2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003These two videos embedded here document the Kuwait International Rally back in the 70s. One of the videos was shot in 1976 while the other 1978. Both feature a lot of great 70s style racing footage as well as snippets of Kuwait like the old Hilton Hotel and the Kuwait Towers.
These aren’t homemade videos but properly shot videos with groovy music and a 70s style British voiceover. It’s actually really entertaining to watch even if you aren’t into cars so please check both videos out.
Tareq Almulaifi is a Kuwaiti singer/songwriter whom I previously posted about a few years ago when he was living in New York. Since then he’s moved to LA and just a couple of days ago released his first track with his new band, Cobra Club.
For the past few years I’ve been really into 80s inspired cinematic synth pop music and Tareq’s new track “Razor” falls right into that category. It’s a great track which I’ve probably already played a dozen times since last night and the music video, which supposedly was shot on a low budget, is really well made and carries over the whole 80s vibe. Can’t wait to hear more of their stuff.
Make sure you check Cobra Club out on Instagram @cobraclubmusic and Tareq on @tarequlous. If you’d like to hear more music similar to this then check out my Spotify playlist “Not the 80s” where you’ll find some of my favorite tracks including Tareqs.
The MOH Instagram account posted the teaser above saying drive-thru testing is coming soon. I’m now kinda curious to see where they’d set these up, the old McDonalds on the Gulf Road would be a great spot since it already handled one of the longest drive-thru lines ever.
Update: I was just informed the first drive-thru testing location will be located at the Jazeera Airways Park & Fly facility. Will be getting more information soon.
Update2: Here is a photo of one lane they’re currently testing. There will be a total of 3 lanes when ready. 2 lanes for the rapid and swab test if u do not have a fever. 1 lane for the full test if u have a fever or if your swab test showed something wrong. You can have 4 people max per car and they will be able to process up to 100 cars per hour at this location.
Although the saying goes “tough times call for tough measures”, I think tough times should call for more compassionate measures! We are dealing with so much right now and I know a lot of you are getting terminated (make sure you get your rights because no one has the right to terminate you because of Covid-19 in Kuwait), or are stuck in other countries, or can’t see your families, and this is why it is important for all of us to be compassionate to everyone we meet.
As a lawyer, I am getting so many emails because of Covid-19 with serious concerns, one of the biggest concerns is not being able to pay rent and eviction. Let me make something clear, a lot of people can not pay rent right now, not just you. And yes, the law allows the landlord to evict you (we wrote about this way back), but we are also going through unprecedented times so here is my advice:
– Write a formal letter in Arabic letting the landlord know that because of the unprecedented circumstances you are not able to pay the rent currently. I will make a letter template available to you in a few days for free, just email me on [email protected]. Also, feel free to communicate with them verbally and openly, I have had clients that have done that and then gotten a discount or a few months free, don’t be afraid to ask, but no matter what the verbal conversation is, I highly suggest that you still send them a document in Arabic (a notice) stating that you can not pay.
– Do not leave the apartment, if you can not pay the rent, stay there anyways. No one has the right to kick you out by force and this is something I doubt is a priority for authorities at this current time. Still, send a letter though.
– Do not feel shy about reaching out to charities, so many people in Kuwait, Kuwaitis and non-Kuwaitis alike have donated to various funds to help out those in need, so reach out to charities, please.
– Be patient and stay positive. I have hope that the Kuwaiti government will draft new legislation to deal with issues such as eviction from properties very soon and in favor of the weaker party, the tenants. I applaud the Kuwaiti government for all they have done so far and I have so much faith in them.
Best of luck everyone and I hope you and your families are safe and sound at this time. Feel free to follow me on instagram @flattland where I will be posting about my experience and the law (among other things) or to ask me and my team for any advice during this time. We have provided a few spots for legal consultations for free every week so check ftl-legal.com for a quick call with one of our lawyers.
Take care and sending everyone lots of love.
Post by Fajer Ahmed – Legal Counsel
Have a Kuwait law related question? Email me at [email protected]
The legal opinions expressed in this post are those of the author Fajer. Opinions expressed by Mark or any other writer on mark248am1.wpenginepowered.com are those of the individual’s and in no way reflect Fajer’s opinion.
[This is a spoiler-free post] I just wanted to take a break from the usual Coronavirus related news and talk about how great the TV series ‘Homeland’ was. The series finale aired yesterday and what a great ending to such a great show. I can’t believe it’s over after 8 seasons or that they managed to keep it exciting all the way through till the end. I’m so glad it went out the way it did.
If you haven’t watched ‘Homeland‘ you really should.
Yesterday I got an email from Qatar Airways letting me know that they’ve resumed daily flights from Kuwait until the end of the month:
Mr Makhoul, in these challenging times, we are here to support you if you need to travel home. We recently resumed flights from Kuwait so that you can now fly daily to select destinations, until 30 May 2020.
As we understand your travel plans might change, we are offering you more flexibility. You can change your date of travel free of charge, or exchange for a future travel voucher*.
Your safety, security and well-being are our first priority. As always, we provide the highest standards of hygiene on our aircraft, so your journey back home is seamless and safe
All flights are one way only and there is no mention that I need to fly specifically to my home country. So I guess I could fly out to any country that is currently allowing non-citizens/residents to come in. They had some offers mentioned in the email but when I checked their website none of the prices there matched the offers in the email. For example, a one-way economy ticket to London was listed as KD85 in the email but the lowest ticket price I found online was KD168.
I don’t think there are any other airlines flying out daily so I guess whatever they ask for you’re gonna have to pay if you want to leave Kuwait. Also if you’re Kuwaiti, it doesn’t seem like you’re allowed to fly out.
If you’re looking for a new quirky Instagram account to follow, check out @quarantineguykw. Quarantine Guy just recently came back to Kuwait from London and is now in mandatory home quarantine until May 22nd.
Everyone coming back to Kuwait right now has to install the Shlonik app which allows the government to track your whereabouts. Part of the process is that the app will throughout the day randomly check and see where you are and then request you to take a selfie to prove the phone is with you.
Quarantine Guy has started taking selfies with funny messages to whoever is checking the photos and he’s posting the screenshots on his account. Funny stuff so check him out @quarantineguykw
Update: Quarantine Guy just got a call from the Prime Minister!
شاهد || سمو رئيس #مجلس_الوزراء يزور مركز الإتصال والمتابعة الخاص بتطبيق #شلونك الصحي لمتابعة المواطنين العائدين من الخارج والخاضعين للحجر المنزلي. pic.twitter.com/wGJCEwEGRq
— الحقيقة (@ALHAKEA) April 30, 2020
Hall #4 at the Kuwait International Fairground has been turned into a pretty impressive field hospital. The hospital includes 200-beds, 40 ICU beds, 19 emergency beds, a pharmacy, and a pretty cool looking laboratory. This field hospital was put together by KOC and KIPIC and I think the other halls at the fairground are also currently being utilized one way or another to fight the pandemic.
I also read that they’ve started building a quarantine facility at the Jaber Al-Ahmad Sports Stadium that includes a field medical center, dormitories for medics and nurses, 5,000-beds, intensive care units, and pharmacies. As of now, 1,250 beds are ready while the rest under construction.
The Center For Government Communication released a visualization of how Covid-19 spread across Kuwait. Looks like Salmiya is safe 😅
Source @cgckuwait
Thanks xbs
Since the start of Ramadan, delivery drivers have been given a curfew pass so that they can deliver food from restaurants to people during curfew, 5PM to 1AM. But, if you’ve tried ordering the past two days you’ve probably run into a lot of restaurants being busy or closed, even though they’re meant to be open. Turns out the issue could be a lack of drivers during the curfew.
So roughly how it works is this, Company A’s drivers are allowed to deliver during the curfew. For those drivers to get the curfew pass, they must be registered under Company A. But, because Company A needed more drivers than they were given visas, a lot of the drivers are subcontracted from other companies and so working for Company A under the visa of a different company. This means those drivers can’t get a curfew pass and Company A is now operating with a smaller number of drivers.
Restaurants are already struggling as is and this obviously isn’t helping them. Yesterday night I felt like having a burger but all my favorite burger places were either marked as closed or busy. So just be patient and understanding of the situation. If a restaurant is marked as busy or closed check again in 10 minutes, it’s usually because the delivery app doesn’t have enough drivers. Also, some restaurants now allow you to order from their own online platforms and those don’t use Carriage, Deliveroo, or Talabat drivers. So if they’re busy on the apps, order from the restaurants own website instead.
Update: Deliveroo just posted that they will no longer be able to deliver after curfew and will now only deliver from 10AM to 2PM. Deliveroo is back to delivering again.
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Just a quick update. My list of local shopping websites has grown tremendously over the past few weeks to the point it was becoming difficult to navigate and find stuff. So, yesterday I updated that page, organized it, and included category links to make searching for what you want easier. If you want to check it out here is the link.
Update: I’ve added a “SHOPPING” link to the navigation bar on top of the page to make it easier to access
I haven’t gone shopping in a supermarket properly since this whole pandemic started. Just being around so many people and waiting in line with people who don’t understand social distancing just gives me a lot of anxiety right now. I now do most of my shopping at the tiny Coops in residential areas and for things like A&W Root Beer, or other treats, I pass by a Sultan Center Express or a Trolley.
But, when I found out you can now book supermarket appointments after curfew, I decided to try it out.
Getting An Appointment
The website you need to go to is https://www.moci.shop/
You enter your Civil ID number, Civil ID serial number, email and phone number and you will be then be allowed to choose an appointment for the following:
– Slaughterhouse
– Fish Markets
– Cooperative Societies
– Grocery Markets
Depending on where you live you’ll have different options and places available since the options are related to your home address.
I live in Salmiya so under the “Grocery Markets” section it’s like hitting jackpot since I have the options of like 3 or 4 Sultan Centers, Carrefour, Oncost and Wholesome Food. Sadly none of them were working, I think it’s a coming soon thing. The only option I had was Salmiya Coop located under the “Cooperative Societies” section.
I wasn’t expecting any dates to be available but oddly I found a bunch for the same day and more for the next couple of days. I decided to book an appointment for 6:30PM which was around an hour later. Once you’re done booking you’ll get two QR Codes. One is for the supermarket and one is for the cops patrolling the street. The QR codes are connected to your Civil ID so everyone out during curfew needs to have a separate QR code and everyone entering the supermarket needs to have a separate one as well. I don’t believe you can get one QR code and just pack the family in the car and head to the Coop.
Curfew Pass
They don’t give you any information but I remember hearing or reading that you can’t get a supermarket/curfew pass and then head the opposite direction. Since I was taking the Alfa out I figured I’d plan a scenic route to the Coop.
Obviously I didn’t take that route but I thought it would be a funny thing to tweet. The thing is cops on roads give me a lot of anxiety even when I’m not doing anything illegal on a normal day. So driving to the Coop during curfew turned out to be super stressful because there were cops EVERYWHERE! Like every intersection and corner had a cop car plus cops driving up and down the roads and cops in unmarked cars. All with their flashers on so you can’t tell if you’re in trouble or not, you just feel they’re all flashing their lights cuz you did something wrong. Or maybe it’s just me cuz I get stopped a lot and guess what? I got stopped on my way to the Coop, and on my way back! If that wasn’t stressful enough my QR code gave errors both times with the cops. I guess because I had just done the booking? No idea but when they’d scan the QR code it would tell them it wasn’t valid. The first cop told me it was fine and I could continue on my way to the Coop, the second cop when I was heading back home wanted to investigate the error further so I ended up parked on the side of the road for around 5-10 mins. In the end, he also let me continue home.
The Supermarket
I got to the supermarket early at around 6:15. The first thing you do is sign up at the desk and give them your Civil ID. You get it back on the way out because I think it’s how they keep track of whos inside because every group is allowed 30 minutes of shopping. Our group was around 20-30 people. At 6:30 they told us we could go in and right away there was a rush of people crowding up wanting to get in because nobody understands social distancing or the fact that this wasn’t an episode of Supermarket Sweep. A friend who had an appointment at the same Coop but at 6PM told me they had let them inside in small groups of 5 people at a time so it depends on whos in charge I guess.
You are only allowed to get an appointment once a week FYI. So if I try to get another appointment now I get the following message:
Tips
Firstly, I doubt I’m going to get another shopping appointment again. I can’t deal being in a place with so many people right now. If people understood was social distancing was then yeah I could do it but a lot of people don’t get it. While my items were getting scanned at the cashier, a guy who works at the Coop came between me and the lady behind me (who was social distancing correctly) and started emptying her cart onto the conveyor belt. But like dude, I’m still AT the conveyor belt, I still haven’t paid, why did you have to squeeze up next to me to unpack her stuff? We were doing so well without your help. I had to tell him to move away and give me some space and he got bothered by it. Like, come on. So personally I’m gonna stick to smaller mini-markets for now.
But the first tip I’d give would be to take your time going in. If you can shop in less than 30 mins then you don’t have to get in right away. Just take your time, wait till the crowd leaves the first area (most likely the veggie section or whatever the first section at your supermarket is) and then go in. You’ll have fewer people around you and you would be visiting sections when everyone before you had finished from it and left.
My second tip is don’t register for an appointment if its an hour or less later. Not sure how long it takes for the QR code you get to work with the cops, but it’s annoying to get stopped and it’s even more annoying not to have a working pass. Next time I’d book for the following day just to be safe.
If you want to get a shopping appointment, here is the link again https://www.moci.shop/
(for English press the white box drop-down box on the top right)
Update: I’m closing this post for comments. If you have any issues check the FAQ over here.
Apple Music is now officially available in Kuwait. Previously the only way to get Apple Music to work in Kuwait is to have a US based Apple account but now it works with Kuwait ones. I’m not a fan of Apple Muisc, I tried it previously and prefer Spotify instead, but I know a lot of people who like Apple Music more. If someone can let me know what the subscription cost is for Kuwait that would be great since I have a US-based account so can’t try it out myself. Source
Kuwait is currently bringing back over 40,000 citizens using around 200 different flights over a period of 10 days. How do you bring so many people back so quickly and in a safe manner? The MOH posted the video above documenting the process, it’s in Arabic but has English subtitles.
The video below, on the other hand, was posted by the MOI and shows actual footage of the process with a recently arrived flight. It’s a hugely complex operation with makeshift tents, lots of manpower and even tracking bracelets.
