When my uncle bought his Provençal house he called on his neighbour, a farmer in his sixties, and jokingly apologised for the fact they now had "des anglais" next door. The farmer merely responded, "Heureusement, vous n\’êtes pas Parisien."
After all, everyone hates the Parisians.
As I pointed out on my blog post on the same article – http://www.di2.nu/200710/02.htm -we received the same basic comment when we moved in too.