Author: Mark

According to an email from Eek!, Lulu Hypermarket on the 208 (Subhan area) caught fire but the fire has been contained. If you have pictures or info [Email Me]

Update: Turns out there was a fire which supposedly started with a delivery car in the delivery area. Below is a video of the incident.

[YouTube]

Update2: Here are some photos taken by Tukmol

After posting about the MILSIM Failaka battle thats going to take place in November, my friend called me up and told me to pass by him at their location in Shaab Park. I posted about that location last year but never checked it out until now. The place is ridiculously cool with a battle ground littered with broken cars and random objects creating a realistic war like environment. Once I got there my friend gave me a handgun and took me to a time trial course in which I think I did fairly well in for my first time.

[YouTube]

Once I was done with that I was handed an M4 Carbine rifle and attached what looked like a silencer. Turns out the silencer had a built in UV light that lit up glow in the dark airsoft pellets on the way out. What you end up with is tracer pellets which you can see in the video above.

The Shaab Park location is like a paintball field, you just pay KD7 for the gear rental and spend the whole day there playing if you want. You just pay extra for the ammo. If you missed my post on the epic Failaka battle that’s going to take place check it out [Here]

According to a friend of mine this happened last night and the owner was found dead. I haven’t confirmed the story so no idea if that’s true or not.

Photo was taken from @3abdalla78 on Instagram.

PAWS are a group made up of part-time local and expat volunteers who are committed to protecting animal welfare in Kuwait. Recently they got a notice from their land owner to vacate their shelter in Kebed and they now desperately need financial help to move and set up a new shelter. They currently have over 100 dogs and 80 cats which need a new home. For more details on the situation as well as information on how you can help visit their website [Here]

The Powerstation is a nifty little device that can charge your phone or tablet while you’re on the go. I previously posted about my battery-powered case for the iPhone (which I still continue to use) but since then with the advent of Instagram that case is no longer enough. On my last trip to Geneva even with the battery-powered case my phone was lasting until late in the afternoon which is how me and my friend found out about the Powerstation. He picked one up from the Apple Store and we were using it to charge our phones once both our battery-powered cases ran out of juice. After that trip I knew I had to have one and ended up ordering getting it from Amazon.

The Mophie Powerstation is pretty compact and can easily slip into a back pocket and is light enough to put in your wife’s purse without pissing her off. While my battery-powered case had a rechargeable capacity of 1,700 Mah, the Powerstation has 4,000 which is enough to charge my iPhone three times. Another advantage of the Powerstation is the fact it works with any phone or tablet and not just Apple specific ones. The Powerstation has a standard USB port so you just plug in whatever USB powered device you want. It can also charge the demanding iPad 3 although it won’t be able to fully charge it.

There is one downside I faced with the Powerstation which is the fact it has only one USB port which means you need to take turns charging or you need to buy a dual iphone charging cable. Another solution is to get the larger Powerstation Duo which has two USB ports as well as a larger rechargeable capacity of 6,000 Mah but it’s also more expensive and bulkier.

If you’re looking for a compact battery powered charger to take with you when you travel or for a day away from any power sources then the Mophie Powerstation is a good option. There are other similar products on Amazon that have even more power but you would have to compromise on weight and size. The price of the Mophie Powerstation is KD18 and you can get it from [Amazon]

Just a quick note. If you come here and don’t find any new posts you can always check 248PM. It’s usually easier for me to find content for that section since it’s just interesting stuff I come across online. [Link]

The Hummingbird Bakery is coming to Kuwait and the rest of the region but not with Alshaya. Arabian Business is reporting that Daud Arabian, a subsidiary of The Daud Group of Oman signed a partnership with The Hummingbird Bakery and they’ll be opening branches in the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, Lebanon and Egypt. The first branch is going to open in Dubai Mall on the 25th of this month which is just 20 days from now. [Link]

When I was in Lebanon over Eid a friend of mine told me about a place called La Reserve. It’s a location deep inside Lebanon where you could do a bunch of outdoor activities under the supervision of experts. We decided to turn it into a two day plan, first we’d camp for the night in a beautiful isolated area and then the next day we’d head to La Reserve which would be around a two hour drive from our campsite.

Camping was great, it had been ages since I had done it and I completely missed it.

Next morning we woke up at dawn and headed towards La Reserve.

Those of you who’ve been to Lebanon or know Lebanon, La Reserve is located in an area called Afqa and once you hit Jbeil (Byblos) it’s around an hour and a half drive from there. The road starts really great and wide but once we started hitting the old villages the roads turned narrow and slow. We finally reached the destination and we met up with the people running the place and they told us to choose our activities. We chose the zip-line, rappelling, rock climbing, mountain biking and caving.

We started with the zip-line which turned out to be pretty disappointing. The zip-line is a cable line that’s tied at both ends and you get hooked onto it and zip down the line. It was really unexciting and very short. A snoozer and I’d skip this activity. The second activity we did was rappelling. This was also unexciting. Rappelling is when you descend a rock cliff using a rope (pictured above). You hold the rope with two hands and when you open your hands you start to drop and when you close your hands you stop. The best part is your first step off the cliff but after that there really isn’t much to it. Looks harder than it is but really gravity is doing all the work. After rappelling we did mountain biking which was horrible. The bikes were rusted with deflated tires and the road was a brutal uphill filled with rocks. I kept wishing I had brought my own bike since the view was a killer and I just wanted to keep going but the bike was falling apart.

So really this whole two hour trip was starting to look like a waste and you’re probably wondering why I’m even posting about it. Well after the bike ride everything got so much better. First we had lunch which was your typical Lebanese mezza followed by grills but everything we had was delicious and unexpected since we weren’t really expecting anything good from them by this point.

Once we were done with lunch we headed to the rock climbing area. This turned out to be a lot of fun, like the best fun I’ve had in ages. It was exhausting, difficult and I personally left with a lot of cuts and bruises all over but I repeat, it was A LOT of fun. If you’ve ever done the climbing wall at Marina Waves then this is kinda similar except instead of climbing up an artificial wall you’re climbing up a real cliff. They have different cliff faces to climb each with a different degree of difficulty going from level 1 up to 7. It was such a blast that I’d go back just for that. We managed to get to complete levels 1 to 3 but by then the sun was starting to set and we had one more activity to do, caving.

We were all tired and none of us wanted to do it. We thought it was going to be a waste of time but they told us the cave was located on the road out of the village and we could try it out, 5 minutes in if we did’t like it we could leave. So we went for it and good thing we did since it turned out to be an unbelievable experience.

The cave is around 6km long and still not fully discovered. It’s not a cave that’s been prepped for tourists with lights and walking paths and it’s definitely not for anyone that feels claustrophobic. The only lights we had were the ones on our helmets. When we first walked into the cave we had to go through a hole in the wall (pictured above) that was less than meter in diameter and required us to crawl in the muddy ground for a few meters before we got to the other side. The idea of being in this dead space inside the mountain with no phone signal and no lights except for the ones on our helmets was just freaky.

We kept going in climbing down wet and slippery rocks in out of different large rooms only to go back into extremely tight and long crawl holes (pictured above) and then up steep ledges. It was scary and fun both at the same time. Since it was Lebanon the guides decided to take a smoke break half way through the trip. It’s like WTF we’re in a cave! Then at one point we had to choose between two options, a passageway with freezing water up to our shoulders or another tight low ceiling and long passageway. I think that was the only problem with the caving, is the fact we weren’t told what to expect and so we weren’t dressed appropriately.

An hour later we finally came out in another location from where we started and it was just breathtaking. After being in the dark cave for an hour we came out as the sun was setting into an open space that wouldn’t look out of place in Jurassic Park. It was so beautiful and it was a relief to finally be out in the open again. I loved the whole experience.

If anyone is planning a trip to Lebanon I highly recommend you book a day with La Reserve. I’d go back again and spend the first half of the day rock climbing and the second half freaking out in the dark cave. Lunch was also fantastic and the price for a whole day full of activities and lunch came out to be just $58 per person. That’s it. I can’t think of anything you could do in Lebanon for a full day thats as fun and for just $58. So if you’re interested in outdoor activities check them out. Here is a link to their [Website]

I was trying to find information on the Anglo American School of Kuwait and by chance ended up finding a whole bunch of old photos of Kuwait dating back from 1960 up till 1984. I hadn’t seen any of them before and the one that grabbed my attention the most was the one above of a karting track in Ahmadi back in 1964. Most likely the first go-kart track in the region. There are a ton of photos, some are more interesting than others but all help paint a picture of life in Ahmadi back in the 60s and 70s. Check them out [Here]

The next BarCamp in Kuwait is taking place early November and registration is now open. BarCamp is an event that takes place around the world at various times of the year. The subject in focus is technology and people usually present and share ideas or creations like the Bacon Vending Machine in the video below from BarCamp Kuwait 3. It’s more of a fun event than a serious one and if you’re into this it’s a great way to meet new people.

[YouTube]

Location: Ibtisam Hall at The Regency, Al-Bida’a, Kuwait
Date: Saturday, November 3, 2012
Time: 3:00 PM to 10:00 PM

For more information including details on how to sign up visit the BarCamp Kuwait blog [Here]

I hope I’m not too late posting about this but I just found out from Kuwaitiful’s blog that not only is Kuwait competing at the Paralympics but that since 1980 they’ve won 49 medals including 10 gold. Why did I just hear about this!

At the current Paralympics that’s taking place in London Kuwait has a total of six athletes competing. For more details check out Kuwaitiful’s post [Here]

Some members of The 3 Club competed in Ironman Austria recently and they were featured in a short documentary of the event. Ironman is a brutal long-distance triathlon race that consists of a 3.86km swim, 180.25km bike ride followed by a 42.2km run. It’s insane! Check them out in the video above, skip to the 4:26 minute mark. [YouTube]

I had lunch with two high school friends today, one of which I hadn’t seen in 16 years. We were mostly reminiscing about the past and how lame everything was for us back then. Those of you in high school today don’t realize how lucky you are compared to us kids who grew up in Kuwait back in the old days. I graduated in 1996 and back then we didn’t have any malls or restaurant chains or anything like that. For entertainment we just had a few options.

The only mall in Salmiya was Laila Gallery but we weren’t allowed in on weekends since it was families only. That was pretty common back in the day.

Even Sultan Center wouldn’t let guys in alone on weekends. It was really embarrassing. Until today whenever I go to the Sultan Center in Salmiya and I see a security guy standing outside I wonder if he’s going to let me or not.

There was a cool Hardees where Starbucks is right now in front of Al Fanar. But then they demolished it.

The ice skating rink was pretty decent in the early 90s but started going downhill after that.

Fuddruckers was like the only restaurant open on the Gulf Road back then. The place used to get crazy packed and at one point was the coolest place to be.

Then Johnny Rockets in Salmiya opened and a lot of the crowd shifted there. Johnny used to get super packed as well but most of us would go and occupy a whole table and just order one tea or one shake. So, they introduced a minimum order charge of like KD1.5 per person so everyone shifted outside Johnny to the sidewalk corner and I never saw Johnny that packed again.

Oddly that sidewalk corner became a hot spot where everyone went to meet up with other friends. It used to get pretty crowded so the cops stopped allowing us to hang out there.

McDonalds opened at around the same time over Johnny so some people started hanging out there instead.

But mostly, we just hung out at each others houses listening to music and talking. Every now and then there was a house party but really that was it.

Kinda miss the simplicity of those days now that I think about it. No cellphone, no internet, no car and just enough money to make the difficult but important decision of buying a music tape from The Video Club or having dinner.

K’S PATH will be holding their fundraiser Quiz Night at the end of the month at the Australian College of Kuwait (ACK). It should be a fun evening with exciting quiz rounds, dinner, and great prizes. Teams can have up to 6 members at an entry fee of KD 10 per team member. It’s a great way to support a worthy cause and all proceeds will go towards K’S PATH’s shelter and programs.

If you’re interested in taking part just email your team details to [email protected] by September 23rd at the latest.

Date: Friday, September 28th
Time: 7:00 PM
Location: Australian College of Kuwait (ACK)

I had no idea who Emmy was until a reader emailed me telling me about her. Emmymade in Japan is a YouTube channel where Emmy usually reviews different kind of candies (mostly from Japan) while eating them in front of the camera. Well it seems she has some Kuwaiti viewers because someone from Kuwait sent her a box full of treats all the way to Japan. It’s really fun watching her trying to figure out what everything is. [YouTube]

Thanks Teeba