2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003

I love Kuwait with all its flaws except for one, the tree cutting for no reason habit. I can never understand why beautiful green trees get cut down in Kuwait. I am also not the only one who hates this because their is a group on Facebook called “Keep Kuwait Green! Stop the Izala from cutting our trees!” which is fighting to stop this. Here is information about the group:

After the government came and removed our 35 year old Rubber trees without any warning, it made me realize that there are many other houses being effected.

People started calling about the same thing happening to them, and told me stories of horrible murder like incidents of the trees they once planted.

The mission of this group is to report and post pictures of all wrong doing by our government and the removal of trees. Please post the address of the places that you see them removing trees that were not used as a personal garden. If possible post your pictures also.

We will be posting and sending the pictures to all newspapers and blogs and anyone willing to listen to us. Some of the trees in Kuwait are a part of our history.

They have been here long before we have.
Let’s unite and try to keep Kuwait greener!

I would like to add one more thing which is the trimming of the trees and bushes. The Gulf Road area near Burj Hamam was looking pretty green and natural for awhile now and then suddenly yesterday they started trimming all the trees and bushes into cubes. Can someone tell whoever is responsible for that to stop. Trees that look like cubes might look pretty at Disney Land but not on the Gulf Road and they definitely don’t give any shade or protection.

So if you think the government should stop cutting trees down then please join the facebook group and voice your support. Here is the [Link]

Before you leave to your destination check #q8traffic on Twitter for the latest traffic updates. [Link]

If you are a Twitter user you can contribute by placing #q8traffic in your tweet.

I first saw this video on q8blackmarket a few days ago but just got around to viewing it after seeing it on Frankoms blog. For those of you who don’t speak Arabic what happens in the video is that a woman goes to see a doctor at a local hospital, she enters the room but then leaves shortly after very upset. She heads to the security department and files a complaint (they never tell us what the complaint was) but it seems it wasn’t a big deal because security never left their desk. She got more upset and called a guy who comes to the hospital and attacks the doctor and then escapes. All of this is caught on security cameras and what is very troubling is the fact that security didn’t stop the attacker. Watch the video. [YouTube]

A very funny short click of the IT guy equivalent back during medieval times. A guy has trouble using a book so he calls for help. [YouTube]

IKEA Heights is a drama series shot entirely in the Burbank California IKEA Store without the store knowing. It’s a very cool idea put together by some creative people with a lot of free time on their hands. So far they’ve created 5 episodes which you can view [Here]

British Business in Kuwait is holding an introduction to Kuwait event tomorrow (Tuesday, 13th October) at the Hilton Hotel. According to the flier it’s a free event and 70 companies are participating. If you’re interested in attending, the event is from 6:30PM to 10PM. Here is the flier [PDF]

Thanks Desert Girl

Someone in Kuwait is putting together the largest puzzle in the world. It’s made up of 24,000 pieces and they’re currently half way through. [YouTube]

They sell this puzzle set on Amazon for KD65. [Amazon Link]

It’s been nearly a month since I got my Tamiya FJ and just a few moments ago I finished building it. It took some time because I had to paint the body and ended up messing up the job, I then had to wait for the motor and electronic speed controller to arrive from the States and finally tonight I just had to source one more small part locally and get some wires soldered onto the motor. I’m now done with it, I tidied up all the wiring and my FJ is finally ready for a crawling session. I missed out on one last Friday because my car wasn’t ready but this Friday I am going and will take some pictures once I do.

Update: Here is a picture I took this morning

Tomorrow their will be a huge fire on the 61st floor of the Al Hamra Tower which is the soon to be tallest building in Kuwait. I can’t see the future but a reader emailed me telling me they will be testing the firefighting capabilities tomorrow. I didn’t quite understand if they will be testing the actual firefighters capabilities to fight a fire in a high-rise or if they’re testing the fire readiness of the building. In any case if you see smoke tomorrow you know why.

Thanks Ba3ks

Update: The exercise took place today but I don’t have any pictures so if you do send it in.

Someone emailed me an interesting question today which I thought I would ask here:

…I was wondering where can someone go and get tested for all types of STDs and HIV here in Kuwait… would really appreciate your help…

I never thought about that before. I am guessing private clinics? The thing is if you do get your test back and you’re HIV positive does the clinic have to inform the ministry or do they keep your results confidential?

This is a very beautifully shot documentary on the South China Mall, the worlds largest shopping mall. To give you an idea on how big the mall is, the largest mall we have in Kuwait is Avenues and that isn’t even in the top 10 list of largest malls. Dubai Mall on the other hand is the 4th largest shopping mall in the world, the South China Mall is literally twice as big as the Dubai Mall. The problem? Only 12 stores have been occupied out of the 1,500 the shopping mall has.

It’s a 13 minute long documentary but you don’t have to watch all of it although it would be hard to stop. Here is the [Link]

According to a news article dated June of this year, the Arby’s and Wendy’s franchises for the Middle East and North Africa were taken by a Saudi conglomerate. This sadly means the first branches which are scheduled to open early 2010 won’t be in Kuwait but will be in Saudi.

Wendy’s/Arby’s Group, Inc. (NYSE: WEN) today announced an agreement with Saudi Arabia-based Al Jammaz Group to build 135 dual-branded Wendy’s® and Arby’s® restaurants in nine countries in the Middle East and North Africa over the next decade.

Here is the link to the article. [Link]

Thanks ElHaddad

If you have the new BlackBerry Messenger 5 then join the 2:48AM Group. All you need to do is click on “BlackBerry Groups” in BBM5 and then “Scan a Group Barcode” and scan the barcode above. It’s that simple.

If you haven’t downloaded the latest BBM you can do so by visiting the link below from your BlackBerry:
https://www.blackberry.com/select/bbm/download.shtml

Update: Seems this group thing is still kinda buggy. Just updated the barcode above, if you had trouble joining before try now.

Update2: It seems the group has his the limit and no more people can join.

q8blackmarket took a picture of this classified ad on the street in Kuwait City. I just tried calling the number to see how much they wanted for the kidney but the phone was closed. [Link]

Update: I messaged the guy asking about the price and he replied saying how much I would pay, I replied asking what the best price was. He then replied saying for a Kuwaiti KD1000 while for a non Kuwaiti just KD800.

Update2: When I didn’t reply he messaged me back asking if it was too much. I told him it was and the best I could offer was KD500. Surprisingly he went down to KD650.

Update3: I asked him why he wanted to sell it, he wouldn’t tell me just said it was a personal problem. It’s sad, he must be desperate. Told him not to sell it and that it was very illegal to do but he just responded with a “Thank You”.

I can see this huge fire from my window in Kuwait City. A friend of mine that works in one of the buildings on the Gulf Road near the Scientific Center told me its a restaurant after Green Island. That could be Burj Hammam which already caught fire before. If you have any details, videos or pictures [Contact Me]

update: so far I’ve heard it’s either the Lebanese, the Saudi or the UAE embassy, a power generator or a gas station.

update2: Seems most probably is was a power generator that caught on fire. Below is a video that was shot by one of my readers.

[YouTube]