Travelling with your mom is much more challenging than with your friends or partners. Due to the “reversed power”, the one who is usually taking care of others becomes the one being taken care of. You will take the responsibility of not only planning the trip and looking after your mom, but also facing the actual generational gap that is sometimes buried under the separate daily routines. The conflicts may rise 10 times more during the trip than in normal life, are you ready for that?
Everything you should know before you start traveling with your mom
The best tips for travelling with your mom.
Tip 1: Do NOT expect your mom to agree with traveling without a big suitcase
Traveling with mom can be challenging in a many ways, mainly because some moms can’t decide which clothes they will take when they travel, others just pack all the possible types of pills that she could come up within no matter where the destination is.
Even if it’s only for a 2-days trip she would still very likely try to bring the whole wardrobe or pharmacy in the suitcase of your size.
Don’t buy any promises from your mom about no big suitcase, or you would expect to pick up a lady with one backpack on the back, one huge bag that a 15-inch computer will fit in, a small suitcase with a travel bag that seemed full with balloons.
Not to mention sometimes your mom needs a big suitcase only to bring spices back home.
Tip 2: Mom loves beautiful herself in pictures, you either needs great photographing skills or a big heart to resist her nags
Sometimes your mom will even pay for you with a new camera as soon as she hears of the travel plan and retweets dozens of articles about how to make nice pictures.
Don’t neglect them or you’ll see what a big mistake you made: though you didn’t check them, your mom sure did.
Then during the trip, you’ll hear her nagging you “hey let’s take a picture under the tree, use the ‘triangulation skill’ so that I will look tall in the picture.” Or “try with different light so that people know this is not some normal tree, it’s certainly a FOREIGN tree!”
You may also see Asian moms with colorful scarfs and beautiful hats, trying to get closer to any normal birds so that their poor daughters can catch the moment in pictures.
Tip 3: It’s definitely important to have shopping hours for moms
Traveling with mom is sometimes like a workshop.
You work your mom shops.
From the crowded duty-free shopping malls full of tourists and expensive stuff to the local markets presenting interesting handcrafts and suspicious snack food, don’t feel surprised when you lose your mom every 5 minutes.
Also don’t expect that your mom will count the expense and exchanging rate correctly even if she is a math teacher.
It’s easy for them to lose their minds when it comes to shopping.
Tip 4: Learn foreign languages so you can help your mom with unbelievable requirements
Only when you encounter with your mom’s requests during the trip abroad can you realize how important language is.
Asking for a food package from buffet restaurants where it states “no takeaway” but only in the local language, begging for packing their chopsticks from some Asian restaurant as souvenirs, bargaining with every shop assistant with a ridiculously cheap offer, request to take back the seashells after a seafood feast in a fancy restaurant.
It’s possible for your mom to eventually get the cultural difference, but after numerous efforts that you have to make with foreign languages, and sometimes, body language.
Tip 5: Learn to “Let it go” is not only the requirement for mom but also for yourself
If you also have a bossy mom who always does things her way, then most of your childhood you are fighting with her to struggle for your own growth. However, when you travel with the bossy mom as an adult, the change of environment and reversed the balance of power will remind you how you become the “control freak” during the trip.
So before you try to nag your mom with “listen to me”, “take that stupid thing off”, or “don’t eat this coffee sugar” in the trip, think of the thousands of moments when you yelled at your mom “leave me alone!” during the juvenile rebellion.
Mom has her unique way of enjoying the trip, just let it go!
Photos: Shutterstock
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