2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003

For those of you who follow my blog regularly, you probably know that my favorite podcast is called Kill Tony, a comedy show run by the popular comedian Tony Hinchcliffe. In the show, Tony randomly selects a name of an audience member from a hat (the audience members are young striving comedians) and they have to come up and do a stand up set for 60 seconds in front of Tony and his guests. After the 60 seconds, Tony and his guests roast the comedians while also interviewing them to find out more about them. The show takes place at The Comedy Store on Sunset Boulevard here in L.A., it’s my favorite comedy store, it’s where Joe Rogan and his friends perform, and I always drop by whenever I’m in town. Today I got to watch Kill Tony perform their 224th show live and I loved it.

Me and my friend got there a bit early so we managed to get a table right up front and dead center which was amazing. Tonight the three guests were comedians Benji Aflalo, Jak Knight and a surprise appearance by the legendary Ron White who came in 30 minutes into the show with a bottle of tequila. I can’t remember the last time I laughed so hard, the podcast is funny as is but watching it live and half drunk is a completely different level of funny. Everyone was also super down to earth and after the show all the comedians including Ron and Tony were in the main patio drinking and talking with all of us.

If you listen to podcasts and like comedy then you need to check out the Kill Tony podcast if you haven’t already. I was a fan before and a much bigger fan now.

From what I’ve been hearing, it looks like March is the targeted opening date for the first phase of the Kuwait Motor Town Race Circuit. The first phase will be the main F1/Moto-GP circuit and drag strip while the completion of the rest of the circuits as well as the hotel and mall will follow at a later date. Personally I don’t care about the hotel or the mall, I just want the main track to open so I could take part in open days.

Kuwait Motor Town will have karting, moto-cross, rally-cross, super-cross, 4×4 technical and ATV circuits as well as the main F1/Moto-GP circuit and the drag strip. For previous posts on the Kuwait Motor Town, click [Here]

Sam Chui, the world’s most followed aviation blogger recently flew on one of the new Kuwait Airways planes and reviewed it. Overall he really liked the new planes although he had major issues with the Kuwait Airport, but don’t we all. I’m surprised Kuwait Airways didn’t bump him up to first class from business since it didn’t look like anyone was there and it’s Sam Chui..

Jazeera Airways just rebranded their identity and launched their new face lifted website. Not sure how I feel about their new logo yet, going to wait and see their new plane livery before I make up my mind on it. [Link]

Thanks Sara

A reader who’s traveling to L.A. next week asked me if I could share a list of places to see and places to eat at. Problem with L.A. is that its huge and spread out so I’m not sure how practical a list like that could be. Traffic here is insane so trips around L.A. usually take an hour easily and most of the time a lot more than that. I’m also staying and hanging out mostly in the Armenian areas like Glendale and Burbank which are not close to any touristic spots I’m aware of, maybe the Griffith Observatory but thats about it. So again not sure my list would work for anybody else but I’ll share some below.

The best way really to find some great eating spots in general is to just open up Yelp whenever you find yourself hungry. If a place has 4+ stars and 200+ reviews then most likely that place is gonna be great. Since I’ve got relatives and friends in L.A. I’ve been pretty lucky so far on this trip with some really great food recommendations, but whenever I’m stuck I just go back to Yelp. Below are some of the best places I’ve gone to on this trip but for all the places I’ve been to, check out my yelp account mark248am.yelp.com

El Faro Tacos – I just found out on this trip that Lebanese immigrants to Mexico had a small influence on their cuisine in the form of the Al Pastor, which is basically a shawerma taco. This small hole in the wall specializes in the Al Pastor and is super authentic and super cheap, just $1.24 for a taco. They were so good I had 4.

Afters Ice Cream – Like In-N-Out but for ice cream. Afters is a California based brand and is currently only located there. I dropped by and picked up their “Anti Diet Diet Club” tshirt which is a spoof of the “Anti Social Social Club” brand, and while I was there I also enjoyed their billion calorie Cookie Monster ice cream in a hot glazed milky bun.

Baja California Fish Tacos – Best fish tacos I’ve ever had, they were crazy good. Order any of the fried fish tacos since there is no way you can go wrong. This place along with El Faro are the only two places I’ve given a full 5 out of 5 on this trip so far.

Eggslut – So this place I wasn’t really going in with high expectations but I ended up leaving impressed. I’ve had a ton of egg sandwiches in Kuwait mostly from EightSix and Eggcellent so really didn’t figure Eggslut could be that much better. It was! I ordered the Fairfax which had scrambled egg and cheese topped with their special sriracha mayo sauce, maybe it was their bun or the sauce but damn it was so good. Actually might go back there tomorrow morning for breakfast.

Sugarfish – Simple straight forward authentic sushi. They have set menus which is what me and my friends all ordered and everything on it was super delicious… except for the blue crab. AVOID the blue crab, it tasted like canned tuna.

The Drunken Crab – A Louisiana-style seafood spot with delicious crawfish tossed in their special spicy drunken sauce and served authentically in plastic bags. Its one my have to visit places every time I come to L.A.

Verve Coffee Roasters – If you’re looking for some good coffee while in L.A. and a place to get some work done, this is a great spot. It’s located in downtown so it’s probably going to be close to where you are and it’s super chill and not too packed.

786 Degrees – They make the best Napoletana pizza I’ve ever had, but not only are their pizza’s delicious and award winning, the people working there are the friendliest people I have every encountered anywhere. Super polite and super nice, they won’t let you pay for the pizza unless you love it!

Other notable mentions:

Norah – Best cornbread EVER

Baco Mercat – Go there for the Hamachi Crudo

Hopefully the spots above are helpful. I might add more to it before my trip is over.

Just found this video while looking for stuff to post about. It took place around a month ago based on the upload date and it happened right in front of Abyat. No clue what it was about but a number of cars were attacked and one car even tried running over a bunch of guys.

A couple of weeks back I posted about Blaze Pizza coming to Kuwait and the Middle East. I had never had Blaze Pizza nor even heard of them up until a few days before that announcement, so I was curious to try it out. Since I’m currently in L.A., I ended up stopping by Blaze Pizza yesterday and figured I’d let you know what to expect.

What makes Blaze different from other pizza places is that it was modeled after the Chipotle concept with a made-to-order approach. As a customer you create your own pizza which they then cook in a high-temperature open-flame oven in 3 minutes. They have a few signature pizzas on the menu if you don’t feel like creating, but all the fun is in the creation.

To start with you get a choice of three doughs to choose from, the original, the high-rise (thicker) and the gluten free. You then get to choose your sauce, they had four kinds, regular tomato sauce, spicy tomato sauce, a white cream sauce and a garlic pesto sauce. After that you get to choose the kind of cheese you want followed by all your toppings. The process is pretty quick and familiar if you’ve ever been to a Subway or a Chipotle. Baking the pizza takes just 3 minutes unless you order the gluten free dough which takes 6. So by the time you are done paying and find a table to sit down at, your pizza would be ready.

If you manage your expectations beforehand, the pizza isn’t too bad. My friend ordered the gluten free dough and I thought that was a better option compared to my original one since it was thinner and crispier, but overall I didn’t like my pizza and only ended up eating half of it. Blaze Pizza isn’t going to taste better than Solo PN or even try to compete with it or similar real pizza joints, instead it’s going to compete with the likes of Pizza Hut and Papa John’s. I’m not so sure how it will end up doing in Kuwait, but more options is usually always a good thing.

The movies below are now showing at either Cinescape, Grand Cinemas or Sky Cinemas:

New This Week:
Ali and Nino (7.4)
Atomic Blonde (7.2) ♦
Boyka: Undisputed (7.3)
Dunkirk (8.6) ♦ ★

Other Movies Showing:
2:22 ♦
Baby Driver (8.3) ♦ ★
Despicable Me 3 (6.6)
London Heist (7.2) ♦
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (7.0)
Railroad Tigers (5.9) ♦
Spider-Man: Homecoming (8.2)
War for the Planet of the Apes (8.5) ★

The movies below are also now showing at the Scientific Center IMAX theater:

A Beautiful Planet 3D (7.9)
Dream Big 3D (7.9)
Humpback Whales 3D (7.2)
Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Secret Ocean 3D (N/A)

The Scientific Center will have discounted tickets for Secret Ocean 3D this weekend up till July 27th because of Shark Week. The discounted ticket price is KD3.

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.
★ is for movies I’m interested in. ♦ implies movie might contain censorship.

For the past week I haven’t been in the mood to post at all. I’m on vacation and like everyone else who goes on vacation, I want to leave my work behind. But with the blog, its not that simple.

With your normal job you tend to handover your work to another employee and then take off, with the blog I don’t have anyone to hand over the posting to. I also can’t just stop posting, I mean I can if its a short trip but I’m out now for nearly three weeks so I can’t just not post for that long.

Putting that aside I also struggle to find stuff to write about when I’m not in Kuwait. When I first started blogging I used to post about my trip, places I’m checking out, things I recommend other people do and if you’re lucky, you’d catch one of my drunken rants before deleting it. But overtime I just kept getting more and more private. I don’t post about my trips anymore and I barely instagram anything as well. I’ve been to the States 4 times over the past 3 years but nobody except my closest friends knew about them. I did Kentucky, Tennessee, Washington, and Philadelphia on one trip and barely posted two abstract pictures on instagram from my whole stay. I like it that way, I like my privacy.

But I think I’m going to go back to how things were before. I think I’m going to start posting about my trips again since it will give me stuff to write about which in return will reduce my stress when I’m on vacation. I do have a bunch of cool things coming up on my trip so we’ll see how things turn out.

If you’re expecting a package to arrive to Kuwait through the local post office then this info might be beneficial to you. There is currently an issue with the post office internal tracking system and so at the moment they won’t be able to track your packages. Neither you nor them will know where your package is until they get the issue sorted out.

Previously when a package arrived to Kuwait you would be able to check on the status by visiting tracking.moc.gov.kw but now you’ll just get a “No information, please check your item identifier” error.

No timeline on when this will get fixed, supposedly they’re waiting on the Minister who is currently MIA.

Thanks Abdulaziz

The upcoming Sheikh Jaber Al Abdullah Al Jaber Al Sabah International Tennis Complex is expected to be completed sometime next year and I just saw interior renderings of the complex for the first time so figured I’d share them here.

The International Tennis Complex is part of the 360 Mall expansion project and is expected to become one of the world’s best tennis facilities. It will house two main arenas with a combined stadium seating for over 7,600 spectators, eight indoor courts with over 500 seats and eight outdoor courts with 1,500 seats. For more pictures and information on the project, click [Here]

Thanks lovelykuwait

According to the instagram account @tafteesh_kw, the government has stated that Entertainment City will be reopening by 2021. There aren’t any other details but I’m assuming the park is set to get renovated during this time.

Originally I heard the plan to renovate the park was put on the back burner after the price of oil plunged below $50 a barrel since the government decided to be more frugal with spending. The aging rides desperately needed an update and by the time the park had closed down, majority of the big rides like the Australian Log Ride and the rollercoasters weren’t working.

There were rumors about Six Flags being involved in the original renovation project, no idea if that is still the case or not but I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

Photo by Ahmed Al Bather

Tiger Tiger
Originally a pop-up restaurant, Tiger Tiger is finally opening up a physical location and its going to be located at the end of the same strip where Gia, Joa and Habra are located in Kuwait City. Tiger Tiger will be located where Shisha Bar used to be.

White Robata
The owner of Slider Station and Burger Boutique is opening a robata restaurant at the Sheikh Jaber Al Ahmad Cultural Centre called White Robata.

Sintoho
Opening at the beginning of September, Sintoho will be a fine dining Pan-Asian restaurant that will be located on the rooftop of the soon to open Four Seasons Hotel.

For those of you wondering what that huge plume of smoke in Kuwait City was, according to Al Rai newspaper it was a bunch of tire garages that caught fire. The fire is under control now and no injuries were reported. For more pictures click [Here]

Thanks KamaZX

Forbes released a list of Top 100 Most Powerful Arab Businesswomen and 10 Kuwaiti women made it on the list. UAE had the most amount of women on the list with a total of 16 while the top position went to the Saudi Arabian Lubna S. Olayan. Below are all of the Kuwaiti women who made the list along with their rankings and their job titles:

8 – Shaikha Al Bahar (Deputy Group CEO – NBK)
10- Henadi Al Saleh (Chair – Agility)
15- Eaman Al Roudhan (CEO – Zain)
34 – Hosnia Hashem (Deputy CEO – KPIC)
38 – Suad Hamad Al Saleh Al Homaizy (Board Member – Bank Audi)
46 – Sara Akbar (CEO – Kuwait Energy)
48 – Ghada Y. Al-Amer (Vice President – KUFPEC)
59 – May Al Mudhaf (CEO – National Bank of Abu Dhabi)
73 – Ghosson Al Khaled (Deputy CEO – ACICO)
98 – Nawal Mulla-Hussain (COO – Global Investment House)

To check out the full list and for more details, click [Here]

via BlogBaladi