To be a bit annoyed at friend for this?

[anmila]

Yes, I know I'm overreacting but the ranting is mildly therapeutic

I have an old friend who lives abroad and who I haven't seen in about 6 years. We've been trying to make plans to see each other for years now and have finally gotten round to actually sorting it. I'm flying over to visit him in December for just under a week, Monday to Saturday.

Thing is, he's just slipped it into conversation that he'll be working that whole week. He works 12 hour shifts during the day, Mon-Fri. Realistically, this means the only time I'd actually see him is during the evening, although he doesn't finish work until 8pm.

I feel like a fool for assuming he'd have booked time off work - even just a couple of days if he couldn't take the whole week. For context, I've had to arrange childcare and sort out my own work to give me that week free (I'm self-employed). I booked the flights around 2 months ago and checked the dates with him beforehand and he said it would be fine.

I know IABU to have assumed he'd give up his week for me, but AIBU to be just a little bit pissed off? I'm happy enough to do my own thing in the city, but to be honest if I'd known he wasn't going to be around, I'd rather just have stayed home or have gone Friday-Sunday instead. He said it so casually so he clearly doesn't think it's a problem, but I don't even know how to react!

It sounds like a good plan.

Definitely cancel. My friends came over from Europe and I took over a week off work and showed them around the country. Your friend is an arsehole

We live abroad and frankly I can't take time off every time someone wants to visit us. We love seeing people but we just can't have a holiday for every visitor!

Admittedly we say this to people - and as we are long haul visitors usually stay a few weeks. Frankly it's exhausting everyone expecting us to be their tour guide!

I must admit I'm quite out of touch with these things as my job is something I can (mostly) do wherever and whenever.

Annual leave can feel very restrictive. I think it really depends on proportion of visitors to annual leave! If he couldn't take any leave he should have warned you up front. However, since he has taken a day off and will be leaving work earlier than normal I think that's a fair compromise. If you were there to visit the city it would be different, but if you're there to visit the person, it's good if you can actually spend some time with them.

My friends came over from Europe and I took over a week off work and showed them around the country. Your friend is an arsehole

This was one set of friends, presumably, and a once-off. Many of us don't live in our country of origin, and/or have a very scattered set of friends and family, and have lots of visitors from abroad. Taking a week or, or even a few days, each time is simply not possible. The OP's friend isn't an 'arsehole', and it will probably not have even occurred to him that she was expecting him to take significant time off work for her visit. He's not the one on holiday.

I don't think you're being at all unreasonable, because the initial suggestion that you visit came from him and he suggested next month. I wouldn't do that, if I worked long hours as he does, without being very sure that I'd be free some of the time.

I worked overseas on an island for nine years and had many visitors from the UK. They would generally ask me if I could accommodate them and I would agree (or not), making it clear that I'd be around during evenings/weekends. When my best friend came out, I took a week off. If I had asked someone to visit, I would consider them my guest whom I would entertain.