Category: Kuwait

I am extremely tempted to buy the RC plane pictured above and get into the hobby. It looks fantastic and comes ready to fly meaning I don’t need much to get it up and running. Price wise its also very affordable costing KD124 on Amazon. I’m just worried summer is already here and outdoor activities season is over. [Amazon]

Note: The plane is 1.28m long and 1.48m wide. Its gas powered and comes with a flight simulator software which will help you learn how to fly the plane on the computer first. Also comes with an adapter that will connect your radio controller (pictured above) to the computer to use with the flight sim. More details on this plane can be found here. [Link]

A new pizza place recently opened up in the Avenues food court called Pizzeria Rustica. Its located opposite Applebee’s. The rice placed called “Rice” also looks to be opening up any day now. The lights were on and the staff looked like they were getting training.

There is a digital art showcase that’s being held at The Exhibition for the next two days. Here is the information I received by email:

Ugly, But Beautiful
Date: February 26-28
Time: 4PM-12AM
Location: The Exhibition

Beauty is something rational, everyone has their own taste of it. Ugliness, on the other hand, is one’s own opinion.

When you look at an image that is full of beauty and structure, you find it beautiful because you are living a structured life. You rarely see things placed randomly, as a result you say an image is ugly without knowing that ugliness has its own beauty.

That is why we can say something is ugly, but beautiful at the same time.

‘Ugly, But Beautiful’ is Remon Yousef’s means of making you see how ugliness can have its own beauty.

Remon Yousef, a Lebanese graphic designer currently working in Kuwait, will be showcasing his artwork to the public for three days only.

All artworks are for sale.

A friend of mine got his Mercedes G55 wrapped in chrome foil. Its also supposedly the first chrome car in Kuwait because it isn’t usually legal to do. He used to have it matte black before but I think this looks cooler since EVERYONE is wrapping their cars in matte black.

Géant hypermarket will be opening in Kuwait at the 360 degrees mall in June 2009. Although Sultan Center purchased and took over the Géant franchise in Lebanon, Tamdeen Group will own the Géant chain in Kuwait.

Thanks YBhatti!

I picked up the latest issue of brownbook and they had an article on Kuwait’s online fashion market mentioning how there were nearly 60 online stores and highlighting their favorite 7. Here they are:

1. www.gojiboutique.com
2. www.krayvstore.com
3. www.cash-art.com
4. www.q8-fashion.com
5. www.butterfly-g.com
6. www.pinkmoonboutique.com
7. www.labiella.com

Proud to be Kuwaiti is a foundation that was formed to recognize and encourage the youth of Kuwait to depend on themselves and establish their own business by giving their skills and talent a chance to shine. I posted about them last year when they had their first event and tomorrow the event is back for the second time. Like last year a ton of small local start ups will be participating. I won’t be able to attend since I am in Lebanon but Nataly will be going for sure. Here are some event details:

Proud 2 be Kuwaiti
Location: Al Raya Ballroom
February 22nd from 6pm to 10pm
February 23rd from 10am to 2pm and 5pm to 9pm

Event is open to everyone and more than 100 small Kuwaiti businesses will be featured. Here is a link to their website. [Link]

From The Exhibition:

My Q8
Date: February 24th
Time: 6PM-10PM
Location: The Exhibition

As you all know, February 25th and 26th are days for celebrating.

Come and join us in celebrating Kuwait’s National and Liberation Days at The Exhibition! We’re all here to show our love of Kuwait.

‘My Q8’ is night where these talented photographers and poets can display their beautiful and personal photographs and poems at The Exhibition.

They want to make you see what Kuwait means to them and they will be doing that by expressing their love of this country the best way they can: through their art and poetry!

Artists and poets will be donating a percentage of their profits to various charities.

A reader spotted a car on fire early morning in the evening while out cycling and managed to capture some pictures to share it with everyone. Looks like there was a big crowd.

Thanks Hamad!

I got the following in my email:

Campus Activities Board, a university funded organization at the American University of Kuwait is creating a charity carnival to help children in need. Whether they have down syndrome or autism, are orphans or in foster care, or are disabled– this day is for them.

All the money from the tickets and all donations will be spent in buying toys and gifts for the children that were not able to attend. The week after the event will be to take volunteers and go to five of the centers here in Kuwait.

The Charity Carnival will include:
Carnival Games
Raffle
Art Corner
Prizes
Face painting
Pony Ride
Bouncy Castle
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory room with movie
Free Candy
Toys
and much more

People are invited to bring friends and family to enjoy this day!

Tickets will be sold at the American University of Kuwait from in the liberal arts lobby from:

Saturday, February 21, 2009
From 11:00 to 6:00

Ticket Prices:
3 KD for adults
1 KD for children

Tickets will also be sold at the door!
If you want to volunteer for this event contact: [email protected]

They also have a facebook account which you can check [Here]

They’re big. I think that summarizes my experience with the Beats. As I said in my first impression I would post about the Beats after my experience with them traveling so here it is. Basically they are extremely comfortable, they sound amazing and the noise reduction is pretty impressive. The biggest and only problem I have with the Beats is the size. They barely fit into my messenger bag! If I had my backpack it wouldn’t be such a problem but I am now mostly traveling with my messenger bag and the Beats are too big to fit comfortably in them.

While on the plane watching an episode of Boston Legal on my iPod, a guy sitting across me in the isle tapped my shoulder. Turned out he had the Bose QuietComfort 3 and wanted to know if the headphones I had on my head had noise reduction. I gave him the headphones to try on and according to him the Beats had better noise reduction than the QuietComfort 3 which actually impressed me since I am not a big fan of Bose. He also commented on the fact how the Beats fit around the ear giving a perfect seal while the Bose fit over the ear. He thinks thats why they offer better noise reduction which makes sense.

Anyway although I really love these headphones I highly doubt I will end up buying them. I need travel headphones and although these are very comfortable they just aren’t practical to lug around because of their size. If only they folded down flatter…

Amazon is currently offering a $50 discount on the Beats by Dre. Click here to check it out. [Amazon Link]

One of the newspaper today published an article explaining the meaning of a dream if it contains a pink ring in it. Nothing out of the ordinary except for the fact that whoever looked for an image of a “pink ring” to attach to that article ended up finding a vibrating ring used as a sex toy. Now that’s funny!

Here is a link to a larger version of the above image. [Picture]

Sorry I forgot to wish everyone a Happy Shani Day yesterday. Have you gotten your loved one a Shani today?

A friend recommended I try The Butcher Shop burger for my Burger Challenge so I passed by a few nights ago to give it a shot. I’ve been to the Dubai branch before but haven’t been to the Kuwait branch one since they launched so I was looking forward to it especially since my friend told me their burger was “amazing”.

I passed by The Butcher Shop the night there was the big dust storm so they only had two tables occupied. All of Avenues was empty which I actually found pretty cool. I quickly flipped through their menu looking for the burger section and then told the waitress I would have the cheese burger medium well and a coke to go with it. It was around 8pm and I hadn’t eaten a single thing all day since I was busy with work so I was really looking forward to the burger.

The burger arrived shortly thereafter and to my disappointment it didn’t look very appetizing. The presentation was pretty dull and I actually had a hard time taking a good shot to use with this post. Looks aren’t everything of course and I was hoping the taste would make up for the presentation. It didn’t surprisingly. The bottom of the bun was very soggy while the top bun was dry. The patty although thick and tender didn’t have any flavor. It was a really boring burger even though it was the only thing I had eaten that day.

The cost of the burger is KD2.950 which is fairly decent for a place like The Butcher Shop but I wouldn’t have it again. I was thinking of giving it a 3 out of 5 but the fact that I was extremely hungry without food all day and still managed to find the burger unsatisfying and flavorless dropped it down another half point to 2.5 out of 5. If you’re at the Avenues and are looking for a good burger have Johnny Rockets or Ruby Tuesday instead.

The Butcher Shop is located at The Avenues
The cost of the Cheese Burger is KD2.950

Here are the burger places I’ve reviewed so far:
Applebee’s
Bredz
Burger Boutique
Fuddruckers
Hashi
Gaucho Gril
Gourmet Burger Kitchen
Johnny Rockets
Munch
Papa John’s Burgers
Prime & Toast
Ruby Tuesday
Slider Station
Sheraton Hotel
The Burger Hub
The Little Oven
Wimpy

Today I went off-roading with some friends. First in our real cars and then in our radio controlled ones. We had three Tamiya FJ Cruisers, my Tamiya Lunchbox and my Tamiya Frog. It was extremely fun, I bashed the hell out of my Lunchbox and it now needs a major paint job but I don’t care. I took a ton of pictures and so did my brother but I couldn’t put all of them here. There are a few more pictures below though if you hit continue.

Update: My brother just uploaded some photos to his flickr account [Here]