Search: “kuwait”

I’ve told them to let me know of their next event before it happens that way I can post about it here in case anyone wants to take part in it.

The 2nd Street Spray Soup took place in Shuwaikh Market. Some of Kuwait’s most talented artists gathered for good conversation, an exchange of ideas and to just draw together while giving one another tips. Mogahwi Stationery, LB o J’zazz, The Kuwait Times and some of Kuwait’s best dancers Doss and C-Sick also dropped by to support the event.

[YouTube]

Yellow Lemon is a new small breakfast place that opened up around two weeks ago in Salmiya near Sultan Center Shaab. It’s been awhile since a new breakfast place opened up and I’ve kinda started getting bored with my usual spots so I was pretty excited to check this place out.

When we arrived to the place it was empty except for one other table that was occupied. In total there are only five tables in the place, two large ones enough to fit four, and three small ones that fit two. The menu is divided into three main parts, omelettes, pancakes and more eggs which are different dishes made using eggs. I opted for the Turkey Muffin, a no carbs dish consisting of baked eggs wrapped in smoked turkey and filled with tomatoes and feta cheese while my friend went for their signature Lemon Pancakes. We also ordered a small bottle of water and orange juice for our drinks.

There wasn’t any music playing so it was a bit awkward having a conversation in such a small place since it felt like everyone could hear us. But, just as our food arrived, more people came in and filled the place up creating a much more cozier and comfortable atmosphere. My dish looked great and had a side of chopped watermelon. It was a very light carb free protein dish that might have been just a tad undercooked but was still fine since I prefer that to it being overcooked. My friend enjoyed the lemon pancakes as well so we were both pretty satisfied with our choices.

My biggest issue with the place had to do with the price of the water and orange juice. A small bottle of water costs KD1.000 while a teeny tiny glass of orange juice was for KD1.500. There is absolutely no reason why water should cost so much at a small hole in the wall and the same goes with the orange juice. The food was more reasonably priced with my Turkey Muffin costing KD3 while the Lemon Pancakes KD3.750. Nothing on the menu exceeded KD4.

The question on would I go back is a difficult one to answer. On the one hand my favorite hole in the wall breakfast place is The Early Bird and one of the best things there is the atmosphere of the place which this place lacks. Yellow Lemon feels like they want to be an upscale hole in the wall breakfast place targeting posh girls, and you know what, that might actually work. On the other hand I would only go back if I’m looking for a quiet private place, maybe for a morning business meeting.

For more information on Yellow Lemon including a map, check out their instagram account @yellowlemonkwt

[YouTube]

Zaina is a Kuwaiti Zumba instructor who was in Japan recently and had a pretty cool experience which I thought would be interesting to share here:

Quick background story: I was in Osaka, Japan with some friends right outside the metro station en route to Kyoto. On the way in I noticed a bunch of different dance crews practicing in their own corners, with their own boom boxes. I sat around and watched for a while until my friend suggested we Zumba!

Despite the major language barrier between us, we managed to find a way and communicated through dance. This is definitely one of the best moments that I’ve encountered on my journey in the Zumba and dance world. OH I also need to mention that this video is the first and only shot. This amazing group of dancers had never heard the song or seen ANY of the choreo prior to what you see!

I loved the whole thing from the story to the video which is why I wanted to share it here. If you’re interested in Zumba you can follow Zaina on instagram @zainzumba or on Facebook [Here]

Ray Elbe, the Kuwait based MMA fighter just finished filming season 2 of Al Batal, the first Arab MMA Reality TV show thats similar to the Ultimate Fighter but based out of the UAE. This is the second season and is going to feature 12 fighters of Arab ethnicity flown in from around the world to compete for the opportunity to be champion in either the 70 kilo or 84 kilo weight division. Ray is leading one of the teams on the show so if you’re interested, the show premiers September 27th on FOX Movies, check out the trailer above. [YouTube]

Kuwait Punjabi Clash Video by PunjabLatestNews

A huge fight took place between a group of Indian and Egyptian workers ending with 2 of the Egyptian workers dead and 25 Indians arrested by the police. I found the video above which shows a bit of the fight but haven’t been able to find another video nor find out the reason behind they fought in the first place. [Link]

If you’re going down to Lebanon for Eid at the end of the month, here are my favorite places you need to visit for 2014:

SUN.DAYS at Skybar
Skybar Beirut have something new going on this year and it’s called SUN.DAYS. Starts at 6:30PM on Sundays while the sun is still up and goes on till past midnight. The whole Skybar gets a major makeover for SUN.DAYS with fake grass flooring, a raised bar area and colorful lounges and chairs all over. It actually takes them nearly 12 hours to setup this conversion, that’s how dedicated they are to SUN.DAYS. There are also special guests on SUN.DAYS and while I was there HVOB were performing and I ended up capturing the great shot below. Reservation is a must.

Le Montagnou
Probably the nicest looking pool in Lebanon with the greatest view. Located up in Faraya, Le Montagnou is a restaurant with an outdoor pool and bar. Caters mostly to the fancy schmancy crowd of Faraya and Faqra but still cheaper than many pools in Beirut and cheaper than most of the pools in Kuwait. Stay for the sunset and reservation is a must.

The Gärten by Uberhaus
They’re only open Saturday night from around 8PM to 6AM and it was favorite place last summer and again this summer. It’s an outdoor club that’s open just for the summer with a large green garden filled with bean bags on one side and a huge open dome which is the dance floor on the other.

Internazionale
There are a ton of great pubs in Mar Mikhael but my favorite this trip was Internazionale. It’s owned by the same owner as another favorite pub of mine Torino Express. Internazionale has two advantages over Torino, a larger space and the fact it’s located in the more vibrant Mar Mikhael area. Just like at Torino, the owner DJ’s here as well.

The Train Station
I wish I had taken pictures of this place but I didn’t have my camera on me then. The Train Station is located on the grounds of the old Mar Mikhael train station. They’ve taken one of the abandoned rusty 50+ year old trains and setup a DJ booth inside. They then setup a bar along with tables all around and they’ve kept everything intact including a rust old water tower which the bar surrounds. Pricy for what it is but it’s worth checking out.

The Junkyard
Also located in Mar Mikhael, The Junkyard is located in a large space between a heavily packed residential area and the theme of the place is a giant junkyard. There is indoor and outdoor seating it’s also worth passing by and checking out since it’s visually interesting. The place is a bit too bright so best to start off your evening with The Junkyard which makes sense anyway since they have a good food menu filled with friendly dishes like burgers and fish & chips.

Make sure you check out last years Ultimate Lebanon Summer Guide since most of the recommendations are still applicable as well [Link]

According to zDistrict, the Kuwaiti banks will now be complying with FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act) which means any American citizen will have their bank information automatically passed on to the IRS for tax purposes. For Kuwaitis with dual citizenship this might end up being a problem with no easy way out. Check out the post [Here]

The image above has been making its rounds on instagram and whatsapp reportedly showing a large ship leaking oil into the Kuwaiti sea near the KPC building in Shuwaikh. Other than the fact that I think this is an old picture, according to a redditor who works with large ships this isn’t even a leak:

When it gets shallow the props brings the mud off the bottom, then it kid of sits there in a cloud while a tug boat is pushing it off to the side. The pollution regulations are huge when it comes to shipping, if it was a leak the last thing that would be happening is a tug boat spreading the oil with it’s props. [Source]

I should have posted this earlier but basically the reason I haven’t been posting here for a few days is because I’m on vacation right now. I’m spending my time with friends outdoors and checking my emails just once a day. It feels good to be disconnected but everything will be back to normal in a couple of days once I’m back in Kuwait.

The MOI released an iPhone App recently allowing you to perform a bunch of tasks like checking on your traffic violations and E-Payments. Sadly the app is not that great since it isn’t really offering anything new compared to other non-official apps that have been out longer and most of us already have installed on our phones.

My main issues with the app is the speed of some of the sections and the fact that it won’t memorize your details. To be able to check on your traffic violations for example you need to set up an account with them. That’s great since it means you don’t have to type in your Civil ID every single time you want to check on something but you still have to type in your password which is annoying. Then for some reason the E-Payments section requires you to type in your Civil ID number instead of allowing you to log in with your username and password like the other sections. It’s a mess.

On the other hand the app is free and it’s the official app. For those of you who prefer not to share your Civil ID with non-official apps this is for you. [Link]

Back in April the government forced all the scrap yards in Amghara to close down and relocate to a new location further up north near the Saudi border. The previous location used to be located off of the 6th Ring Road, around 10-15 minutes from 360 Mall but the new location is around 45 minutes further away from that location. I’ve been wanting to visit the place but I kept putting it off because I thought it was too far away until yesterday I decided to finally check it out.

Before I headed out I filled up my car with a full tank of gas, got a few bottles of water with me and set up a music play list. If this was going to be a long trip I wanted to make sure it was a comfortable one. The location of the new yards was on the same road as the Ali Al Salem Air Base, an area I know pretty well since it’s where I usually drive to when I take cars on a test drive. It’s very easy to get to, you just take the 6th Ring Road and drive north until you see an exit for Ali Al Salem Air Base, you then take it and drive 30 minutes further down past the base until you see the scrap yards on your right hand side. It’s not complicated and I have the exact location linked at the end of the post.

Once I got near the scrap yard location I noticed a small sign on the main road, it had a Mercedes logo and an arrow pointing right so I exited the main road headed down a dirt road towards the area. It suddenly felt like I was in a post-apocalyptic future where I was driving in the middle of the desert looking for supplies and I just found this small lawless city. It literally was a city in the middle of the desert surrounded by sand on all four sides.

When I finally got to the junkyards the sight was very familiar, different fenced up yards all located side by side with each one specializing in a style or brand of vehicles. I wasn’t looking for anything so I just drove around scouting the area before heading back to the city.

The journey really wasn’t bad at all, there is never any traffic on that road and it’s really peaceful. If you’re interested in heading out there, here is the location on [Google Maps]

The European production company behind the 4 part documentary on Kuwait that is being aired on British Airways will be in Kuwait next week and they need your help. The 4 part series is being spread out over a one year period, the first part was released last week while the second will be released before the end of the year.

[YouTube]

The second part of the documentary will be focusing on tourism so they’re looking for places or activities to film that are off the beaten track. Meaning, they know about Souk Mubarkia and the Scientific Center, what they’re looking for is less popular but still very interesting things to do. I’m not sure how long the team will be in Kuwait for but here are my suggestions:

Sabah Al Ahmad Sea City (aka Khiran)
Paddle Boarding
Wakeboarding
House of Mirrors
Fish Market Auctions
Powered Paragliding
Friday Market
Weekly Al-Farsi Kite Show (not sure if they’re active in the summer)
Cinemagics Rooftop Movies (currently not active because it’s summer)
Qout Market (currently not active because it’s summer)
Shakshooka Market (currently not active because it’s summer)

This is all I could think of for now but if you have any other suggestions leave it in the comments below.

Around a month ago I got a phone call from a reporter at Al Qabas newspaper. He was doing a story on the state of the local blogging scene and had some questions he wanted to ask me. On Saturday the article was finally released with a large dramatic headline that roughly translates to “Blogs have Declined by 97% while Instagram Grows and Grows”.

I started blogging back in 2003 when me and a friend started Qhate, which at that time was the first and only blog in Kuwait until Zaydoun launched Kuwait Unplugged soon after. I’m going to sound like a grand parent reminiscing about the past but I’ve seen hundreds of blogs come and go during this time and the whole local blogging community evolve. It wasn’t just us geeks and dorks anymore sitting on a computer and writing into the wee hours of the morning while snacking on Nutella sandwiches. Everyone suddenly wanted to become a blogger and one by one people started setting up their own blogs and posting. Many and by many I mean 97% of them were rubbish either just copying pasting articles from other international blogs or just became a tool for local advertising and media agencies to hawk products and services to readers who were naive enough to fall for the posts.

The fact that blogs in Kuwait have declined by 97% is a good thing.

A lot of people ask me all the time why I haven’t shifted to Instagram. Simple, Instagram isn’t a replacement for blogs.

What I found ironic about the Al Qabas article was how they made it seem like blogging as a medium itself was dying when ironically it’s the newspapers who are the ones suffering because of blogs and other online news sources. I mean the article itself uses a screen capture of my blog from back in 2012 and what I am guessing is a screen capture of The Blogs Lounge from around the same time. Where the hell did they even manage to find a capture of my blog from 2012 and why couldn’t they get a recent one? Newspapers are large companies while blogs are like mom-and-pop stores, we actually care about our posts and readers.

I don’t think of myself as a great writer and I never pretend to be one either. But I can tell you one thing and that is the fact that I dedicate every waking hour to this blog trying to find something to write about so everyone else can read it. It’s in my head all the time, everything I do everywhere I go I’m always looking for something to write about. It’s taken over my life and my thinking process. It’s become my life actually. It’s so difficult for me to focus on something because I’m always distracted, I’m always reading, I’m always trying to absorb as much information as I can hoping one thing or another will trigger an idea for a new post. It’s a challenge every single day because this is Kuwait and not a lot of things happen here. It’s exhausting and sometimes I just wish I didn’t have this blog just so that I could shift my focus onto other projects.

But I love it, I love what I do and I love how I somehow manage to find stuff to write about on a daily basis and I’ve been doing this for over ten years now. It’s something I’m really good at and as long as I can keep coming up with interesting content for my readers this is something I am going to keep doing.

So yes most of the blogs in Kuwait are dead but mine isn’t and I’m not going anywhere.

I was having a debate with someone in the blogs Community regarding the safety of drinking Kuwait’s tap water. I personally don’t think it’s safe to drink and I can say that with full confidence based on the color of the filter that’s attached to my washing machine.

Is there anybody here who drinks water straight out of the tap without running it through some soft of filtering process?

Update: More information on this subject [Here]

I hadn’t heard of Khalli Walli until a few moments ago when I watched the parody music video above on another blog. Turns out they’re a group of Pakistani artists living in Saudi Arabia who use comical relief to highlight some of the issues facing low income workers. They’re the only non-Saudi group licensed by the Ministry of Culture and Information.

The video above is about a runaway maid who wants to leave her sponsors home but their driver doesn’t want her to leave because he’s in love with her. Watch it till the end for a surprise ending.

Check out their official YouTube channel [Here] and their Facebook page [Here]