Family holiday looming? It’s not all doom, gloom and your dad finding you face down drunk in the toilets aged 26 after you'd snuck off to hang with the hot poolguard. Unless that actually happens. Here are some tips on how to avoid that happening.
Get drunk, but not too drunk
Once, I went to Portugal with my parents and we ended up wasted on vodka tonics, drunkenly setting up the video camera and filming ourselves doing butterfly stroke races. None of us can swim the butterfly. This is an example of a good kind of drunk night, but you don’t want to push it too far unless you’re happy spending the following day’s breakfast in an awkward silence while flashbacks hit you like tequila slammers. And this advice isn’t just for you, but your parents as well. A friend recently told me that his mum - who isn't a drinker - once got drunk on euro-strength gin and tonics and asked a 60-year-old gay man how he managed to get it up to father his children. This is an example of a bad kind of drunk night.
Don’t bring up any family issues
Holidays are for getting away from the fact you lied to your dad about having done your tax return. Or the fact you think your mum is too controlling. Or any sort of problem that could end with someone sobbing into their suncream. ‘My grandmother threw up on her plate after she had eaten way too much chicken at a restaurant and my dad brought it up years later on another holiday we took together which ended in a huge stand off,’ a friend Maddy told me. ‘My dad basically was of the mind that she ate too much and was trying to get her to admit to it in a jokey way
and she was adamant she had food poisoning. My grandfather stepped in to defend her honour and everyone burst into tears.’ Yeah, don’t dredge up the past unless you’re cool with the consequences (i.e. tears).
If you’re on someone else’s family holiday, wear too many clothes
Alright, not too many, but enough. Always enough. Why? Examples: jumping into the pool and your flimsy bikini shooting off, your skirt blowing up and you’re wearing no pants, wearing no bra under a tee shirt then getting splashed or thrown into a pool and having your boyfriend’s parents see your boobs. Plan for every eventuality when it comes to nudity because it’s embarrassing enough having your own parents see your rude bits, but your boyfriend/girlfriend’s parents? ‘I went surfing with my ex-boyfriend and his entire family, and I didn't realise that you had to wear a bikini under your wetsuit. So I didn't,’ says my uni friend Jo. ‘Then at the end, his mum was like 'I need to take your wetsuit off you’ and I was too embarrassed to say anything so in the middle of a car park she stripped me naked and saw my flange and boobs.’ PREPARATION, PEOPLE. ALWAYS PREPARE.
Don’t try and get laid if you’re anywhere near your parents
So you’ve got a tan and you’re surrounded by flirty waiters, lifeguards and guys wanting to have a bit of (sex) fun but this is one week out of the 52 that you should probably give the whole pulling thing a miss. The ONE week. There’s just too much that could go tits up (and out) with shagging around when you’re supposed to be with your parents. Like Older Generation Racism for starters: ‘I got off with the deckhand during a boating holiday, my mother heard us giggling and had a huge rant at me about how they were Muslims and he’d probably never been with a woman in his life
and how she didn’t want her daughter being a white hussy,’ a friend remembers. ‘Obviously nothing happened after that. Just continued furtive glances. And huge amounts of shame.’
Don’t interrupt your parents after they’ve had some wine and it’s the PM
They’re only human, and humans while they’re drunk on holiday like to get up to stuff. ‘I walked in on my parents having full-on sex when we shared a villa in Portugal,’ says Anna. ‘I should have realised because to be fair they were pretty drunk and it was nearly midnight, but my aftersun was in their room. I couldn’t pass it off as not realising because I’m 24.’ I think the lesson here is to utilise the complex concept known as ‘knocking’ to ensure you don’t get way more of your parents than you bargained for. Oh, and when I said ‘But it’s sweet they’re still
into each other’, she responded: ‘You wouldn’t have said that if you’d seen your own dad’s balls’. Fair point.
Don’t rub suncream on your boyfriend’s dad’s back
It’ll just be a bit weird, y’know? There should be whole novels dedicated to etiquette when holidaying with your SO’s family (including ‘always at least look like you’re moving towards your purse at the end of a meal so they can stop you’) but offering to smear cream on them is pretty basic stuff. ‘I put suncream on my boyfriend’s dad’s back and it was so cold he jumped and fell off the deckchair and hurt his ankle,’ Jo says. ‘Luckily he was nice about it but I was mortified.’ Could have been worse - he could have broken his leg. Or his swimming trunks could have fallen down. Just don’t risk it.
At least look like you're moving towards your purse at the end of a meal so they can stop you
As mentioned above, this works well when holidaying with your boyfriend/girlfriend's parents - they'll think you're charming - but also with yours, too. Sure, they might
want to spoil you rotten, and god knows they might have more disposable income than you, but you want to at least look like a) you've got your shit together enough to pay your way and b) like you didn't just come on the holiday as an excuse to get loads of free food. Even if that's 100% the case.
Follow Stevie on Twitter @5tevieM
Picture: Getty
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.