After move to India, French designer says neighbours are 'more than people living next door'. Her viral post

A personal reflection by a French designer living in India drew wide attention online after she described how her experience of community shifted when she moved to Gujarat last year. The designer, Julia Chaigneau, recounted that she had never known the names of people living around her during her years in Europe, and said that her parents had been the same.

She explained that, for much of her life, neighbours were simply individuals encountered in passing. “For most of my life, I never knew my neighbours' names. My parents didn't either,” she wrote, adding that in Europe “neighbours are just people who exist in the background,” with interactions generally limited to brief greetings in shared spaces.

Chaigneau said her understanding changed almost immediately after arriving in India in 2024. She described her first day in Gujarat, when someone from the apartment opposite knocked on her door to ask whether she and her family required any assistance as they settled in. She recalled that the neighbour even offered to arrange food if needed. She wrote that she had been taken aback by the gesture, saying she stood there “a little shocked” because the encounter was unlike anything she had previously experienced.

She said that in the months since that initial interaction, the families had spent festivals together, exchanged homemade food and organised outings, including safaris. According to her account, these regular, informal moments had gradually reshaped how she viewed those living around her.

She wrote that neighbours in India were “not just people next door”, but individuals who were close at hand, quick to notice if something seemed wrong and willing to respond in an emergency. She added that the presence of such support felt reassuring, describing it as an unexpected sense of belonging.