Category: Information

The best thing about summer is KDD Silver ice cream.
The second best thing about summer is Faloda sorbet.
The third best thing about summer is Sunkist orange drink.

Faloda, also spelt Faloodeh or Faludeh and is a Persian sorbet made of thin frozen noodles. Its pretty strange but tastes amazing. Really refreshing plus you can add either lemon or rose water to it for extra flavor.

The place I get my Faloda from is located in Kuwait City, opposite Al Rayya mall and under the Baba Taher Iranian restaurant. I think the place that sells it is called Marafie. A small sized portion will set you back 250fils which is the same cost as regular ice cream.

According to Wikipedia, Faloda is one of the earliest forms of frozen desserts, existing as early as 400 BCE.

Nibaq just finished setting up KuwaitBlogs Search and even created a googlish logo so try it out.

https://search.kuwaitblogs.com/

In 1988 a Kuwait Airways Boeing was hijacked and diverted to Algiers while on its way to Kuwait from Bangkok. The hijacking lasted 16 days and ended with a Naval Officer from the Kuwaiti Royal Family being killed along with another Kuwaiti military person. The Algerian authorities allowed the hijackers to escape in exchange for the remainder of the 110 people aboard to be set free. (Wikipedia)

This is a video sporty4ever uploaded on to YouTube which is of the plane returning back to Kuwait after the hijacking.

[YouTube]

Here are a couple of cool watches that I like and their prices in Kuwait:

Part of the Bvlgari Ergon line, it comes in two models, with and without the chronograph… but I prefer it with. The case is made of steel, the bracelet is a steel and rubber combo while the dial is made from black carbon fiber. Only the non-chrono version is on display in Kuwait but you can order the chrono version and its priced at around KD1,500.

Bvlgari
Location: Salhiya Complex.
Telephone: 2415360

The Panerai Luminor Chrono Daylight is definitely my favorite Panerai watch ever made. Sadly though its no longer available in Kuwait and according to the dealer you can’t even order it. Its a big watch made from steel and the diameter of the dial is 44mm. The price when available was around KD3,300.

Panerai
Location: Salhiya Complex.
Telephone: 2421907

Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Offshore. The most expensive of the three coming in at KD7,000 for the steel version and KD7,500 for the titanium model. This is the ultimate watch to get. Its both classy and sporty at the same time and its distinctive octagon face makes the watch recognizable from a mile away. The dealer does offer a 25% discount which brings the price down to a mid sized car.

Audemars Piguet
Location: Salhiya Complex.
Telephone: 2441716

A nice list when planning your vacation:

1. Moscow
2. London
3. Seoul
4. Tokyo
5. Hong Kong
6. Copenhagen
7. Geneva
8. Osaka
9. Zurich
10. Oslo
11. Milan
12. St Petersburg
13. Paris
14. Singapore
15. New York

Kuwait isn’t in the top 50. Actually the only country from the Gulf which is on the list is UAE and it takes two spots, 34 for Dubai and 45 for Abu Dhabi. Here is the top 50 list. [Link]

Today morning I found out from Confashions that Villa Moda was having a one day 50% sale at their Fanar and Mubarikiya branches. So during lunch I went with some friends to the Mubarikiya branch which is extremely close to my office. It was my first time there and was pretty impressed at the size of the branch but kinda shocked at the location since its in a pretty old and beat up neighborhood.

The choice of clothing in the mens section was pretty poor. The stuff on display I would never wear and I can’t imagine anyone else wearing. Now take what I say with a grain of salt since I wouldn’t call myself stylish being that all I wear throughout the summer are Zoo York and Hurley t-shirts with Hurley jeans on the bottom. I did find a pair of Prada sneakers though that were pretty OK but after discount they were KD60 which I would rather put on a pair of Camper’s.

The womens section had a lot more items but the cool stuff (like Juicy Couture) were not on sale and their collection of accessories was pretty weak. Anyway if you have nothing else better to do it might be worth the trip to check it out. The Mubarikiya branch is larger then the Fanar one plus the interior is a lot more interesting.

update: I caved in and got the shoes after work.

There are four guys who have been uploading a ton of old videos that used to be played on KTV back in the 80s and 90s onto YouTube for us to view. The four guys are (in no particular order):

hummer15al
sporty4ever
NiceQ8i
k0003

I would like to just say thank you to them because they have really been doing an amazing job. If you would like to view the videos they have uploaded just click on their names above.

A commenter posted a link to a Kuwait Times article entitled “What not to do in Kuwait”. K.thekuwaiti replied back to the commenter telling him the article was retarded because every piece of advice ends with a warning that you would be raped if you don’t do this.

I decided to check out the article myself and its true what K.thekuwaiti said. The article is giving the worst impression on Kuwait and a lot of things are really taken to the extreme. Here are some examples from the article:

Avoid starting friendly conversations with taxi drivers. This would give him the impression that you want him to have sex with you and of course, he would ask you if you are married and if your husband is with you. Never admit to be single and alone or even to confess that you are a runaway maid or employee. Many of them would not hesitate to rape you and leave you empty handed and get you pregnant.

So tip #1, don’t talk to taxi drivers or they will rape you.

Avoid accepting gifts or laughing over sexual jokes with your boss unless it is really okay with you and this is what you want .If you came from an environment where you are very open with the opposite gender, then you might think that such jokes are okay but here, it is not. This would give men a hint that you are ready to have sex with him and you could find yourself a rape victim. Besides, accepting someone’s gifts means approval.

So tip #2, don’t be friendly with your boss or he will rape you.

Avoid trying to look sexy by showing the sexiest parts of your body. You may think that you have a sexy body and want the world to see that because it is okay for you, but do not do that here. Lots of men here would think of you as a prostitute and may try to reach or touch you by any means. You may not mean it but this would be hard to convince them because they came from a different culture. The culture here associates clothes with manners. The more you cover yourself, the more respected you will be.

Tip #3, if you are hot people will think you are a prostitute and you will get raped.

Avoid fighting with a Kuwaiti. He simply wouldn’t hesitate to use any wasta to make you the wrong person of the dispute and make you take the blame. You might end up begging to him just to let you go!!!!

Tip #4, don’t fight with a Kuwaiti or he will rape you.

You can check out the full article on the Kuwait Times website but in case they decide to remove it you can grab a copy from [here]. The writer of the article is Muna Al-Fuzai. [Link]

Villa Moda started their summer sale on Saturday and it ends tomorrow (not sure about this). They have 35% off on most brands except for Gucci. Since they haven’t advertised their sale the place isn’t that packed. For more details on the sale you can call them up on 4827004. I tried calling them now to find out if the sale ended tomorrow but its 9AM and they are still closed.

Thanks Dana

K.thekuwaiti has a detailed write up on what is BlackBerry and the packages MTC are offering. If you are interested check out his blog. [Link]

This is a cool feature. It seems you can now make Google Images search for pictures of just faces. There isn’t a command available yet in the user interface but if you append &imgtype=face to the end of your search result url, it will filter the images and just display the ones that are of faces.

For example try these two links:

A search for images of Kuwait
https://images.google.com/images?q=kuwait

Same search for images of Kuwait but with the faces filter
https://images.google.com/images?q=kuwait&imgtype=face

Its slightly geeky but still cool. Check out this site for more details. [Link]

An interesting article detailing the way The Pentagon (US Department of Defence) building became a pentagon. [Link]

Ansam posted a letter someone had written to Carrefour management complaining about the shopping cart rules. The person was pissed because he wasn’t allowed to push his cart through the mall. Well yeah, I kinda understand why that rule is in place. Imagine everyone roaming around Avenues with a shopping cart, it would be total chaos. But, if I understood his letter correctly, you are also not allowed to push your cart in the parking lot outside the designated Carrefour area. That I think might cause a problem since when you enter the Avenues parking during peak hours its difficult to find an empty parking spot yet a lone one thats in the Carrefour area. Anyway you can read the letter on Ansams blog. [Link]

Slider Station is a new restaurant that opened up around a month ago. Its a local creation by the same guys behind Burger Boutique. I passed by yesterday night with Nat and a friend for dinner and I left the place extremely impressed and I will tell you from now that I gave the place a full 5 out of 5 rating without the slightest hesitation.

Since the place is pretty small you need to call ahead to reserve a spot. We called on Friday to reserve 3 places at the bar for Sunday night. I had seen the actual location before it was built, I saw sketches on how it would end up looking like and I even so pictures of the interior taken by various other bloggers after Slider Station was launched but even though, when I got to the place I was astonished. Pictures really don’t do the place any justice. I think its currently one of the nicely designed places in Kuwait, everything about it from the walls, to the chairs to the food conveyor belt, everything was paid attention to.

The food conveyor belt, thats the reason we asked for the bar seats. One of the coolest things at Slider Station is the large u-shaped bar taking up the majority of the space on the ground floor. Its surrounded by very comfortable seating and the bar has a built in conveyor belt. Each group at the bar is assigned a number and they serve your food by rolling it out on the conveyor belt. For example our number was 1 so all the dishes that came out on the conveyor belt with the number 1 in front of it was ours. Its a nice gimmick that is both practical and fun. The music that was being played was really cool and their choice of plates, cutlery and glasses were just spot on.

I could talk more and more about the actual look of the place but it would all mean nothing if the food wasn’t any good. The most popular burgers at Burger Boutique are the sliders. Sliders are mini burgers simply put and what Slider Station did was take them to a different level. I don’t know exactly how many different sliders they have but I think they were over 15 variations ranging from beef, to chicken to fish. Unlike in Burger Boutique where sliders come in groups of 4, at Slider Station, each slider order is just a single slider. This makes things A LOT more fun since you could mix and match sliders as you wish. I personally ordered the Roast Beef slider, the Wagyu slider with mature english cheese, the Caribbean crab slider which is a crab burger with a delicious mango sauce, and finally a Hammour slider. For appetizer we had two types of fries, the regular and the extra thin and crispy one. We also had buffalo wings and duck quesadillas. Everything was just really good, the presentation, the flavor, the buns, it was just perfect. There wasn’t anything I could find wrong with the place but I hadn’t ordered the dessert yet so before I could give it a final score I had to try their chocolate pudding. As you could already guess, I must have liked the dessert or else I wouldn’t have given the place a full five out of five. Yes, the chocolate pudding rocked!

So, good food, good atmosphere, good variety and good prices. I don’t know of any other restaurant in Kuwait that deserves a better rating. Final score five out of five. To get reservations call 2465047. They are open from 7PM to 11PM. You can also check out their blog by going to www.sliderstation.com

Pictures taken from SliderStation.com

note: I forgot to mention, they are located on the Gulf Road between Seef Palace and the House of Parliament.

I was showing my partner at work the blog uncrate.com when we got to the post on the Obelisk chairs (pictured above and right below). I was telling him about how cool the design was when he told me his cousin has them in her store. So during our lunch break we both headed to his cousins store called Home House which is located adjacent to the Amiri Hospital on the Gulf Road.

Right as we walked into the store which was actually an old Kuwaiti house we spotted the Obelisk right in front of us. It was exactly like the one we saw on uncrate except we didn’t expect it to be this big. We were given a tour of the place and it turns out they have some really really nice stuff. I really don’t know where to start since I literally fell in love with their brands.

I guess I will start with my favorite brand they carry which is Vange. They have some of the most beautiful industrial designs. Just flipping through their website now while writing this is giving me goose bumps. Most of the Vange stuff is by order but they had the K-Baby, the K-Bench and the MAUI console on display. I loved the K-Bench and the MAUI series of shelving is just so hot!

After the Vange we were shown some stuff by Gandia Blasco. Their stuff are mostly for patios, chalets and beaches, they reminded me a lot of the stuff I see on CSI: Miami. Their style is the very modern outdoor furniture which comes all in white, very straight edged with white drapes and they are very very sexy stuff.

Finally we were shown some lighting systems by Tobias Grau. It was another brand I hadn’t heard of before but again they have some really really slick looking lamps. So minimal and so cleanly designed. If Apple were to make lamps this is how they would come out.

I am probably going to go back there and see how much the MAUI console and the K-Bench cost since I would love to have them in my place. I didn’t ask their prices while I was there for some reason so I don’t know how much they cost. The Obelisk costs around KD1,600 which although isn’t cheap, its still cheaper then in the US where they sell for $8,500.

If you want to pass by the place its very easy to find. If you take the right after the Amiri hospital you will find that the first house on the left is called Bait Al Cedra. They are located right inside Bait Al Cedra. Its right next to the Karizma gallery. You can call them on 253 0358 in case you get lost or visit their website www.homehouse.be

Here are the websites to the brands:
Vange
Gandia Blasco
Tobias Grau

update: I made a mistake. The store is called Home House not Bait Al Cedra. Bait Al Cedra is the name of the old house where Home House is located. I just edited the post above to reflect this.