Letters to the Editor
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Give yourself a break
Okay, someone has already posted a "Throw away your TV and go meet people!" letter... but I imagine you've been telling yourself the same thing since you arrived. If it were that simple, you would have done it by now.
My suggestion is to lower your expectations and stop trying to have the ultimate, awesome, perfect, life-changing experience... that's too much pressure.
Instead, tell yourself this: "It's okay if I don't love it here. It's okay if I don't make lots of friends, or any friends."
If you can make peace with these realities, you can try to make the best of your time in Europe without feeling like you have failed, or have wasted your time.
Imagine a day where you walk through a foreign city by yourself, read a book on a park bench, and write a journal entry in a cafe. Then you purchase dinner, go back to your apartment, and watch television before bedtime. A day like that should not make you feel like a failure because you're not living it up with your new European best friends. A day like that could be a perfectly nice day if you aren't feeling pressure to have a different kind of day, the kind you saw in movies about Americans in Europe.
I'm not saying you should give up on socializing -- on the contrary, I think Cary's suggestions are quite good. I'm sure other people will have ideas for making new friends, and I hope you keep trying. But I really feel that you need to stop pressuring yourself and accept that your time abroad is not what you thought it might be. And that's totally fine. It's okay to spend time alone. It's okay to watch television. Really. You're doing the best you can, and it will all be over soon.