Category: Kuwait

I just got the following email from a reader:

AbdulAziz wrote:
I’m a frequent visitor of your how shall I put it colorful site in both topics and presentation. I was shocked to see the topic about the Harley crash … I was the first to witness the accident the guy was right in front of me when he flipped due to bad judgment by the lady merging onto the street …. However, I called the emergency service 777 … just wana share my disappointing experience with them … it took 6 tones for them to answer keep in mind it should not take more then 1….. once they answered I Said guys a bike just flipped come over and make it quick on Khaleej Road opposite Hard Rock café…. They acknowledged and took my name incase it was a prank call …. They called back 8 minutes later and asked me if he needed an AMBULANCE …. Why the hell was I calling u …. After I emphized that he did they hanged up and called 10 mins later …. They asked where he was and said that they are at the place but there was no accident … I said again please check … they called and hanged up for about 15mins just double checking ….. anyways I got pissed and starting raising my voice …. Apparently they were at the HARD COOK restaurant and not Hard Rock.

Just wanted to share this with you … hopefully none of us would need their services.

Took a day off work to enjoy chocolate day. Today is the chocolate event at Hilton and I am going to leave in a few minutes for the 12:00 lunch. 12PM, thats brunch or lunch? Anyway it should be fun, will try to take some pictures.

Oh and I got a call a few minutes ago from U Shop We Ship. My package which shipped on February 9th (another harddrive) from the US arrived to Kuwait today. Thats just crazy. I placed the order for my harddrive from Amazon on the 8th, the package then shipped and arrived to my USWS mailbox on the 9th, then it shipped from my US mailbox on the 9th and now the package is here in Kuwait by the 11th. I don’t think it could get faster then this.

Whats up with my luck? Thursday I suddenly felt like pizza and ordered from Papa John’s only to end up in a fight with them because over an hour and half had passed and my pizza hadn’t arrived yet. I decided I would never order from Papa John’s again.

Tonight I placed an order for pizza from Dominos. I placed an order at 8:33 and they told me I would have it within 30 minutes. 9:03 the pizza was still not delivered. 9:11 I get a call from the driver, he is around a block away from my house, less even like 100 meters away. He was lost and I explained to him how to get to my place. Take a right and get onto the main road, then take a left and another left. Very easy directions…

Thirty minutes later and the guy was still lost. Everytime I told him to take a left he takes a right, go straight he takes a right, U-Turn and he takes a left. The guy was a complete idiot. I just called and canceled my pizza, told them its been over an hour snce I ordered the pizza and over 30 minutes on the phone with the delivery guy and he still can’t follow directions.

I just called Papa John’s and ordered a pizza from them. I can’t be pissed at both Papa Johns AND Dominos… I have to still eat pizza from somewhere…

note: The guy was an Arab and I was talking to him in Arabic so it wasn’t a communication barrier.

Also while writing this post the Dominos manager called me and apologized. Told me what happened was unacceptable and that before anything they want me to be happy. He told me he would call the Dominos branch now and have them resend me the pizza and it would be for free. I told him thanks but I had already ordered from Papa John’s and thanked him for his call. He was like what can I do to make it up to you, I told him by calling me and apologizing you made it up and I would order from them again the next time. He apologized again and I thanked him and hung up. Thats good service.

update: Papa Johns told me the pizza needed 45 minutes, it arrived in 40. They must have sent me their best driver because he didn’t even call to get directions. Glad my pizza curse is over with.

Go Nuts Donuts sent me a Happy Valentines today made up of a dozen heart shaped donuts. I knew they had star shaped ones before but I guess for Valentines they are making heart ones.

I was with Nat and had just parked my car near Shoo Shawerma? which is located near Sultan Center when I heard the sound of motorbikes. I looked towards the Gulf Road and saw three Harleys zoom by probably going around 80km an hour. I continued walking when I heard the loud sound of the bikes suddenly down shifting and then what sounded like a skidding sound. I told Nat it sounded like a bike skidding and she told me it was probably just their engine sound. I looked towards where the sound came from and noticed a car had put its emergency flashers on. I told Nat it was the bikers and we ran towards the scene.

When we got to the scene cars had already stopped and people had gotten out to help the bikers. There was one rider lying on the grass on the side of the road being looked after. He had a broken nose and was in pain. One of the bikers who was riding with him was next to him talking to him while the third biker was moving the bikes off the road with the help of some people. Around five minutes later an ambulance arrived. Four other bikers (sport not cruisers) who were passing by realized it was a biker who was injured and parked their bikes and got down to see if anyone needed any help.

I spoke to one of the guys on the scene and it turns out a woman came out onto the Gulf Road from one of the side exits behind Sultan Center and she went from the far right lane across all the way to the far left lane. She hadn’t seen the three bikers and all they could do was brake suddenly trying to avoid her. At first I thought only one biker slid but I think a second biker had also slid because there was another bike that was damaged.

I don’t know if the biker is fine and what injuries he has but hopefully he will be ok. Even though it was the womans fault I am glad she at least stopped her car and didn’t drive away. She was crying at the scene and was very apologetic and kept yelling she hadn’t seen them. I had another friend who also slid and crashed when a woman ran a red light and he had to brake to avoid her. That woman never stopped and kept driving off.

Placed order with Papa Johns at 8:30. Promised would be delivered within 45 minutes. Called back at 9:20 telling them pizza hadn’t arrived yet, they told me within 10 minutes. Called back at 9:35 telling them pizza hadn’t arrived yet, they told me they will check on it and get back to me. Called back at 9:45 telling them pizza hasn’t arrived yet even though I called twice. They transfered me to manager who told me he will call back in 2 minutes. Its been 5 minutes and no call back yet and I need to leave the house.

update: called back at 9:55, spoke to manager again told him he had told me he would call me back in 2 minutes and he hadn’t. He told me he spoke to Salmiya branch manager and he is probably trying to call me now and he is getting a busy tone. I told him no I have call waiting if he was trying to call me I would know. I told him I need to know when my pizza will get here because I need to leave. He was like if you have to leave I can’t do anything about it. So I was like then cancel my order, he was like fine. What the hell, what lame customer service is that.

Then a few minutes later I get a phone call from the Salmiya branch manager telling me my pizza will be late. I told him why didn’t you call me half an hour ago when the call center manager told me you would call me. He was like I had to call the driver. I was like you need 30 minutes to do that? I was like anyway I canceled my order. He was like ok and I closed the phone.

I would never order from them again. Why?
– They should have been apologetic instead of blaming it on traffic
– Its Thursday night and they know there is traffic so why tell me 45 minutes in the first place
– After my first call they should have called the driver and found out how long he needed
– After they told me they would call me back they should have called me back
– At the very least they should have offered me the pizza for free, its been over an hour and a half and the pizza is going to be cold anyway
– The two managers I spoke to were not friendly enough

I just got an SMS from Choowy Goowy saying that on the occasion of Valentines they have a special jar. If anyone is interested in sending cookies on Valentines the last day to place your order is February 11th. To order call them on 2626559 or 2620011.

I just got back from the Mercedes SUV experience awhile ago. The event is being held near the ice skating rink parking lot.

So I am parking my car and I spot a Mercedes G-Class doing a climb decent. I was thinking wow they actually have the G-Class here. For those of you who don’t know, my favorite SUV is the G-Class and my favorite SUV list actually goes something like this (notice they are all boxy):

1- Mercedes G-Class
2- Land Rover Defender
3- Land Rover LR3
4- Jeep Wrangler

So I get into the main tent and sign up for a ride in the G-Class and then head over to the car. Once I got close I realized this wasn’t the regular G-Class, this was the freakin 500HP AMG version! This was like the motherload. Sadly I wasn’t able to drive the car today because they had professional drivers taking the guests around the track BUT, I was promised by my Mercedes contact that once the event was over and the car cleaned up I would be able to have it for a test drive. When that happens be sure I will post about it here.

Me and a friend at work both purchased some pimped out RC cars from Fantasy World. I got the Mercedes G-Class and he got the Dodge Charger. We built like a makeshift ramp in the office and we were flying the cars off it. The cars although costing only KD8 are pretty responsive and fast.. for their size. My G-Class out performed the Charger in everything except when it came to making donuts but thats because the Charger has a longer wheelbase.

Just saw the new license plates live, it looks kinda boring.

I got an email today from Hilton Kuwait Resort inviting me and Nat to a a live “chocolate show” done by one of the world most famous chocolatier, Pierre Marcolini on February 11th. The day will start off at 12PM with lunch at the Teatro Restaurant, this will then be followed by a live chocolate presentation by chef Pierre Marcolini at 2:00PM in the Song Bird Cafe where we can eat all the chocolate that we can eat.

The live chocolate presentation is open to the public and you will be able to buy and try a variety of chocolates. I have never been to a chocolate event so it should be interesting. You can view the ad for the event by clicking [Here]

I was on the Gulf Road yesterday driving towards Salmiya when I saw a bright flash light go off around a 100 meters in front of me. The speed camera just before the gas station and Texas Chicken was installed again over the weekend…

A friend of mine just told he saw an ad for KEMS (Zajil) in the newspaper saying that you can get an 8MB DSL connection for only 8KD. For more details you have to visit their stand at InfoConnect. Anyone know anything about this???

update: I just called Zajil and this is there offer.

Now until February 9th they have a special 3 in 1 deal. When you sign up for their DSL connection you get a free dial up connection AND access to all their hotspots in Kuwait. Here are their prices:

256KB DSL + Dial up + Zajil Hotspots = KD96 a year (KD8 per month)
512KB DSL + Dial up + Zajil Hotspots = KD179 a year (KD15 per month)
1MB DSL + Dial up + Zajil Hotspots = KD349 a year (KD29 per month)

You can get more info by calling them on 820820

I think the 1MB connection for KD29 is a really good deal and add to that free access to the hotspots and it makes things a lot more interesting. I am really tempted to swap over from Qualitynet to Zajil now.

note: The Zajil Hotspots can hit up to 8MB thats why they are saying 8KD for 8MB.

When you are going to permanently mark government property at least get the spelling and grammar right.

Today I had to wake up at 5AM because I had a photo shoot at 6 in the morning. Once the shoot was done and after having a quick breakfast at Krispy Kreme, me and a friend decided to head to the Friday market.

Last time I went there was over a year ago and things have changed condierably since then. The place is cleaner and more organized then before. They seriously sell the strangest stuff there, you can find anything including used deodorant cans.

After walking around for around 40 minutes I spotted a guy with a ton of vintage video game systems. He had a ton of video games for the SNES, NES, Megadrive and MegaCD. He also had some video game consoles, Sega Genesis, Sega 32x, Sega MegaCD, Sega Saturn, Atari Jaguars, NES systems, a Panasonic 3DO and a NeoGeo. They weren’t all in the best of shape plus I had most of them so I wasn’t really interested in any of them for my collection. Then I spotted a NeoGeo game. The guy noticed I was interested and told me he had more pointing to under the table. I looked down and was like fuuucccckkkkk…. There were around 15 NeoGeo games just pilled up there.

A quick history on the NeoGeo. It was released in 1990 and back then it was priced at $650. It was one of the most expensive video game consoles and each game used to cost over $200 and most of the time over $300. Finding a brand new NeoGeo console today is very difficult, the last time I saw a brand new one online they were selling for $1200. Luckily a few years ago I got my brand new NeoGeo for less then $300.

So back to my story. The guy wanted KD5 for every game. I told him the prices were too expensive but he then pointed to the original price tags on the games.. KD75, KD60, KD65 etc.. I told him yeah they cost this much back in the 90s. I offered to give him KD10 for the 15 games. He said no and so I left. 30 minutes later I came back and decided to haggle with him. In the end I ended up getting 11 NeoGeo games (I had the other 4), a NeoGeo joypad and 2 Atari Jaguar consoles all for KD14. I have an Atari Jaguar but I accidentally ruined it a while back and needed a replacement. He didn’t know if the 2 systems he had worked so I decided to take both of them.

When I came back home I quickly started checking the NeoStore for prices of the games plus checked the price guide and it turns out I walked away with over $700 worth of NeoGeo games, the most expensive being Aggressors of Dark Kombat which is selling for $149 at the moment.