New Years Resolutions

My exchange is half way over, but the New Year brings with it a wonderful new opportunity to look back and see what I have accomplished so far, and set new goals for the coming year. I have already met what was at first my year-long goal of being able to read the first Harry Potter book in Italian (done!), and have been surprised to see what a long way I've come this year. I do still have plenty of barriers I'd like to break, goals to be met, things to be achieved, and plenty of pasta to eat. So, here are a foreign exchange student's New Year's Resolutions.

1) I want to be fluent by the end of the year, now I am conversational but still make tons of grammatical errors and could work on the pronunciation. I would like Italian to be as close to my "madrelingua" (mother tongue) as possible. It is improving though...I can now pass for an Italian at times, after I made a mistake with some change in a store the other day and hastily apologized to the shop keeper she just laughed and said "for a second I thought you were foreign!".

2) I want to learn to cook...better. I have made one cake (failed) two pizzas (not bad really) and a batch of Frittelle, a traditional Venetian dessert that is basically fried dough with apple chunks (delicious, if I do say so myself). I love food, and would like to be able to cook some of the amazing stuff I've been eating here when I return home. ( a warning to my friends and family: this could go very wrong indeed).

3) I want to eat...MORE. Yes, I realize this a bit different from most people's new year's resolutions, but I really would like to try more foods. I've set a goal to eat a different pizza every time I order (last night I had a pizza with a cream of potato sauce, and salmon on top...delicious!) I have eaten ox tail, eel, horse, pig leg (foot still attached) and squid in its own ink. None of which I can honestly say I loved, but I tried nonetheless. I hope to keep up my culinary quest for new and exciting foods.

4) I will conquer Latin. Learning Latin in Italian is no picnic, but I am determined to understand what the heck is going on with all these declinations.

5) Have More Fun. Cant hurt, right?