Final Post

This final entry has been a long time coming.

It seems like "it changed my life" is the apropriate response to "how was Croatia?" but the real answer is long.

I remember an argument I had with Ian shortly after we came to Dubrovnik, in which I asserted that people in Croatia were very different from Americans, and Ian disagreed; that people are people and on a basic level, all want the same things. In retrospect, I'd pick a completely different side. People are reflections of their environment. It's arbitrary to proclaim that Americans are this way or Croats are that way, because the way we are is influenced by an uncountable number of factors. Our language, our parents' opinions, our teachers' attitudes, our experiences, the experiences of those we encounter.

This part is hard to explain.

People being reflections of their environments and largely obvious, and something I've always known, but now I really see it. In an abstract way, it's something I've experienced.

This hightened awareness that mine is a very unique model of reality creates a larger frame through which I see the world. For example, instead of considering someone naive for their belief in god, I think about what the details of their life and their story might be that - if I had undergone, might have brought me to the same beliefs.

Mine is a negligable fraction of the human experience, but to me it is valuable.

All of my travels, culminating in 3 months in Croatia, make me realize this.