Please may I have a moan about holidays ....

[Countingthegreyhairs]

I find the worst thing about holidays when you are an expat ...

.... is that you don't really have any!!

We always have to visit parents or siblings or friends or godchildren or cousins or aunts back home ....

and we end up arranging our holidays around trips to see other people ......

Dh only takes two or three (at most) weeks holiday a year. And I just long for the time when we can go away as a family - with no "purpose" to the trip - other than to be together with no pressures and have some rest and repose and fun ...

What does everyone else do?

eeeeeekkkk

flying to see family tomorrow

Why does he only take 2-3 weeks a year?
I was an expat brat and yes we had yearly trips back to the UK but we also had fabulous holidays to places we couldn't have afforded if we had been in the UK. You need to make the most of being an expat!

I understand, but our current problem is due to visa difficulties we can't even LEAVE the country we're in for a holiday. And they won't know when it will be resolved! Argh.

When a single expat, I pleased myself where I went and went all over. Now with a DH and DS it's a little harder, but he is going back to his home country on his own to visit, and I will be saving my holidays for the holiday I want to take.

But I'm selfish like that.

My sis says the same thing. She and her hubby live in California (where every day is a holiday if you ask me!) and they have to spend her hubbies limited holiday time coming home to stay in mum and dads, where, with 2 kids, conditions can be a bit cramped. It's a tough life I tell her!

It can be really hard. You actually kind of have to get tough and tell family you'll see them less often.

We don't go home every year any more. We encourage our family to visit us and we go home about once every 18 months. That way we still get holiday for ourselves that is actual holiday. Because let's face it, going home for a holiday, while fabulous, doesn't exactly lend itself to sleeping late, lazing around and generally just doing what you want when you want.

We go home for a short break, generally just a week or a couple of weekends.

When at my parents we issue an invite for a BBQ to all our friends and relations.

If they can't be bothered coming to see us then I am not trailing around the country visiting them.

My parents visit several times a year.

I think you have to get a bit selfish about it. Obviously easier if you only have a short flight home, than if you are in Australia or US.

Thanks for everyone's replies

I know I sound a bit sorry for myself - I love living abroad really - I'm just a bit grumpy at the moment because I'm trying to organise the upcoming summer break and it's a logistical nightmare. I spend days and weeks planning to try and please everyone else and in the end please no-one, least of all ourselves.

Libra- dh only takes 2-3 weeks because we run our own business (and pay high taxes)

Yes, it may be that dh and I have to holiday separately jemesouviens ...and hope you get your visa sorted ... that's awful not being able to leave ...

Jennymac - the opposite side of the coin is that we seem to run a permanent guest house here where everyone piles in on us at regular intervals!!!

Yes, Madame Lindt and Bling I think we are going to have to get more selfish about this and perhaps a bit more disciplined in terms of ruthlessly fitting family visits during half term and long weekends which will be easier as dd gets older ...

Madame Lindt - I think that is a brilliant idea about the barbecue - perfectly possible because we only live a Eurostar ride away - it could become an annual event!! That would really take the pressure off .... we would have to hire a venue (my remaining parent is v elderly and my inlaws live in a third, different country)but it would be worth it

Back to the drawing board ...thanks all

We've always taken the more "selfish" option and invited people to have a holiday wherever we happen to be - both when I was growing up abroad with my parents and now with my own family abroad (I've been an expat almost my whole life). We visit the UK usually only for a few days/one week a year and we invite friends to meet with us at a certain place and date, as we just don't have time to travel around seeing everyone individually - this is sometimes a restaurant or park in London (i.e. fairly central for most of our friends) or at my parents' house (not so convenient for our friends but easier for us, especially when we're pushed for time).

I think people understand but it is a tricky problem, also not to upset anyone (especially family).

Other expats we know spend a few months a year back home, particularly the non-working wives/husbands with their children, either during the long summer holidays or over Christmas/New Year. They then have time to see everyone, of course. We just prefer to travel and have a real holiday ourselves as we don't have that much holiday time from work (we both work).

At least with phones, email, Skype etc. it's easier to keep in contact with friends and family, even if you don't get to see everyone as often as you'd like

We're lucky, DH gets loads of holiday and we're not too far from UK so we just go to his parents for a week in the summer and week at Christmas and get everyone else to visit us there. That said, haven't seen MY family for two years now (DPs live in the States and THEY get no holiday!)

I don't feel that I have this problem.

We take a week's family holiday at Easter time and a fortnight to three weeks' family holiday in the summer. The five of us (DP, me, DD, DSS1 and DSS2) go on a proper holiday to another country.

DP and the DSSs go ski-ing in February. DD and I go to England to visit my parents then.

I also go back to England to visit my parents for the odd weekend (last weekend, for example) taking DD and sometimes taking DP. DD and I went for a week after Christmas, and we will go for a fortnight this summer. We also often go for a few days around Toussaint.

We're different in that we probably wouldn't actually go away anywhere on holiday if we didn't go and see my family back in UK. DP's family have a variety of holiday homes / huts /fields to camp in around and about the place so these are great for that "getting away from it all" week in the summer.

But we've only once been to a new place together. I like going back to UK to see everyone, but agree that you do need to be selfish and get them to come to you once you're there.

We try to take our 'family holiday' in the countries where our friends and family are.

For example, a week in the UK would mean half the time at my Dad's catching up with family and friends and a few days discovering a new part of the country.

When my brother lived in a Californian city, we had a few days with his family in that city, and then a few days 'family holiday' in Yosemite.

The problem is when you're half a world away - I'm lucky in that my family are in the UK. DPs family are in Tahiti and you can't pop over there for a weekend! When it comes down to a 2 week holiday then I'd love to go on safari in Africa or something but the obligation is there to go to see them. The stopover is in America or Japan though!

We were terribly slack about visiting family when we lived overseas. I mean, really, a week at your ILs in their windswept, damp godforsaken town or a week in the Bangkok Peninsula? No contest

We told people to come to us, because we got so little holiday entitlement in HK that we were buggered if we were going to use it sitting at the luggage carousel at LHR waiting for the workers to come off strike and get the thing moving.

Counting, I agree with you! I alway come back from visiting my or DH's familly completely exhausted(sp)!

My family lives on the continemt and DH's in North Africa. Last year for the fist time we did not go and visit them but had our own 10days of holiday and doing nothing but use the hotel swimming pool or go to the beach! It was fantastic!

The thing is , this year we have to go and see both families in the same holidays so I do not know in what state I am going to come back but it wont be good!

I have tried for years to get my family to come and visit and always get some excuses I have got 4 to drag with me everywhere, she never seem to find it hard fo us! If we were not making the effort we would never see them. Ii is very hard for DH's family to actually get a visa to come and see us so we have to go there as well.

If i am honest it is nice to go and see them all but it never is relaxing as I do not want to give them more work when we are visiting.

Sorry, missed a bit: last year for the first time in 12 years we have been married we had our own holiday just us and the DCs.

Agree, it's difficult. Living in NZ it's a time and money issue. I've taken the boys home to the UK without dh 4 times in the past 6 years to stay with family. I always come back very stressed from 4 weeks in close confinement and long haul with 2 littlies. We have had 2 family holidays since we moved here. Last year to Fiji when mil died and left us some money and this year when I said I wouldn't be going home so spent 3 weeks in Oz. I've now changed my mind and am heading home alone for 9 days later this year. Now that's a whole new thread I've been meaning to start - guilt going home on your own etc....and to top it all last night there was an advert for Fiji on the tv the boys very excitedly started jumping up and down chanting 'oooh oooh can we go again'. Dh's reply 'not his year your mothers spent our money going back to England again'. A mixture of and .

Crikey, just checked back in to see loads more replies - thanks everyone -

Am coming to the conclusion that inviting everyone to a set venue once or twice a year (if our budget can stand it) is the solution to all this. If only I had relatives with holiday cottages like you Cies!! I need to rent an entire village!!

As usual, Bonsoir Anna, you have it all worked out. Your arrangements sound great. Unfortunately; in addition to parents in two separate countries, dh and I have a multitude of siblings, nieces and nephews and cousins (over 17 just on one side of my family), 4 godchildren each etc etc and that's before we have started on friends who are scattered across Europe and beyond. Even if we had six weeks holiday a year, we could never get to them all.

Agree about the exhaustion Gorionine!!! Glad you got your relaxing holiday at last.

And Sibble, I couldn't agree more with your your point about cost. It costs us 500 Euros each in flights alone to go and see the in-laws ...and then we have to pay for accommodation when we get there as they live in a tiny apartment ...

But it is, as has been mentioned, much easier now to keep in touch with e-mail and skype etc ...and agree FrakkinPannikin & Sibble that I shouldn't complain when our relatives are largely based within Western Europe ..well, except for the rellies in SA.. but that's another story as one of them appears to be living with us on a virtually permanent basis at the moment and he only came to stay for a fortnight!!