Author: Mark

David Guetta performed last night in Saudi after the first Formula E race of the season took place there. How did Saudi Arabia suddenly become more open than Kuwait? If they legalize alcohol in Saudi before us that would be both the funniest and saddest thing at the same time.

With the roads in such terrible condition at the moment, its such a relief finding a long stretch of highway that isn’t falling apart. Over the weekend I was testing out a new location for my GoPro mic in preparation for an upcoming track day, and decided to take the new highway the starts in Shuwaikh.

I’ve taken the highway before but always exited towards Jahra so was pretty surprised to find out the highway actually continued a good distance past my usual exit. If you’re looking for a nice strip of road to drive on, this is probably your best bet right now.

Here is the starting location on [Google Maps]

Starting January 1st, Kuwait Airways will start flying to New York again non-stop. Kuwait Airways used to fly non-stop a few years ago but due to our airport’s weak security, flights to NY started stopping in Ireland for one more final security check. A non-stop flight to New York obviously makes the journey a lot quicker and practical, but with the new Kuwait Airways planes and terminal, it could also potentially be the best way to get to NY from Kuwait. [Link]

The weekend is here and so are all the events. Make sure you drop by the Caffeine & Wheels event this Saturday, it should be fun! Check out the full list of events below:

Thursday
Exhibition: Abstraction by Farouk Hosny
La Selva Caliente
Korean Calligraphy – Making Christmas & New Year’s Card
Entertainment Con
Graduates of 2019: Moo Milk Bar

Friday
Entertainment Con
Christmas Extravaganza
Stargazing in AlSalmi Desert
Blues in the Night
Talentshop’s Funky Sweater Show

Saturday
Exhibition: Abstraction by Farouk Hosny
Entertainment Con
Qout Market
Caffeine & Wheels

If you’d like to share an event on the blog [Email Me]
For a full list of upcoming events click [Here]

Sometimes events get canceled or have details changed so always double check with the organizers.

Screenshot from Aquaman

The movies below are now showing at Cinescape, Grand Cinemas, Sky Cinemas and VOX:

New This Weekend:
Aquaman (8.2)
Christmas Break-In (N/A)
Elliot the Littlest Reindeer (5.2)
Malevolent (4.8)
Second Act (6.2)
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (8.6)
The Bombing (3.6)

Other Movies Showing Now:
Creed II (8.0)
Detective Conan: Zero the Enforcer (6.2)
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (7.1)
Instant Family (7.6)
Mortal Engines (7.2)`
Ralph Breaks the Internet (8.1)
Robin Hood (5.8)
The Grinch (6.1)
Widows (7.4)

The movies below are also now showing at the Scientific Center IMAX theater:

Amazon Adventure 3D (6.6)
Oceans: Our Blue Planet (7.4)
Planet Power 3D (N/A)

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.

After Kuwait’s attorney general issued on Monday strict guidelines to ensure that children are adequately protected from the potential dangers associated with social media, an attorney told Kuwait Times 18 social media accounts were referred to the prosecutor yesterday. Lawyer Mohammed Al-Khaldi explained the new guidelines only expound on already existing juvenile laws which criminalize the abuse of children. Chief among the new guidelines is introducing age restrictions requiring social media users to be at least 13 years of age. [Source]

Looks like the government is on a roll cracking down on Instagrammers. The last sentence is a bit confusing because it sounds like anybody under 13 isn’t allowed to have a social media account, but I think they actually mean anyone under 13 can’t be exploited by the parents on social media. At least I think that’s what they mean…

I haven’t had much time recently to start a new TV series which is why I haven’t published a must watch tv post since the summer. But, last week I somehow managed to find time start the HBO series The Deuce and after just one episode, I made enough time to watch all two seasons of it.

The Deuce takes place in New York during the 70s and 80s, before the city was cleaned up. We get to follow the lives of prostitutes and pimps and watch the birth of the porn industry and VHS tapes, we get an insight into the gay community at that period of time and the backdoor dealings between the NYPD and the mobs. In a way, the series is a kind of documentary thats filled with sex and nudity, but one thats also informative and very fun to watch.

The Deuce was created by George Pelecanos and David Simon who are best known for their work on The Wire, a series which many consider to be the best ever made. The cast is also incredible with James Franco being the biggest name but a ton of other great actors whom you’ve seen before on other shows like The Wire, The Sopranos, The Night Of, and Entourage. Even the kid from The Karate Kid is in the show.

If you’re looking for a new show to binge watch, I can’t recommend The Deuce enough. It’s on HBO so if you don’t have an account you can always sign up for a month, binge watch the show and then cancel your membership (although I’d also recommend you binge watch Barry, Crashing and Succession as well). I highly recommend it. [HBO]

Detectives in Kuwait have been called to investigate several social media influencers for money laundering, according to reports.

Arabic publication Al-Jarida cited sources as confirming the notices regarding more than 10 bank accounts belonging to social media stars.

The sources said the balances in some of the accounts exceeded millions of Kuwaiti dinars and the ‘fashionista’ owners would need to prove their source of income. [Source]

I clearly must be doing blogging wrong…

Does anyone have any insider information as to why none of the rain-damaged roads have been fixed yet? A lot of the roads look like the picture above which is usually how the roads look like just before being resurfaced, but I’ve never seen so many roads looking like that and for this long.

The road in the picture above at least is flat, there are some roads that are covered in potholes and bumps. Yesterday I noticed two very large potholes opened up on the Gulf Road, potholes large enough to cause flat tires or damage wheels.

Something is definitely up, my guess is the government is looking for a new contractor since the last one did such a terrible job.

A friend of mine is putting together a cars and coffee event this weekend called Caffeine & Wheels. If you’ve got a nice or interesting car, or if you’re simply into cars, then pass by and check the event out. There will be a bunch of coffee shops taking part as well as the Nomad Kitchen food truck. I’ll be there obviously and there should be a ton of great and rare cars showing up. For more info click [Here]

Dar Scrubs is an interesting small store that sells clothing and accessories for doctors. I didn’t think there could be so much variety in scrubs but I guess even doctors want to look good. I even spotted Grey’s Anatomy branded scrubs which is actually pretty smart of the show.

If you’re a doctor (or just looking to role play) then you should pass by and check them out. They’re located in Promenade Mall inside their Soapbox space. If you don’t feel like passing by you could also check out their online store [Here]

I’ve got a Viva line and a friend called me last week and told me that when she called me Arabic music started playing. I never signed up to the ringback tone service so I called up Viva and told them what was happening and to turn it off. Fast forward to this morning and a friend calls me up and tells me the Quran started playing when he called me so he thought he had the wrong number. So I called up Viva up and told them to turn off the ringback tone again and also asked how it got activated in the first place? The call center guy told me Viva activated the Islamic ringback tone as part of their 10 year anniversary. So I got in touch with Viva on Twitter and this is what they had to say:

So basically, on their 10 year anniversary, they decided to activate a paid service on all their customers’ phone lines without informing them. On their 10 year anniversary as a gift to me, they activated a service I didn’t ask for without telling me. How much more unprofessional can you get?

Usually, I would have dropped them as a telecom provider instantly and moved my number to another one but I don’t think the other providers are any better.

I had a second number with Zain I wasn’t using but was keeping for nostalgic reasons. It was my first mobile phone number which I got back in 1995 when I was still in high school. Every month I would log in to the Zain website and settle my bill which was around 2KD. A few months ago I logged in and noticed on top of my usual monthly bill for my number, I had 500 fils to pay for a second number I hadn’t owned in five years.

When I was married, my wife’s number was under my name, then when I got a divorce 5 years ago, we shifted the number to her name. She spent over 3 years paying the bills and then around 2 years ago, she closed her line and moved out of the country for good. For some unknown reason, Zain decided to bill me 500 fils randomly out of the blue 5 years after the number stopped belonging to me and 2 years after my ex wife had closed it. I could easily have just paid it since it was just 500 fils, but it was more about the principle. I went to a Zain branch to figure out how this happened but they couldn’t figure it out so I just paid the 500 fils and closed my account with them and lost my high school number in the process.

I guess Ooredoo is the only telecom I haven’t tried but can’t imagine them being any better.

While looking for old photos of Green Island I found a very interesting article on the whole waterfront development project that took place between 1978 and 1988. The Gulf Road was built on land reclaimed from the sea and part of that project was the development of the waterfront stretching 21KM from Seef Palace all the way down to where Scientific Center is today (check the map below).

As part of the waterfront project the Green Island was created and the article shares some of the backstory and design decisions related to it. The article is in PDF format and contains some pictures, so even if you don’t want to read it all you can skim through it and check out the photos. Here is a link to the [PDF]

The current state of the Green Island is very disappointing. I passed by a month or two ago and the place just looked sad and desolate. Not only that but security didn’t even want to let me in because I had a camera with me. They told me no photography was allowed, how stupid.

via Archnet

After getting their operation suspended back in September, the civil aviation authority have now pulled the license for Wataniya Airways. They were originally suspended because of recurring flights’ delays and cancellations and were given three months to get their act together. Seems like they weren’t able to do that so for the second time in the airline’s history, they’ve had to shut down.

This is pretty disappointing news since Wataniya Airlines were flying to some interesting destinations and more competition in the market is always a good thing. [Link]

Super busy weekend with a lot going on. Check out the full list of events taking place this weekend:

Thursday
Exhibition: Abstraction by Farouk Hosny
Pantomime: Aladdin
Silent Disco Kids Workout

Friday
Pantomime: Aladdin
Silent Disco Kids Workout
PlayStation Fifa19 Tournament
Experience Adventure 3.0
Gifts & Food Fair
Winter Craft Market
Gingerbread House Decorating Contest
Kuwait Harps’ Youth Day
Italian Winter Bazaar
Family Seasonal Concert

Saturday
Exhibition: From Up There by Ramy Khair
Walking Tour : Landmarks Of Kuwait
Pantomime: Aladdin
PlayStation Fifa19 Tournament
Experience Adventure 3.0
Winter Football & Basketball Festival
Feed Market

If you’d like to share an event on the blog [Email Me]
For a full list of upcoming events click [Here]

Sometimes events get canceled or have details changed so always double check with the organizers.