If you want your next trip to be more than a blur of fast-fading memories, take a page from a scouting handbook and create your own badge. Give some thought to what you seek from a travel experience, and come up with a list of activities you'll engage in to earn a badge in that area. Your badge will reflect what you gained from your trip and imbue your vacation with more meaning than a series of postcards and souvenirs.
Next time you travel out of the country, avoid the well-worn tourist paths and get to know how people in that area really live. A checklist of activities for this badge might include having a conversation with a local person who doesn't work in the tourism industry and eating at a restaurant where you are the only American. Travel with an open mind and try to genuinely engage with a foreign culture without judgment--bonus badge points if you get invited to dine with a local family in their home or to join a celebration that is usually for natives only.
Instead of choosing a work-related seminar in an exotic location and calling it a vacation, choose a completely new subject to learn and build your trip around that. You might use discarded childhood dreams and pastimes as a starting point. If you once dreamed of being an archaeologist but became a grade school teacher or real estate agent, join a dig. If you have fond memories of climbing trees as a child, but haven't done anything like that in years, take a tree-climbing class. Or try a language immersion experience where you live with native speakers and negotiate everyday life in a foreign tongue.
If you live in a rural area and your usual recreations include hiking and hunting, learn to negotiate city streets. Earn badge points by negotiating the public transportation system in a big city and touring a museum or taking in an opera performance. On the other hand, if you think of yourself as an urbanite, try roughing it a bit. Pitch a tent, build and cook over a campfire. In either direction, the point is to learn to appreciate, rather than criticize, the alternate lifestyle.
For a truly meaningful vacation, participate in a volunteer vacation. Many organizations offer packages where you can teach, help construct homes and schools, or provide assistance in a variety of other ways. When you get home, you can make a badge displaying the helping hand you gave to those with fewer financial resources than you have.
