To wonder why the fuck I agreed to visit DH's parents again!

[HeyNa]

We are in Eastern Europe. It is 40C in the day and 35C at night. No wind, no air con. We have 4 Dcs and DH reverts to the ignorant sexist pig that most of his countrymen are aslmost as soon as we arrive in the country!

It is too hot to sit around the in-laws house (they expect me to constantly clean and make chai anyway), we have a 2 year old and we need to go somewhere where there is air con as we had planned, but he has buggered off with his cousins without a word to me. No idea when he will be back. All he does while here is sit on his arse drinking chai and jibber jabbing away with his numerous relatives, leaving all the cleaning, cooking and washing to me. The electricity goes off constantly so it can take all day to do one load of washing.

I can drive but I am terrified of driving here as they drive like maniacs and on the wrong side of the road to boot! The older Dcs have not had lunch as there is nothing in. I feel absolutely trapped and powerless. I do not speak fluently in his language so can't join in with conversations and I can't get a word in edgeways. He has been ignoring me.

I would like to smash DH's teeth in actually. This is not a holiday for me or the DCs. This is our 3rd time here and he promised this would not happen again. At home, he helps a lot and I wear the trousers if you will. I will never come here again. I am even thinking divorce would be a better option. AIBU?

[CaptainVonTrapp]

Good Luck HeyNa. Save a copy of this thread. Read it back to yourself in a few years if you are wavering and thinking about going back there.

I understand why you've put up with a lot but don't really get the pouring tea thing. Personally wouldn't dream of doing this. Anyhow, you'll never be so happy to be home. Please update the thread when you're back, it'd be great to see an update!

[giveitago]

You should be sainted.

Yup don't go again. The entitled twat thing is ripe in western europe as well though. My dh's cousin had to come to UK - all very secret and in the end I was cooking and cleaning for this arse. I work and dh got in a takeaway - the arse ate the lot having first put some on dh's plate - none for me. Every time I spoke to him to be polite - in his language - he just looked away and started to speak to dh. Even ds at the age of 5 asked me who that awful man was. Erm - typical 40 something bloke from your dad's village mate!

Look when you are in another country it is horses for courses but in your case your dh is expecting YOU to facilitate his trip - not merely blend in. Not sure I'd want my kids picking that stuff up.

You are a saint.

[LunaLunatic]

I still don't understand after reading the whole thread why you have allowed yourself to be used as an unpaid servant, treated with utter disrespect and walked over in front of your kids. Sorry, I just don't. I also live in a very chauvenistic culture, women are home makers and serve the men etc. but I put my foot down from the start and as a result no one in the family takes the piss out of me. I do help out when we see the in laws, out of choice, but I'm treated nicely, spoken to directly, whereas the other women are ignored and often shoved into a different room entirely.

All you've done is show your husband that he's entitled to treat you like shit, your kids that women are there to serve men and have the very opposite of a nice holiday for yourself.

I'm sorry, I know I am coming across very harshly, but I can't help it. I absolutely can't abide women martyring themselves for the sake of saving face, family honour, all that crap. I see it here every day and it is just an endless cycle with kids learning the same behaviour from their parents.

Please please keep your promise to yourself not to go back. It's easy once you're home to rationalise everything and time blurs your strong feelings.

Once again, sorry for being so harsh but I felt so awful for you and then you just stayed and put up with that treatment...for what?

[LurkingAndLearningLovesCats]

For her marriage.

I'm the first to screech 'leave the bastard!' but this seems more like pressure from his family to conform and he's simply pathetic and weak in their presence.

I'm sure if OP thought he was actually abusive she'd leave him. She sounds a very strong woman.

[JustinBoobie]

Blimey OP! Sounds like a nightmare. I will say well done though - it can't have been easy, and you've managed to put your DH first... again.

Only fair he makes it up to you

[emark]

Life is slowly changing in kosovo and albania, they even have package holidays to albania available!!!
In the twelve years i have been going there about 6 times, there have been massive improvements, not least a new airport instead of a shed.
There are now supermarkets and you see women walking alone and working.
There were noo real shops and it used to be mainly men twelve years ago.
It is still not an easy place but I have found it much easier with children especially as I insist we rent an apartment or stay in hotels to avoid sexist family occasions, thus family visits are curtailed to few hours every other day within the two weeks.
Maybe this will be an option the op coild pursue as the children get older as I could not contemplate allowing children to be there without me.

[LurkingAndLearningLovesCats]

I think (and hope!) Op's last last post said she and children would never, ever go there again due to his behaviour.

I certainly don't want them uncomfortable in a motel while her DH is waited on hand and foot. :( What sort of lesson does that teach him?

[oooohhhhyes]

Please never go back, OP! Glad the torture's nearly over. Focus on that moment you walk in your own front door and pour yourself a . Ahhh!

[HeyNa]

o last night, H was 'too tired' to take us out for dinner (we have only eaten in a restaurant on one night when we went to the beach in the 3 weeks we have been away and there are some quite nice restaurants here). Roll on 9.30 and he and his brothers decide to go out for a 'coffee'. His parents go to bed in the other house at 11.00pm and I am alone with my 4 DCs in an unlocked house as they have no keys. We are having to sleep in a room 'outside' off the balcony with it's own front door and the older DCs have been sleeping in the lounge inside the main house. It gets to midnight and I am desperate to sleep so I have wake up the DCs and get them to sleep in our room so I can lock us in! The house is in a rural area and there are large metal doors that the car drives into with a walled garden. These doors are always kept locked but they have to remain open as the 'men' are out and they will need to get back in. I shit myself until 1am as I can hear shouting and gunshots (probably for Eid) in the village. I have images of Serbs invading again in my sleep deprived state (we have had to sleep on the floor all the time we have been here and it has been bloody uncomfortable, No 1 brother has had his parents bed). H rolls in with bros at around 2am and I refuse to unlock the door so he has to sleep on the sofa in the lounge.

I am totally unreasonable to pissed of about this apparently and should not have been worried about us being on our own at all .

Last day today!

[HeyNa]

Oh SILs were not here as they are staying with their families so it was just me on me tod. Probably had nothing to worry about but quite scary in the middle of the night.

'o last night' should be 'So last night'.

[oooohhhhyes]

Last day today, hooray! Last night sounds awful, I am like that too, no way could I sleep without feeling secure. Are you leaving tomorrow morning? Good luck with journey, only a few more hours now, yay

[NellyJob]

sounds horrible.....I bet you will be glad to get home.
i wish you a good journey.

[mrsscoob]

Wish you a good journey, give him hell when you get home xx

[Sunnydelight]

Please update us when you get home about your revenge. Well done for getting through it with dignity - I think I'd have left something very sharp on that sofa last night just around testicle level!!!!!

[helenthemadex]

hope you have a good trip back, plenty of time to plan revenge!

[quoteunquote]

Op, sounds like you have done your duty, you need a holiday, tell your husband it's time to go, enjoy a leisurely journey in hotels on the way back.

the "culture norm" should be what you and your husband have set out in the way you do things in your family(or how else would thing progress), if he's decided to change that without consulting or caring how you feel about that, he is being totally unreasonable,

explain to him you find it unacceptable, and if he doesn't take the opportunity to rectify situation, leave and if he's embarrassed, he can think about why his choices put him that situation,

If the "holiday" isn't working for you, that is totally unfair, you have identified the problem(s), he needs to work with you to find the solutions.

[SlightlySuperiorPeasant]

I think I might accidentally-on-purpose leave 'D'H at a French service station on the way home, remembering to keep his passport and door keys in the car, and journey on with the DC to a luxurious holiday in the UK...

[DrowninginDuplo]

Poor you, sounds like hell on earth. Your DH is a right twonk by the way. I accept that he feels he has to act within cultural norms, but he doesn't have to be an arse with it. And that man, my dear, is being an arse. On return to UK, book yourself into a spa for a week and he can have the kids.

[Floggingmolly]

It sounds crap, but it also seems to be culturally normal? If it is, how does your dh handle you "wearing the trousers" when you're at home? Maybe he's using the time off the leash to enjoy himself while he can.
Some marriages seem to be a battle for supremacy rather than a partnership; I'd have had more sympathy for you if you hadn't included the wearing the trousers comment in your op.

[eagerbeagle]

OP you deserve a medal for enduring that.

I simply dont understand the "cultural" excuses for outright sexism and mysogny. Is inequality because of race acceptable for "cultural" reasons? I would bloody hope not and the same should go for sexism.

I'll get off my soapbox now and hope OP updates us on her joyous homecoming.

[AngryAndLost]

My DP is albanian. The first time I went to Albania was 3 years ago, and had very similar experience like OP, except that in-laws and numerous family members were doing their best to make me happy. Bt my DP changed to a pig as soon as we landed in ALB, behaving like OP's husband- leaving me home withs a 1-year old all the time while visiting uncles, cousins, etc., as it was really too hot to travel anywhere with our DD. i was stuck there for 3 weeks! I never went back after that time and not planning in the near future. Now DP just takes our DD for holidays there as she needs to see her albanian grandparents and family. I feel a little bit guilty every year when DP start looking for plane tickets, but stand my ground, and never been back. I do 'speak' to DP family on SKYPE and that is quite sufficient :)

[kukeslala]

Chai (through spelt caj, and the c has the little tail thing), is also drunk in Albania.
Though Im assuming as OP says she is always being asked to make chai, its not Albania, as Albania's only really drink tea when ill on the whole, and coffee tends to be there drink of choice.

[quoteunquote]

THIS IS A ZOMBIE THREAD!

[ginmakesitallok]

Oh ffs!, I got to page 3 before realising this is an old thread...

[kukeslala]

God, didn't realise this was really old when posted reply, or that 10 pages had been written.
Just scan read now.
Know its not about Albania, but as it has been mentioned, just wanted to give my thoughts.

My husbands family are generally traditional, males on the whole go out to work females stay at home and work in the home.
However there are a few female in his family who wanted a career and are either studying for this or currently doing it, not just as a stop gap until settling down but also with a family.

But they aren't disrespected, not spoken to, kept in separate rooms.

I didn't find the ladies ignored, in fact laughed at my ideas they would be, when on the first day we went to stay with my husbands Aunty, and she lit up one of my cigarettes, her brother and husband said something to her about getting a cough, and she told them she was a grown women, and it was good enough for them so to shut up-LOL. I sat there gob smacked, as had "heard" lots before going there.


Me and my husband have an equal relationship in England, and wouldn't be together if this changed even for a few days when going back home.

We have been together 10 years, I go to Albania yearly, and have for periods spent months there. I would live there if I could take my family with me.