Category: Personal

Today was the third and final day of the three day shoot. When I woke up in the morning I was worried that the shoot was going to get postponed till tomorrow since today was declared a national mourning day after the assassination of the politician yesterday. Luckily it wasn’t canceled and we went ahead with the shoot.

We started shooting late at around 10AM today because it took a lot longer to setup the market then expected. Once everything was setup it just looked really great and full of colors and colorful characters. I took a ton of pictures which you can check by clicking the link below.

Tomorrow morning I have to attend the color grading of the film in the morning and that should take a few hours. Once I am done I have to quickly rush to my hotel, pick up my luggage and head off to the airport to come back to Kuwait. I can’t wait to get back.

Today was the second day of the three day shoot. I was on set at 6:30AM and we were done awhile ago around 8PM. It wasn’t as exhausting as the first shoot but since I’ve only had a total of eight hours of sleep in the past two days I was extremely tired. I was still better off then some of the guys in the production team who had slept only two hours in two days.

While in the middle of the shoot we got word that there was an explosion a few kilometers away. We later found out a politician was assassinated. Another explosion, another day. Things are just a total mess over here.

To check out more pictures from todays shoot click on the link below.

I just got back to the hotel room, its 6:30 in the morning. We were out shooting since 2 in the afternoon and it lasted all through the night up until the break of dawn. I am extremely exhausted but I wanted to upload a few pictures of the shoot before I went to sleep. There were over 100 people on the set today so it was really packed. This was the first day of a three day shoot. Check out the pictures by clicking the link below.

I am in Lebanon shooting a TV commercial for MTC-Vodafone and today is going to be the first day of a three day shoot. I am going to get permission from MTC to allow me to post pictures I shoot on the set at the end of every day. We are shooting two locations today, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. The evening shoot will start once the sun goes down and end before the sun comes back up. Its going to be a really long day but hopefully once I get back to the hotel I will post some pictures.

The reason I am not posting much is because the hotel DOUBLED their Internet rate. Its $5 per hour now which sucks. As you can expect I sent them an email complaining but of course since this is Lebanon, no one cares what the customer thinks.

I took the picture above tonight when I was in Gimayze, an extremely popular street on a Friday and Saturday night since its packed with pubs and restaurants. Tonight it was empty and its for the same reason I posted about earlier which is people are afraid to go out. I’ve never seen anything like this here its strange, usually people in Lebanon go out and party no matter what.

Although I was in Lebanon around 3 weeks ago a lot of things have changed here mostly related to security. It seems people are starting to worry about all the bombings that are taking place and it shows with the extra security precautions.

My hotel for example doesn’t allow cars drive up to the entrance anymore and while entering the hotel I now get scanned with a metal detector. Bliss Street where the American University is located, now has yellow no parking warning on both sides of the street.

Yesterday evening I also passed by the ABC mall in Achrafieh, a place thats usually packed with young people shopping and hanging around at the cafes but yesterday when I passed at 9:15PM half the stores were closed, the other half were closing down and there were barely any people around. Since the bombings are taking place at night, everyone is afraid of the dark.

I am not worried about the bombings but its pretty obvious that this years tourist season in Lebanon has been killed.

My MEA plane was supposed to take off at 11:15AM but after boarding the plane turns out there was going to be a delay. After 2 hours of waiting on the plane with no AC we were taken back to the airport transit area where we are now waiting for the plane to either get fixed or something. It really sucks.

note: on the bright side The 4 Cats are with us on the same flight.

I am going down to Lebanon to shoot a commercial on Wednesday Thursday and will be back on the 15th. I will have better internet access this time so I shouldn’t have problems posting while I am down there.

I just bought two tickets for the Nine Inch Nails and Foo Fighters concert that will be held on August 22nd in Dublin. August 22nd is my birthday which is perfect timing plus I have never been to Ireland before so it should be fun.

Only thing I am worried about is getting the tickets. My shipping and billing address had to be the same while paying for the tickets so I used my regular unreliable Kuwait PO Box. I hope it doesn’t get lost in the mail…

update: I spoke to Ticket Master about my problem and they will now no longer mail me the tickets but instead I will be able to pick it up from the box office.

Not going to spend to much time on this review since there isn’t much to talk about. I had lunch at the newly opened Noodle Factory in the Avenues and I really didn’t like it. Me and my friend ordered the following:

Cantonese Duck Roll (KD1.950)
Peking Fish Ravioli (KD2.250)
Malaysian Char Kuey Chow with Beef (KD2.900)
Kung Pao Chili Prawns (KD3.950)
Vegetable Rice (KD0.900)
Indonesian Nasi Goreng (KD2.500)
2 Pepsi (KD1.500)
7up (KD0.750)
—————
Total: KD16.700

Everything we had was bland and tasteless and there really wasn’t anything we ordered that I actually liked. The only thing that kept me going was the fact that I was planning on having a milkshake from D*lush when we were done.

Would I go back? No I won’t. Do I think it will be successful? No I don’t. Final score 2 out of 5. Two points because the location is good, waitress was friendly and the place is nicely designed.

Slider Station is a new restaurant that opened up around a month ago. Its a local creation by the same guys behind Burger Boutique. I passed by yesterday night with Nat and a friend for dinner and I left the place extremely impressed and I will tell you from now that I gave the place a full 5 out of 5 rating without the slightest hesitation.

Since the place is pretty small you need to call ahead to reserve a spot. We called on Friday to reserve 3 places at the bar for Sunday night. I had seen the actual location before it was built, I saw sketches on how it would end up looking like and I even so pictures of the interior taken by various other bloggers after Slider Station was launched but even though, when I got to the place I was astonished. Pictures really don’t do the place any justice. I think its currently one of the nicely designed places in Kuwait, everything about it from the walls, to the chairs to the food conveyor belt, everything was paid attention to.

The food conveyor belt, thats the reason we asked for the bar seats. One of the coolest things at Slider Station is the large u-shaped bar taking up the majority of the space on the ground floor. Its surrounded by very comfortable seating and the bar has a built in conveyor belt. Each group at the bar is assigned a number and they serve your food by rolling it out on the conveyor belt. For example our number was 1 so all the dishes that came out on the conveyor belt with the number 1 in front of it was ours. Its a nice gimmick that is both practical and fun. The music that was being played was really cool and their choice of plates, cutlery and glasses were just spot on.

I could talk more and more about the actual look of the place but it would all mean nothing if the food wasn’t any good. The most popular burgers at Burger Boutique are the sliders. Sliders are mini burgers simply put and what Slider Station did was take them to a different level. I don’t know exactly how many different sliders they have but I think they were over 15 variations ranging from beef, to chicken to fish. Unlike in Burger Boutique where sliders come in groups of 4, at Slider Station, each slider order is just a single slider. This makes things A LOT more fun since you could mix and match sliders as you wish. I personally ordered the Roast Beef slider, the Wagyu slider with mature english cheese, the Caribbean crab slider which is a crab burger with a delicious mango sauce, and finally a Hammour slider. For appetizer we had two types of fries, the regular and the extra thin and crispy one. We also had buffalo wings and duck quesadillas. Everything was just really good, the presentation, the flavor, the buns, it was just perfect. There wasn’t anything I could find wrong with the place but I hadn’t ordered the dessert yet so before I could give it a final score I had to try their chocolate pudding. As you could already guess, I must have liked the dessert or else I wouldn’t have given the place a full five out of five. Yes, the chocolate pudding rocked!

So, good food, good atmosphere, good variety and good prices. I don’t know of any other restaurant in Kuwait that deserves a better rating. Final score five out of five. To get reservations call 2465047. They are open from 7PM to 11PM. You can also check out their blog by going to www.sliderstation.com

Pictures taken from SliderStation.com

note: I forgot to mention, they are located on the Gulf Road between Seef Palace and the House of Parliament.

Does anyone know of a person or a place that sells old arcade machines in Kuwait? I knew a guy who had old arcade machines for sale but his number isn’t working anymore…

In the article below on online shopping one store that was mentioned was called Noutique. I think Noutique has a MAJOR flaw which is the fact that you have to create and account and log in BEFORE you can even see what they have available for sale!

Who is going to bother going through that hassle just so they can check out what they have for sale?

Yesterday while at the Avenues with Nataly and a friend we decided to pass by D*lush and pick up a milkshake. D*lush is an American beverage joint which recently opened their first branch at the Avenues and hopefully will open up more branches soon.

I ordered the Sassy B which is a strawberry and banana shake, my friend ordered the Cookies + Cream which is an oreo cookie shake and finally Nat ordered the Lemon Lush which is a frozen lemonade.

My favorite milkshake is the strawberry shake at Johnny Rockets and so far the D*lush shakes are ask good if not better. Firstly they have a much larger collection then Johnny Rockets which makes sense since D*lush is dedicated to drinks while Johnny is a burger joint. The shakes themselves also taste extremely good, the Cookies + Cream which I tried from my friend is probably going to be my favorite milkshake from now on. Even my Sassy B was really good and I am glad they were actually sampling it out at the store in small shot glasses because otherwise I might have stuck to ordering the regular strawberry shake. I found Nat’s lemonade very sour but she was really happy with it.

The only negatives I could think of are the price of the drinks and the lack of sizes. The shakes are priced at KD1.750 or KD1.850 depending on what you order. Thats more expensive then the largest sized chocolate cream frappucino at Starbucks. They should offer a smaller sized cup priced at under KD1.400. On the other hand Nat’s frozen lemonade was for KD1.100 which isn’t bad at all considering the size.

Final score is a 4 out of 5. The shakes are awesome, they have a good variety so it should take you a while to get bored and the service was very friendly and fast. The negatives are basically the lack of drink size options and the price which is kinda related to the size problem.

www.dlush.com

I hadn’t been to the Avenues for awhile so this is just an update for people haven’t been there recently also.

Carrefour is now open. I was expecting to find stuff there that wasn’t available at Sultan Center but surprisingly they either had the same stuff or less. The cornflakes section for example is a joke at Carrefour filled mostly with their Carrefour branded cornflakes. Their fish section was larger and their bakery seems better but didn’t get a chance to try it. The coolest thing about Carrefour is their electronics section. They have a ton of stuff and its all good brands like Sony, Samsung etc.. plus they have a ton of accessories and gadgets. Problem is you can find the stuff cheaper elsewhere.

Gap is now open. I was never a fan of Gap so I can’t say much about it. Kuwaiti Cosmopolitan has a detailed post on Gap so you can check that out. [Link]

GoSport is now open. The place is huge, much larger then I was expecting it to be. They have a lot of sports gear all laid out very nicely. I think its my favorite sports store at the moment not that they had strong competition.

Other notable mentions: Lucky Brand Jeans opened up. Ben Sherman is opening soon. Banana Republic still closed. I was supposed to have lunch at the Noodles place upstairs but there was an hour and a half waiting list. Parking wasn’t a problem at 2PM on Friday.