2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003

Well for some reason today my credit card just stopped working. It didn’t get canceled or anything of the sort, machines just don’t read the card anymore. I think the chip on my credit card got damaged somehow. Now I have to walk around with cash, sucks!

In my Hummingbird Bakery post I was told to try out Ben’s Cookies in Covent Garden so first thing I did today was try some for breakfast. They sell cookies by weight not piece. I had one milk chocolate and one double chocolate cookie and they came out to KD1.250 which is around 600 fils a cookie. Not bad considering they were pretty big and Starbucks in Kuwait sell their crappy ones for nearly the same price. I ate both cookies and found the double chocolate a bit too heavy but the milk chocolate one which is basically a chocolate chunk cookie was delicious. It was perfectly balanced, not too sweet, very light and crunchy on the outside while soft on the inside. I loved it. (Posted from my Nokia e61i)

We left Paris today and got back to London but not without going on one hell of a ride.

We got to the Eurostar train station in Paris around 5PM which was around an hour before our train was set to leave. When we got to the automatic check in the machine rejected our tickets. I couldn’t understand why until an employee there arrived to help us and explained to us the problem. Our train had left over an hour earlier!

I am not one to make a lot of mistakes, I am usually the extremely reliable guy who plays it really safe and always tries to arrive earlier than the recommended time. Somehow, for some fucked up reason, I read our London arrival time as our Paris departure time. I can’t understand how that happened, looking at my non refundable non exchangeable ticket now I can’t imagine how I mixed up the departure and arrival times. Its right up on my list of dumbest things I have done in my life. We had missed our train out of Paris and that was just the beginning of our adventure.

There was another train leaving to London in around 2 hours so we headed to the really long cue queue to buy tickets and waited. While in line I tried calling NBK on 801801 to try and move money onto my credit card. I didn’t know how much I had left on the card and I didn’t know how much the tickets would cost so I figured I would play it safe and move some more money onto my visa. I spent 15 minutes trying to call Kuwait without any luck when suddenly I got through and got a hold of the NBK operator and explained to her that I wanted to move money onto my card. After 10 minutes of trying the NBK operator told me there was a problem with the NBK automated system and I should call back in 15 minutes.

We got up to the ticket counter and we asked for 2 one way tickets out of Paris. The employee told us we could get on the next train, price was 236 Euros per person which amounted to a total of 472 for the two of us. That was more than DOUBLE what I had paid for 3 weeks ago for our two way tickets! We didn’t have any other option so we asked for the tickets but when we tried paying for them both my credit card and Nat’s got rejected. Our cards were maxed out, it just wasn’t our luck.

Now you are probably thinking why didn’t I just withdraw money from an ATM machine and pay for the tickets with cash? Well the problem is when I travel I don’t keep a lot of money in my ATM card account so that just in case I get mugged at an ATM machine I can only withdraw a certain amount of money (I watch a lot of movies). It’s never been a problem before because I always use my credit card for my purchases and if I needed more money than whats available on my ATM card I just transfer more onto it.

So here was the situation, my Macbook had no battery and I didn’t have the charger so I couldn’t connect to a wifi network at the train station. There was also no Internet cafe at the station but even if there was I didn’t want to access my bank account from a public computer. I couldn’t get a hold of NBK, the answering machine never came on it just kept ringing and no one was picking up. Since I couldn’t connect to my NBK account I couldn’t use my credit card and I couldn’t withdraw any money so I was pretty much fucked.

I decided to call my sister and have her log into my NBK account and transfer money, problem was she wasn’t at home and the line kept breaking up. I then started calling my friends one by one to see if they were near an Internet connection including Bader, Marzouq and Khalid but no one was near a computer. It was just freaking frustrating. I had the money to buy the fucking tickets to get the hell out of Paris but I just couldn’t get that money onto my ATM or credit card! Time was running out by now and I needed to buy the tickets.

We decided to leave the station and head out around town looking for a place to get Internet access. After around 30 minutes of exploring and asking people we finally found an Internet cafe. I asked the guy if I could connect with my macbook but he told me it wouldn’t be possible. I looked at his computers, they had Windows XP on it… I had no clue if there were any trojans or softwares that would read and store my bank account info and passwords on the machines but I didn’t have an option, I was desperate and I just needed Internet. In literally 2 minutes I had logged into my bank account, transferred money onto my ATM and credit card and was out of the cafe. Thats all I needed, 2 fucking minutes of Internet to change the direction of my life.

We ran back to the train station with 45 minutes to spare but now we were back in the cue queue to buy tickets. 30 minutes later we purchased the tickets. The employee told us something about how our seats would be pull down seats but we didn’t care we just wanted to get on the train. We checked in, passed through passport and security check which luckily was empty and ran towards our train. If we had just been 1 minute late we would have missed the train again.

When we finally got on the train and the doors shut and we started moving, it was just the most amazing feeling of relief. Our fold down seats were these tiny seats located between the carriage cars (pictures above). They weren’t really that bad, it was kinda cozy sitting in between the carriage cars alone.

I can’t believe how an average day turned into such a mess. First thing I did when I got to my hotel room here in London was log on to the internet and change my NBK online banking password. Also when I get back to Kuwait I am going to take out another credit card and keep it aside just in case of emergencies like today. Finally Nat is going to be taking care of our traveling from now on, I am losing it!

ZDistrict came to my office a while back and sat behind my desk and asked

Where is your computer
I dont have one I replied.
He had the look of bewilderment.
I am here to think, not to work.
More confusion from ZDistrict (He was actually speechless).

Dilbert

I really dont know how to feel about this. I feel those two brands really don’t belong together. Well unless the Segway had Formula1 shifting gears and that wonderful Ferrari sound with 0-60 in under 4 seconds. Then it would be really cool

Segway have teamed up with Ferrari to release a special limited edition version of their i2 Personal Transporter. Ferrari have used Segway’s as a transportation method around their Maranello factory for sometime now, the Segway PT i2 Ferrari Limited Edition comes in Ferrari’s signature color, red and features the Scuderia Ferrari logo at the base. It has a range of almost forty kilometers off one battery charge and can be easily stowed in the trunk of a car for longer journeys. It comes with a handlebar bag made of leather.

It seems Nandos is finally opening their Avenues branch. According to a user in the forum invites were sent out in preparations for the launch which could be sometime this week or next week. You can check out pictures of the invite and more info by clicking [Here]

Thanks Sin!

I thought I sent a post earlier in the day from my phone saying I was in Paris but I just checked and it didn’t get posted. We arrived here today morning and we will be leaving tomorrow night. Its kinda like speed shopping/tourism. Being here makes me miss the London Underground. The Metro here in Paris is moldy and fugly.

Optimus Designs is a an entrepreneurial architecture company which is established by three young Kuwaiti architects. Last year they had an event called Funkyture where they displayed and sold furniture that they designed and manufactured themselves. They have some really creative original designs with a taste of their own. It was a very successful event last year and it is being repeated this year, I really recommend everyone to go check it out if you want to see something different. They can even design some furniture for you if you have something specific in mind. They have done houses and offices, interior design and architectural design. Take a look at the link for pictures of their previous event.

Date:
27 Oct – 6pm
28 Oct to Nov 1 – 10 am to 1pm & 5 pm to 10 pm

Location:
Qadsiya
Block1
Bader Street
House 11

Link: Optimus Designs

Lately I been playing lots of Halo 3 and been staring at that image as I wait for my games to load. It really astonished me since I am very familiar with the picture the world at night showing the world’s continents lit up.

Yet on Halo 3 Africa and South America are dark spots with a dots compared to the rest of the world.

It reminded me of my post Google Per Capita on how many people have access to Google. Yet the Halo Per Capita is even more telling. Just a quick glance of the map you can see which countries have access to high speed internet and disposable income to pay for a XBox.

Update: The lights on Halo3 map lighting up on the day of the game’s launch

We were at the supermarket picking up some munchies when on our way to the cashier we noticed a bunch of self checkout counters. It was hard to grasp the concept at first, I check out my stuff? Who will check and see if I was honest and didn’t skip anything? I still don’t know how they make sure people don’t cheat (probably monitor them with CCTV’s) but the idea of having customers check themselves out is unreal.

Its a pretty easy process, you take your items one by one, scan them on the machine and place them in the bag. Then you have a number of ways to pay, I chose credit card and just placed my card in the machine and that was it. Its the coolest thing ever.

The coins! So many fucking coins! The smallest note is like 5 pounds and everything else below is just coins. My wallet doesn’t even have a coin pocket so I am walking around with all these coins in my jeans and I am jingling the whole time like one of Santas reindeer’s.

Seriously there is a blog for everything. [Link]

I watched The Kingdom yesterday at what has to be the worst movie theater here in London. Seriously what theater actually leaves the lights on during a movie? The movie itself was pretty decent but now that I watched it I am really surprised it was banned in Kuwait. Watching the movie you can tell that the producers tried their best not to make Muslims look bad and the Saudi police actually were heroes in this movie so why was it banned?

On paper it doesn’t take much to open a store in Kuwait, the business process is comprised of the following: get money, get franchise, get location. The same store you visited a few years back on your summer vacation to an Arab hotspot (London, California, DC) has now shown up in your neighborhood avenue. In the past ten years, most Kuwaitis have grown accustomed to the growth of shopping malls and their associated brand names. The Midases of Kuwait who do come up with their own names are merely an amalgamation of other brands.

So what is one to do if the franchises (or combination of them under a local name) do not carry the products you are looking for?
You make it yourself.

Well, that is what one company recently did with Baroue… The concept was realized by Fahed Al-Mutawa after a bout of frustration finding items for his then newborn. After realizing the need for a child superstore; the idea behind Baroue was hatched, and it came to life through MS (Mutawa/Sayer) Retail (Restaurateurs in previous ventures).

What differs Baroue from any other children’s’ store?

Baroue has gone beyond the cookie-cutter approach of reselling items and retaining franchises; They have created a complete brand/franchise from zero. Their design studio (clothes) is based in London, their factories are in India and their head office is home sweet home, Kuwait.

Their first store is the third largest at the Avenues and carries everything from clothes and toys to a huge dragon that is a playpen in itself. And they have plans of expanding to other countries shortly.

For those who have had the theme song playing endlessly in their head (Baroue, Baroue, Baroue) .. You can blame Yuri Mrakdi, who originally came onboard as a Marketing director (and later sang the song). For the techies, you can track your children (RFID armbands) playing in the dragon through the kiosks scattered around the store.

Oh my god its really as good as people said it would be!! (Posted from my Nokia e61i)

update: Here is a link to their website. [Link]