Search: “kuwait”

Back in October there was a press release in the papers by a company which stated that they were opening Fatburger in Kuwait. Today there was another press release by another company stating that they are also opening Fatburger in Kuwait. So what gives?

Well this is what I found out. A local company got the Fatburger franchise rights 2 years back for Kuwait but never opened up a store. So, Fatburger decided to take the franchise rights from them and pass it to another local company. Fatburger will now be finally opening in Kuwait before June.

I am still holding my breath for Arby’s and Wendy’s.

Update: Turns out yesterday’s press release was actually placed in the newspaper by Fatburger North America themselves to clarify that there is a new Fatburger owner in Kuwait.

I totally forgot to post about this. Most of you have probably heard about the ladies only pink taxis driven by women that will soon be roaming the streets of Kuwait. I thought that was a cool idea until a friend pointed out something pretty funny but sadly will come true. Since the taxis are bright pink and for ladies only, it should make life a lot easier for the guys who cruise on the Gulf Road. It’s like waving a red cape in front of a bull.

Thanks G45 M45K!

Picture from Kuwait Times

The 2010 Quality of Life Index is out and Kuwait ranked 106 which is up nearly 30 spots since 2006. Jordan is the only Arab country ahead coming in at 104 while UAE is 141 and Lebanon 113. The highest ranking goes to France followed by Australia and then Switzerland. Here is the link to the full list. [Link]

Thanks Farid!

The only Quiznos branch in Kuwait shut down. It seems the franchise owner wasn’t interested in the brand anymore. I thought it had a lot of potential but oh well, at least I still have Charley’s and Subway to fall back onto.

[YouTube]

I passed by the RC track near 360 Mall today to check out some of the races. The Radio Control Car Club of Kuwait (RCCCK) had an official point race today and I was really hoping to spend all day there watching the races but ended up leaving early due to other engagements. But I did manage to shoot two videos which show the full track, prep area and a start of a race. It’s very organized and very proper and I wish I had a car to participate in the races since it looks like a lot of fun.

[YouTube]

Are they ever going to fix the mistakes on the Kuwait Airport website? The mistakes were highlighted back in 2007 when they launched the new site and its been nearly 3 years and the same mistakes are still there. [Link]

So I’ve been pushing DHL EasyShop a lot recently as a replacement to Aramex’s Shop&Ship but now it looks like I am going to start pushing Aramex again.

I received an email earlier today from a reader telling me about how DHL has new calculations for the weight. So I called them up and spent 20 minutes trying to understand how to calculate my shipping weight and honestly I still don’t know exactly how it works. The DHL employee told me its simple mathematics, I told him the last thing I want to do with my life is start plugging in formulas and make calculations to try and figure out how much my shipping cost will be. Here is what I understood:

If you get a package that weighs 2KG but it comes in a big box that gives you a volumetric weight of 8KG then you do the following:

8 – 2 = 6
6 > 5 = charged based on volumetric weight

So the formula looks something like

v: volumetric weight
w: actual weight

v – w = x
if x > 5 then you will be charged based on volumetric wieght
if x < 5 then you will be charged on actual weight Lets try it again. I have a shipment that is 6KG but the volumetric weight is 10kG the answer is? 10 - 6 = 4 4 < 5 so I pay based on actual weight The biggest problem is you can't figure out what the volumetric weight (v) of your package is until it arrives to your DHL mailbox which means you can't estimate the shipping cost. Seriously who at DHL came up with this smart idea? They had a chance here to gain customers that were pissed off with Aramex and now with this new change I think other customers like me will move back to Aramex. Update: I just passed by the Kuwait City DHL branch to pick up my package. What can I say, its hard not to like them. They’ve increased the amount of staff at that branch to 2 which is a good move since 1 guy wasn’t enough and I paid the regular shipping fee for my package which was based on actual weight since it was 2.5KG. I guess I will keep using DHL for everything under 5KG. I will use Aramex for items that are over 5KG but under 13KG and I will use MyUS for items 13KG and up. Life is complicated like that.

According to this list Kuwait has a extremely low unemployment figure of 2.2% which is one of lowest unemployment rates in the world. The issue is the figure was last updated in 2004. UAE has an unemployment rate of 12.7% but I think that’s actually low. Thing is I don’t think these numbers for the GCC are accurate because if you don’t have a job here you can’t stay if I am not mistaken. Other interesting numbers, Zimbabwe has the highest unemployment rate which is 90%. Iraq has an unemployment rate of 18% but 83% of the woman in Iraq are unemployed. Thats probably related to the security situation there. Qatar has the third lowest unemployment rate with just 0.6% and in Andorra everyone is employed because they have a 0% unemployment rate. Here is the full list [Link]

I really like the old buildings in Kuwait and its very sad to see them crumble. So when I found out about this exhibition by Architect Deema Abdullah Al-Ghunaim I thought it was really interesting since it involved two things I liked, photography and old buildings:

|Tæ’boõq| طابوق
This exhibition is a starting study to trace architectural conceptions in Kuwait through series of screens photographed around Qebla, Merqab, Dasman, Hawalli and Jeleeb Shyoukh. The buildings studied are standing from 1960s as time sensors of placement, displacement and improvisation.

Time
From January 5th to January 7th 2010
January 5th from 7pm till 9pm
January 6th from 9am till 4pm and from 7pm till 9pm
January 7th from 9am till 4pm only

Place
The Sultan Gallery
Sabhan, southern entrance, Sadeer Co., block 8, street 105, building no 168
Telephone: 24714325/26 ext 110
Here is a map [Link]

You can find out more by visiting Deema’s blog where she also has scans of the invitation [Link]

via ProjektCyan

Since I have a long weekend I decided to pass by Extreme Hobby and pick up a small indoor helicopter. I played with it in their store a while back and since then it’s always been on my mind. Unlike the crappy toy helicopters you find at regular toy stores, this is a proper tiny hobby grade helicopter. It comes with a 4-channel 2.4Ghz digital transmitter with four AA batteries for it, the actual micro helicopter and a 1-cell LiPo battery.

The helicopter is very tiny which makes it perfect for flying around in the living room. Helicopters in general are difficult to fly and so this micro helicopter for me is a good way to get into them. As a beginner its a bit mind numbing still trying to fly this thing around. The left stick on the transmitter controls the throttle and the direction the helicopter is facing. The right stick controls the flight direction, front back left and right. You charge the helicopters battery in the actual receiver, there is a slot in the back where you can insert the LiPo battery and it takes around 5 minutes to fully charge it. You can then fly the helicopter for around 8 minutes. Because its a hobby grade helicopter Extreme Hobby carry all the spare parts for it so if you need another battery or if you break something you can get a replacement part.

[YouTube]

As I mentioned above I’m a beginner so I am pretty crap at flying it still. But if you want to see the helicopter in action there are a ton of videos on YouTube. The one above is my favorite since the guy is pretty good. The cost of the helicopter is KD26 and it comes with everything you need to get it up and running. It costs KD29 on Amazon so its cheaper in Kuwait. They only had around 4 more helicopters left so if you’re interested you can pass by them in Dajij. Their phone number is 24348123.

I just got back to Kuwait this morning, was out for a total of 10 days. I thought the weather in Lebanon was hot but it turns out its even hotter here. I am really glad to be back on a high speed internet connection again, I was on a 256kb connection back in Lebanon that was just slightly faster than dial up and had a download limit of just 6GB. My iPhone here in Kuwait has a much faster connection speed and a much higher download limit so I don’t understand how people in Lebanon are still living with their crappy connection.

Speaking of broadband connection, I read an article the other day about how in the UK by 2012, 40% of the population will have access to 100Mbps connections. And here I am happy to be back on a 2Mbps line…

The Aramex Ardiya branch has new working hours. Starting today, the Ardiya branch is now open from 8:30AM to 9PM from Saturday to Thursday and Friday from 12PM to 6PM. I am guessing this is in reponse to DHL EasyShop who’s Ardiya branch is open daily till midnight except for Friday when they close at 9PM. I hope this is a sign that Aramex is going to try and improve so that they can compete with other mail forwarding services. I just hope packages go back to taking a few days to arrive to Kuwait and into my hands instead of the 10 days its taking now.

If you’re staying in Kuwait for New Years then here is something for you to do. GUST is holding a talent show on December 31st from 5pm to 7pm at their university campus. The students will be performing a wide range of shows from a comedy play to song and dance. A blogger called Mish is giving away 4 tickets to the show which you could win just by leaving a comment on his post. So if you are interested, here is the [Link]

According to a survey held by HSBC, Bahrain turned out to be the friendliest country in the world. Couldn’t find Kuwait on the list not even after I downloaded the full report from the HSBC website. That’s probably because there is no HSBC in Kuwait. Here is the top 10 friendliest countries:

1. Bahrain
2. Canada
3. Australia
4. Thailand
5. Malaysia
6. South Africa
7. Hong Kong
8. Singapore
9. Spain
10. United States

Here is a link to the Forbes article [Link]

Found out about Capital District from iLSuL6ana’s blog and I think I like where they’re going with the brand. Their clothing are unique in that they’re based on Kuwait and it’s past which automatically differentiates them from everything else out there. They have a few designs at the moment which you can order at very reasonable prices. If you’re interested in checking out their designs and placing an order visit their Facebook group [Here]

Note: You can see their designs in the photos section.