Ciao Fab, In questi casi significa "un po'" - (un po' strano; abbastanza duro) - senza "a"... .....Se dici: A KIND OF... significa: "un tipo di"

Sorry, "kind of" can mean "type of" without the "a" too, such as " I'm not that kind of guy" or "what kind of a place is this?" Oh just thought of the Queen song " It's a kind of magic" you might have heard it. Which means " it's a type of magic" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWf5BLUOhNM Sorry there are so many expressions and words that can come after "kind of" there are no lists of the most common words I can give you.

You would use 'a kind of' in the context of defining something e.g. "a rose is a kind of flower". You could also say here: "a rose is a type of flower". If you leave out the 'a' and only say "kind of" it can be translated differently as - quite/sort of/a little bit/pretty. I think in Spanish it is equivalent to "bastante" in this case. For example you might hear: "It's kind of nice here" or "It's kind of stupid that he never bothered to come to the party" etc.