Category: Personal

I posted just over a week ago about my kitchen from IKEA. Originally when I posted they were over installing my kitchen and it was a positive post but as the workers progressed with the installation things took a turn. In short they installed my kitchen bar crooked and had to fill the space on the side with a ton of silicon, also 2 panels were installed crooked and 2 major parts still weren’t in stock.

Surprisingly I got a call a few days later from a manager asking if everything was ok and if I had any feedback. He was a very nice guy and when I told him about my problems he offered to come by and check the kitchen which he did. He told us he would solve our problems and make sure the remaining items (two horizontal wall cabinets and two pull out corners) would be released from customs as soon as possible.

Today IKEA was back in my kitchen finishing up the install and fixing the problems from last time. When they were done I went to check the kitchen to make sure everything was fine. I opened the horizontal wall cabinet upward and the door came crashing down. I was like isn’t this supposed to stay open like the ones at display in IKEA? The employee was like this is the new model it doesn’t stay open. So every time I need to get something big from the cabinet I need to hold the door open with the top of my head while I use my two hands to take out an item? I didn’t get a response. I then opened the corner cabinets and to my surprise they had installed a rotating shelving system instead of the pullout I had chosen at IKEA. When I asked why they told me the pullout doesn’t fit in my cabinet, it needed a bigger cabinet. Fine but why didn’t the salesman tell me that instead of misleading me to believe I was getting the pullout? Not only that but we were really excited about the pullout shelves and we could have gone with larger corners if we had known.

A quick call to IKEA resulted in no help. There isn’t anything we can do about the corners, we were screwed by the salesman and to solve my wall cabinet problem they would replace our cabinet hinges with the older model off a display cabinet from the showroom.

The employees left and I was confused. The wall cabinet hinges are huge (pictured above) which doesn’t make sense if their only job is to open and close the doors. I also figured IKEA wasn’t stupid enough to make cabinet doors that don’t stay open so I took out the cabinet instruction manual and tried to see if I could fix it myself and guess what? I did! Turns out there was a screw they needed to rotate to the right like 30 times and that adjusted the door to stay open. The doors work perfectly now and stay open when lifted which means IKEA needs to start hiring people that read the goddamn manuals! My kitchen corners are screwed up but at least I don’t have to bang my head every time I take out a plate from the cabinet.

In conclusion, IKEA kitchens are affordable but you get what you pay for and that’s terrible finishing and sneaky salesman. If you do decide to get a kitchen from them make sure you not only go through the list of items one by one but also have the salesman show you each item one by one. A friend of mine had warned me about this based on his experience with IKEA and so I was careful but it seems not careful enough.

***REDUCED PRICE***

I’m selling my bike if anyone is interested. It’s an excellent condition Ducati Monster 620ie with upgraded Termignoni exhausts and has around 5000KM mileage on it. If you’re interested, send me an email. [Email Me]

Update: Bike is sold

IKEA are over today installing my new kitchen. My experience so far with them has been really great. I think it was around 2 months ago when I first approached them about getting a kitchen and they quickly sent someone over to get the sizes. After that it was kind of a long process for the design since me and Nat kept changing things around until we finally settled on something we were both happy with. After that it was all about trying to keep the cost down as much as possible and we were able to chop around 25% of the cost by removing things we didn’t need and when we finally paid we used an NBK credit card and got another 10% off as vouchers which dropped the price down even further. The guys installing the kitchen are telling me they need two days to finish the installation but they’re pretty quick so I think they might end up finishing today.

Update: I guess I spoke too soon. Its not even 3PM and the guys were packing up to leave, they told me they had another kitchen at 3PM they needed to go to. I was like WTF? My kitchen is 80% done and I booked this day over 2 weeks ago how could you leave after half a days work? So I called their manager up and complained, I told him I took a day off work and the employees came in at 10 and they are now leaving at 3. I told him the kitchen is nearly done so I don’t understand why they can’t work a full day on it and get it completed. He told me they only work from 7 to 3:30, I told him if they did come in at 7 we would be done by now plus they told me they have another kitchen they have to go and work on. The manager asked to speak to one of the guys over at my place and when he was done I was told they would stay longer and try to get the kitchen done today.

I purchased an oven from Abyat a few days ago. Yeah it sounds strange buying an oven from Abyat and not a place like Alghanim or Eureka but I was looking for a built in oven for my new kitchen and I found a really great looking Gorenje oven from the Ora-Ito collection and for a really competitive price at Abyat.

So yesterday they call me up to deliver the oven. I tell the driver how to get to my place and within 30 minutes he comes over with the new oven and leaves.

So today Abyat call me up to deliver the oven. I tell the driver how to get to my place and within 30 minutes he comes over with the new oven and leaves.

I didn’t mistype, it was déjà vu. It seems they made a mistake and they delivered my oven twice. I now have two beautiful ovens in my kitchen but not for long. I called them up and told them about the mistake they made. They were surprised but very apologetic and will be coming by tomorrow to pick up the extra oven. I like Abyat, its no Home Depot but its close enough.

I took this picture a few hours ago.

I am going to Cairo on Friday for 8 days on a work related trip. I’ve never been to Egypt but I’ve heard a lot of good stuff about it but also a lot of bad stuff (supposedly I should only drink bottled water?). I have two days free while I am there so can anyone recommend places to visit or places to eat?

Back in 2006 I posted about how I was able to get a hold of three original Apple Think Different banners from the local Apple dealer (Digits) and today I finally put them up.

For those of you who don’t know, the slogan “Think Different” was created for Apple back in 1997 (yes they were around before the iPod). The slogan was used in various commercials and print adverts but the most famous ones were the creative innovators tribute ads. I was able to get a hold of 3 banners, a Pablo Piccaso, Martha Graham and the rare Buzz Aldrin one.

Since I just finished redecorating (I now officially live inside my blog), I managed to find space to put up the banners and they look great. It took me two years but they’re finally up. The picture above is of the Buzz Aldrin banner, its 70cm wide and 160cm in height.

In short, STAY AWAY! I am a huge Wasabi fan but the one in the Avenues sucks big time. I passed by them today for the first time for lunch and out of the three dishes I ordered I had problems with two of them.

First I ordered the salmon and avocado salad for starters, it took what seemed like an eternity to arrive and when it finally did it turned out they had forgotten to add the avocado. After having that mess sorted out turns out the salad dressing is different than the one used in their main city branch or at least tasted different. I also had ordered the exotic roll but it tasted like crap so I didn’t eat it. If all that wasn’t bad enough I had to listen to what had to be the noisiest kitchen door in the world which squeaked like a haunted house every time someone went in our out of the kitchen.

For your Wasabi cravings stick to the main city branch, I know I will.

Picture by iDip

My MacBook finally got delivered today. It got held in customs yesterday but luckily I didn’t have to pay anything just the clearance fee’s which totaled to KD16 and this included the KD5 Aramex charge to clear the packages themselves. So far I am really loving it, it just looks amazing, while taking the picture above no matter what angle I tried to shoot it from the MacBook looked great. Now I will spend the next few days manually transferring files from my old MacBook onto the new and then will put the old one up for sale.

My new favorite chocolate. According to Wikipedia its only available in Australia and New Zealand. Its like the regular Mars bar except it has crispies embedded in the outer layer which makes a world of a difference in my opinion. It’s available at Sultan Center for 450fils.

Now that the price of oil is like the lowest in 16 months does that mean McDonalds, Burger King, KFC and Hardees will drop their prices? Will products at Sultan Center cost the same as they did 16 months ago? I think it’s only fair that if they raise the prices because oil prices are up then they should drop the prices when oil prices go down.

I have a feeling Virgin is going to end up closing down at Marina Mall. I don’t think they’ve been doing good for a long time and the only thing they really have left is their electronics and video games section. Today I was at Marina and noticed Alghanim was opening up right in front of Virgin. Alghanim sells both video games and electronics for cheaper so whats really left for Virgin?

I am currently extremely hooked on the tv series Jericho. I’ve been watching one episode after another without a break, the only other show that does this to me is 24. The plot of the series is very unique which is why I think I am addicted to it. I am not going to go into too much details as so not to ruin it for anyone but basically a nuclear bomb goes off in the city of Denver and a small Kansas town nearby try to cope with the aftereffects. Definitely worth watching if you can get a hold of it. [Link]

So the new MacBook’s are out and I want one. Problem is every time I get the first release of a laptop from Apple I get screwed. With my iBook I ended up with the infamous logic board problem, with my MacBook I ended up with the discolored palm rest followed by a logic board problem. So thats twice in a row, which is why I am hesitant. [Link]

I’ve been put in charge of our office’s redesign and was wondering if anyone had any recommendations on a company or studio I could call up for this job. If you do please post a name preferably with a website or phone number as a comment below. Thanks!

Note: My dad is an interior designer but hiring my dad for the job would look pretty suspicious to the auditors lol