New Year, New Me!

Well, looking at the year in review, quite a lot has happened to me in the last 12 months. I have successfully lived in one of the biggest cities in the world and tried to do and see everything I could; I lived in one of the smallest apartments in NYC and still loved it; feel into this amazing job by pure luck and in one month completely changed my life by moving to a country where I wasn't exactly an expert at the language but managed to come out alright; I learned that I have much more patience with kids than I ever thought I would and that my silly personality makes me a pretty decent teacher; I have made friends with people from all different countries and have learned snippets of everyone's languages; voted from overseas in our historical election and of to see the international impact that the USA really has on other countries; travelled to more countries in 3 months that I have been to in my life so far; figured out that even though I always got A's in English classes, there is still quite a lot of English I don't know (like the present perfect auxillary verb in this paragraph or something crazy like that); and last but not least, I got to share all of these great experiences with you in my blog - something I have never done before as well!

If you would have asked me last New Year's Eve if I thought I would be in Rome for 2009, I probably would have laughed and said no way, but alas, here I am. It has been a crazy year full of a lot of change - but most I would say is good! My life changed from a 9 to 6 job that I didn't like at all in a city that I have always dreamed to live in into an adventure, complete with weekend roadtrips to different countries and new vocabulary words everyday in a city I have never heard of before I got this job (probably the same for you huh?)

I normally don't make New Year's resolutions because I never keep them, but this year I have some that I think are really attainable: 1) become a Spanish expert, 2) visit Paris, Germany, Portugal, Netherlands and other countries to get the most out of my time over here, and 3) keep up with my blog to keep you entertained and also so I can look back on it in 40 years and see all that I was lucky enough to experience. Do you have any New Year's resolutions??

About to sign off, but just one last thought: they say that what you do on New Year's Eve foreshadows how your year will go. I am currently in Rome, just leaving from Brussels and am headed to Florence tomorrow... if that is any indication of 2009, I am pretty excited about the coming year and hope you are as well!

Happy New Year - Feliz Año Nuevo!

Baci (Italian for besos)!

Amanda