Orthodox Jews tend to do much of our visiting of family/friends on the Sabbath, when we don’t drive, and most of us don’t live within walking distance of a hotel. I have almost never stayed in a hotel when visiting someone, even on weeknights, and have never put a guest in a hotel at all. One of the reasons Mr. GilaB and I love our apartment is that we have a nice guestroom, which is a rarity in our community (in Manhattan, where space is at a premium.) We have Sabbath guests pretty often, and they’re not always relatives or close friends. This past weekend, a guy who works in my husband’s building wanted to be in our neighborhood for the Sabbath (our synagogue was running an activity he wanted to be part of), so he asked if he could stay at our place, which was fine by us. Our standard offer to friends with new babies is that the new grandparents can stay over for a few days if they like, although this is one of the few cases where we have people over for longer than Friday afternoon through Saturday evening. (My in-laws stay over for longer as well.)
This is pretty universally true within the Orthodox community. It’s perfectly acceptable to ask your friends and neighbors if they can put up your out-of-town friends and family for celebrations on the Sabbath (most notably bar mitzvas and the party that the groom’s family hosts the Sabbath before the wedding.) We’ve hosted strangers who were stranded in our community for the Sabbath due to transportation falling through, or who wanted to try out a new community, and been hosted by strangers (more for Sabbath meals, which are also a big deal, than for lodging) when we’ve been tourists in far-flung locations. The mutual hospitality is one of the nicer things about being part of a tight-knit culture.
Since I moved to flyover country, it’s not an issue anymore. When I had my great beach apartment, I had frequent visits from relatives and always put them up at my place. Now I have a real live guest room, but nobody comes to stay.
For my husband and myself, we always get a hotel room. I can take my relatives in small, controlled doses, but we really need a place to retreat. Also, I have very different standards of cleanliness than many of my relatives and don’t want to be so impolite as to refuse to eat something prepared in their kitchens, or take showers in their bathrooms.
We usually just stay at relatives’ houses. I’d vastly prefer to stay in a hotel. When we visit my husband’s family, since co-sleeping is the norm, I usually wind up in a small bed with children piled on top of me while my husband snores happily away either beside me or on the floor. Plus, there are usually at least five or six other people visiting at the same time, usually all congregating in the room next to the one we’re trying to sleep in. Last time we went to my husband’s aunt’s house, I think there was a gaggle of people in the kitchen, which was on the other side of the wall from us, cooking until about 4 a.m. Then our hostess was up again at 7 a.m. to cook breakfast for the army staying at her home. It was insane. That lady must never, ever sleep.
When we visit my mom, I don’t mind staying there. Obviously, I’m familiar with everything since I used to live there. My only beef is that for some reason, my husband insists on sleeping in my old double bed with me while our son gets a whole double bed all to himself. This wouldn’t be an issue but my husband is 6’3" tall and takes up a ton of room. Plus, he snores and we usually have the baby in my room in a pack n’ play. She sleeps lightly.
As for having people stay over… Unless it’s my mom, who is the biggest diva and second most terrible house guest to stay with me, I don’t mind having people over at all.
I prefer to visit other people for just a couple of days, max, even my mom. Same for having people over - after a while, it just gets old.
I have always stayed with relatives unless it was totally impractical and sometimes when it was (when my wife and I piled into my mother’s two BR apartment and the three kids slept all over the LR, she sometimes decided to invite my sister’s two kids over because the LR wasn’t quite full enough.
When I visit my now grown kids, I expect them to find room for us somehow. Since two of them live in small NYC apartments, this has not always been possible, but it grates on me, especially given NYC hotel prices. And when my son and his brood of four was going to visit and I had made arrangements for my wife and me to stay at a friends a few blocks away (he was going to be at his summer cottage) I was kind of put off when my son announced that they would prefer to stay in a hotel. Now he can well afford it, but it just isn’t the same kind of visit when you are miles away in a hotel and cannot put the kids to bed and have a pleasant evening together.
I am amazed at some of the posts in this thread. I also feel that I would not visit very often (or at all) someone who didn’t want to inconvenience their dog to make room for me.
I would never hear the end of it from my parents if I chose to stay in a hotel when I visited.
My parents are pretty frugal, so even when I had a small apartment and was sleeping on a rollout mattress, they always brought along their sleeping bags when they visited. I didn’t mind, especially if it meant they could save a few bucks.
Also whenever we visited family, we almost always stayed at their house and vice versa.
I think you are missing the dog point folks- the visitors also have dogs that don’t get along with hers. It’s better if the visitors stay in a hotel, in part, for the visitors dogs comfort.
I don’t live where anyone would want to visit unless they’re coming specifically to spend time with us, so they stay at the house. We have plenty of room. The exception is my oldest son – we have a dog and two cats and his wife has allergies, so they sleep in a motel.
But I wouldn’t be offended if visitors would rather sleep elsewhere – whatever lets them enjoy their visit works for me.
Friends, friends of relatives, and relative strangers I have put up with them all. The best events were where we had bodies everywhere, grateful they were to have a warm dry place to rest instead of the motorcycle campground that became a swamp. No fuss no muss, bachelor types that were used to roughing it. Thankful for hot coffee in the morning and dry bath towels in the evening, they came bringing offerings of pizza, beer, and friendship.
now the outlaws, when they come to town, different story. Hihg maintenance types who look down their nose at the accommodations, food, drink and location. Too cheap to get a hotel,but intent on paybacks from the the few times they hosted us in the last century,they arrive ready to complain, whine, and leave early. Good riddance don’t come back.
We have an entire wing of the house dedicated to housing guests; bedroom, bathroom, separate stairs, kitchen and garage bay. My in-laws come down quarterly for the medical facilities in our city and my parents too are ageing and may need to do the same at some point, so we’re well set up to handle situations like that. We too stay with them whenever we’re in town. Course with their grandchild in tow it would really upset them if we did anything different.
We generally stay at relative’s houses and have them stay with us. I’d love to have house guests more often, but it’s mostly limited to my parents and a party or two a year where people stay over when they’ve had a lot to drink.
We don’t impose the dogs on anyone but my parents or siblings, though. If we’re visiting someone else, we usually board the beasts but would stay in a hotel if that weren’t possible.
This is how I feel. I love having people stay unless they’re high-maintenance types. My mom, for example, parks her butt on my couch for days, keeps the TV on constantly, insists that “there’s nothing on” when golf and Andy Griffith aren’t on, doesn’t follow our house rules and insists on elaborate dinners, even though we have a preschooler and a baby. She’s of the school where the kids eat “kid food” first and the adults have a real dinner later. And it doesn’t help that she drinks constantly, so she’s put out by the time we actually eat and loose-lipped enough from the gin to say so.
I get some fabulous food out of her visits, but at the same time, they’re often not worth the stress of trying to get kids to bed. If she didn’t care that we don’t eat until 9-ish when we do an “adult” dinner, I wouldn’t mind. But she does.
My in-laws, on the other hand, although they prevent us from sleeping, don’t care if we eat on a table or on the floor and kids are a part of everything. In that culture, they’re not considered a chore to be dealt with then put away. The only beef I’ve got with them is that my FIL is very old-school and constantly expecting me to make him food and coffee. He’s really accustomed to having servants, so I usually give him a pass.
With both of our families, and with our friends, it’s assumed you will being staying in the house, not a hotel room. We frequently cram 10 people into my SO’s mother’s house. Maybe 6 every other month. Sure, there is a line for the only shower, but it also means we can stay up until 1AM talking and playing cards.
The only time I’ve had to put someone up in a hotel was when we hosted a college friends’ reunion. There just wasn’t any way to put up 20 people, although everything except sleeping was done at our place.
Thankfully, we live in an area where we can afford to buy a house that, while bigger than just 2 people need, will allow us to comfortable put up friends and family.
I’ve happily put up all sorts of friends, and crashed with all sorts of friends. I have crashed with many relatives, but unfortunately can’t return the favor with most of them because they are allergic to my cat.
However, the last time I crashed at my aunt’s house was such a disaster that I think on any future occasions I will crash with a childhood friend who lives near her (even though the friend has much less space), or get a hotel room. My aunt is getting older and more set in her ways, and even though I had reconfirmed the advance permission to crash with her months in advance, and even though she had an extra bedroom and I always chip in for groceries and cook and clean up after myself, she basically uninvited me halfway through the trip. It was not pleasant, and I don’t care to repeat the experience.
Now that we actually have a bona fide spare bedroom and 3x as much square footage, I look forward to hosting many more people.
Nope, this is it exactly. I love and adore my in-laws and my parents, but their dogs tend to be poorly behaved around the dads and around our dog. Because of this, hotels tend to be more comfortable for everyone involved.
I never had overnight visitors until my daughter and her husband lived in another state. It was really a shock to find it so disruptive to my routine having out of town company.
Now, we compromise. They stay at a hotel for a couple of days and sightsee etc. Then they stay with me a couple of days doing quality visiting.
