The Mediterranean countries are notorious for a mañana attitude, which covers a lot more than the timing of appointments. A laid back Italian understands that you shouldn’t drive the wrong way down a one way street when cars are coming – he just doesn’t understand why you shouldn’t do it if the road is empty. No Greek would dream of driving through a red light when there’s traffic – but supposing there’s no traffic? And every Spanish kid on a motorcycle understands that he has to wear a crash helmet. And he does; on his arm.

But at least some of this mañana stuff is in the eye of the beholder.Plenty of British plumbers will also tell you ‘tomorrow’ while actually meaning ‘next week’ or ‘next month’. So let’s not exaggerate. When something has to be done urgently, people will respond. (The thing is, what you think of as urgent may not seem very urgent to them.) And many people in country areas work extremely hard indeed, from first light until dusk. Much harder, in many cases, than people in towns.

One of the hardest working men we’ve ever come across owns the garage in a nearby village. Almost any time of day, any day of the week, including Sundays, he can be found lying under someone’s car, jeep, tractor or harvesting machine, covered in oil. Nor will you see much of the ‘slower pace of life’ if you have the misfortune to work in, say, the kitchen of a seafront café. No, it’s really that the countryside induces a more philosophical approach to life. Things are linked to natural cycles and the weather, and can’t be forced. No matter how dynamic you are, you can’t harvest a crop until it’s ready.

So you’ve decided to move abroad. Very sensibly you’ve settled on a rural retreat far from cities and far from tourists. But there’s just one problem. According to experts, anything that causes a change in your life actually causes stress. So it’s Catch 22: whatever you do to reduce stress actually introduces a new stress.

The experts say that the death of a spouse is the most stressful event in anybody’s life. If we put that at 100 on the stressometer, then leaving your job is about 35, a change in your financial circumstances is also 35, a change in your living conditions is 20, in your personal habits 20 and in the frequency of family get-togethers ten. That’s already 120 you’re going to incur before factoring in life abroad.

Oh, by the way, a hot climate is also stress. So take it easy. If you can’t slow down, you probably won’t fit in and your antics won’t go unnoticed nor uncriticised. In fact, you’ll probably be the target for a lot of humour. People from towns tend to have the feeling they don’t exist or have any significance if they’re not rushing somewhere. A lot of expats bring their stressed out attitudes with them. It takes some a year or even two before they slow to the rhythm of the locals.