2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003

That must have been a pretty strange sight. [YouTube]

So as I posted earlier, my Archos 7 arrived today. I watch a lot of movies and tv shows on the plane when I travel and I’ve been using my old iPod to do that. It served me well but the tiny screen and the 4 hour battery life wasn’t cutting it for me. I also didn’t like the fact I had to convert all my videos to a format the iPod would read because it mean I had to plan ahead of time what I was going to take with me so I could spend a couple of days converting them.

I wanted a player which had a long battery life, a large screen and a player that could play Divx and Xvid formatted movies. Thats why I ended up going with the Archos 7. The battery lasts over 8 hours, the screen is a huge 7inch and I could just drag and drop movies onto its 160GB hard drive without converting them.

My first impressions so far are good. The screen is great and much more responsive then I was expecting. It doesn’t get smudged easily because its a matte screen but the back of the device which is shiny is full of smudges. I moved a few tv shows and movies over to the Archos and it played them all except for one which had AC3 sound encoded. To play that I needed to purchase a plug-in which I did. The US site has 3 plug-ins listed for the Archos 7 at $20 each while the global version of the site had the 3 plug-ins bundled together for $40. I decided to get all 3 plug-ins for $40 and I can now play HD movies and movies encoded with AC3 without a problem. I don’t like the idea of paying for plug-ins but I am glad I have the choice to do so instead of no choice at all. I tried watching tv with the built in web tv and although it works I couldn’t find a decent channel to watch except for Sky News. The web browser on the Archos works really well and I was able to load up my blog without any issues. It even displayed the flash ad banners which I have on my site, something which Safari on the iPhone can’t do.

Now the negative stuff. The device is heavier than I expected which isn’t really a problem for me since I will only be using it on the plane. I also had trouble playing one movie, every time I tried it would just crash the Archos. I am thinking its because of the way the movie was encoded but need to experiment more with this. It was a 1.8GB file. Quantum of Solace which I have encoded with AC3 sound and coming in at around 1.4GB played flawlessly.

So far I am really liking the device. I know some of you might have specific things you want to know about the Archos just ask me below and I will try to reply. The Archos 5 and 7 are basically the same device except for the larger screen and longer battery life on the 7.

160GB Archos 7 is for $272. [Amazon Link]
320GB Archos 7 is for $412. [Amazon Link]

Aramex just dropped off my Archos 7 and it looks AMAZING. Will take a better shot of it later but I just took this quick one to show how much larger the screen is compared to my iPhone. This is going to make watching movies on the plane a lot better now!

Yesterday I passed by a new concept store which my friend set up called i love souk. It turned out to be a pretty cool store that sells a bunch of random funky items like design books, vintage clothing, accessories, artwork and more. They’re also authorized dealers for Lomography and American Apparel.

They’re located outside Al Corniche Club to the left of Athletes Foot right on top of the Al Sabah Art & Design gallery. Their main ilovesouk.com website is still not up but there is a small section with pictures about the store on the Al Sabah Collection website which you can check [Here]

A friend of mine spotted a vending machine at one of the guy bathrooms at the Avenues offering free condoms and tampons. Tampons I can understand although its strange that its in the guys bathroom but condoms? The bathroom he found this vending machine in is on the top floor next to the first Starbucks that comes up when walking away from IKEA.

Thanks Holla!

update: This is NOT an april fools prank!

Magic Planet opened up at Avenues and it looks really great. What I think makes the place special is the minimalist design of some of the toys which all seem to take form of white bugs. I took the picture above but a friend of mine (Thanks Ibrahim!) emailed me a ton of pictures which you can check out by clicking on continue below.

Shot this video while I was at the Avenues for lunch today. It was pretty cool the first 5 minutes but this went on and on and on for at least another 30 minutes. [YouTube]

I posted about Yehya on the Jimmy Kimmel show back in 2006 but here is another newer and even funnier clip. [YouTube]

[YouTube]

Two days ago it rained pretty heavily in Kuwait and in some areas it rained hail which I posted a picture of but, I just found a video on YouTube showing one area (South Jaleeb) that got hit by hail so hard it actually looked like it snowed.

[YouTube]

Update: Buzberry has some pictures which you can see [Here]

A friend of mine told me the other day that Caribou Coffee got the rights to Cheese Cake Factory cheese cakes in the Middle East and today I got an email confirming this. In total, Caribou Coffee will be bringing in 15 different types of cakes. They will be introducing this partnership on April 6 at the Kuwait City branch (next to Johnny Rocket’s across from Salhiya). The slice of cake will be priced at KD1.950.

Thanks David!

Note: The cheese cakes are currently available at Caribou Coffee but I guess the official launch is April 6..

Update: 4thringroad posted it first [Here]

A friend of mine got a hold of some cupcakes by Blossom’s Bakery and I think they’re the best cupcakes I’ve had so far. Sadly I understood she no longer takes orders or delivers but you can still check out her blog for a ton of pictures of some really great looking cupcakes. [Link]

A few people emailed me a link to this video on YouTube where two AIS school teachers trash Kuwait. Judging by the viewers comments the two teachers should probably go into hiding. [YouTube]

Thanks to everyone who emailed this in.

Update: Video has been removed from YouTube

Asking price? A ridiculous KD20,000! You could probably buy two from eBay for that price and ship them to Kuwait (ok maybe not two but still) or just wait until the local dealer gets them and sells them for around KD11,000. [Link]

I took this shot outside the Avenues at around 2:15PM with my iPhone.

I found out today that Planet Hollywood will be opening in the basement of the Olympia towers in Salmiya at the end of summer. The only good thing that might come out of this is if Sylvester Stallone comes for the opening and I stalk him until he agrees to take a picture with me.

Update: Turns out The Noodle House is also opening in Olympia in June.