Search: “kuwait”

I was in Beirut over the weekend and on this trip I ended up staying at the Four Seasons Hotel in Downtown Beirut. The hotel is located in what I think is one of the nicest looking towers in Beirut, right in front of the very popular Zaituna Bay and so I was really looking forward to staying there.

Right from the moment I stepped out of my rental I knew I was going to be enjoying my stay at the hotel. The customer service at the hotel was just better then any other I had previously stayed in before and I’ve stayed at many. The feeling I kept getting is that every single employee wanted to help make your stay better, and by every single employee I don’t mean just the reception staff or managers, I mean everyone from the valet guys, to the housekeepers to the waiters. I think its the words they use but you just get this feeling that you can ask them for whatever you want and they’d love to do it and that made me super comfortable in asking them for stuff which I tend not to do.

Other than the excellent service my room was also very comfortable. I had overpacked on this trip but there was more than enough closest space and drawers to accomodate all my stuff. The room wasn’t that big but the bathroom was with a large sink area, tub, shower room, toilet room and a makeup table. The room had a balcony that was big enough to fit a table and two chairs and finally there was free wifi in the room and the whole hotel. My favorite part of the hotel though would have to be the roof. During the day the roof is a cool place to swim and tan but at night it’s an open air lounge overlooking the Mediterranean sea and Beirut.

I do have two minor complaints though. The first issue the hotel really can’t do much about but the view from my room could have been better if there wasn’t a large sand lot right outside. I live in Kuwait so I would rather not see sand lots when I travel. Even though the hotel is right in front of Zaituna Bay, my room was more on the side and I could only see the marina if I was on the balcony looking left which was disappointing. The other issue I had was with their breakfast. It’s not a breakfast buffet and one of the things I look forward to the most in hotels is their breakfast buffets. At the Four Seasons they have a dried fruit, fresh fruit and cereal buffet but if you want any hot dishes you have to order them. The advantage obviously is your breakfast is made for you and so is fresh, but the disadvantage is it takes time to make and you also can’t just fill up your plate with whatever looks good like you would do at a regular buffet.

In the end though I had a really good time at the hotel. I generally don’t tend to spend much time at hotels but on this trip I was having all my friends come over so we could just chill out on the roof. The incredibly friendly service and the lounge on the roof made me really love my stay. I’d most likely stay there again once I’m done reviewing other hotels in Beirut.

Here is the link to their [Website]

I’m in Kuwait and I’m in big trouble.
My dealer thinks his social networking sites are being tapped by Kuwaiti police. Can police or secret service or whatever see facebook chats? and can they still see it with Secure Browsing (https) turned on please, help an ent in need. I really don’t want to die. I’m going to delete this post after 24 hours

That’s too funny. [Source]

Tonight I passed by the Al-Maidan Cultural Centre for a showcase of new Kuwaiti writing and directing talent. It was just a one night event and a friend of mine was taking part so I passed by with some friends to watch the performance. It was my first time at Al-Maidan Cultural Centre and I was surprised to find out that the place was located just a 2 minute drive down the street from my apartment in Salmiya. It has a very nice setup on the inside and there seem to be a lot of different events that take place there all year round.

If you want to check out some of the events and performances that take place at the Al-Maidan Cultural Centre then you should download their calendar from their website [Here]

Even though the old blue and white ghost house off the 4th Ring Road has long been demolished it looks like it’s still haunting people. There currently is a hotel being built where the ghost house used to be and according to one of the project engineers who works on the site, they’re facing problems with the laborers because they’re afraid of going down to the basement. They’re even afraid to work alone on any floor.

I still haven’t been able to find a picture of the ghost house but I did find the cute sketch above that was done by Mr Divi.

Update: Below is a photo of the ghost house taken from [Here]

Assistant Under secretary for traffic affairs at the Ministry of interior Major General Abdulfatah Al Ali has warned pedestrians against violating the traffic law.

According to Arab Times report, citing Al Rai news paper, Al Ali said pedestrians must use only the zebra crossing to cross the roads wherever there are such signs. He also stressed the pedestrians should wait for the road crossing pedestrian signal to turn green.

He added violators of this law will be fined KD 25, a maximum of 15 days imprisonment or either one of the two penalties.

Luckily you won’t get deported. [Source]

Thanks Goldy

These renderings are the final approved concept for Burj Al Shaya designed by Gensler, the same architects behind The Avenues. The building consists of two towers, the tall tower will serve as the new Alshaya headquarters while the second shorter tower will be the Four Seasons Hotel. The location of this building is next to Burj Jassim in Kuwait City and it’s expected to be completed by mid 2015. From what I understood Alshaya haven’t released the renderings to the public yet but some people have leaked them online. Those two in this post are the only ones I’ve been able to find.

[Source1] [Source2]

After one of my images on Instagram went viral this weekend I started getting a lot of new (and mostly weird) followers on my Instagram account. One of my followers turned out to be a sheep seller. It’s such a weird account, just pictures and pictures of different sheep with a phone number to call if you want one. It’s by far the strangest thing I’ve seen so far being sold on Instagram in Kuwait. I tried calling the number to see if they deliver and how much a sheep costs but the guys phone was closed. If you’re interested you can follow him on Instagram under the account @sheeps_sell

I would love to spend a day inside Zaha Hadid’s mind. Construction will supposedly start this summer and be completed by 2017. [Link]

And Kuwait, where’s our metro at?

Cost has gone up KD5 this time around but there’s also going to be a small expo for Kuwaiti businesses running at the same time.

Location: Marina Crescent
Date: June 27 to June 30 2013
Time: 10AM to 12PM
Cost: KD25

If you’re interested you should probably book from now by calling 22621766 or 94004335.

If you have ever smiled at one of the Dr. Seuss books, such as The Cat in the Hat, or Horton Hears a Who, you will love SEUSSICAL THE MUSICAL, a show filled to bursting with Dr. Seuss’s wonderful characters including Horton, The Whos, The Grinch, Amayzing Mayzie, Gertrude & her one-feathered-tail, and many more . SEUSSICAL is one of the most popular and successful new musicals of the millennium; a delight for all ages, packed with wonderful songs, humour, colour and spectacle and guaranteed to entertain you be you four or ninety four.

Performance dates and times are as follows:
Wednesday June 5 at 7.30pm (KD5) Preview Night
Thursday June 6 at 7.30pm (KD7.5)
Friday June 7 at 3pm and 7.30pm (KD7.5)
Saturday June 8 t 12 noon and 4pm (KD7.5)

Location: Live Theater at Discovery Mall

If you’re interested in booking a ticket, visit their website [Here]

There’s an idiot in Kuwait filming himself shooting and killing cats with his pellet gun and he then uploads the videos onto YouTube. Pretty messed up shit. [Link]

Thanks Patrick

Early in the month I was sent to Basel World, the largest watch expo in the world by Trafalgar so that I could cover the event for my blog. I was there for 3 days and I think by the last day I had managed to check out the whole expo since it was just so ridiculously huge. I managed to get access to a few brands I wanted to see except for two which were Rolex and Breitling. Rolex had the new anniversary edition Daytona I wanted to check out while Breitling had the new Emergency. If you don’t have access to a brand you basically only get to check out their displays outside their booth. With access you get taken inside the booth where you get to see the watches in person. Below are my favorite watches from the expo.

Last weekend I went to Milan and stayed at a trendy little hotel called Nu. It was actually my second choice since I had originally set my eyes on Hotel Straf, but Nu Hotel ended up coming in at half the price which made it the obvious choice.

The hotel is not located in the city center and is not walking distance to Duomo which is actually a good thing. Duomo is in the city center where all the cathedrals, department stores, franchises, luxury brands and ALL the tourist are. Many people actually want to be in Duomo which is fine by me but I would rather shop and stay in places with more locals than tourists. The hotel is located 5 minutes away from the Metro anyway which means a ride to any part of Milan will mostly take just under 20 minutes.

My room was pretty spacious for European standards but what probably helped the room look even more spacious was the super large window that occupied most of one wall. It brought in a lot of soft natural light into the room even on an overcast day. The room had all the regular amenities like free interent, mini bar, a safe and breakfast in bed should you choose. The customer service was fantastic, I was having minor issues with my AC since in typical person from Kuwait style I wanted it on all the time and at the coldest possible temperature and they were extremely helpful with sorting that issue out for me.

There wasn’t much going on around the hotel other than a happening bar across the street. Other than that everything on the street was usually closed by nightfall. If I ever go back to Milan I wouldn’t hesitate staying at Nu Hotel. Here is the link to their [Website]

The post below was written by a friend of mine, a Kuwaiti doctor currently living and working/training in Montreal.

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Recently, posts on twitter and many blogs including this one have featured a text message appearing on peoples phones as a random statement that Mental health facilities are available in Kuwait (pictured above). I’m sure that the idea was a good one, unfortunately there was no information on how to get in contact with people who can help (no email, website or hotline to call).

Like many of you I met these efforts made by the ministry with heckling and criticism. In my eyes this was an imported idea that we just couldn’t get right. Granted, it’s not a major disaster but still it’s just one more thing to complain about (the national sport) and it’s not like people here in Montreal don’t have problems with their hospitals. On the contrary, if you read the papers you’d see that some of these places are nearing bankruptcy, and others are being sold off all together with staged layoffs commencing soon.

People complain in Montreal too, they complain a lot, the difference is that despite all the problems and near disasters they face here, there’s always progress being made.

We can now boast that at the Montreal General Hospital (a level 1 trauma centre) we go from the trauma bay to a whole body CT scan and to the ICU or the operating room in less than 30 minutes. You might assume that this is as a results of care considerate government planning. It isn’t, the Montreal General Hospital relies on non government foundations to provide donations on a regular basis to fund research and buy equipment that the government can’t afford. These include MRI machines, CT scanners and surgical equipment that has made the place a true monument to trauma and emergency surgery.

They don’t just wait for people to donate, they set up funds and activities to provide long term assured income annually. This year their campaign included a “dancing with the docs” event where you could sponsor doctors in a dance off and an annual raffle.

Another hospital has come up with similar events such as annual tennis tournaments and fashion and style events as well as an annual gala that honours their doctors as well as many many others (about three per season). They also have franchises open within the hospital which are obligated to donate annually (the frozen yogurt place beats anything I can find at a hospital cafeteria).

That hospital has become the first robotic cancer surgery (surgical oncology) center in the province and one of the most active in Canada. Some of it is because of the money they donate and make for the hospital but a lot of it is because we can rely on these fantastic volunteers to help moving patients, inspect rooms to make sure they’re clean and take care of elderly patients who can’t take care of them selves.

These foundations are practically built on volunteers led by the CEO of the hospital (every hospital has a CEO to handle the business side of things over here). Some of them provide administrative work, others organize activities and others actually involve themselves with patient care activities such as feeding, pet and animal therapy and patient transport as well as acting as translators throughout the hospital I don’t think these hospitals would be the centres of excellence in their fields if it wasn’t for these community led initiatives.

The generic response would be مالت علينا these people are organized and efficient and our guys can’t even run a small emergency room but the fact of the matter is that progress in hospitals in Montreal isn’t just reliant on doctors, nurses or administrators alone, it comes from the community we service.

Think of how much you and I can do to help our hospitals, maybe we can educate diabetics, help inspect rooms or just set up donation pools and funds to build initiatives and not just giant buildings or buy equipment with no further planning involved.

Trying to do this in Kuwait will take an effort on both parts, hospitals have to be willing to accept donations, volunteers and also train them while on the other hand people have to be committed to making their hospital the best they can. Success in this field is never due to one individual and I’m probably as guilty as you are for neglecting my local hospital when it is clearly in need.

Post written by Saud, a Kuwaiti doctor living and working/training in Montreal. Twitter: @saudnz

Back in 2011 I posted about how a team of students from Kuwait came second place in the GCC Microsoft Imagine Cup. The idea that got them there was the creation of an App that would use crowd sourcing to inform the authorities of various problems around Kuwait. Using your phone you could snap a picture of overflowing garbage, large pot holes, accidents etc.. and then send the photos to the proper authorities with a GeoTag of the location.

Fast forward a couple of years and the Riyadh municipality just launched an iPhone App that does all of that. The screenshots above are in Arabic but the App also has English. Another example of a great local idea that gets implemented by another GCC country. [Link]

via @ahmed