After a whirlwind 27 days and 4 different countries, my time with Contiki is finally over and it’s time to begin the second part of my journey.
These past 12 days I’ve spent in Vietnam has made me think and feel things I never questioned before in my life. Seeing how these people live their lives and comparing it to mine makes me so grateful for every opportunity I’ve ever had. To think that there was a high probability that I would have lived my life in the jungles of Northern Vietnam is hard to wrap my head around.
My life would be drastically different, but would I be happier?
As a child, I could be standing around the big tourist attractions trying to sell small trinkets. Then I could have grown up to be a farmer and working in the rice paddies everyday. I wouldn’t speak English, I would most likely not be educated after primary school, and I wouldn’t be able to travel around the world like I can today. There is also a chance that I would have never left the mountains and stayed in my tiny village. Again, there are a lot of what if's that I question about, but I'm glad I can put myself in a vulnerable state to discover the unknown, which is my biological past.
Everything is getting very real. Today I will visit my orphanage back in Hòa Bình. Whatever happens, is just going to happen. I don't really have a plan, but I'm ready to go wherever this takes me... even if that means finding nothing.
Comments