2:48AM - Entertaining Kuwait since 2003

TivoGuy was telling me that Aramex was closing down their Kuwait City branch and moving everything to Ardiyah. I quickly sent an email to Rabih who is always kind enough to answer my questions. Turns out its true, Aramex is shutting down the Kuwait City office, this is the email I received from him:

Dear valued customer,

Yes it is true we are moving our operations to Aardiyah since our main location is there and all our operations start from there. An email was sent to all our customers today morning. Another email in Arabic will also be sent by tomorrow.

Trust us that the move is for the best of all our customers: Delivery will be much faster and security and control on non-delivered packages will be much better. Most of all, Management will have more direct control on service level provided to our customers.

We will also open a new location for customer service and opening new accounts in Al-Bustan Mall in Salmiyah before year end inshallah.

Always at your service.

Personally I am going to find it a hassel to drive to Ardiyah everytime a package arrives but I guess I don’t have any other option.

Yesterday I mentioned I saw a kid with a puppy and when I asked him where he got it from he said Amazon.com. He told me it cost KD50 for the dog and KD100 shipping.

I tried to find dogs on Amazon and wasn’t able to find any. I guess the kid found an external link (like an advert) on Amazon but actually purchased the dog from another US based website. I also emailed Aramex to see if they shipped animals and I got the following reply:

Dear Mark,

Thank you for contacting us via email regarding your below request.

Kindly note that pets can not be shipped via express. Live Animals shipping is complicated and requires special documents and laboratories tests at both origin and destinations before being shipped.

Please accept our apology for not being able to help you much with your request.

Kindest Regards

So I guess the kid had the dog shipped directly to Kuwait. I should have gotten more information from him…

I just received a msg from the zMacShop owners telling me their website is now online and you can check it out by going to https://zmacshop.com

This video is not for the faint of heart. I think it was shot in Saudi Arabia of a car making stunts when everything goes wrong. Not very graphic but definitely shocking. [WMV 3.8MB]

After yesterdays post on Larry I decided to find other options quickly. I called up the guy who has the British Bulldog and I will be meeting with him today to check out his puppies. I was reading up on the Bulldog and it seems we have things in common, we both hate excercising and we both enjoy lying on the couch all day. So the Bulldog seems more compatible with my lifestyle then a German Shepherd. But the Bulldog is a small dog and I am looking for something alot bigger.

My first choice would be a Belgium Shepherd (pictured above) and yesterday night I contacted 3 different breeders to see if I could purchase one directly off them and have them ship it to Kuwait. Two of the breeders are in Belgium so it hopefully is possible to have them ship me a dog to Kuwait.

I also called my cousin up asking if he knew anyone that sold dogs, he told me there was a shop in Jabriya that only sold dogs and that there is a dog school after the Fintas bridge that also sold dogs. So tonight I am going to pass by both and see what they have.

I checked the Paws Kuwait website and found a young German Shepherd which is looking for a home but sadly its a female and I am not interested in getting a female dog.

Finally a friend of mine told me his friends dog just had puppies and is looking to give the pups away. He doesn’t know what breed they are but will call me today and tell me.

So hopefully I will find a dog that I want that will cost me alot less then KD1000.

The owner of Larry emailed me his pictures of when he was still in Germany. So everyone, meet Larry Von Billberg (thats his full name).

Don’t know what happened but somehow I didn’t wake up to my alarm today instead woke up after a friend from work called me up at 9:45 to find out where I was.

Me and Nat have been wanting to get a dog for some time now and we finally decided on what to get, a German Shepherd. We found a British Bulldog for sale (KD350 if anyone is interested) but in the end me and Nat want something much bigger. I have always loved German Shepherds, my cousin had two and I used to love playing with them. German Shepherds are very friendly and very loyal dogs who are mostly trained as police dogs. Today I called up a guy who imports pure bred German Shepherds from Eastern Germany, he has two dogs for sale, Larry and Ben. Ben is 2 years old while Larry is 11 months old. I was interested in Larry but I wasn’t able to see him because he is currently being trained at a school and has 2 more weeks before graduation. I met Ben and he was amazing, the dog is huge and EXTREMELY friendly. He couldn’t stop running around and jumping wanting to play with someone and when you called his name he would run towards you and start licking you. I saw pictures of Larry and he looked even finer and according to the owner even more playful. I also was able to see pictures of Larrys family, his mother and father, his grand parents and his grand grand parents. I saw his whole family tree and they all looked great. I am totally convinced about getting him except for one thing, the owner wants a thousand fucking dinars for him! Nat thinks we should just charge it on our Visa card but a thousand dinars for a dog?! I think thats just crazy, its like hmmm a Quad core 2.5ghz PowerMac or Larry? Now I have to quickly find her another option or else I am going to have to get Larry. I met a kid at Ace Hardware today who had a puppy with him, when I asked him where he got it from he told me Amazon.com! So now I need to check that out…

I posted about this dog back in July and I just found out it died on Friday. [Link]

Starting early next year AOL is going to start offering old TV shows to watch online for free. They will start with the following TV shows:

Adventures of Brisco County Jr., Alice, Babylon 5, Beetlejuice, Bret, Maverick, Cheyenne, Chico and the Man, Dark Justice, Eight is Enough, FBI, The Falcon Crest, Freakzoid, Freddy’s Nightmares, Fugitive, Growing Pains, Guns of Paradise, Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper, Head of the Class, Histeria, Hunter, Kung Fu, La Femme Nikita, Lois & Clark: The Adventures of Superman, New Adventures of Batman, Perfect Strangers, Pinky and the Brain, Sisters, Spenser: For Hire, Welcome Back Kotter and Wonder Woman.

From all the shows listed the ones I am looking forward to watching again are Spenser: For Hire, Hunter, Kung Fu, Growing Pains, Dark Justice, Perfect Strangers and The Falcon Crest.

[Link]

I am sitting here listening to the song Crimson by Circulation and I have to say, the PX100 are amazing. When I first got the PX100 I posted about them but now that I have been using them for over a week I am ready to review them. These headphones are really everything I was hoping them to be. They are light, compact, comfortable and sound fucking great.

I usually carry my stuff into work in the morning and then take them with me in the evening. I don’t like leaving my personal stuff behind and thats why I was looking for portable headphones. The PX100 fold up nicely into an amazingly designed case which I can fit in my pocket and then throw into my wrangler knowing that no matter how violent I am with it my headphones are tucked away safely in its hard case. I can imagine this case would also be perfect for throwing into your backpack which would be filled with books and other objects that might usually break your headphones.

During working hours I spend 90% of my time listening to music and if I work an 8 hour shift that means I spend maybe 7 hours listening to music (I know thats not exactly 90%). This is why I really needed my headphones to be comfortable and the PX100 are exactly that. I could have them on for 7 hours straight and not feel the need to take them off. They are super comfortable and light enough for me not to even realize that I have them on.

Now although comfort and portability were a priority in choosing a headphone, sound quality was even more important. Since I also own a pair of Bang & Olufsen A8’s (which suck) and Shure E2’s (great at isolation), I wanted these headphones to be everything the other 2 weren’t.. good in the low frequencies. The bass response in the PX100 is deep and tight and not overdone like my old Technics Dj1200’s were. The highs, the mids the lows, they are all there and perfectly balanced. I enjoy the sound of my Sennheisers now way more then the B&O’s and a bit more then the Shure E2s which is saying alto.

In conclusion I don’t think I ever need to buy another pair of headphones (Actually I do want to try the Grados). The Sennheiser PX100 turned out to be better then I was expecting them to be and I really love them. They cost $45 on Amazon and I think thats a steal, I would pay double the price easily. [Amazon Link]

If MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, Jabber, AOL or GTalk is blocked at your office or maybe you are on a computer which won’t allow you to install any of these chat programs, a new website will allow you to get on these messengers. I know there are many other websites that do this but this is the only one I know that uses Web 2.0. I just tried it out now and its great, works exactly like the real thing with chat windows which you can move around and stuff. Give it a try and you will see what I am talking about. [Link]

I was watching 5th Gear yesterday on the Discovery Channel when they had a bit on light poles similar to the ones used on Kuwait streets. They took a regular car and installed hardware on it so they could control it remotely and then driving at 45mph they made it ram into one of these steel light posts. The result was catastrophic. The light pole barely moved or bent while the car was destroyed and thrown violently around. If there was anyone in the car they would have been seriously wounded if not killed.

They then started to tell us about these new types of light poles that are being using in countries like Sweden and Finland, collapsible poles. These poles are made from aluminum and are designed to absorb the impact of a car and slow it down. They look very similar to the regular poles except of course they are very different.

To demonstrate how safe driving into the poles were the inventor of the “safe” poles got into a car wearing only a seatbelt and a helmet (to protect him from flying glass if any) and drove into a pole going at 45mph. It was incredible, once the car hit the pole it bent and the car drove over it slowing down. The car did get damaged but very lightly, the driver got out safely and the car was even drivable after the crash.

Now I have seen loads of accidents here in Kuwait specially on the Gulf Road where people have rammed into the light poles and gotten killed. With all the money in Kuwait how come the government hasn’t installed these new collapsible poles.. at least in places where it is very common for people to ram into them?

Update: Here is a link to an article abou the Lamppost which turns out has been in use in Sweden for the past 12 years! [Link]

Update 2: If you want to download the bit on the lamppost you can from the 5th Gear official website for a price of KD1 [Link]

Update 3: The video is on YouTube you can check it below

The Kuwait Advertising Awards it currently taking place at the Salwa Events Hall near Marina Crescent. I just got a message from my sister who is at the awards ceremony. The event started 1 hour late at 7 and they started of with speeches, according to her its very boring. I received another message from another art director from my agency who is there and according to him the event actually turned out to be very formal, so Nataly was right when she said it was a formal event.

Update: My sis called me after the event finished. Basically out of 22 awards my agency (JWT) took half of them while Nats agency (Saatchi&Saatchi) took the other half. Just to make it clear out of all the awards Saatchi took none were for Kuwait work, and out of all the awards my agency took only 1 was for Kuwait. The event supposingly was very unorganized and chaotic, my sister should be posting about it tonight on her blog.

I was researching on food when I came across this text which I really liked and would like to share:

Eating is a biological necessity, but answers about what is eatable and not only edible, the way we prepare food, the way we serve and consume meals in social settings are to be searched for in cultural and religious contexts.

We are born into a culture with its set of social relations, traditions and developments, values, food standards etc. During adolescence we get taste memories, which have an influence on our food choices, but we are challenged by different kinds of food, different kinds of lifestyles and culturally different ways of eating. We meet the unfamiliar and strange when we travel, through ethnic food restaurants and when we go shopping. The world is not static; changes seem to happen faster in relation to what we eat today, when, where and with whom we dine daily and on festive occasions. Industrial food production and the global market exist alongside the regional and national kitchens. Urban meal traditions, art of cooking, advertising, technology and taste affects us.

Taken from here.