Category: Kuwait

Recently the subject of segregating the private schools has come back into the limelight. I am personally against this because I think its unhealthy for the male and female students not to mingle while they are young. With regards to this subject a reader asked me to share the following message with everyone:

Your support is needed to attend and pass this message on to others: There is an important gathering at the Kuwait Womans Society in Khaldiya on Tuesday at 6pm in which they want owners of foreign schools and Kuwaiti parents and students to attend to contest the segregation law. They also want to invite as many Arabic speaking parents to support this event. Lots of press and MP’s will attend. Try and make it. Thank you.

Here are two better shots of the new Alghanim Electronics store that opened up at the Avenues. There were less people there today so it was easier to take the shots.

the Internet is fixed .. long live the internet.

There is finally a light at the end of the tunnel (pun intended). Flag Telecom has reported that both links will be fully operational by February 10th now.

Cut # 1: FLAG EUROPE ASIA Cable cut between Alexandria (Egypt) and Palermo (Italy)

• The repair crew of marine experts, optical engineers has reached the site yesterday and it is expected that the splice work will be carried out today. It is currently planned that the repairs will be completed by Sunday, February 10th 2008.

Cut # 2: FALCON Cable cut between Dubai (UAE) and Al SEEB (Oman)

1. The ship loaded with spares, marine experts, and optical engineers have reached the site yesterday. The crew has recovered the one end of the cable and cable joining work is in progress.
2. The repair team has observed steady progress and the repair work are expected to be completed by Sunday, February 10th 2008.

I personally find it quite ironic that the Internet issue is fixed the day after InfoConnect; memo to Gitex, there is no need to sabotage our event (the organizers are doing it for you). Until the internet is fully operational, I suggest you check out Mark’s post on the ‘The internet’s undersea world‘. One of the more unnoticed parts of the image is the available/used capacity of the underwater link.

The fiber links around the world can handle up to 7.1 tbps. The capacity ‘purchased/reserved’ by ISPs is 5.7tbps. Which leads us to ask .. how much of the internet capacity is actually being used? 2.1tbps. In theory, everyone (around the world) could have triple the internet speeds and the fiber links would still have roughly 15% left of unused capacity.

-Posted by K.

I just saw the new Alghanim Electronics store at the Avenues and although I am not a big fan of Alghanim Electronics I was actually impressed by the place. The place looks pretty cool and EVERYTHING they have is on display to be played with from phones and cameras to mp3 and portable video players. The new store is located under Cinescape near NBK and IKEA.

Flag Telecom has released a press bulletin with an updated status on the cut fiber links:

Cut # 1: FLAG EUROPE ASIA Cable cut between Alexandria (Egypt) and Palermo (Italy)

• The ship loaded with spares has reached the fault location and has initiated the repair work; the repair work is estimated to be completed within 6-7 days.
• The Mediterranean network will be fully resilient with the addition of FLAG Mediterranean Cable current under implementation.
• The cable cut was reported at 0800 GMT on January 30th 2008 around 8.3 Km away from Alexandria cable landing station between Egypt – Italy segment.

Cut # 2: FALCON Cable cut between Dubai (UAE) and Al SEEB (Oman)

• The ship loaded with spares, marine experts, and optical engineers have reached the site yesterday. The crew has recovered the one end of the cable and cable joining work is in progress.
• The repair team has observed steady progress and the repair work are expected to be completed in next 3 – 4 days.
• The weather conditions are not favorable but the crew is continuing with the repair process.
• The cable cut was reported at 0559 GMT on February1st 2008 around 56 Km from Dubai, UAE on segment between UAE and Oman.

We should expect internet to return to normal within the next week. The official press bulletin is updated daily and can be found [here].

-Posted by K.

When will this stop? A regular combo used to cost KD1.750 a few years ago at Gulf Royal Chinese in the Marina Mall food court and then they increased the price to KD1.950. Now they’ve increased it again and the new price for a regular combo with coke is KD2.250.

From all the online dessert/munchies stores that are opening up in Kuwait this has to be the strangest one so far. I was checking out the blog Some Contrast today when I found out about an online store here in Kuwait that makes and delivers flavored popcorn! They deliver popcorn to your house.. thats nearly weirder than the idea me and Nibaq came up with for selling flavored banank online! [Link]

Picture above taken from Some Contrast

Best Buy Kuwait, the fake Best Buy in Hawalli have the tiny Asus Eee laptops for sale and they are being sold for KD159 which is KD50 more expensive than Amazon. Its really sad how they’ve blatantly copied Best Buy’s logo and name. If it was a crappy shop I could care less but they do actually have a decent collection of stuff so they should also put the effort in coming up with a better name for the place.

Marzouq and I had a chance to check out InfoConnect before the doors open to public tomorrow:

The good:
Qualitynet is offering huge price cuts in addition to ‘extras’ that will only be offered when you subscribe/renew at InfoConnect. In addition to a ‘Sky DSL’ service which possibly means two way satellite service (as UCC). They also are offering a raffle for a Mini (might be one of the ‘extras’) with Al-Ghanim.

TechSys has a ton of new products from Planet and Silverstone, from HTPC/High-End cases, quiet/ultra-powerful power supplies to affordable networking products like smart switches and ip-cameras.

Lastly, E-Government is in full effect this year; Bahrain and Oman’s governments showing off their e-capabilities alongside Kuwait’s MOI, MOC and PACI. There are Several Kiosks, payment devices and even a decked out BMW Police Car on display.

The bad:
No Zain (they have their own event in April?), No Zajil, No Fasttelco, and not even Wasel (new Internet Company). For those looking to get a new deal on their EGO or DSL lines… You might be out of luck with the big players sitting it out. However, Zajil has already slashed prices with 3mb going for less than 850kd for a year’s subscription.

The ugly:
Aside from the cheaper yet still over-inflated pricing on the same old items… There is not much that InfoConnect has to offer. Without the Internet companies using February as a time to introduce their new offerings… you might as well take a stroll down any Ibn Khaldoun for the same experience.

The reality is that InfoConnect is a second rate bazaar with local stores trying to unload the remaining stock from their warehouse. Everyone from ElectroZan, Yousifi, Al-Ghanim Electronics and Sony are busy selling Televisions and DVD players than showing off new technology.

On the bright side, this might be a good chance to pick up that TV you have been thinking about. In addition to the electronics… there is an endless supply of Phone stores, two bit computer shops and Chinese stands selling items which can probably be found for cheaper in Hawalli.

I put up some pictures on my Flickr page [here].

-Posted by K

I will be posting tomorrow the ISP cost comparison.

Info & Connect 2008 will start from tomorrow the 3rd of February and last until the 9th. If you are planning on renewing or getting a new Internet connection this would be the best type time since all the ISP’s usually have offers at this exhibit. I tried checking the Info & Connect website for more details but its currently not working which is ironic. Location for the exhibit is Mishref Fairground Hall 4. [Link]

I thought I needed an hour more work today but it ended up taking like three. I was experiencing some vibration sounds yesterday so today I removed the 4 speakers and stuff the area behind them with a lot more pollyfill (pillow stuffing). This ended up improving the sound quality and killing any vibrations I was hearing. I also cleaned up the wires in the rear, and fastened my amp and subwoofer into the trunk.

Even though I have the amp and sub installed in the trunk, when the rear seat is folded up there is still a lot of room for Geo to get in, sit and walk around. When the rear seat is down the amp is hidden and there is still some room next to the sub for some grocery bags.

I tuned the sound system a bit but will wait two more weeks for all the speakers to break in before I spend more time tuning things. Although it was really exhausting work it was a good learning experience. Next project I am probably going to try is to install is a suspension lift by myself. I already have the step by step instructions just need to get the right tools.

I woke up at 9AM today morning so I could start work on the installation of my Alpine sound system in the Wrangler. First thing I did was pass by Sultan Center and pick up a cutter and extra batteries for my MagLite. From 10 in the morning until 5 in the evening I was working on the installation non stop without lunch just 2 small bottles of water and gum. I got a lot of surprises, most of the stuff I was expecting to be difficult turned out easy and what I was expecting to be easy turned out to be difficult. My fingers are killing me now and I have a ton of tiny scratches all over my hands from all the work I did under the dashboard trying to get all the cables neatly through.

I am not done yet, I still have around an hour of work work which I will do tomorrow. I still need to fasten the amp and the sub to the car, I already drilled the holes just need to screw them in. I also need to fine tune the sound, currently I got a lot of highs and a lot of lows with no midrange. Also the front speakers are slightly louder then the rear so I can still tell which direction the sound is coming from but thats also an easy fix. I think I did a pretty good job of the install, there were a few moments where I thought I was fucked but those quickly got worked out. Only thing I need to improve on is my soldering technique.

If you were wondering why you have been unable to access the internet, its due to the SMW4 (South East Asia-Middle East-West Europe 4) SEG-4 link between Alexandria and Marseille has being cut (not good). Calls to the helpdesk won’t resolve much, as this is something beyond the repair of our local ISPs (it is affecting the whole region).

Status:
January 30th – 2.30pm : There is no Estimated Time of Repair.
January 30th – 10:00pm:  A cable-ship has been dispatched from Italy; repair may take up to two weeks.

More about the SMW4 Link: Wikipedia / Official Website

-Posted by K
(Psst M.O.C .. It might be time to re-evaluate our backbone links.)

My friend at work has been nagging me to start riding in to work again but I just found the weather too cold to ride. This week the weather has been perfect so I am back to riding to work and although I was originally worried I would freeze my ass off in the morning, it actually isn’t bad at all, refreshing if anything. During lunch I ride with my friend to Souk Sharq and the weather is usually sunny and cool but once the sun goes down in the evening things will get nippier again.

Yesterday during my lunch break I passed by the Bosch Power Tools dealer in Shuwaikh to buy a drill. I originally wanted to get the 14.4v cordless drill but ended up going with the 12v because it looked and felt more balanced in my hands. The manager was there which was cool because he was able to give me a good deal on the drill and some drill bits.

While browsing the store I found out they were also the dealers for Dremel. I had only seen Dremel tools at Ace Hardware before so I had assumed Ace was the dealer but turns out that wasn’t the case.

The prices of the products at the dealer here in Kuwait are either cheaper or slightly more expensive then Amazon. I got the Bosch 12v drill (Swiss made not Malaysia) for KD42 while the same drill on Amazon is being sold for KD37 without shipping. The Dremel tool I was interested in sells for KD16 in Kuwait but for KD17 on Amazon without shipping.

Finding the place is easy, if you take the road where City Center, KFH and Mercedes dealer is in Shuwaikh, just take the right hand turn after the KFH branch and head straight down. You should find the Bosch Service Center (for cars) on your left, thats where the Power Tools store is also located.