To think a UK holiday is still a proper holiday?

[Driedpotatochip]

I’m going to Argentina next week and a friend commented that it’s been ages since I had a proper holiday post covid.

I’ve managed to do long weekends away and a week away twice in the UK and also went to Spain for a long weekend from 2020 to now.

True I haven’t been to a destination that’s really far away since 2019 but I feel like i still had proper holidays. Aibu or does what I did not count as a holiday?

@bellac11 people are entitled to their preferences of where they choose to holiday. What languages? Not been funny but brits are notoriously known to go to places and moan they can't get a bacon sandwich on hol or the hotel staff were not speaking THEIR language. It's sheer rudeness and ignorance! What language are brits known to speak? Because even the French get annoyed with us!

I live in London for a bit and knew someone who had been abroad lots. And London. But not ever really seen anywhere else in England!

The word means different things to different people and that's OK.

No, it’s not okay. Language only works when words have a common meaning.

To say a holiday is only a holiday if it is abroad is to unilaterally change the meaning of the word holiday. For what purpose? To show off? To make others feel excluded? To enforce your values on everyone else?

If you can afford holidays abroad, and prefer them, well, lucky you. But don’t make an arse out of yourself.

This thread is making me think of all the people on here that gone on about 'travelling' for several years in their 20s and I always wondered how on earth they afforded it.
But after reading a lot of those threads it seems they were just living abroad working - to me that's not 'travelling' but moving somewhere because that's where the job is.

One of my favourite places to go on holiday is Cornwall but I imagine people that live in Cornwall would prefer me (and all the other tourists - are we still tourists if we're from the UK and therefore not "properly" on holiday...? 🤔) to go abroad!

We don’t do holidays abroad. Our uk holidays are still just as much holidays.

Why does it matter so much to you? Some people only think holidays involve going abroad, and they’re still going to think that post this thread. If staying in the same country is still a holiday to you then that’s fine, if you’re having a good time then that’s all that matters, surely? Why do you need everyone to agree on the definition?

You're aware of Welsh I presume?

You're aware of different words and dialects that people use regionally?

Perhaps you're not

Also where did I say that someone isnt entitled to their preference as to where they go on holiday?

Well its more that its just a factual thing, the word holiday means 'time away from home' a period of recreation and leisure

It doesnt specify that it has to be a different country

So people getting confused that a holiday is only a holiday if they are 'abroad' are just factually wrong.

Definitely, OP! UK holidays are holidays - you can take it from me. (Staycations at my house are also quite nice.)

But, having read through a lot of responses here, I've learned that I've actually only been on about 6 holidays in my entire life - don't know what the others were (in the lovely, varied, green and gorgeous UK).....??? Oh well - now I know.

What a lot of small-minded snobbery here. I have to laugh, because I think since crude social snobbery has become unacceptable, other more oblique sorts have crept in to satisfy some people's need to feel superior.

This has made me think of a situation I've begun to notice in a meeting I go to each week (sort of hobby, but a bit serious too). The organiser is rather stern and when people are absent and we tell her someone is, say, walking in Wales or in a cottage in the Cotswolds, she will often show irritation, as if it's really self-indulgent of them to show lack of commitment. It's fine, though, if you've flown away to the sun - that's OK, and usually elicits a jolly remark such as 'Ooh, lucky her!'. I'm really not imagining this - it's happened just too often. Will definitely challenge her next time...

I find it really odd how hypersensitive some people on this thread are to how holiday is defined! Looking up definitions and telling us that we must use them correctly.
Absolutely bonkers😀

I will never call time spent on the UK , where I live a holiday. Just like I will use staycation to mean holidays in the Uk.
It doesn’t matter to me the terms other people use. You could spend a week in the local park and say you went on holiday for all I care’

To me a proper holiday is being abroad. Always has been, always will be!

I find the best, most rejuvenating holidays can be the ones where you don’t waste time, energy, and money on getting to your destination. You can have an amazing holiday relatively close to home if you plan well.

Exactly this. I think it's very snobby to only define a 'holiday' as outside the UK. There are some lovely places here.

Can you not see that by refusing to acknowledge that a holiday in one's own country is a 'holiday' you are devaluing others' experiences.

It's fine to say something like 'I don't feel properly refreshed unless I go on holiday overseas' or words to that effect, but you shouldn't deny other people's experience of a 'holiday' just because it doesn't match yours.

You're factually wrong. People might just want to tell you to stop you looking silly getting it wrong in the future

@AllThingsServeTheBeam 😂

I think it's another symptom of our consumerist culture - you haven't done something "properly" unless you've done it to the max and in the most resource-heavy way.
You haven't had a proper holiday unless you go abroad, buying second hand presents is grotty and doing handmade ones is tight, you need to buy a new outfit for a date or a social occasion... In other words, buy buy buy and consume consume consume.

Well said - it's very depressing.

Same for me. Everyone around me in real life is the same.

And neither of you will accept that the your choice of language affects other people. You are so determined to be defend your holiday choices you can't see in front of your noses.

@rainbowandglitter yeah, there’s mumsnet and then there’s real life!

Indeed.

I live in Northern Ireland. I do consider trips away around Ireland to be holidays (and have taken some) but I would still call trips abroad ‘proper holidays’. To me, a proper holiday involves flights and going through airports, using passports and staying somewhere with different food/currency/ language or weather (but not necessarily all of them at once). Going somewhere in Ireland just isn’t the same because I’m staying on the same island.

I know. Its bizarre.

I call a week somewhere beautiful in the UK a holiday. I’d call a week on the Costa Brava an endurance test.

They're both (if they're not just the same poster) snobs. They won't answer you.