Over a year ago I posted “Elect me as mayor of Salmiya” because I was pissed at how the old shopping street in Salmiya was getting torn a part bit by bit and all my childhood memories were disappearing with it. Well since then things haven’t changed, I wasn’t elected as mayor and Salmiya is still losing its history.
The building that has Hardees, Tikka, KFC, Waleed Toys, Alamiah and The Family Bookshop is going to be demolished soon. Already Hardees, Tikka, KFC and Baskin Robbins have vacated the building and I am sure the rest will follow soon. What I heard is that whole block with the land behind it and to its sides plus the old souk in front of Marina Mall (Kaysariyah) will be demolished and turned into one giant super mall, as if we don’t have enough of those already.
I got my first computer, the Sakhr MSX2 from Alamiah, I had my first roast beef sandwich from that Hardees and I bought all my Peter and Jane books from The Family Bookshop. This really sucks.
33 replies on “I am still not the mayor”
that sucks. more malls, more glory ha ? They should make it a walk-only zone, the street is ALWAYS full of traffic..
p.s. You’ve got my vote.
There was talk of turning it into a walk-only street but I don’t know why nothing ever materialized.
Its such a shame that we are losing whats left of the little heritage we have. I have simialr childhood memories to you and am still very fond of that district of Salmiya. They were the places, especially the gold souk, where I would take visitors to Kuwait as at least they had some local identity rather than the endless developments of shopping malls and franchises. When its gone its gone, it shows such ignorance and irresponsibility as an easy option out on part of the people involved in its development. I left Kuwait 8 years ago and it gets worse every time I come back. Would hate to see what they have done to my hometown of Failaka, where generations of my family have lived and died, been buried etc. It has probably been developed into some sick megalomaniac vision of a party island. What culture is left, culture of the instantanious, in an image conciouss consumerist driven society. Sad
What happening in Kuwait is sickening, The country is becoming a big mall. they should preserve old buildings like salmiya.
it would be nice if they made it a walk-only street like Critic said.
no family bookshop?
shit, my igs are coming up! 🙁
Welcome to the 53rd State.
Fuck, I used to spend weekend in that street
Wow another landmark gone, godammit now it’ll take hardees 3 years to get to my house, i wont be able to get books when ever i happen to need one and most importantly ill never use the excuse i’m strolling around since theres nothing to look at !
The stupid Fanar complex was sold for 67 Mil two days ago, do you really think the rest of Salmiya is going to stay put? Hello! There is absolutely no consideration for heritage in this country when it comes to the almighty KD.
Good luck
i think its enough that they took away the 1 and only tunnel in kuwait, now old salmiya ?
Money Talk – and bitches walk ! shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit
this country does NOT believe in renovation at all …
what a sad piano
Come see Abu Dhabi/Dubai…It’s not much better. Everytime I go back home to Abu Dhabi, I find out that another piece of my childhood has been destroyed. Pretty soon you’ll find no trace of the Abu Dhabi of the 20th century. Beyond tragic.
ok i agree i had memories there too i also bought lots of MSX cartages from there too , lots of of THOUMSUN tapes from swan lake … etc.
BUT
i think the place now isn’t that popular like it was back in the late 80’s early 90’s and thats because people now “the new generation” like to go to malls instead , things that if we had back then we would hang out there all the time “admit it all we had back then was nougra complex and it sucked” , i mean if the place isn’t that cool now why not turn it into something everyone will go to like the avenues or marina mall , admit it when was the last time you went to that street?
p.s. we don’t have enough malls , Dubai does, all we had thats even remotely close to a real mall is avenues and that pile of crap isn’t done yet!
dubai doesn’t have enough malls..we need more malls yet planned malls! having a duplicate of Marina mall or another avenues doesn’t help
Plenty of childhood memories there with Family Bookshop, but I hardly visit the place anymore. The one lane road was a disaster, and so was parking. I also never got the idea why the road made a big U-turn instead of just letting you cross through the place, which is probably what was causing the whole traffic jam at the 4th ring road’s traffic light.
I know it has a lot of sentimental value, but I honestly think this is for the best.
Just imho.
I have noticed that kuwait has no problem with tearing down old buildings they tear away the landmarks, showbiz for example, i was pissed when i heard about them tearing down the fahaheel maze area until i walked into almanshar most of the old stores are still there and in the exact places they used to be the twists and turns of the old maze are still but the place is made-over with ac and totally modern without taking away the old feel if they would bring back the KFC and hardeez it would be exactly the same.
hi mark can u really be appointed mayor. i mean does the kuwait constitution support it.
i think there needs to be a committee formed who can first identify all such places. Once all the places are shortlised there could be certain locations which could get automatically qualified and then for the other places people can vote to have specific ones preserved. The ones that dont make the list could be then put up for sale.
wishful thinking maybe!
Well i really think that there is so much of free place in Kuwait.
and you will NEVER be the mayor of Salmiya :>
I know exactly how you feel.
I grew up in the Fintas/Mahboula/Mangaf area, and what Salmiyah is to you is what Fahaheel is to me.
I was there a few weeks ago, and it was a really horrible feeling to be so disoriented in a place I used to know my way around with my eyes closed for years. Some things kinda looked familiar, and that was it…
Fahaheel and Salmiyah are also special to me because they were around even before the Invasion. They survived the Invasion, but they can’t survive the mall-building-modernization-let’s-demolish-everything-craze going on in Kuwait.
I really does suck.
I remember me postin a comment on this subject a year ago,,cant belive that theyre gona do that..honestly we lost our old heritage and now were gona lose our glory years,,guess teenagers are quiet happy that theyll be havin a new place to go round and round in circle searchin for the opposite sex.funny how they are renovatin some old mud houses and sayin how sad they are for demolishin many of them while in the same time theyre demolishin one souq were every single one of us have a beautiful memory.i wonder how many of these malls r they planin to do and once land is full of them t they planin to buil any malls under the sea?? btw khalid i think i know u mate..never knew u read this amazin blog!will see u next year n uni 😉
not the Waleed Toys, I still remember the microscope i bought from there years years back … with my 3eedyaa
why these people do that?, why destroying everything reminds us of the beautiful past?
In comparisson to you guys, I haven’t been around here very long (first visit in 93 and then back from 96 till now), but it makes me sad too. I love Kuwait because of its unique flavor and it is getting lost. As my mom says, whenever a country tears down its quaint villages and then has to build new replica quaint villages to remind them how life used to be, it defeats the purpose.
Pi the tunnel where the shisha places were located and the music store Subway was the most disgusting thing ever. People pissed in it and it was always flooded, really gross.
NO, how could they do that!
Does this mean the stores there are closing down for good? Do you happen to know if the famiy book shop is going to re-open? please update us with info regarding. thanks
https://www.sshic.com/commercial_and_retail_southsalmiyacommcomplex.htm
the above is a brief about the project from the architect’s website. From it we can conclude three points:
1- the same architects who designed the site in the 70’s are designing the new one.
2- The old building is preserved. Similar to what happened in Al-Manshar in Fahaheel, it will enclose the original building against weather elements.
3- Research and learn about the new development before judging it.
If it was up to me, i wouldve renovated the whole street until the beginning of the 4th ring road, made it only for pedestrians and called it the ‘Salmiyah Strip’. It would be an area of gatherings, retro shopping and cultural activities…
and then, maybe just maybe Kuwait would manage to have a real touristic destination!
man.. over here everybody is too intimidated by the weather and are afraid to build anything revolving walking outdoors if it isn’t a beach resort or something.. it sucks.. i always thought before that building a super dome like umbrella thingy over a huge space would fix everything.. i still like to think that it would ^^
Uturn I checked out the link, no where does it say the building will be preserved. It just says they are going to enclose the shopping experience.. ie: turn it into a mall
So sad….Kuwait is not what it used to be 🙁
The country is going Mall madness, I used to live in Fahaheel and man so many changes happened over the years…too bad I didn’t have any pictures from those old bloody days. Now the same thing is happening to Salmiya, since they removed the tunnel which was really a great landmark of old Salmiya and the place was not the same.
Alot of things will change, Fahad Al Salim Street in Deera will also have some buidlings removed…I just don’t know when will it end like we have a dozen malls for a small country and what’s bad about it is regular people like me and you can’t even afford to have a shop in one of them !!
Kuwait is turning into Richy Rich Town !
:`(
I Ate my first baskin robins there… i recall it was the minty green one o i was amazed at its color
I Had my first sakhar computer o every cartridge from there
I loved family book shop :`(
WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY
In response to the Pi, THERE IS a tunnel in Kuwait, one linking Fajer Sabah School with Salmiyah. IT GOES UNDER ROAD 30.
Am still soooo mad about Souq al Salmiya.
nxt thing u know they’ll tear down the Kuwait Towers and all they’ll say is “its too old”