Category: Personal

A friend of mine at work just came back from Spain and while there she got me a gift from the Lomography Shop. This reminded me of my Holga camera which I haven’t used since the last time the sky was blue. Shooting outdoor pictures in Kuwait during the summer sucks because we don’t have blue skies neither do we have any clouds. This is why my favorite time of the year to take pictures is during the winter.

Holga is this really cheap camera I bought awhile back which takes pictures using medium format film. Since the camera is cheap the pictures have this really strange feel and effect to them which ends up making all the pictures look really trendy.

I have some pictures I shot with the camera attached to this post which I took 2 years ago at Marina Mall and as you can see you could never achieve the same with a digital camera. Now the coolest thing about the Holga is the price, it costs just $20 on Amazon. Thats a really good deal. [Amazon Link]

So yesterday I was kinda pissed that I forgot my phone in Dubai but now I am actually enjoying it. It’s been a peaceful day so far and although I should be getting my phone back tomorrow via DHL I think I am going to keep it turned off and see how long I can last without it. If I want a pager (beeper) can I still get one here in Kuwait?

I left Geo (my dog) with my parents for one night and this is what my sister did to him! [Link]

Note: This is not the first time… [Link]

In the dumbest move of the year, I forgot my mobile phone in Dubai.

I am going to Dubai tomorrow and coming back Saturday. I really don’t feel like going to Dubai, all I feel like doing is just sleeping in late and then ordering a pizza while I watch some TV on the couch. This would be the third weekend in a row in which I am traveling, but unlike the last two trips, Dubai doesn’t interest me. I won’t be taking my laptop with me and I don’t think I will be moblogging from there either. Last months bill increased nearly 600% from my usual because of my moblogging!

In response to this [Link]

While in London I was able to walk around and discover the city without holding a large map and looking like a tourist because of a simple software I was able to get for my phone called A-Z London Maps. I don’t think I would have been able to enjoy my stay without this incredibly easy to use and practical software.

You don’t need a GPS device and you don’t need to connect to the internet to be able to use the map, the software installs everything onto your phone. To use the software all you need to do is type the name of the street you are in and the software will show you on a detailed map where you are. This helped me a lot since if I needed to find my way back to the hotel I would just check on the map to see where I was and then plan my route. Also if I found a street I liked I could easily find my way back. If I was using a regular paper map it would have taken me ages to find my location on it but with A-Z maps I just type my street and the software instantly circles my location on the map.

There are maps for London, Paris, Dubai, Barcelona, Helsinki and more but they only work on some Nokia and Sony Ericsson phones. You don’t need to buy it to try it either, you can download the map and try it out for 30 days before you decide to purchase it.

I only found 2 problems with the software or should I say there are 2 things I would have liked the software to do. The first is the option to work with a GPS device. Although every street corner in London displayed the street name it would have been more practical if the software automatically recognized where I was. The second thing I would have liked would have been the option to search for shop names and then have the software find it for me on the map. Of course thats asking for to much but still, it would have been nice to have.

Final score is a 4 out of 5. If you are interested in the maps you can check out the Lumisoft website for more details and trial downloads. [Link]

One store I fell in love with here in London is called Size?. Size? is a sneaker store but they seem to have the coolest/funkiest collection of sneakers I have seen all in one place. Majority of the sneakers I saw today I had previously only seen on SneakerFreaker.com and DrJays.com. Now I am trying to figure out which sneaker to get, I only want to get two but I have around 10 I like. Some of the sneakers I found and liked are displayed above and below this post.

I am at the Kuwait airport now waiting for my flight to Beirut. I was planning on having breakfast at Fuddruckers but I missed it by 15 minutes (they stop breakfast at 11AM).

Sunkist
A classic, probably the best orange drink ever created.

Frutti
Tasted terrible! I also had what looked like red hair in my drink although I am guessing its supposed to be orange pulp.

Fresh
Tasted better than Frutti but just not good enough to beat Sunkist.

Now on a side note if you look at the orange illustration on the Frutti cup you will notice it resembles the orange on the Sunkist cup. If you also look at the shape of the Fresh cup you will notice it is the same shape as the Sunkist cup. As they say, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

I was hoping to rest this weekend but it looks like thats not going to happen since I have a work related trip I need to take. Thursday I leave Kuwait around 1PM and get to Beirut at around 3. I spend the night there and next morning at 9AM I leave to London. I get to London at 1PM then the following day at 10PM I catch a flight to Bahrain where I catch another flight back to Kuwait. Its going to be really hectic but spending a day and a half in London is going to be worth it. Like last weekend I will be blogging directly from my phone which means I will be posting a lot of pictures. It should be a lot of fun.

Picture by kayodeok

My Gulf Air flight arrived at 7AM to Paris. Kuwait to Bahrain was a pretty lame flight, the plane was really old and the seats extremely uncomfortable. Bahrain to Paris was a completely different story. This was my first experience with sleeper seats and I love them. Now they aren’t as comfortable as real beds but they are more than enough for long night flights where you need to get some sleep. The entertainment system is crap though, its nothing like Emirates on demand system, its just the regular old system still used on Kuwait Airways flights.

After landing and checking in to the hotel we decided to do a bit of sight seeing since our first meeting was at 5PM. The weather here is great, yes its raining but I miss rain. It feels like winter and its hard comprehend how its 52 degrees in Kuwait and just 15 degrees in Paris! I should pick up my work schedule tonight and hopefully I will have some free time to do some shopping and take in the sights. [YouTube]

His Majesty King Raam by Lemon Jelly.

While watching my partner at work try to balance himself while standing on a soccer ball, it reminded me of this toy I had back in the 80’s. It was a disc with a rubber ball stuck in the middle and the aim was to stand on it and jump around.

I spent a good chunk of time trying to find a picture of it but I couldn’t. I remember it being called Disk-O-Jump or something of that sort but I couldn’t find any pictures or traces of it. Then I remembered the Pogo Stick and figured I try searching for Pogo Ball and to my surprise I found it. I really don’t remember it being called a Pogo Ball though… [Link]

I have tickets to the NIN concert that is taking place on the 22nd in Ireland but I will be missing it and instead going to Paris for work. I am disappointed I will be missing out on NIN but it’s not like I am getting sent to Dubai or Beirut. I’ve actually never been to Paris before so I am really looking forward to it. I will be leaving on the 21st and coming back on the 26th. While there I will try photo blogging since with my new phone (the E61i) I can actually do that. By photo blogging I mean taking a picture from my phone and then instantly sending it to my blog. I already have a software that will do that for me and I will try it out before I leave to France to make sure its working right.

update: Here is a link to my old photo blog, before I started 248AM and Miskan. [Link]