Meaningful or Transformational

Meaningful or Transformational?

I have had conversations with myself, cautioning me not to allow experiences living amongst the people in Vietnam to create expectations for this trip. Tourists come to see, travellers come to be.... In Vietnam I was a traveller. Living there was transformational. Within ten days of my arrival, I felt like Norm in the Cheers bar, "where everyone knew my name, And they were always glad I came; I wanted to be where I could be...."

Will I will be more of a tourist this time? I will stay in tourist hotels, cruise and cycle with perhaps no Dutch citizens. I will try a variety of foods and beers, but certainly not legal drugs, or legal sex trade offerings. I will see the marvels of land reclamation and Dutch flood control technology, but probably not mingle with the locals in their daily lives as I did in Hoi An. 

One can't help but develop a great respect for a culture who literally carved more than a quarter of their land from the sea and fought the power of Mother Nature's always dynamic push and pull between outflowing flooding rivers and the inflowing North Sea tides and storm surges. But will I be able to "feel" their determination, practicality, their dogged determination and not just "see" the physical results of those qualities?

So I wear a different hat this trip. Appreciate what I see, what I learn, what I taste and smell. My perspective will be stretched. It probably won't be a transformational experience, but one framed by the intention to learn what I can about a people whose culture is defined by constantly wrestling with water. To view life from a different point-of-view knowing I will often be between 1 and 7 metres below sea level. Hmmmm...