Apologies if I'm casting aspersions on your relatives' reliability here, but a lot of folks have a tendency to exaggerate how 'rough and ready' some of the planes they've travelled on are. One example: a guy I used to work with in the chemical industry several moons ago, who travelled quite a lot, who reported that a plane he flew on from Amsterdam to Frankfurt 'had holes in the cabin you could see daylight through.' It was a Cityhopper F50. And another guy whose regular lift back from CDG was a Gill Air F100, who reported that the ATR42 they subbed it with one day was 'a 1930's thing, falling to bits.'
Again, apologies to question your story, but this is my genuine experience.