2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003While we’re on the subject of Ahmadi today, here are some photos of KOC buildings from the early 60s. These were old postcards that were scanned and the descriptions were written on the back.
One of the married payroll employees houses at Ahmadi
Kuwait Oil Company’s guest house, Ahmadi
The training centre at Ahmadi
Housing for bachelor payroll employees at Ahmadi
For more old postcards (all for sale) click here.
I came across these photos years ago but when I searched the blog I realized I had only shared a couple of them. Below are some photos of a home taken by a family who used to live in Ahmadi back in the early 60s.
Ok this is going to be a long shot but does anyone have an Ahmadi Desert Motoring Club car badge for sale? Back in the old days (like 50s/60s etc.) people use to put badges on their car grills similar to the photo below and so I’m looking for the ADMC car badge to put on the front grill of my Alfa.
There are different variations of this badge either with the word Kuwait or Persian Gulf written on it, I’m not picky and fine with either one. I can’t find the exact date these badges were used by the club in Kuwait but I’m assuming it was in the 50s to late 60s, maybe early 70s.
If you have one or know anyone who would want to sell theirs, let me know!
If you’re itching to buy an interesting book about Kuwait, this is one that came out in 2008 but copies of are still available online. The book deals with the construction of the Kuwait National Assembly building that was designed by Jørn Utzon who was also behind the design of the Sydney Opera House.
Completed in 1982, the Kuwait National Assembly remains one of the outstanding modern buildings completed in the Middle East by a European architect. A tour de force of precast concrete construction, Jørn Utzon’s design also represents the culmination of themes that had preoccupied him throughout his work, notably ways of combining ideas derived from traditional cultures with the ‘additive’ principles of cellular growth found in nature. This beautifully produced book, the latest addition to Edition Bløndal’s acclaimed ‘Utzon Logbook’ series, was developed in close collaboration with Utzon and presents an exceptionally comprehensive account of the Kuwait project through photographs, original drawings and the recollections of key contributors – Utzon’s staff, consulting engineers and contractor, and an extended interview with Utzon himself.
If you check out the publisher’s website they have two videos taken during construction which I had never seen before. You can check those out here.
If you want to buy the book I got my copy from Amazon for $69.
Back in 1977, Andy Warhol came to Kuwait under the invitation of the National Council of Arts, Culture, and Letters and his work was exhibited at the Dhaiat Abdullah Al Salem Gallery. I’ve posted about his visit a number of times before and you can read more about it in my previous post here.
Earlier in the month, I was made aware that a signed copy of his catalog from his exhibit in Kuwait was up for auction in Germany. The first thing I wanted to do was share it with people but since I wanted to bid on it myself I decided not to. The auction house had estimated that the signed catalog would sell for €250 – €360 so I figured I’d play it safe and put a bid of €1005.
The auction took place this past Friday and because the site was in German and I’ve never really taken part in a live auction similar to this, I didn’t know how it would work exactly. To summarize, I was at the race track taking part in the KMT Open Track event on Friday when the auction went live and someone ended up topping my bid and winning the item for €1200.
It sucks because I really wanted it, but I’m guessing whoever bid on it really wanted it to and most likely had a deeper pocket so I’m kinda glad I missed the auction. I’ve been in bidding wars before and things can get out of hand very quickly. In any case, now that auction is over I’m sharing pictures of the signed catalog. Even without the signature, the catalog would have been an interesting purchase. The description for the item on the auction site was in German but here is the rough translation:
Andy Warhol. Catalog for the exhibition in the MAYOR Gallery London and the Dhaiat Abdulla al Salem Gallery in Kuwait 1977. 7 pages each in English and Arabic with staple stitching. 35.5 x 23 cm. Illustrated original cardboard cover and signed on the back by Andy Warhol (a little bit at the edge of the bend, front cover with small paper abrasion in the edge, back cover a little rubbed).
Very rare catalog for the exhibition in London and Kuwait. – Paper slightly creased.
Here is the link to the item on the auction website and below are links to the high res images in case they get deleted from the auction website.
The Family Bookshop, one of the oldest and most popular English bookshops in Kuwait closed down for good eight years ago. Just before they closed down I passed by and took photos of the place. I shared some of the photos back then but since it was National Bookshop Day a few days ago, I wanted to re-upload all the photos I took that day. The photos below are in higher resolution than the previous ones I had published and I’m also sharing all the photos I took that day, not just some of them. So check them out below.
I have a series of old posts called “Life in Kuwait back in the 1950s” that still attracts some of the most amazing comments today by people who used to live in Ahmadi in the 50s. I’ve even previously posted about how a bunch of kids who grew up in Ahmadi together were able to reconnect after 60 years in the comments of one of these posts and now someone left another very interesting comment. Mike Green grew up in Kuwait in the early 50s and he converted some of his parents old 8mm film to digital and uploaded the footage to youtube. Below is his story along with the videos:
My Dad (Cliff Green) arrived in Kuwait in 1953, and the rest of the family left rainy Manchester in a Dakota the following year. My final time in Ahmadi was 1968 when I started work in the UK, and Dad left in 1971. I have converted some old Standard 8 film to digital and that along with some interspersed photos and modern film I have posted on YouTube.
Many of the “second generation” along with now very few older generation meet each year for an Ahmadi reunion which has been running now for nearly 50 years. In 2010 my sister and I visited Ahmadi on our way to Dubai and it was very strange to see the old haunts still there but there have been many changes to the housing (etc).
The Hubara Club has been renovated but there are still some remnants of the old days which were not destroyed during the invasion. Particularly (and how strange is this memory) the power socket on the outdoor stage is still the same one I used back in 1966 with Chris & Glyn Gustar, and Kerry Scott as our “holiday band” got into full swing – supporting, if I remember “The Twisters” I must consider putting down on paper more of the life we had as “privileged kids” during the 1950’s and early 60’s.
When the Thunayan Al Ghanim Building was constructed back in 1954, it was considered to be one of the most advanced buildings in Kuwait at the time and one of the first to have an elevator. There are many stories on bedouins coming in from the desert to watch “the flying horse” that can go up and down. Back then the Thunayan Al Ghanim building housed the original KOC offices, the British Consulate, the first English bookshop in Kuwait, and later on the Rolls Royce dealership.
The building was originally designed to be 10 floors tall but during construction, the Kuwait City municipality changed the law and set that buildings in that area to be no higher than 4 floors since they wanted to spread out the city instead of having highrises with everyone located in a smaller area.
Below are some photos of the building from the 60s compared with photos taken last week.
Thanks Noura Anwar Al Ghanim!
Not sure what I was searching for on eBay but I ended up finding a 35mm slide of Kuwait for sale taken back in 1961. My curiosity kicked in so I decided to see if there were more 35mm slides of Kuwait and ended up finding a few for sale and a whole lot that had previously sold. I saved all the ones I found, they’re 32 photos to be exact and I’ve shared them below.
All these photos were sold by the same person on eBay and they all date back to 1961. The interesting part is that all these slides were sold individually and each one had multiple bids on them. Some ended up selling for over KD40 (per slide) and some quick poking around made me realize most were purchased by the same person.
Whoever is buying up all these slides, email me!
Check out all the photos below, there are some great shots of Kuwait I hadn’t seen before.
Al Qabas newspaper launched a new service recently called Al Qabas Premium where they’ve digitized all their issues going back to 1972 and made them available online.
This is such a cool thing and I’m so surprised they did this. Previously the only way I could access their archive is by going to the National Library and having to flip through large and heavy books, so this is way more convenient.
Al Qabas Premium isn’t free, it costs $60 a year but you can sign up to a monthly package ($6) if you want as well. They do have some free content available and I just found the picture on top of Cinema Salmiya dating back to 1972 as part of their free content. But, $6 is pretty reasonable so I’ll be signing up to their monthly package.
Al Qabas Premium is in Arabic and if you want to check it out then click here.
Thanks Omar!
Update: Here is a video they just published about Al Qabas Premium
I just realized I had some more pictures I had taken from the KOC archive and hadn’t shared yet. This one is of the Ahmadi Market taken in the early 60s. If you want to check out more pictures from the KOC archive, click here.
Found this photo on a twitter account with the caption “First elephant in Kuwait for the zoo – Kuwait 1952”. I’m not sure which zoo though since the current one opened up in 1968, so could be some other zoo that was open back then (did Ahmadi have a zoo?) or maybe it was part of a traveling circus? Still cute though.
via Bader AlRoudan
Update: Supposedly there was a zoo called the Salwa Garden, and it was the first zoo in Kuwait and the GCC. Trying to get more info on this now.
Update2: Check out the snippet below
Not many visitors to the Zoo at Omariya know that Kuwait was the first country in the Gulf where a zoo was established، in 1955. And even less people will remember that it was Shaikh Jabir Al Abdullah Al Jabir Al Sabah who set up the region’s first zoo known as Salwa garden، after which the place Salwa was so named subsequently. He purchased animals، with his own money and eventually transferred his collection in 1965 to form the nucleus of Umariya Zoo.
The long and moving story has been told in the book titled “Salwa Garden: the first zoo in Kuwait and the Arabian Gulf” written and published by his daughter Shaikha Mona Jabir Al Abdullah Al Jabir Al Sabah، Assistant Undersecretary of Al Diwan Al Amiri and author of several research-oriented books on Kuwait and the Gulf. Source
Update3: How am I just finding out about this? The picture below is of the entrance to the zoo and you can see a couple of more photos here.
Tomorrow is the anniversary of the 1990 Kuwait Invasion, and every year on the anniversary, I like to share some links related to the war. This year though I noticed two of my favorite websites related to the invasion are no longer up and running, Free Kuwait and The Evidence.
Both those website contained a large archive of photos related to the invasion and I’m pretty upset that they’re both no longer working. I’ve already emailed the people behind those two websites to see what the issue is, hopefully, it’s just a technical hiccup but in any case, below are the rest of the links.
Free Kuwait
This is a website that focuses on the campaign that was led by Kuwaitis in exile and is loaded with photos and information.
Kuwait Invasion – The Evidence
This is a website that contains over 1,200 pictures taken right after the 1990 invasion as photographic evidence to all the destruction caused by Iraq.
Short movie: Hearts of Palm
Hearts of Palm is a short movie set in August 2nd 1990 and deals with Kuwaiti students living in Miami Florida during the Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait.
The Class of 1990
This is a short documentary about reuniting class mates years after the 1990 Iraqi invasion.
Homemade video from the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait
Video clips taken by a Kuwaiti family during the Iraqi invasion
Desert Storm Photos
Photos taken by soldiers during Desert Storm.
Short Animation: Sandarah
A captivating story based on true events that took place during the 1990 Iraqi invasion.
First Account of Iraq’s Invasion of Kuwait
Interviews with various Kuwaitis that were in Kuwait during the 1990 invasion.
Iraqi Invasion Pictures
Photos of the Gulf War aftermath.
Politics of Wor
A tumblr account with some not so commonly seen photos from the Gulf War. (Warning some are graphic)
Magnum Photos
A gallery of images taken during the Gulf War by some great photographers. (Warning some are graphic)
BBC Documentary: The Last Flight to Kuwait
A series of documentaries on Iraq begins with a look at the fate of British Airways flight BA149 to the Far East in 1990. As the plane landed in Kuwait, Saddam Hussein invaded, capturing its crew and passengers.
Photos in this post are by Bruno Barbey
Update: I just bought a hard copy of the books The Evidence and Evidence II which is what the website The Evidence is based off. Now looking for “A Testimony from London” which the Free Kuwait website is based on. If you know where I can find it let me know.
While at the National Library recently, I found a few newspaper clippings related to James Brown when he visited Kuwait back in 1978. I was hoping to find more coverage in the papers but I searched through 1 month worth of AlQabas newspapers and only found a few ads and one article. I’m gonna go back and try to look for more in other newspapers but for now, I’m gonna share the ones I found. One is on top and the rest are below. If only the library didn’t have the most impractical opening hours…
