The Sum Up

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A few little facts about my trip:
In the three and a half months I was away I spent time in 17 countries, 16 of which did not speak primarily English. From those 16 I had the chance to experience 14 different languages (although as soon as I came across a new language, any vocab retained from the last was pushed out of my memory to make room for the new one). I made it as far east as war-stricken Bosnia; from the cool, northern climates of Scandinavia all the way down to the warm, sunny weather of the Adriatic and Mediterranean coasts. I zig-zagged my way across the continent on buses and trains, but I still barely scratched the surface. I tried to immerse myself in the various cultures as much as possible for someone spending no more than a week in any one place. But the fact is, you could spend years in some cities before you could really start to know them.
The countries I visited (in the order I first visited them) were:
England, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany, Czech Republic, Poland, Estonia, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, Hungary, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Slovenia, Italy and Switzerland.
You could also count Vatican City, Monaco and Liechtenstein although these visits were all for less than a day.
Overall, the decision to debark on my trip has been one of the most rewarding decisions I've ever made. I got more out of it than I thought possible. Not only did it do wonders for my knowledge of history, my understanding of other cultures and my social skills, but it also gave me a greater understanding of myself.
Am I a different person? Well, I’d like to think so, but I think more than anything it hasn’t been that I've become that much different - more that I've become more like me. Having a greater understanding of myself has brought out more of what makes me me. I've become more Benj-like and if my trip did nothing else (which is absurd of course) it was worth it for that alone.

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