Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

Do many of you find this happens when you plan your trip home?!
I come from a (UK-based, originally from NZ) family which is very laid back about these things and takes one day at a time, but the M-I-L is absolutely determined to plan every second of our UK trip in April to suit HER agenda... forget about what suits us, or our friends! The tone of her messages is frankly extraordinary.
It seems like there is a major difference between British/Irish and Antipodean family thinking on this one... as if the former believe that expats have acted so selfishly and unreasonably by moving more than 10 miles away from the family bosom that they must pay the price when they return through complete suffocation and submission.
Rant over.

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

:blink:

Tell her you can do every other day only.

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

Stuff that !

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

I think that is quite a generalisation based on one MIL!

No, our families never tried to organise our time when we visited. We told them when we would be around and available.

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

Strike a deal. She pays for everything she arranges. ;)

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

:lol:

My lot are really good, they find out what i have planned and then fit in around it, they also accept that I have friends to catch up with and therefore I won't be with them all the time - having said that, my elder niece now joins me when I go out drinking with my mates, and my sister has annexed some of my other friends since coming across each other on facebook, so we now meet up witht them together!

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

There are huge variations between families.

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

Then you need to be firm with her and tell her that it will be lovely to see her but this is also your heard earned holiday. It's easier to set expectations before you arrive.

Alternatively you could tell her just to back off if she doesn't want to be replaced by the mouse with the big ears in Florida.:thumbup:

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

Huh?! Nope, not my family. When I/we used to return for visits they happily put us up, loaned a car and got on with their lives. Only thing they did like to be sure was that they took us out to dinner before we left.

I'd try Triboy's tack! Should be up to your wife to put her mum straight but you might need to step in.

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

:goodpost:

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

I could imagine them saying "See you there - I thought that we could check-in to the hotel at 2pm on the Thursday, 15 minutes to unpack, then walk to the rollercoaster for 2.38pm. Assuming average queues, we would then move on to the ferris wheel at 3.11pm..."

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

My brother was annoyed that I didn't spend more time with my family last time we were there- but since he never bothers to communicate with me unless he wants something, and we were only there for a funeral anyway, we spent a larger portion of our time at MIL's. OH is her only surviving child, and she is in poor health, and tbh, I prefer her to my own family, who are all mad and keep stinky animals (ferrets, parrots,cats, large bouncy dogs, hamsters and a snake) that either I or my daughter are allergic to. They also have nowhere to put us up and we can't afford to pay for hotels etc. on top of horrendous airfares for 3 adults.
Also last time we came we told them where and when we would be in their area, but they were "busy".

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

She can try organising you from afar but just wait until you actually get there. "No battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy."

Re: Family arranging every minute of UK trip!
 

My parents live here, but we visited the wife's family and stayed with them when we went back for the first time in a decade, last June. It was similar to what you're describing but not as bad. We did some monumentally boring shit because the wife wanted to keep her parents happy and missed out on doing stuff we actually wanted to do such as getting down to Cornwall to catch up with friends and family. Everything's a compromise ...