Author: Mark

The Charities Aid Foundation released their yearly World Giving Index and Kuwait scored pretty high in the “Helping a stranger” category coming in 3rd place world wide. Overall though Kuwait barely made it in the top 20 coming in 19th place mostly because of a really low score in the “Volunteering time” category (83rd place). You can check out the full index at the CAF website [Here]

Spoiler: Myanmar came first overall.

Thanks Omair

Usually I let my brother write all the video game posts but in this specific case I wanted to share my favorite games of last year. I went through a lot more games than usual this past year but the list below are of the ones that did it for me:

Here’s some cute uplifting news. Earlier this morning, a giraffe was born at the Kuwait Zoo. The mother went into labor at 9:30AM and the giraffe was finally born at 11:30AM. The sex of the giraffe is still unknown as of this post since the zoo keepers can’t touch the giraffe until it nurses.

Update: Here is a link to a [Video]

Thanks Tam!

Incase you missed it, last week I posted about a bunch of teens who were able to sneak onto the roof of Al Hamra Tower. While checking the instagram account of one of the teens called Abood, I realized that sliding around the roof of Hamra Tower was probably one of the safest things the guy has done.

Abood who’s instagram account is @pk_spark enjoys climbing on top of towers and recklessly sit or stand right on the edge. The photos definitely look cool on instagram, but damn its also so not worth the risk. You can check out his public instagram account @pk_spark for a ton of photos, but he also has a YouTube channel with a bunch of videos (mostly parkour stuff) [Here].

Over the weekend a brand new Kuwait Airways Boeing 777-300ER plane arrived to Kuwait. This is the second new plane to come into service and there are 8 more coming before the end of the year. The first 777 is supposed to fly the Kuwait – London route but I’m not sure if they’ve started yet. I’m planning on going to London next month and a return ticket on both Kuwait Airways and British Airways are equally priced at just KD133. If the new 777 is being used, I might just fly Kuwait Airways instead since the interior of the new planes are much newer than BA.

Photo by @eng_burezq

If you’ve got free time to kill and enjoy being outdoors, Al Shaheed Park are looking for part-time park guides. The only requirements are you be proficient in Arabic and English, and also be aged between 18 and 30.

If you’re interested, here is the link to the application form. [Link]

This is an updated list of some popular breakfast places in Kuwait. Compared to the previous list I removed some places that had shutdown, added some new spots, updated the timings on some and also highlighted my favorite spots:

Baking Tray
8:00 AM – 1:00 AM

Baker & Spice
Weekdays: 8AM to 1PM
Weekends: 8AM to 2PM

Breakfast Club
KIPCO: 6AM to 12AM
Mahboula: Open 24 hours and breakfast all day

Cheesecake Factory
Friday & Saturday: 10AM to 2PM

Cocoa Room ★
8AM to 12PM

Dar Hamad
8AM to 11:50AM

Dough Cafe
8AM to 2PM

Early Bird ★
Fahaheel: 5AM to 3PM
Jabriya: 5AM to 5PM

Eggcellent
Weekdays: 6:30AM to 2PM
Saturday: 7:30AM to 3PM
Friday: Closed

Gia
Weekdays: 9AM to 12PM
Weekends: 9AM to 1PM

IHOP
Jabriya: Open 24 hours and breakfast all day
Mahboula: Open 24 hours and breakfast all day

Johnny Rockets ★
Salmiya: Open 24 hours but breakfast only from 7AM to 12PM

Ladurée
360 Mall: 9AM to 2PM

Le Pain Quotidien
Marina Crescent: 7:30AM to 11PM

McDonalds
Gulf Road: 6AM to 11AM

Prime & Toast
Seef: Open 24 hours and breakfast all day

Q at The Yard
Weekdays: 7AM to 1PM
Weekends: 8AM to 6PM

Ryoog
6AM to 11PM

Street by Al Makan ★
Saturday: 9:30AM to 2PM

Yellow Lemon
Sunday to Tuesday: 8AM to 4PM
Wednesday to Saturday: 8AM to 7PM

Zaatar W Zeit
Marima Crescent:7:30AM to 12:30AM

★ My favorite places

Below are the events taking place this holiday weekend:

Thursday
Still Departures by George Awde
Circus Show at Al Kout
Movie & Dinner: The Croods
Movies at the Park: The Time That Remains

Friday
Circus Show at Al Kout
Tai Chi in the Park
Hatha Yoga with Rosie
Good Game: Magic – The Gathering
Salwa’ Walk and Socialize Meetup

Saturday
Circus Show at Al Kout
Yoga with the 3
Movie at the Park: Hunt for the Wilderpeople

Sunday
Circus Show at Al Kout
Project 5 Miles Running Group

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.

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

New This Week:
Assassin’s Creed (6.7) ★
La La Land (8.9)
The Monster (5.3)
The Snow Queen 3

Other Movies Showing:
13 Days (N/A)
Allied (7.2) ♦
Collateral Beauty (5.4)
Hacksaw Ridge (8.8) ★♦
Incarnate (5.6)
Moana (8.2)
Passengers (6.7) ♦
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (8.3) ★
Sing (7.3)
The Girl with All the Gifts (7.3)
Trolls (6.7)
Within (5.3)

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.
★ is for movies I’m interested in. ♦ implies movie might contain censorship.

I could swear I had seen and posted the video above before but turns out the structure of the film as well as some of the footage and dialogue is shared with another video I had posted a few years ago. The video above on the other hand was uploaded by the archive website Periscope Film last week and is actually pretty good quality for a film from the 60s.

If you’re into old stuff like this then make sure you browse through the “50s to 90s” category on my blog [Here]

Thanks H.J.O

No idea how they managed to get up there without running into security on the ground floor who would have most likely stopped them (its a business tower so there are never any kids there). The scene before they get to the roof they show an elevator ride going past floor 46, but those elevators don’t get up all the way to the top. My office is on the 46th floor and to get to Alghanim offices which are on the 70th floor, I need to take two different elevators down to the ground floor and then 2 more different elevators on the other side past security back up to the 70th. Not only did they manage to bypass all the security and figure out the elevator maze, but they eventually got to the roof and then dangerously started sliding around. Disturbing.

Thanks Dal

The Kuwait subreddit on Reddit are trying to put together a list of local content creators so I figured I’d help them out. Below is the list I’ve put together of local content creators on YouTube. If you know of any others, please let me know about them so I can add them to the list.

Arabic Channels
4GX (Tech)
Amoosa Games (Video Games)
Aya’s Nutrition (Food)
Deera Gaming (Video Games)
ExtravaGaming (Video Games)
Ezzebda (Tech)
Gamer Snack (Video Games)
Kuweat (Food)
Lucky Generation Gamers (Video Games)
Q8 Stig (Cars)
REDFOXZERO (Video Games)
ShreetVideo (Movies)
Slorks (Tech)
Stay Foolish (Tech)
Super Kalam (Humor)
Swar Shuaib (Interviews)
UrbanQ8 (Informative)
World of Swalef (General)

English Channels
Amirah Of Makeup (Makeup)
MrJovitageorge (Makeup)
Sahar Glam (Makeup/Personal)
The Hybrids (Fashion/Personal)
Voices & Verses (Poetry)

Not to be confused with the Jaber Al Ahmad Cultural Center, the Sabah Al Ahmad City Cultural Centre will be located in Sabah Al Ahmad City and feature the following:

– 2 theaters (700 seat & 250 seats for all sorts of theatrical productions)
– 200 seat Conference center with flexibility for hosting conferences with different capacities
– 250 seat Recital hall for music performances
– Children culture center with many cultural activities for children including a 150 seat theater
– Amphitheater for outside performances
– Museum
– Art gallery for hosting art exhibitions
– Library
– Book exhibition for hosting book fairs
– Cultural café
– Oasis: a green air-conditioned large space for public gathering

I originally posted about Sabah Al Ahmad City Cultural Centre back in 2012, but the project disappeared until it was brought back to life last month. It seems Al-Diwan Al-Amiri have taken over the project and its now expected to be completed mid 2018. Al-Diwan Al-Amiri are behind some of the biggest projects in Kuwait like the recently opened Jaber Al Ahmad Cultural Center. Check out some of the renderings below:

Thanks q8-msc

ARÉATA is a short film by Ahmed Al Terkait, an independent Kuwaiti filmmaker. The film was officially selected to compete in the Dubai International Film Festival earlier this year and was only published online last week.

The film is a psychodrama/thriller following a young woman with a hair loss condition called Alopecia Aréata. She visits a psychiatrist hoping to uncover the mystery behind her illness. You can watch the full film above or you can checkout the trailer below.

Yesterday parts of Fahad Al Salem street was closed off to cars due to the amount of pedestrians in the city because of Christmas. The cops were only letting in busses and cabs and it was pretty surreal I guess because I’m so used to that street being a chaotic mess.

There has been talk about closing Salem Mubarek Street in Salmiya to cars permanently for years now but nothing has ever come of it. But even if they don’t close it to cars permanently, they really should close it off every now and then and turn it into an outdoor market.

The last time they closed Salem Mubarek Street I think was back in 2005 as part of the national day parade. But imagine how much better it could be today, imagine if Salem Mubarek Street was one giant Qout Market. Actually, imagine if Shakshooka and Qout Market both collaborated and took over the street for a day, I think that would be amazing. We really need car-free days.

Barrak Al-Babtain from the blog re:kuwait has spoken about turning SAM street into pedestrian only a number of times before and even has some pretty good creative proposals. Check out some of his old posts below:

NY High Line
SAM Street
SAM Street Analysis
SAM Street: Winter Only?

And this is a quote by him from back in 2009

I think SAM street is probably one of the best spaces in Kuwait where a real public space can happen. A place where people can go window shopping and listen to live music and buy food from street vendors. The intervention is relatively minor but the potential is incredible. We can ignore it and let it suffocate or we breathe new life into the street and create something that Kuwait doesn’t really have; a lively, free and open public space.

If you make me the mayor of Salmiya I’ll make Barrak the urban planner. #voteformark