One of the motivations for going is that since we have a new bride in our family, we're supposed to be taking her to visit with all her new relatives. Show off the new addition; the latest model. And while we'd made the easterly trek (to New Jersey) two weeks ago, we hadn't yet headed west.
It was a nice weekend. We spent one day just hanging out, ending the evening with my husband's famous kabobs and a horror movie. The next day we drove to a safari park, spent the day feeding animals from our cars, had pony & camel rides for the kids, and then drove home. I enjoyed my time there, M was a great translator for me as always, and the baby had fun with his cousin. The only real hurdle was the sleeping arrangements.
M's (and his family's) concept of having guests over is very different from what I am used to. In my family, if you are a guest in someone's home, it means you get a guest bedroom. One that has a bed in it. If the host's house is too small for that guarantee, guests will stay in a hotel. No one will be offended by this hotel stay. These things are almost always true. Only very occasionally, and only when staying at a very close relative's house, would someone maybe sleep on a couch.
In M's family, if you are a guest in their home, there is no guarantee of a bedroom. Or, in fact, of a bed. Or a couch! It doesn't matter if the house you are staying in has only 2 bedrooms but there is a need to sleep 3 couples and 2 children. No hotels will even be mentioned - it would be thought of as VERY bad to stay in a hotel. Instead, upon arrival, it will be suggested that all the women sleep in one room, and all the men sleep in another. I just can't imagine sharing such close quarters with my two sisters-in-law while my husband cuddles up to his brother and brother-in-law in the adjacent room.
In my family - my culture - it would usually be considered very strange, probably even rude, to suggest that a married couple split up and sleep with other people instead. But I've heard this suggestion made so many times in my years as the wife of a Pakistani. (And by "happen", I mean I've heard it suggested. I have never allowed it to actually take place. I'm not sleeping in the same room as anyone except my husband. Even if it means I have to sleep in a hallway or living room.)
In this case, M's sister's house only has 2 bedrooms. M and I claimed the extra bedroom as our own and that left Chachoo and his wife to sleep on the floor in the living room. (Of course this was after the usual suggestion that we all split up and sleep along gender lines instead.) We took the bedroom primarily because of the baby - he needs a dark, quiet place to nap and sleep at night, and he has a pretty rigid sleep schedule that means he sleeps a lot during times when other people are still quite active. So he really needs his own space separate from the common areas.
Unfortunately, the extra bedroom was not dark - nor does it have a bed. It just had an extra blanket and two pillows laid on the floor in the center of the room. I'm no stranger to sleeping on the floor in a Pakistani home. That's how we sleep for weeks at a time when we're vacationing in Pakistan. In fact, we always sleep on the floor whenever we visit any of M's relatives. To be clear, I'm not saying that beds or extra guests rooms make a people or culture any better or worse than an alternative culture or people. These are not value judgements. I'm just saying that these customs are very different from the ones I grew up with, and it's quite an adjustment to go from one to the other. Especially as I get older and older. I never noticed my back hurting so much before. Luckily the baby is so young - he didn't mind sleeping on the floor at all, though he did require some crafty solution to make sure he had a dark enough environment to nap. And the solution to that problem wasn't a bed - it was a desk. And a towel.
