there is nothing left to fear now now that bigfoot is captured

This will be a short post, becaue I have to get started on an essay I must write for AFS. This is making me way more stressed than it should.

I had a nice weekend. Went to Karla's birthday party, which was in her house, not in Candela. She has just a host mom, an older woman with grown-up children, who seems really nice and lets her do really whatever she wants. I think about nine people stayed over, which would not go in my host family's house (the rule is ONE FRIEND AT A TIME. This is tough because sometimes with people who I don't know so well, like the other exchange students, having more people over kind of breaks the ice a little and is less stressful.)

No run-in with the police. We ate yummy pasta salad with curry paste and played games and watched movies.

I am feeling a little weird about the halfway point of my exchange. Although I feel better about school, etc, I still feel sad a lot of the time (I'm sorry, complaints) and my German leaves something to be desired. I guess mostly, I'm worried about regrets. Right now, this feels so, so normal to me, being here, and I'm afraid I won't even really realize I was here until afterwards. Even though my goal is to take every opportunity, that isn't always easy, especially in school, where I literally have NEVER raised my hand or contributed anything in some of my classes -- therefore many of my teachers believe that I don't speak ANY German. It's silly, but I'm afraid of looking stupid -- my first month here, I was brave about asking people, speaking German, trying everything. And it's like a little of that has worn off, and now I just feel like a non-fluent, weird, nerdy girl.

I just want to bring something back with me after this is over: a couple new friends, conversationally fluent German, more confidence, a bigger world view. And it would be nice if I could come back having seen some of Europe too, because I don't know when I'll be back. I have pretty realistic expectations, and plus, these are all really in my control. I think I just need to step it up a little, try harder in school, and stop writing and reading English every day. So we'll see.