Search: “kuwait”

A couple of days back I passed by the Kuwait National Museum for a little bit of exploration. Last week some friends of mine were given a tour of the two buildings that were still vacant and in shambles since the 1990 invasion and I really wanted to go check it out for myself. I’ve always been curious to see whats inside so I headed there on Thursday to take a look.

The museum is made up of four main buildings with two being occupied and two vacant. One of the vacant ones had under construction hoardings all around but the other building didn’t and the door was open so I just walked in. I took some photos which you can check out above, the black and white ones are from the first building I walked to while the colored ones are from the second building. There was nothing really to see since it looks like they’re finally renovating the building but at least I got to satisfy my curiosity.

If anyone knows where I can get some photos of the museum taken right after the invasion let me know. Also if anyone can get me access to the abandoned Al-Salam Palace then please email me.

The Kuwait Motor Show starts from today at 360 Mall and has over 70 vehicles on display. This will probably be the largest car show this year since I don’t see any automotive event on the Kuwait International Fair events page. [Link]

The 2013-2014 ‘Global Competitiveness’ report ranked Kuwait the worst GCC country in:

1. Access to loans
2. Direct foreign investment
3. Government surplus/deficit
4. Financial services
5. Quality of primary education
6. Quality of higher education
7. Quality of math and science education
8. Procurement of advanced technology products
9. Intellectual property protection
10. Bribes
11. Governmental laws
12. Brain drain
13. Extent of staff training
14. Starting a business
15. Technology transfer

Ouch. [PDF]

via Kazima

The World Design Rankings is based on the number of designers that have been granted an A’ Design Award. Kuwait is ranked 16th (which is pretty high) mostly because of AGi Architects who’ve won 14 awards so far. AGi are the guys behind projects like the Secret House pictured up top and the Star House pictured below.

I absolutely hate the architecture of residential buildings in Kuwait so it’s always great seeing how buildings can be beautiful in Kuwait if they’re done right. Check out all their projects on their website [Here] and their Facebook page [Here]

[YouTube]

I was kinda curious at first to how he was allowed to play with the ball inside Avenues, but then I remembered I’ve actually caught kids before kicking the ball from one side of Avenues to the other.

The friendly American Football game between the Kuwait Gridiron team and the Swiss Neuchatel Knights is taking place tonight (January 18th) at 6:30PM at the Kuwait University Stadium. Entrance is free and it’s not everyday an American Football match involving a Kuwaiti team takes place. So pass by if you can. [Link]

Spotify is my favorite digital music service and whenever I post about it on the blog people always ask me how I manage to get it working. Geek in Kuwait has put together easy step by step instructions to follow to get Spotify and Netflix working in Kuwait. So if you’re interested in getting those two services working, follow this [Link]

Note: I use StrongVPN to bypass blocked websites. Also with Spotify unlike Pandora, once you sign up you no longer need to use a VPN to use it.

[YouTube]

Shark of Kuwait has setup a YouTube channel and has started uploading all his videos. If you don’t know who Shark of Kuwait check this old post of mine. To check out his YouTube channel click [Here]

While flipping through some old files I found this old article from Kuwait Times about blogging in Kuwait. It’s from 2004 and back then I had stopped posting on qhate.com and instead moved to moblogging photos (kinda like instagram). Back then the blogging community was really tiny, it’s crazy how things have changed since then. Check out the article [Here]

Note: The link to Qhate in the article is wrong, it should be https://qhate.com

Mr. Greek, one of the largest Greek cuisine restaurant chains in North America is opening up this week at the Marina Mall food court.

There used to be a Greek restaurant before on Blajat Street called Zorba which closed down years ago. I’m surprised no one thought of opening up another Greek restaurant until now.

Fast Company released an infographic showing the life expectancy of nearly every country in the world including Kuwait. In Asia, Kuwait came in at 11th place with a life expectancy of 77 while Macau and Japan both topped Asia’s list with 84. Regionally, both Bahrain and Qatar performed better than Kuwait with a life expectancy of 78.

So where would you have to be born to live the longest? The answer is Monaco where the life expectancy is 90 years of age. Check out the full article [Here]

Thanks John

Thanks Wahab

Just a bit of positivity to start off the day (yes my day starts at noon). Local startup FishFishMe have secured $200,000 from investors to expand their operations globally. FishFishMe is an online platform to book fishing charter boats and they’re already pretty global as it is but with the new investment they’re hoping to expand even more while also improving their current offerings. If you haven’t checked out FishFishMe before you should, here is a link to their [Website]

Goes to show, a good idea is a good idea no matter where you’re based.

The American chain Denny’s is coming to Kuwait and the Middle East. Their first location is opening next year in UAE followed by locations in the rest of the region. They’re known for serving breakfast, lunch and dinner 24 hours a day so hopefully they won’t be opening up in a mall. [Link]

One of my favorite news sources Quartz just published a list of the cheapest beer prices in the world as well as the most expensive. On the list of cheapest beer prices, Saudi Arabia came fourth which kinda makes sense since I know non alcoholic beer like Barbican are super popular there. Quartz also put up a list of the most expensive beers in the world and thats where Kuwait comes in.

According to their data, the price of 0.5L of draught beer is $6.48. Problem is I don’t know of any place in Kuwait that serves draught beer (that’s beer from a tap). Quartz assumes the reason the price of beer in Kuwait is expensive is because it’s illegal and link to a post of mine from last year in which I had published the prices of alcohol in Kuwait (taken from a newspaper). Problem is if the price was based on illegal alcoholic beer then Kuwait would top the chart. The price I had posted was around KD150-KD180 for a case. A case has 24 cans and KD150 is around $530. 24 cans x 330ml = 7.92L ÷ 0.5L = 15.84. $530 ÷ 15.84 = $33.4. So the price of 0.5L of beer in Kuwait is $33.4 which is a lot more than $6.48.

Anyway check out their article [Here]