18

I am going to be 18 years old for approximately 15 more minutes, so I thought that I'd do my yearly progress report. I actually prefer to do this on my birthday, rather than on New Years, because the beginning of Spring seems like a better time to reflect and restart than the middle of winter. Anyways...

In the last year, I have:

- Ended my (first :D) job at the library after a year and a half
- Felt an earthquake
- Graduated from high school
- Won Parkway West's Spanish award
- Won Parkway West's Latin award
- Become the First and Only Recipient of the "Best Language Student" award at Parkway West
- Become a National Merit Scholar
- Been to San Jose, Costa Rica
- Experienced a Cow Sculpture Festival
- Gone swimming under a waterfall in the rainforest
- Visited hot springs
- Seen a volcano erupt
- Gone Ziplining
- Gone hiking in a cloud forest
- Spent a week living with a host family in Costa Rica, up in the high altitude 'mist zone'
- Taken public transportation in Costa Rica alone
- Read a poem I composed (in Spanish) to a Costa Rican elementary school for tree day
- Seen a sloth
- Seen three different kind of monkeys in the wild
- Been to Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica
- Made a solo trip
- Been to Stockholm, Sweden
- Taken a ferry across the baltic sea
- Eaten pickled herring
- Met my wonderful penpal, Liisa, in person
- Stayed in a hostel
- Slept on a boat
- Been to Turku, Finland
- Learned Finnish from refrigerator magnets
- Explored the ruins of six Scandinavian fortresses
- Been to a three day long heavy metal festival
- Washed potatoes in the sea
- Been initiated into Finnish sauna culture
- Eaten the best strawberries of my life
- Gone kayaking in the Archipelago sea
- Been to Helsinki, Finland
- Been to Moominworld!
- Been to Naantali, Finland
- Won a pancake competition with the odds stacked steeply against me
- Seen an anthill taller than myself
- Seen a jumping toilet
- Been to Oslo, Norway
- Seen the Viking Ships
- Seen two Stave Churches
- Been to Tønsberg, Norway
- Been to "The End of the World"
- Been to Sandefjord, Norway
- Acquired a 'Norwegian aunt'
- Experienced a Norwegian birthday party
- Learned a few words of Norwegian sign language
- Taken the train from Andebu to Trondheim
- Eaten lunch with a family of real Norwegian farmers
- Blown bubbles in Trondheim Fjord
- Been to Trondheim, Norway
- Used Norwegian in real life!
- Spoken Spanish in Norway so that the Norwegian's wouldn't understand
- Spoken Norwegian in Norway so that a Spaniard wouldn't understand
- Been to Geirangerfjord... the most beautiful place in the world, period
- Been to Trollstigen... the windiest, crazies road in the world
- Been to Trollveggen... the highest vertical rock face in Europe
- Returned home with 35 books... to say nothing of other souvenirs
- Begun attending the University of Missouri
- Discovered the Cranberries :D
- Experienced my first kiss
- Declared a Spanish major
- Been to a Renaissance Festival
- Worn a bodice. :D
- Bought a sword
- Voted in a presidential election
- Declared an International Studies major
- Been admitted to the school of Journalism
- Begun to learn Faroese
- Discovered Eivør Pálsdóttir :D
- Gone Zorbing
- Volunteered with Big Brothers Big Sisters
- Achieved a 3.95 GPA for my first semester in Uni
- Tested into Intermediate German 2
- Tried skiing for the first time
- Made my first curry
- Seen a flock of birds lit up like stars from flying above city lights
- Taken up cold water swimming (I have swum outdoors in Missouri in November, December, and January)
- Drank four drinks. Total. For the year. :D
- Joined the national foreign language honors society, Alpha Mu Gamma
- Learned how to cook (almost) anything with a microwave, toaster, food processor, and rice cooker
- Given in and started buying bottled water (only because the alternative tastes like the filter is probably infected with something that will kill me)
- Lived on the International floor here at Mizzou and met people from all over the world.
- Used a blow gun
- Crossed a stream on a fallen log
- Lived independently (or close to... XD) for 5 months


In the next year, I plan/hope/expect to:

- Continue to maintain reasonable (3.5 or higher?) grades here at Mizzou
- Hopefully travel this summer
- Save up some money for study abroad
- Get everything in order for study abroad
- Make more friends! :D
- Keep up with Uni and I's new blog! Learn more Faroese
- Improve my speaking abilities in Spanish
- Continue studying Norwegian
- Study some Finnish
- Finish my journals from last summer's trips
- Keep up with Liisa
- Have my family move to Florida, changing my life quite a bit! XD
- Decide my sequence in Journalism
- See Stephanie and Lucia as much as possible
- Maybe enter a relationship? :)
- Eat more vegetables!
- Drink more milk and orange juice!
- Have a job next year (hopefully the one I applied for...)
- Make the world a better place