2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003

I love Montreal. Its my favorite place on the planet. Since Christmas is nonexistent in Kuwait and since Nat has never been anywhere other then Lebanon and Kuwait I figured we would spend Christmas and New Years in Montreal. I was looking forward to binging on Labatt Blue while stuffing myself with poutine. Nat on the other hand was looking forward to the Tiesto concert on New Years night. We had everything planned and ready, only thing missing was Nats visa to Canada. I don’t need a visa because I have the Canadian citizenship.

Around a week ago we sent Nats passport and all the forms and papers needed to the Canadian Embassy in Abu Dhabi (local embassy don’t do visas). Visa costs like KD18 while DHL with a return airway bill costs KD55. So thats KD73 for a one time entry visa.

Today Nat got her passport back and guess what? They refused to give her a visa! Their reason was the following:

You have not satisfied me that you meet the requirements of Regulation 179; that you would leave Canada at the end of the temporary period if you were authorized to enter. In reaching this decision I considered your ties to your country of residence/citzenship balanced against factors which might motivate you to stay in Canada.

In summary, they think Nat will basically go to Canada, tear up her passport and request asylum. How did they come up with this conclusion? Its because she is Lebanese. How much more discriminating can they be? No one called her to talk to her, no one called her in for an interview, they didn’t even care that her husband is a Canadian.

I am extremely pissed off now because it basically means I can no longer go to Canada unless I am alone, which isn’t going to happen as long as I am married. Tomorrow I will be calling up the embassy and giving someone there a piece of my mind. No way am I gonna accept the fact that some stranger all the way in the UAE is going to ruin my Christmas!

What I realized today (its probably a generalization but still) is that before the invasion the people who came to work in Kuwait liked living in Kuwait. Today most of the people who come to work in Kuwait really don’t like living here.

Here is some interesting information regarding the Kuwait national squad. It was written by ilbaasha and edited by me.

Why is the Kuwait national team called Al-Azraq?
Al-Azraq refers to the period of time at the start of February when it becomes extremely cold after few days of warmth and people start to wear winter clothes again. This is the last chance of getting rain in Kuwait and it indicates the start of the end for the winter season.

The national team mascot is Haydoo the camel; the word is used as a “sit down” order to camels according to the Kuwaiti accent dictionary.

Why and how was Haydoo used as the mascot?
Back in October 1981 Kuwait was playing a world cup qualifying match in Oakland, New Zealand where the Kiwi fans had signs reading “Go Back to your Camels!” which they were waving as the Kuwaiti team came onto the field. Kuwait won that match 2 goals to 1.

When it was the home game later that year, 100 camels were brought on the pitch before the match to show that Kuwait was proud of its past.

Kuwait ended up qualifying to the 1982 world Cup in Spain and was the first Arab country from Asia to ever qualify. A Spanish newspaper later claimed that the Kuwait national team will be late to the World Cup because they would be “traveling on the backs of their camels!”. So, the Kuwaiti Football Association decided to use a camel (named Haydoo) as their mascot.

Unlike the newspaper had predicted, the Kuwaiti team ended up arriving early. Too early actually and no one, not the journalists or the locals knew that the Kuwaiti team was even in Spain! To attract attention, the head of the Kuwaiti Football Association told a French journalist who there to cover the arrival of the French team that “The Kuwaiti team would withdraw from the competition unless they were allowed to bring their mascot.” Within hours the hotel was packed with journalists wanting to find out more about the mascot

The Spanish authorities and the hotel manager finally allowed the Kuwaiti team to bring their camel as long as it was left in the backyard of the hotel. The head of the Kuwaiti Football Association then called the minister of sport in Morroco to send a camel as soon as possible to Spain. He also ordered a T-shirt to be made for the camel. This hype and the Camel mascot helped make Kuwait’s presence extremely felt by the locals and journalists.

Haydoo, has been the mascot for the Kuwaiti national team ever since.

You can listen to the Haydoo song (its Arabic with some English). The file is in Real Audio format. [ Download Song]

Update: Here is the video

I just found a video on YouTube to probably one of the coolest moments in the World Cup ever. Back in 1982 when Kuwait was at the World Cup a very controversial incident took place. Kuwait was losing 3 goals to 1 when the French team scored the 4th goal. The Kuwaiti players thought they had heard the Russian referee blow the whistle before the goal so they stopped playing. After the goal was scored Sheikh Fahid Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah who was president of the Kuwait Football Association came down to the field and demanded the referee cancel the goal. He was furious and was yelling at his players to get off the pitch and go home when finally the referee gave in and canceled the goal. That was the only time in the World Cup history where someone other than the referee made the decision to cancel a goal. The referee later had his international refereeing credentials taken from him.

In the video the incident takes place like after 1:10 minutes.
Here is the link to YouTube

Today morning another demonstration was taking place outside the House of Parliament. This time though the crowd was a lot larger and more organized. Crowd barriers were also place alongside both sides of the road in front of the parliament building. While sitting in my car I watched the large crowd which surprisingly included a lot of high school students cross the road while yelling out their demands. I am not sure but according to their banners I think they want the local government to drop all the personal debts of Kuwaitis. I shot a short video of the demonstration which you can watch by clicking [Here]

ps: here is a higher resolution picture of the one above if you want to attempt to read what it says on their banners. [Picture]

I like David Lynch a lot but I wouldn’t have him in the #1 spot. Takashi Miike should be wayy up higher in the list, at least ahead of Michael Moore. What is Michael Moore even doing on this list and where is Terry Gilliam? [Link]

Another funny commercial but this time its for the Shelby Mustang. You can view the video on YouTube by clicking [here] or you can download the quicktime version from [here]

via autoblog

A hilarious commercial for Geox footwear. [Video]

Here are 26 urls from A to Z. These are the first sites that appear in Firefox when I type a letter:

A – Autoblog
B – Blind Melon
C – CNN
D – Digg
E – Engadget
F – Applenova Forums
G – Gmail
H – Hotbot
I – iToot
J – Joystiq
K – Kottke
L – Lebanese Forces
M – MacRumors
N – NBK
O – NBK Online
P – PowerPage
Q – Qualitynet Unwanted
R – Real Hot Stuff
S – Socialitelife
T – TorrentLeech
U – U Shop We Ship
V – Virb
W – Naharnet
X – XE Currency Exchange
Y – YouTube
Z – zDistrict

update: Just to make things clear. In some browsers when you type a letter in the address bar you get a drop down list of your most visited sites starting with that letter. the above list is my most visited sites per letter on my Mac at home. Yours will be different. This list is just to share with you some sites some of which you might not know of.

Watch as a Hezbollah supporter throws down the Lebanese flag and replaces it with the Hezbollah flag at yesterdays demonstration in Beirut. Hezbollah wants our current anti-Syrian prime minister to step down because they think he is an American puppet. Hezbollah on the other hand isn’t controlled by Syria or Iran. I think this video symbolizes the future Hezbollah wants in Lebanon. [Video]

via Beirut Spring

When I asked about good chilidogs in Kuwait a lot of people recommended I try the chilidog at Johnny Rockets. Well I tried it and it sucked.

First of all the hot dog arrived with the bun wide open. Then the hot dog itself was also split open down the middle and the whole thing was covered with a ton of chili and some chopped onions. When I closed the bun so I could eat it the top half of the bun split away from the bottom half and the chili just started dripping uncontrollably everywhere. Its definitely not a sandwich you would want to order on your first date… or ANY date for that matter.

After a short struggle and going through a dozen napkins I finally managed to finish my chilidog. I wasn’t impressed. Their chili is decent but really the whole experience wasn’t very pleasant, their chili burger is much more enjoyable. Compared to Hardees, Burger Boutique and Fuddruckers, Johnny Rockets has the worst chilidog. My final score is a 2.5 out of 5. The price of the chilidog is KD1.850. I’ll stick to their burger next time.

Picture by Kristel Wyman

In the comments to my Nearly There post, a reader commented saying that I needed to “add more interesting stuff which appeals to a broader audience”. I try my best to scour the web everyday trying to find interesting stuff to post, I also spend most of my day looking for stuff to post wherever I go and some days I find a lot of stuff and other days its a struggle.

My question is what would you, my readers like to see more of in this blog? I don’t know if I will change the content much since the formula at the moment must be working if people are coming back, but it would still be interesting to read what you guys would like.

November had the highest amount of visitors come to this site. The total for November was 97,411 unique visitors and they generated 160,612 hits. If November had 31 days we would have been able to top 100,000 visitors. We’re nearly there.

Pretty goofy but funny. [Video]

After going to sleep early last night I woke up around 9AM today and decided I would go out for a ride. By 9:30 I was downstairs in full gear warming up my bike. Today I even put on my Alpinestars Knee Guard which I should have worn the day I had my crash because it would have saved my knee from getting road rash. Its kind of bulky but its not about the looks, its about the protection. One thing I forgot to do with all my excitement was brush my teeth which was a big mistake because I ended up spending the whole ride smelling my Friday morning breath inside the helmet.

I had 3 rules for my ride today:
(1) Keep off the Gulf Road
(2) On traffic lights, go straight or right but not left (since I had my accident while going left)
(3) Stay clear of roundabouts

Well I broke one of the rules. I ended up going out onto the Gulf Road but just for a tiny bit. My bikes gas light came on and I figured I might as well fill it up with gas, something I hadn’t done before. But before I got onto the Gulf Road I rode into the AUK parking lot and decided to do some riding exercises which involved lots of driving around in circles and braking and accelerating. Once I felt comfortable with the bike I rode out of the parking lot and headed towards the Gulf Road. I ended up going to the gas station opposite Pizza Hut. I was hoping I would find some of that ultra super high octane gas (the green one) but turned out they only had the regular and super versions. It was my first time filling up gas in my bike and I felt awkward. First I didn’t know how to open the gas gasket, the key wasn’t turning in the gasket lock so I called up Marzouq who told me I needed to push the key in and turn which worked. Second I didn’t know how much gas the bike would take but I kept filling it slowly until I could see the gas line in the tank. I filled up 550fils worth of super gas and rode back out onto the Gulf Road and then back into Salmiya.

In total today I rode for around an hour and a half. I would have stayed out longer but my wrist started hurting so I had to come back home. The weather was amazing and I spent most of my ride riding with the helmet visor open so that the wind blew in onto my face . I really had a lot of fun, can’t wait for my next ride.