire" and "Eymet-on-Thames" en route.

Invariably those poor, cunningly seduced, English residents quoted in the resulting articles spent all their time angrily explaining to anyone who would listen that what they said and how it was reported were two completely different things.

Eymet is a village of around 2,700 inhabitants. About 200 of them are British. They're not as anonymous as they may have been back home.

So, when a national newspaper or television crew arrive in town from Blighty they're quite happy to grab their 15 minutes of fame.

And who can blame them. Naturally, most people would see it as a golden opportunity. Free advertising. A way to promote the business that they work so hard at through media renowned for their integrity.

Some of the British residents who have been quoted feel bitter at how what they said was twisted. But let's face it, good press is bad news.

Yes, there's a cricket club and an English grocery shop in Eymet but does that make it a ghetto?

Aquitaine was once part of England going back 700 years and bitterly fought over in the 100 Years War. That's how long the English have been coming here.

It's a bit like a 700 year marriage. We don't always get along but we can't do without each other.

Accept it. The English are accepted in Eymet.

According to the 2001 Census in the UK there were 300,000 French nationals living in London alone, about 4.2% of the population. That's more than the Irish population of 3.07%.

London is the 7th largest French city. It has a bigger French population than Lille.

Now there's a scoop.

But I don't imagine that it has nearly the same appeal as the chance of a boondoggle to the sunny, safe Dordogne where the cut and thrust of city life is but a distant memory for its British residents.

Then there's the story of the two Eymet residents from the Isle of Man. Both ladies had lived in Eymet for several years but had never met until recently.

Janet, a close friend of one of these ladies, was on the flight from Bergerac to Stansted and got chatting to the lady in the seat beside her.

As an opener, she asked the lady if she lived in France and where she was from. The lady replied that she was originally from the Isle of Man but had been living in Eymet for several years.

Janet was surprised to hear that her friend and the lady beside her had never met. Afterall, they only lived three streets from each other, it transpired.

The story has a happy ending in that both ladies are now good friends. They wondered why, in such a social village, they had never met. But they simply had different sets of friends, both French and English.

They reasoned that they didn't meet sooner because, contrary to what the press would have us believe, the Brits in Eymet don't actually live in each others' pockets.

The point is that you can live your life in any way you choose in Eymet or any other foreign community.

Sure. If you shut out your French neighbours you can exist but I wonder how happily.

So, to the British national press we say, the next time you come to Eymet, stay a while... it's on us. Live a little of our lifestyle and form your own opinions over time. We've got plenty of that here.