Planning my Winter Break

This week I've been planning my winter break. I'm going to visit Medellin and Cartagena with an American friend whom I met on the internet. He and his family are coming to Colombia the first week of January. I have never been to Cartagena before. It's the most tourist city in Colombia, but I have not heard good comments about this city apart from its beautiful downtown.

In December I'll be studying German as much as I can. I want to be at the A2 level in German by January next year. I was gifted a book for my birthday titled "Assimil German With Ease". I highly recommend it to study German. Regarding my bad English, I will try to improve it next year. I'm still ashamed (¿embarrassed?) to speak in English to a foreigner. It's a problem because I'm also shy in Spanish, and when it comes to speaking in a foreign language I'm more even shier.

Judging from your writing, your English is very good.  Ashamed refers to feeling shame, guilt, disgrace or inferiority.  Embarrassed implies feeling foolish in front of other people. 

Shier means more shy, so you would not say 'more shier' = more more shier, but instead you would say 'even shier'.  Once you hang out with a native speaker for a while, you will probably feel much more comfortable speaking the language.

I really like the Assimil courses as well.  Did you get the CDs with the German text?  Assimil also has good English courses as well.

Planning my Winter Break

This week, I've been planning my winter break. I'm going to visit Medellin and Cartagena with an American F friend whom I met on the internet. [Good one! Most English speakers don't even understand how to use "whom"!] He and his family are coming to Colombia the first week of January. I have never been to Cartagena before. It's the most touristy city in Colombia, but I have not heard good comments about this city apart from its beautiful downtown.
In December I'll be studying German as much as I can. I want to be at the A2 level in German by January of next year. I was gifted given a book [much less formal] for my birthday titled "Assimil German With Ease". I highly recommend it to study for studying German. Regarding my bad English, I will try to improve it next year. I'm still ashamed to speak in English to a foreigner. It's a problem because I'm also already shy in Spanish, and but when it comes to speaking in a foreign language I'm even more shier shy. ["Shier" isn't a word.]