Final Thoughts

Well, this is it. After this post, I hope to never blog again for the rest of my life.

I'll start off with the really important stuff: the final McDonald's review. The following is a list of the countries in which I ate at McDonald's, in order from best McDonald's to worst. Criteria weighed included speed and efficiency of service, perceived quality of ingredients, price, and overall impression and presentation. Feel free to ask if you're wondering about any specific details (although you probably aren't and probably think I'm nuts for going to McDonald's so much while traveling around Europe).

1. Hungary

2. Austria

3. Germany

4. France

5. Monaco

6. Czech Republic

7. Turkey

8. Switzerland

9. Italy

10. London

11. Dublin

You'll note that Slovakia and Vatican City are both absent from the list. The former is absent because I was in the country for about two hours and was too busy drinking 1 euro pints to care about McDonald's. The latter is absent because it doesn't have a McDonald's.

So, you may be wanting to ask the typical dichotomous question: is Europe better than America?The answer, in my opinion, is no. In some ways it certainly is, but in many ways it's definitely not. Neither place is better than the other - each is just different according to the priorities and customs of the people who live there. Maybe we work too hard. Maybe they don't work hard enough. Maybe we have the right priorities, maybe they do. Maybe some people have particular tastes that make one place much more appealing than the other. I think that there is merit in both ways of living. Maybe I don't have particularly strong "values" or whatever, but I tend to think that results are what matter, and from what I can tell, it seems like both the American and the European ways of life tend to produce pretty great results in the end.

It's nice to be back in America and be able to embrace my roots once again. Ironically, I thought I'd be embracing my roots by traveling around Europe to the places where my grandparents are from, but along the way I realized just how American I am and just how fine I am with that fact. America certainly isn't perfect (and neither is Europe), but it's my home, and it's my duty to make it a better place, not to abandon it because of its imperfections.

On a sappier note: traveling is fun, but in the end, places are just places. It's people that really matter.

In a sense, I became a different person while I was abroad. I was more open-minded and less resistant to change and strange ideas. I did some things that were out of character, at least at the time. I pushed the envelope. And in the end, I think that my personality really benefited from it, and my experiences have helped shape new and more enlightened perspectives. So, finally and most importantly, I learned that Europe isn't really a place. It's a state of mind.

With that, I would like to thank you one final time for your attention and for putting up with my self-indulgent crap, and bid you "auf Wiedersehen!"