For about a week, though I've had some amazing experiences just in this weekend alone, I've been starting to feel a bit... strange. As if the rapid excitement that I felt all of October and the beginning of November was going away, a bit of homesickness, and some moments of feeling down. Some things that I haven't felt since August. Today it was really annoying me that I'd been here for 3 months and feeling a bit like this. I decided to investigate "The Exchange Student Survival Kit" (a book that was given to the exchange students). Little did I know that feeling this way is actually part of the process - and I'm right on time. The book talks about the ups and downs of settling during the year, starting with the extreme ups and downs that most students feel in the beginning, to the high that usually comes after school has started and we've truly begun to settle in, and then to the culture shock that normally shows itself around the 3rd or 4th month. Earlier this year I thought I would skip over this step, because I didn't feel shocked by the culture! (As I would assume someone from the U.S. in China or India would). Because while there are lots of differences here, they were never the sorts of differences that I thought would affect me greatly, or cause any sort of culture shock (especially after the first month!). But the book was talking about how it's not necessarily one particular habit, or a huge difference in food, but simply the overall experience beginning to truly sink in. Things aren't as new and exciting, and it's when the realization that I am actually living here, doing school, having obligations, balancing time (just like I did in the U.S.) surfaces. While I'm still feeling a bit down, it makes me feel so much better to know that this is a normal thing. I talked to the exchange student from Taiwan tonight and she said that she's feeling the exact same thing!