AIBU to be angry my sister left my 16-year-old alone?

She's 16, not 6.

A lot of us took the subway to school as teens younger than her.

You need to get her life skills up and running. Finding your way around cities and using public transport is a pretty necessary skill.

As others have said, I think this is an over reaction on your part. Assuming a 16 year old has a phone with internet then they should be able to use a google map or other app to find their way back to the station by walking or bus.

Also, if you find it necessary for your 16 year old to be accompanied back to the station by your sibling then that's something you should have first discussed with your sister. If it's important to you then you should have raised it. We are talking about 16 year olds and not 12 year olds so you can't assume everyone will feel the same as you.

Your DD will have forgotten about this next week.

Oh no OP, this is very poor attitude towards your daughter’s independence.

I caught a flight on my own at 15 and I was extremely shy. YABU

You haven’t prepared her for life.

Oh it was a couple ..that means they could never have any ill intent…oh ok? Meanwhile checks cv …worked for probation, victim support and know that problematic people don’t wear monster signs…sixteen may be very young to navigate such things …I would have expected my sister to stick around

WTF. My additional needs DD15 would be able to manage this absolutely fine, and we live quite rurally. It probably never crossed your sister’s mind that it would be an issue, because it really shouldn’t be. At 16 I travelled abroad with friends, before the age of mobiles and we managed to survive!

the deal was, my sister would meet DD in London at the train station and take her to meet this young couple.

Which is what she did.. are you sure there hasn't been some sort of miscommunication, why didn't your DD ask her when she said she was suddenly leaving what the plan was for afterwards? Was your sister expecting a phone call when she had finished etc? If she went to pick her up from the station and take her there, surely she was expecting to meet her after she had finished?

It sounds like someone has got the wrong end of the stick somewhere.

If you're going to ring your sister I'd ask her what the plan was as your DD got confused and struggled to get home, and then see what she says?

This sort of experience is what builds independence and resilience. Being frank, if you’ve raised a 16 year old who wouldn’t think to use Google Maps to find the station, there’s a lot of work to do before she goes off to uni.

Different times, but the first time I was allowed to go to London with friends and no adult, I was 14. We went down to the tube to get our tickets (paper in those days) and there was a young man having an epileptic fit on the floor in front of the ticket machines, everyone just walking past him. One of my friends (also 14) calmly got down on the floor and made him safe while directing another one of us to get help. Turned out she had an epileptic relative.

These experiences are part of growing up and learning how to look after yourself and others. Too much cotton wool makes for the opposite of what you want as a parent, which is an independent young adult unafraid of the world they’re launching into.

Handed over! She’s 16, having a coffee in a public place in central London with people her aunt knows. And we wonder why our young people have anxiety and resilience problems. She’s not a baby!!!!!

What a horrible thread, nasty unpleasant things being said about a 16 year old. There's absolutely no need.

It doesn't matter what anyone else and their kids did at whatever age. Rightly or wrongly this particular 16 year old hasn't traveled to London on her own before.

Perhaps a little more communication between the OP and her sister to clarify the arrangements, so the OP could make sure her DD was better prepared before she made the trip would have been helpful. Someone made some good suggestions for planning earlier.

All of this, she must have issues, she's 16 not 6, she'll never manage in the profession she's interested in and declarations of what she should be capable of doing are just unkind and don't recognise that kids aren't all the same.

I agree that the OP should start planning to build up her DD's independence and resilience, and could have done so earlier. But overall her DD seemed to have coped reasonably okay and hopefully got a boost of confidence from it.

@Rubexellen I would feel like you have OP. I wouldn’t be comfortable with my DD effectively being handed over to strangers!

I wouldn’t have minded her going to London and having to navigate her way back to the station, but whilst your sister knows this couple, you don’t and all sorts of things go through your head as to what could’ve happened to her. Fortunately, they were nice people.

I imagine an office which deals in migration and human rights also has strict rules about access.

Citymapper or Google maps?

Your 16 year old has demonstrated that she is sensible enough and capable enough to deal with this. She had a problem and didn't know her way back to the station so she sensibly decided to ask the people she was with for directions. Problem solved. They went a step further and helpfully escorted her.

Oh dear. She needs to toughen up and so do you! She'll be an adult in less than 2 years and off to uni (without a babysitter!).
It sounds very safe and well organised. Meet by aunt and taken to the meeting.
Public place. Professional couple with professional qualifications and known personally to your sister. Hardly "they could have been anyone".

My son had an evening job in a restaurant at 16. He would have been absolutely mortified if I'd have come to the interview with him.

Blimey
the things I got up to at 16 and you are worrying about this?

YABVU or is your 16 year old particularly immature?

When my son was 10, he was walking from my work 15 minutes to the station (also in a capital city), getting the train, travelling 4 stops down the line and then walking to his primary school, all completely unsupervised (although tracked on his Apple Watch and iPhone). He then did the same on the way home (into the capital city).

If the train was cancelled, he used the Trainline app on his phone to work out the next train and platform.

If a 10 year old can manage to be independent, why can’t a 16 year old?

I stayed with an exchange family in Paris at 16. For weeks. On my own. Even, shock horror, took a train across international borders.

At 16 I was working full time! Don't parents bring their children up to be useful and competent members of society? I would be mortified if my children couldn't have navigated travel and life at that age.

The irony of this 16yo being interested in refugees and immigrants...bet they were able to use Google Maps 🙄

YABU, sorry. Your DD is 16 and this was London during daytime not a foreign country; in the age of smart phones in particular a 16 year-old is fully capable of figuring out a walking route back to the train station she had come from shortly prior. Being left to have coffee and chat with two people at a planned meeting in a public place after an introduction is also perfectly fine at an age where many teens work jobs interacting with the public.

Ideally your DD and DSis would have had the same expectation of DD staying to have the chat by herself and then walking back to the station - it sounds like she was just a bit caught off guard and that may have affected how she handled it - but no one was in the wrong there, they just made two different but reasonable assumptions.

Acknowledge that misalignment of expectations to your DD. Also tell her that feeling awkward sitting with these people was normal. First dates, interviews, networking opportunities, meeting a boyfriend's family, starting a new job... most of us feel insecure and a bit on edge when meeting someone we want to think well of us. Reassure her that asking for directions was perfectly fine and she successfully navigated her first solo trip to London, but offer opportunities to practice navigating different cities and public transport over the next few years so she can get more confident. Think of this as a two-year learning path to being able to travel independently and potentially move to an unfamiliar city.

Also, remind her to send a thank you to her aunt and the two people who took time to meet with her.

Your 16 year old is apparently old enough to want to talk to people about careers in a think tank but can’t navigate using google maps. Do you see you might be getting your priorities wrong here OP?

I think it's reprehensible that your sister didnt make sure your DD didn't know how to get back to the station it would gave been wise but apart from that YABU.

I got myself back to England from Paris on the boat train (remember that anyone?) when I was 16. I seem to remember 3 men attaching themselves to me but nothing bad happened.