An important question about eating out is who pays for the meal. If a friend of yours asks you to have lunch with him, you may say something like this,“I'm afraid it'll have to be someplace cheap, because I have little money.” The other person may say, “OK, I'll meet you at McDonald's.”

    This means that the two agree to go Dutch, that is, each person pays for himself. He may also say, “Oh，no，I want to take you to lunch at Smith's,”or“I want you to try the Chinese dumplings there. They are great.”This means the person wants to pay for both of you. If you feel friendly towards the person, you can go with him and you needn't pay for the meal. You may just say, “Thank you. That would he very nice.”

    American custom(习惯) about who pays for dates (约会) are much the same as in other parts of the world. In the old days, American women wanted men to pay for all the meals. But, today, a university girl or a woman in business world will usually pay their way during the day. If a man asks her for a dance outside the working hours, it means “Come, as my guest.”So as you can see, it is a polite thing to make the question clear at the very beginning.

    In the front of many American homes you can see a mat(脚垫). This mat is sometimes called "welcome mat", because many of the mats have the word "welcome" on them.

    Because Americans don't take off their shoes before going into the house, they need a welcome mat to clean their shoes. If the children don't clean their shoes on the mat, they may be scolded(被责骂) by their parents. If you go to an American home, please remember to clean your shoes on the mat, or you may be told to do so. "Different countries, different customs(习俗)."

D

    Do you have a lucky number? What is it? Many people have a special number. They hope it will bring them good luck.

    In Chinese culture, people believe some numbers are lucky or unlucky. This is based on the Chinese word that the number sounds similar to. 

    For example, the Chinese word for the number 8 sounds like the word for "making a fortune". So, people consider it a very lucky number. Some people spend a lot of money to have 8s in their phone numbers or vehicle license plate (车牌照) numbers. The opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics began at 8:08 pm on August 8, 2008.

    The number 9 is also a lucky number because of its connection to the emperors (皇帝) of China. There were nine dragons on emperors' robes (龙袍). Today, 9 often stands for "long lasting". That's why a man always proposes to (向…求婚) a woman with 99 or 999 roses.

    So what's a "bad luck" number in China? It might be 4. Many Chinese people see 4 as a "bad luck" number because it sounds similar to the character for "death".

    Because of this, many buildings skip the fourth floor, and simply call it the fifth floor. In Hong Kong, some buildings even skip all floors numbered with 4, such as, 4, 14, 24, 34 all 40-49 floors. Some buildings also skip the 13th floor, as 13 is an unlucky number in the West. As a result, a building whose highest floor is 50 may actually have only 35 floors.

    When we talk about our grandparents, the first word we can remember is "old". Super Grandmother and Super Grandfather contest (比赛) gives old people a chance to show their talents to us. What is this contest like?

    Every year, people aged over seventy, from all over Georgia, come to Tbilisi to take part in Super Grandmother and Super Grandfather contest. Some play the piano, some dance, some sing and some perform plays. Although they are very old, they perform very carefully. In fact, some of their programmes are good and they are even invited to television shows.

    In this year's contest, 80-year- old Tsuri Kakabadze got the title of "Super Grandmother" because she had a beautiful voice. And 77-year-old Yuri Merabov got the title of "Super Grandfather" because he played the piano well.

    But the results do not really matter. These old people just come to have some fun. I hope this kind of contest should be all over world. Don't you?