Nishihara San-A City and QB barber

San-A group, whose founder is Okinawan, has many brunches in Okinawa prefecture.
Their shops are mainly classified as two types. One is supermarket style which sells foods, commodities like detergents or tooth brushes or clothes. The other is a mall style which has several shops which are run by San-A or other companies. Needless to say, The malls are bigger than the supermarkets.

Nishihara San-A City is a mall, located in Nishihara town. It looks like wrong that there is a city in town but It is indeed called "city." There are many shops, which are clothes, a electricity appliance "DEO-DEO", restaurants, cafes including Starbucks and Mister Donuts,  a 100 yen shop "DAISO",  a book store, a photo studio, a massage service, and so on.

I sometimes go to the QB which belongs to a national barber chain in Japan. It is located near the Starbucks. They give us quick and reasonable services. To do these, They practiced their own system that is different from other barbers and I feel it a little odd and inconvenient. When you go there, you are going to buy a ticket from a ticket vending machine. But this can accept only 1,000 yen bill so that they don't need to prepare changes. Therefore you have to prepare a 1,000 yen bill before going there. This is why I said. They don't offer washing your hair or shaving your beard. After having your hair cut, your hair is vacuumed by a special vacuum, which is just for customer's head and never for the floor.  Although I have a complain about their service, It helps me to get things done in no time.

Another QB barber is in Naha San-A main city.

Talking to a stranger

For people who is shy, it is difficult to talk to a stranger. Today's theme was talking to a stranger. We practiced to start talking with following topics.

• commenting about surroundings.
• It's hot in this room, isn't it?
• asking for the other's opinion.
• I wonder if this train had more space. Do you think so too?
• offer information about yourself.
• By the way, I am from Japan.

There may be another way that is asking about the other but I am not sure that it is that.

Perhaps, we have more chance to be asked by a stranger on board of plain, train or bus. If I didn't want to the other, I would brush them off or gave them the cold shoulder.

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In plain, Seats that are near an isle are called isle seats and ones that are near window are called window seats.

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The word "line" in the sentence "What line of work are you in?" means type of work, for example, sales , IT or medicine.

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The money you pay when to rent a house is deposit, which is "Shiki-kin" or 敷金 in Japanese.

Souvenir

Today, I learned how to describe objects. Today's case is about souvenir.

According to my teacher's story, word "souvenir" is from French, which means "to remember."  Therefore souvenir is to remember the trip for the traveler neither their family, friends, nor colleagues.

In this meaning, I might not have any souvenirs.

There is a list of attributes to describe things.

• size and shape
• the same size as ...
• heart-shaped
• carve  (cut)
• curve (shape)
• appearance
• polished
• glossy,luster <-> dull, lusterless
• tufty, fringe
• color
• gray-ish
• material
• molded
• brass
• ivory (elephant's tusk)
• condition 
• cracked
• chipped

(These green heart-shaped leaves are named Hoya. I looked them at Bios's hill)

The words "carve" and "curve" are difficult to distinguish by listening to their pronounce.

"Statuette" is used to describe a statue which size is smaller than what is called statue.

When comparing things with our impression, we can use, for example, "It is lighter than it looks."

I told about an ornament of awl which made from a pine corn bought by my wife.

I feel like buying some souvenirs for myself when I am on a next trip.

Portrait generator

Portrait generator can create portrait images by choosing facial parts. It is available on Android. You can download the image and use it on SNSes. Please feel free to try it!

Giving instructions

I learned about giving instructions of games like chess, darts, cards and sports.

Following things are needed to play the game.

• Setup
• things to play the game.
• Objective
• how to win the game.
• Movement
• how to deal with cards, pieces or something.
• Special rules
• like you can change all your card before bet

I found that billiards and pool mean different game.
Accoriding to wikipedia, there are two kind of billiards, one of which is called pocket billiard or pool billiard, the other is carom billiard the table of which has no pocket and the game is played with 3 balls.

Movement of piece in chess is different from Shogi. but some pieces have similar movement. For example, bishop moves diagonally, which has the save movement of Kaku(角) in Shogi.  As I heard Queens move any directions, Queens look like a mixture of Kaku and Hisha(飛車) which moves vertically and horizontally.

We talked about Monopoly and Jinsei-game or life game, which are games like rolling the dice and landing your piece on a square. These games use dice. The word 'dice' is plural but I've heard that it is often used as singular.   I think why we don't use singular of dice is because it is 'die'. In Monopoly, there is no goal, therefore players go around squares on the board until the game finishes until someone win.