Categories
Movies

Movies Showing in Kuwait over Eid

The movies below are now showing or will be showing over Eid at either Cinescape, Grand Cinemas or Sky Cinemas:

During Eid:
Deep (5.1)
Mr Frog (N/A)
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (7.0)
The Mummy (5.8) ♦
Transformers: The Last Knight (5.4)

Movies Showing Now:
Alien: Covenant (7.0) ♦
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (3.3)
Don’t Breathe (8.3) ♦
Fast & Furious 8 (7.5)
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (8.2) ♦
Hacksaw Ridge (8.8)
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (7.2)
The Boss Baby (6.5)
The Circle (7.5) ♦

The movies below are also now showing at the Scientific Center IMAX theater:

A Beautiful Planet 3D (7.9)
Flying Monsters 3D with David Attenborough (7.6)
Humpback Whales 3D (7.2)
Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Secret Ocean 3D (N/A)
Journey to Space 3D (6.5)
Kenya 3D: Animal Kingdom (6.0)
Mysteries of the Unseen World 3D (7.5)

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.
★ is for movies I’m interested in. ♦ implies movie might contain censorship.




Categories
Personal

Goodbye Alarm Clock

Back in 2001 when I first moved back to Kuwait from university and started my first job, the first thing I did with my very first salary ever was buy an alarm clock. It wasn’t just any alarm clock, it was the Nakamichi SoundSpace 3. The alarm clock had a CD player and was composed of three square shaped pieces, two were clocks, one for each side of the bed, while the third piece was the subwoofer. It cost me KD220 back then which was basically half my salary, but I used to love the Nakamichi brand and this was love at first sight. The picture above is the oldest picture I have of the alarm clock and its from 2003.

The alarm clock stayed with me for 16 years, and in that time I went through 4 jobs, 4 different blogs, a marriage, a divorce, 5 cars, 3 apartments and 2 dogs. Last night after watching an episode of the show “Hoarders“, I decided I would finally throw the alarm clock out. Now I regret it of course.

It’s pretty sad and reminded me of the old IKEA lamp commercial. I sometimes ask myself if I was to start all over again, would I be able to leave all my things behind? After throwing out my beloved alarm clock, I think I can. This post is dedicated to you alarm clock, goodbye.




Categories
Automotive

The Lotus Exige S – Three Months Later

I’ve had my Lotus Exige now for nearly three months and during this time I had a bunch of things done to the car in terms of upgrades and improvements. This post is mostly for people trying to google info on the Lotus, so if you’re not into cars in general, just skip this post. Before I get into the specifics of what I’ve done to the car, I do want to highlight one aspect of owning a Lotus that I wasn’t expecting, the amazing community.

The Lotus Community
The Lotus community has been pretty great so far, from the local dealership to online forums and even the main Lotus factory. Everyone is just so friendly and helpful. Like I’ve already mentioned in my previous posts on the car, the local dealer Alghanim has been incredible, I’ve got the brand manager whom I whatsapp whenever I need anything and is now more like a friend then a brand manager, I also have the same Lotus technician I deal with every time I’m at the garage whom I’m on a first name basis, so the whole experience feels very personalized. I’m also in contact with the only other Exige owner in Kuwait at the moment and we’re planning to meet up soon for a photoshoot. I want to see what he’s done to the car and show him what I’ve done. There is another Exige arriving any day now and its going to a guy who’s connected to my circle of friends as well and then there is another Exige arriving by the end of summer that will belong to a close friend. So we’re going to have a pretty great little Exige community popping up here in Kuwait soon.

But its not only in Kuwait where I’ve been having a great experience with Lotus people. When I first got the car I contacted Lotus in the UK regarding some questions I had with the AC, a guy called Tony who is their ‘Technical & Training’ guy responded to me within a few hours. When I emailed him some feedback regarding the AC system, he forwarded my email to their electrical and HVAC department so they could check it out. They actually care about their customers and since we are a small community take all feedback into consideration. A couple of days ago I had another question which I emailed him and again within a few hours he got back to me. Someone at the Lotus factory is replying to my emails in a few hours, I mean I don’t reply that fast to people who email my blog, it’s really impressive how personal the whole experience feels.

The people in the forums are also amazing. Since I got the car I’ve been an active user in The Lotus Forums and I’ve been trying to contribute to the community as much as I can [eg 1, 2, 3 and 4]. Since there are only a few hundred Exige (V6) owners around the world, there really isn’t much documentation and reviews online on various accessories and upgrades you can perform on the car. So whatever I’ve been doing, I’ve been documenting and sharing with the community.

The Upgrades
So like I mentioned at the start of this post, I went through a first round of different upgrades for the car, below is a list of what I’ve done so far.

Sound System
The first thing I did as soon as I got the car was upgrade the sound system. The car had four cheap-ass speakers and a very basic single-DIN car stereo that didn’t even have bluetooth. So I decided to upgrade the car with the following setup:

Alpine CDE-HD149BT Receiver
Alpine KTP-445A Amp
Focal 100AC Access Series Speakers (Front)
Focal 130AC Access Series Speakers (Rear)

The whole setup looks stock with the amp also hidden in the dashboard so you wouldn’t really be able to tell I changed anything. But sound wise its a huge improvement over the stock sound system and it didn’t really cost me much for basically what is top of the line stuff.

Carbon Fiber Covers for the Engine Bay
This was strictly a cosmetic and practicality upgrade. You can see the Lotus engine through the glass boot and since we have a lot of dust in Kuwait, I have to clean the engine bay every so often so that it looks presentable under the glass. I kept having trouble dusting one of the large plastic covers in the engine bay because it had a rough texture. So I ordered a pair of glossy carbon fiber covers from Komo-tec in Germany, and now the engine is sandwiched between two shiny carbon fiber pieces. If you want to see how the engine bay looked like before, click [Here]

2Bular Exhaust System
This was the biggest upgrade I did to the car, I swapped out the stock exhaust for one by 2Bular. There are three popular exhaust brands for the Lotus, 2Bular, Komo-tec and Larini, all three cost the same so in the end it came down to aesthetics and sound signature. 2Bular won on both those counts for me. The 2Bular exhausts are hand built by a guy called Jim Valentine in Aberdeen and he just does Lotus exhausts and nothing else. It took around a month from when I placed an order, had him build it and then get it shipped and delivered to my door here in Kuwait. Last year he had a backlog of orders and so was taking months to deliver the exhausts to customers which is why I was grateful it just took a month in my case. I had the exhaust installed at a local garage called Gemballa and I’m currently in the processes of breaking it in. It sounds really angry so far, but like the stock exhaust its also valved which means I can have it quiet when I want it quiet, and loud when I want it loud.

Soft Top
This is the last thing I got but won’t be using it till fall when the weather cools down. During the cold months I’ll be removing the hard top roof on the car and replacing it with the soft top. It will make taking off and putting on the roof a lot easier plus it rolls up and fits in the trunk, something I couldn’t do with the hard top. New at the local dealer the soft top costs KD900, but I found a used one on the German eBay for KD400 shipped to Kuwait. I decided it was too good a deal to pass and just bought it and will now store it till winter.

Whats Next?
Nothing, I think I’m done for now. I’m considering getting a small sub for the sound system, but because of the size of the car, it’s gonna be a bit of a headache to install and hide which is why I haven’t pulled the trigger on it yet. Other than that though I think I’m done with all the upgrades. I fucking love this car and I’m so glad I’ve got a friend getting one because we basically spend the whole time now sharing Exige videos and talking about the cars. It’s so much fun.




Categories
50s to 90s Geek

Digitizing Old Videos

Like with the pager in my previous post, while going through old boxes at my parents place I also found a bunch of old Video8 camcorder tapes. Luckily I also found my old camcorder and although the battery no longer works, the camcorder still functions properly when plugged into power. So last night I decided to digitize some old tapes.

If you want to digitize your old videos that are on VHS tapes or camcorder tapes, its actually not that complicated to do so. I’m using the Elgato Video Capture which I bought around 7 years back and it works on both Mac’s and PC’s. The way it works is also pretty simple:

1) Plug the Elgato device into your computers USB port
2) Connect your old VCR or camcorder to the Elgato just like you would to your TV
3) Run the Elgato software on your computer and press record
4) Press play on your VCR or camcorder
5) Thats it. Once your’d done click stop and the software saves the file

So if you’ve got old tapes lying around it’s really not that hard to digitize them and if its important stuff, I’d try and get it done as soon as possible. Here is the Amazon link to the Elgato video capture device I use [Link]




Categories
50s to 90s Technology

Found my old pager!

Yesterday while going through some old boxes at my parents place I found my old pager from high school (circa 1994/1995). I didn’t know I still had it so was pretty surprised to find it. I looked around the device to see what kind of charging cable I needed but I couldn’t find a charging port. Then I remembered it used regular batteries so I popped open the battery cover and inserted one AA battery and lo and behold, the pager turned on!

For those of you too young to know what a pager is or how it works, it was basically a device that was used before mobile phones when you wanted to talk to someone. Every pager had a phone number and when you called it, the number you’re calling from would display on the pagers screen. The pager owner would then call back the number when they were near a phone to see who called. When you would call a pager, the automated answering system would also ask you if you wanted to leave an optional 3 digit code. That 3 digit code would show up on the persons paging device when you called. So usually you would assign different codes to different friends, so say my best friend would use “666” that way when I get a page and I see “666” after the phone number, I know it’s my best friend trying to get a hold of me. If you left “010” it basically meant fuck you, “911” meant it was urgent and I’m sure there were other numbers that also had other meanings.

What I also remembered was how when you got a page you’d go looking for a shop that would let you use their phone so you could call back the number from. I mostly ended up using the phones at baqalas but it was also an issue the other way around. Sometimes you would use the phone of a shop or a baqala to page a friend, and then you’d just wait at the place near the phone for your friend to call you back.

The pager model I had I think was the most popular (Panasonic EK-2097), but I think there were only ever two models of pagers available to choose from back then. There were no private telecom companies, the pager I have was from the government operated Mobile Telephone Systems Co. (K.S.C.) which I think later became Mobile Telecommunications Company (M.T.C.) which later became Zain. If I’m wrong, let me know in the comments.




Categories
Animals & Wildlife Interesting

Gatwa W Gahwa, the First Cat Cafe in Kuwait

Gatwa W Gahwa is a cat cafe thats soft launching this coming Saturday. They’re located in the basement of Galleria 2000 in Salmiya and they have around 10 cats which you can hang out and play with. The idea of a cat cafe isn’t new, I got to experience one around 5 years ago when I was in Japan, but this will be the first cat cafe in Kuwait and only the second in the region.

The price for spending time and playing with the cats is KD3.5 for half an hour or KD5 for an hour. They will be offering discounts for those who wish to stay longer and even a monthly membership for those who want to come in everyday. You’ll also be able to book the whole place for book readings or even cat yoga. I was there earlier today and the cats are super cute and really playful. I was pretty surprised at how beautiful some of the cats were, for some reason when I heard they were rescued cats I was expecting to find a cafe fill with street cats but instead all the cats I interacted with were so cute and fluffy.

They’re soft opening from this Saturday and their timings during Ramadan will be 12PM to 4PM and then 8PM to 12AM. After Ramadan their working hours will be 11AM to 10PM. They’ll also have an online reservation system up and running this weekend. For more information check out their instagram account @catcafeq8

PS: Remember Abdulai? He now works at the Cat Cafe!

Update: Their website and reservation system is now online [Here]




Categories
Design

Cinescape Website Redesigned

Cinescape have finally given their website a much needed facelift and just in time before Eid. The new website makes looking for, and booking a movie a much faster experience with a lot less clicking and page reloads.

When you first enter the website you have all the movies currently showing listed, if you’re looking for movies playing in a specific Cinescape location, you just click on the location on the left sidebar and it will filter out all the movies not playing in that location without having to reload the page. Booking is also a much quicker process now with the quick book option and overall you can do a lot more now without having to leave the main page. The website also looks pretty great on mobile browsers.

The only thing that seems to be missing in the new redesign is the banned movies section. Cinescape used to have a page where they would list all the movies that were banned by the MOI and it seems they’ve now removed that in this new version of the website.

If you want to check out their new website, click [Here]




Categories
Law

Kuwait Law: Home Businesses Can Now Be Licensed

New bylaws were passed yesterday that now allow some businesses to operate legally with a license from their homes (aka home business). There are some requirements to obtain this license including the following:

– Kuwaitis only can apply for a home license
– Must be older than 21 years old
– You need permission from the home owner
– The license is mostly for services such as designers, calligraphist, illustrators, photographers, web and app developers, watchmakers, gardeners, technicians, event planners, translators, museums, and so on.
– No cupcakes, or burgers or any other food businesses can be licensed from homes

The Ministry of Commerce does not want to turn residential areas into commercial areas, they still want homes to be homes but a lot of businesses don’t involve a lot of interaction with customers or require customers to come over and so it doesn’t make sense that those businesses require a commercial space. The ministry has stated that the above law will come into effect first day after Eid.

I want to dedicate this post to my dear friend Ahmed Al Gharabally who recently passed away. Ahmed was a lobbyist and an activist that worked really hard on bringing this law to life through @legalizekw, a campaign that was launched to make home business in Kuwait legal. May you RIP Ahmed. It is great to see young Kuwaitis actively suggest new laws, and the new and young minister of commerce and industry Mr. Khaled Al Roudhan has done a wonderful job listening to their suggestions and attending their events.

For any legal inquiries, please email me on [email protected] and my team or I will get back to you within 24 hours.

Post by Fajer Ahmed – Legal Counsel
The legal opinions expressed in this post are those of the author Fajer. Opinions expressed by Mark or any other writer on mark248am1.wpenginepowered.com are those of the individual’s and in no way reflect Fajer’s opinion.




Categories
Video Games

The eSports Scene in Kuwait

eSports is a form of competition that involves video games and it’s a scene thats blowing up pretty big worldwide with teams making millions of dollars off of sponsorships and prize money. If you do a quick google image search for esports stadiums you’ll find photos of large stadiums and arenas packed with people watching gamers compete against one another (similar to the one below). It’s pretty insane really and regionally it’s also starting to blow up. A number of eSports competitions are being held locally and around the region, and one Kuwaiti team has been making waves recently, Evolve Gaming.

Evolve Gaming was formed early this year and is composed of 6 members aged between 17 and 26. Recently they came first in the largest Overwatch tournament in the Middle East and Africa destroying the competition. Overwatch is a multiplayer first-person shooter and Evolve Gaming beat the popular and more established Dubai based team YaLLa eSports 3-0. Even though YaLLa has sponsors, a large fanbase, more support and a proper e-gaming atmosphere, the Kuwaiti team managed to beat them with ease and just a couple months after being formed.

Evolve Gaming is currently ranked as the #1 Overwatch team in the Middle East and Africa and so I got in touch with them recently to get an idea of what our local scene lacks and how I can help. According to a team member I spoke to, one of the biggest issues we have locally is the lack of awareness. Even though the eSports scene is growing rapidly abroad, locally not a lot of people know about it although its starting to pick up with a few gaming tournaments taking place locally like the Kuwait’s eSports Tournament and the Hydra Entertainment Tournaments. Evolve Gaming is hoping large companies will realize this is a growing market and help it grow even quicker by sponsoring local teams and tournaments. By having large companies sponsor local teams and events, it would bring a lot more attention to this sport which will also encourage more teams to formed and more events to take place.

Hopefully my post will help bring a bit of exposure to their community. If you’d like to follow Evolve Gaming they’re active on twitter @EvolveGamingKW. If you’re also a company that is interested in sponsoring Evolve Gaming or a tournament, get in touch and I’ll pass you their contacts.




Categories
Apple

To Touch Bar or Not to Touch Bar

Yesterday Apple updated their MacBook Pro lineup and so I decided to post a quick update on my experience with the Touch Bar. If you’re trying to decide if you should get the MacBook Pro with or without the Touch Bar, this is my quick feedback after using it for nearly 6 months, it’s worth getting.

Since I got the MacBook Pro I’ve been experimenting with it a lot, customizing it to my liking and trying to understand how to make best use of it. After 6 months, I’ve basically resorted to using it as a secondary display, and I like that. For the past few months I’ve been using my Touch Bar with the setup you can see in the image above. I have half of the Touch Bar working as a stock ticker keeping me posted constantly on how my stocks are doing, while the other half dedicated to my music controls and an emoji shortcut button. The area further to the right of that can’t be customized and includes Apple mandatory shortcuts like volume control, screen brightness, spotlight shortcut etc..

I’ve customized my Touch Bar to permanently display the above information in nearly every application since I realized I wasn’t using the default shortcuts that apps would display. Some programs like FaceTime I leave it at the applications default display since I like the information thats displayed, in FaceTime’s case the amount of time I’ve been on the call for. I actually like how customizable the Touch Bar is although I’m using the third part software BetterTouchTool to be able to do that.

So if you’re trying to decide if you should get the Touch Bar version of the MacBook Pro or not, I’d personally recommend you get the Touch Bar version. Other than making your laptop look a lot more futuristic and different from the MacBook you’re replacing (I’m assuming you already own a MacBook), the Touch Bar does have functionality and you’ll love the ability to customize it. Want it to display the name of the song you’re listening to? You can do that. Want it to have custom shortcuts? You can do that. It’s really flexible so if you like to tinker and personalize stuff you’ll love it.




Categories
Healthier Lifestyle Reviews Sports

Review: Fitbit Alta HR

A couple of months back, Fitbit sent me their latest fitness tracker to review, the Alta HR. I’m a mechanical watch kind of guy and so don’t own an Apple Watch so figured this would be a good alternative. I’d be able to keep wearing my mechanical watches on one wrist, and a fitness tracker on the other.

The Fitbit Alta HR is a pretty great looking tracker, it’s slim and looks like a regular rubber bracelet and so can be worn on the opposite wrist of your watch and not look like you’re wearing two watches. The biggest selling point for me with the Fitbit was the fact it had a heart rate monitor. I’ve been going to spinning quite a bit and was curious to know how many calories I was burning exactly. Since the Fitbit could monitor my heart rate, I assumed it would be great at that one job… it wasn’t. But I’ll get to that in a minute.

The Alta HR has a pretty simple and straight forward screen that can display the time, your heart rate, how many steps you’ve done, how many calories you’ve burned and a bunch of other information. You flip through the screens by tapping the screen and using the Fitbit app on your phone, you can even customize what information you want to show on the screen and in what order. So in my case the first screen would show me my heart rate, second screen the calories burned, followed by my active minutes and finally the battery life.

I like the screen because of its simplicity but I hate the responsiveness of it. I have quick view turned off since I don’t want the screen to turn on randomly when I raise or flick my wrist, so to turn the screen on I need to tap it. Problem is, 99% of the time it doesn’t turn on with the first tap, 70% of the time it doesn’t turn on with the second tap, 30% of the time it doesn’t turn on with the 3rd tap either. I have to tap the screen a few times to get it to wake up and thats very frustrating. The other major issue I have with the Alta HR is that the heart rate monitor doesn’t seem to work when I’m sweaty which is when I need it to work the most since thats when I’m working out. During spinning when I’m curious to see my heart rate, I need to tap a few times on the screen to turn it on and when it finally would come on I’d get “–” which means it can’t read my heart rate. Then the screen shuts off again and I tap it a few times to wake it up and I get “–” again. Then the screen shuts off and I tap it again a few times and suddenly its reading my heart rate and showing “148” or whatever my heart rate is at that moment. So much work and in the middle of spinning its really unpractical.

The worst part is it doesn’t seem to be accurate at all. Saturday I ditched my gym and didn’t do any exercise other than binge watch season 2 of “F is for Family” and my Fitbit says I burned 2,995 calories that day. Yesterday on the other hand I had 45 minutes of spinning and my Fitbit says I burned 3,084 calories all day. It won’t do the one thing I wanted the Fitbit to do which is let me know how many calories I’m burning during spinning. It doesn’t make any sense.

On the bright side, it does seem to be good at doing one thing really well, monitoring my sleep. The Fitbit is pretty accurate in knowing when you fall asleep and when you wake up. It also uses your heart rate to monitor how much deep sleep you’re getting, if you’re waking up in the middle of the night and how much light sleep you’re getting. So if you want to monitor your sleeping patterns this is actually a pretty great tracker for that. Another great feature is the ability to vibrate when you get a phone call or message. My phone is always on silent and I tend to not notice it vibrating sometimes. Now my wrist vibrates as well and so I haven’t missed a call ever since I started wearing the Fitbit. Battery life on this thing is also fantastic, it lasts around a week of constant use which means you don’t have to constantly be charging it.

Overall though I’m pretty disappointed with the Alta HR. The biggest selling point for me was the ability to monitor my heart rate and let me know how many calories I was burning but that didn’t work out as planned. The FitBit Alta HR is selling for around KD54 on [Xcite] and KD59 on [Blink]. Here is a link to the official Fitbit Alta HR product page [Link]




Categories
Photography

Printing Digital and Film Photos

A few years ago I posted about my favorite place to print digital photos, Boushahri off of Baghdad Street in Salmiya. Since that post two things have happened, first they merged or got bought out (not sure which) by their old competitor Ashkanani who used to be located across the street from them. The second thing that happened is they changed locations.

Saturday night I passed by their old Baghdad Street location to print some photos and found them closed. So I passed by yesterday morning and they were still closed. I just figured their Ramadan timings were weird and I was missing them. Then by chance last night, I was walking over from my apartment building to the ATM machine in the building next door when I came across their new location. I recognized all the employees before I noticed the sign outside and walked in. Turns out they had just moved to the new location this past Saturday.

Ashkanani can print your digital photos in various sizes, I usually print them in 10×15 and it costs 150fils per photo. For film lovers they also sell 35mm film in their store and they can also develop any size of film including 35mm and 120mm (as long as its color film).

So if you’re looking for a place to develop your photos, here is their location on [Google Maps]. If you’re driving there then I would recommend you park in the lot next to McDonalds across the street.

Update: Found a cheaper and quicker place to develop film. Click here for more info.




Categories
Movies

Movies Showing in Kuwait this Weekend

The movies below are now showing at either Cinescape, Grand Cinemas or Sky Cinemas:

New This Week:
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (3.6)
Fireman Sam: Alien Alert! The Movie (7.7)
The Exception (6.5) ♦

Other Movies Showing:
Alien: Covenant (7.0) ♦
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul (3.3)
Everything, Everything (6.2)
Fast & Furious 8 (7.5)
Gifted (7.8)
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (8.2) ♦
Here Alone (5.2) ♦
Jurassic World [Re-Release] (7.0)
King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (7.2)
Minions [Re-Release] (6.4)
Smurfs: The Lost Village (5.8)
The Bleeder [Chuck] (6.8) ♦
The Boss Baby (6.5)
The Circle (7.5) ♦

The movies below are now showing at the Scientific Center IMAX theater:

A Beautiful Planet 3D (7.9)
Flying Monsters 3D with David Attenborough (7.6)
Humpback Whales 3D (7.2)
Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Secret Ocean 3D (N/A)
Journey to Space 3D (6.5)
Kenya 3D: Animal Kingdom (6.0)
Mysteries of the Unseen World 3D (7.5)

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.
★ is for movies I’m interested in. ♦ implies movie might contain censorship.




Categories
Food & Drinks Information

Restaurants that Deliver Before Iftar (2017)

If you’re not fasting and want to order food before Iftar, then below are some restaurants that will deliver early. It’s not a big list but it’s still better than nothing.

China Garden
Deliveries start after 11AM
Telephone: 25720010

China Kitchen
Deliveries start after 11:30AM
Telephone: 25738754

Marina Thai
Deliveries start after 12:30PM
Telephone: 23720040

Noodles
Deliveries start after 12PM
Telephone: 25749933

Osaka
Deliveries start after 10AM
Telephone: 22637331

Pastamania
Deliveries start after 12PM
Telephone: 1828585

Sea Taste Restaurant
Open 24 hours
Telephone: 66395655

Ubon
Deliveries start after 1PM
Telephone: 22260848

Upper Crust Pizzeria
Deliveries start after 11AM
Telephone: 22943200

I’ll be updating the list above as I find out about more places, if you know of a place that delivers before Iftar (like 3PM or earlier) let me know.

Update: Removed Poele from the list since it turned out they only had desserts and bread 12PM onwards. Also removed Beit Dickson since they had originally told me deliveries start 12PM onwards but now are stating 5PM onwards.




Categories
Food & Drinks Information

Ramadan Buffets in Kuwait (2017)

Every year I put a list of Ramadan buffets together and every year the list grows. Since it was becoming a bit cumbersome to navigate, I’ve decided to split the list up this year into two to make it slightly easier to go through. Below is this years list, the first half is a list of hotels with their buffet prices while the second half of the list are restaurants. Like always I’ve highlighted the price increases over the previous year in red, and the decreases in green. Check out the full list below:

Hotels

Al Jahra Copthorne Hotel & Resort – Taima’a Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD10 (-2.000)
Telephone: 24590000

Courtyard by Marriott
Buffet Price: KD14 (+1.000)
Telephone: 22997000

Crowne Plaza – Al Ahmadi Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD14.950 (+0.950)
Telephone: 1848111

Hilton Resort – Teatro Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD17.500 (+2.000)
Telephone: 22256222

Inn & GO Hotel – Al Dallah Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD9.9 (+0.900)
Telephone: 22436686

Jumeirah Messilah Beach – Garden Cafe
Buffet Price: KD19
Telephone: 22269600

JW Marriott – Al Thuraya
Buffet Price: KD15
Telephone: 22455550

Millennium Hotel & Convention – Lamar International Restaurant
Set Menu Price: KD14
Telephone: 22050505

Movenpick – Free Zone – Bays Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD12
Telephone: 24610033

Movenpick – Al Bida’a – Breeze Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD15
Telephone: 22253100

Radisson Blu – Al Bustan Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD14
Telephone: 25673000

Safir Hotel – Fintas
Buffet Price: KD14.500
Telephone: 25455555

Sheraton – Coral Tent
Buffet Price: KD17.750 (+0.500)
Telephone: 22422055

Symphony Style Hotel
Buffet Price: KD12 (+1.000)
Telephone: 25770000

The Regency Kuwait – Silk Road Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD18
Telephone: 25766880

Restaurants

Abdel Wahab
Buffet Price: KD10
Telephone: 1821000

Al Noukhaza Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD14.950
Telephone: 24757775 or 1823888

Al Sanawbar Lebanese Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD9.000 (-0.950)
Telephone: 25756273

Applebee’s
Set Menu Price: KD7.950
Telephone: 1844466 or 25381481

Assaha Lebanese Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD10 (-1.000)
Telephone: 22533377

Avanti Palace
Set Menu Price: Vegetarian KD3.100 – Non Vegetarian KD3.500 (both min 4 people)
Telephone: 25751081

Burj Al-Hamam
Buffet Price: KD12.5
Telephone: 22529095

Dar Hamad
Buffet Price: KD15 (+1.500)
Telephone: 22275555

Enab Beirut
Set Menu Price: KD12
Telephone: 90009874

Jeans Grill
Buffet Price: KD8.500 (+0.550)
Telephone: 22264503

Kababji
Set Menu Price: KD5.950 (+0.450)
Telephone: 1861616

Kosebasi
Set Menu Price: KD9.750 (+2.250)
Telephone: 22251303

Kuwait Towers
Buffet Price: KD11 (-3.000)
Telephone: 22081999

La Brasa Argentinian Grill
Set Menu: KD11
Telephone: 99052419

Leila
Set Menu Price: KD10 (+0.500) – min 6 people
Telephone: 22996414

Naranj
Buffet Price: KD12.5
Telephone: 22268666

Palm Palace
Buffet Price: KD9.250 (+0.350)
Telephone: 67009575

Pop A Loop
Set Menu Prices: KD9 to KD14 (+1.000)
Telephone: 22271439

Qasr Al-Saraya
Buffet Price: KD9 (+0.500)
Telephone: 25711101

Ruby Tuesday
Set Menu Price: KD7.950 (-2.000)
Telephone: 22444454

Saladworks
Set Menu Price: KD2.750 to KD4.750
Telephone: 22201888

Tallu Hbabna
Buffet Price: KD10
Telephone: 51113700

Tandooriwala
Set Menu Price: KD6.750
Telephone: 25745458

Vapiano
Set Menu Price: KD6.000 (+0.450)
Telephone: 22597171

Veranda
Set Menu Price: KD12.450
Telephone: 22283141

Villa Fayrouz
Buffet Price: KD9.500 (-0.500)
Telephone: 22650052

Zafran
Buffet Price: KD8 (+0.500)
Telephone: 22285203 or 97281007

If you’d like to add a restaurant to the list above [Email Me]

Note: The prices listed above are for adults. Some restaurants offer special prices for children. I will add more restaurants to this list as I find out about them.