Search: “kuwait”

I don’t have any paintings or pictures on my walls back home in Kuwait but when I get back I will have my first one. I got the picture above enlarged and will frame it and hang it up on my wall once I get back. Its a beautiful photo taken in the 80’s during the war in Lebanon. The picture was taken by Roger Moukarzel who also signed the photo for me. I love war photos and this one is probably as good as they come. if I wasn’t working in advertising I would most probably be a war photographer. Its something I’ve always wanted to do.

I’ve been in the studio since morning shooting. It’s not as interesting as shooting outdoor since the studio feels very monotonus (no spell checker on my phone). Anyway I am no longer coming back to Kuwait on the 4th, I am now coming back on the 6th. This means slow posting till then unless I can find cheap Internet access somewhere. (Posted from my Nokia e61i)

A few weeks ago a new shawerma place opened up called Mr Subs. I got emails from readers of the blog telling me about it and some friends also recommended it to me. What made this shawerma place special is that it was owned by Samir Saeed, the owner of Mr Baker.

The place is located in Jabriya, over looking the 4th Ring Road near where Mr Baker is. I passed by last week for dinner and it wasn’t that hard to find, you take the first right after Hardees, then another right so that you are driving in the direction of the 4th Ring Road and at the end of the street take a left to find Mr Subs on your left hand side.

Mr Subs serve a variety of stuff other than shawerma but I wasn’t interested in them. I ordered two chicken shawermas and was told I had a choice of 3 different bread to choose from. I chose the regular Arabic bread, the other two choices were a burger bun like bread and a bread that had olives in it or something. First thing that struck me about the place is how clean it was. It’s probably the cleanest shawerma place I have ever seen, the area around the shawerma grills were spotless which really impressed me. Sadly that was the most impressive thing about the place.

After picking up my two shawermas I went back to the car and started munching on them. I wasn’t very impressed. The shawermas reminded me a lot of the Kurdo shawermas which I am not a fan of. Its what I call commercial shawerma and its mostly because of the sauce they use. Notice I said sauce not garlic because thats basically what both Mr Subs and Kurdo use. Its a consumer friendly replacement to regular garlic most shawerma places use. The sauce which probably does use a bit of garlic doesn’t taste like garlic, instead it tastes more like mayonnaise which I can’t stand. Its also very liquidi which makes the shawerma feel greasy.

Another problem I had with the shawermas were the price, starting from 600 fils per shawerma its not cheap. The cheapest shawerma they have is the one that comes in Arabic bread, the other two choices of bread add 100 or 200 fils more to the price. At 600 fils a shawerma is also puts it really close in the price range of the Villa Fayrouz Express shawerma which tastes a lot better and is of much better quality. Oh and while I was waiting for my shawermas at Mr Subs I saw them pre grilling their burgers. They were grilling their burgers and then placing them in a container so that if someone ordered a burger they could just place it on the grill and heat it up. Although the place is really clean I didn’t like the idea they were pre-grilling their burgers. Anyway for the final score I decided to give their shawermas a 3 out of 5.

I am in Lebanon now and the weather isn’t as cool as I hoped it would be. Its good enough to drive around in a convertible or on a motorbike but not cool enough for long walks. Its kinda humid, not Dubai kind of humidity but still enough to make you feel icky after a short walk. I can’t believe how hot it still is in Kuwait!

[YouTube]

A friend of mine is directing this new show on Bahry TV called Bhar w Bahar. It’s a cool Kuwaiti cooking show thats really fun to watch. The video above is of the promo while the second video below is of the pilot episode. The show is aired every Saturday at 4PM then re-run at 10PM and on Tuesdays at 9PM and Thursdays at 4PM. You can get the Kuwaiti station Bahry TV on NILESAT 10892H.

[YouTube]

A while back Villa Fayrouz Express opened up on Baghdad Street in Salmiya. It’s a take-out version of their popular Lebanese restaurant of the same name minus the express. Since the place is in my neighborhood I had to try their chicken shawermas and I have to say I was surprised.

I was surprised because each chicken shawerma cost 750 fils! That officially makes it the most expensive shawerma I have ever reviewed and it also makes it the most expensive shawerma I know of in Kuwait. 750 fils, thats three times the price of a shawerma at Badar Al Badoor and more than double that of Dodo. So is it worth it?

It takes only one bite to realize why the shawerma is priced so expensive. Its the quality of chicken they use, it tastes fresh and healthy. From the chicken to the garlic its all just top notch quality. They also aren’t stingy, I can barely finish two sandwiches at Villa Fayrouz Express while at Dodo for example I could easily have three in addition to a side order of fries. The sandwich isn’t huge mind you, its fat and short but not huge.

So back to the main question, is it worth 750fils? No, I personally don’t think so. I mean I really don’t care where I eat shawerma (except for this one place next to my office) as long as it tastes good. I have now had shawermas ranging from 200 to 750 fils and I can confidently say that I would rather have Badar Al Badoor’s 250 fils shawerma over Villa Fayrouz Express. Not because for the price of one shawerma at Villa Fayrouz Express I can have two shawermas and a kofta sandwich at Badar Al Badoor, but I also felt Badar Al Badoor’s shawerma was more fun. Shawerma isn’t meant to be healthy or made from great quality, its supposed to just taste good and thats it. Still though for people who care about hygene and are looking for a good shawerma Villa Fayrouz Express is highly recommended. My final score is a 4 out of 5.

According to a few readers and a post by K.thekuwaiti, Zain has acknowledged the issue with the iPhone and is trying to fix it. One comment on K’s blog even states the iPhone should be working with Zain by 3PM today. If thats true it would be perfect timing since Nat should be collecting her iPhone today from U Shop We Ship.

Update: It is now confirmed, as of 3PM today the iPhone started working with the Zain network. Thank you to everyone at Zain who helped out in updating the network to support unlocked iPhones.

After months of spy and leaked shots, Toyota finally announced their new 8th generation 2008 Land Cruiser. I am guessing they should be in Kuwait before the end of the year. [Link]

Update: Here are a ton of new pictures [Link]

My favorite thing about Ramadan is that I get off work at 3PM. This allows me to have a ton of free time to do stuff I wouldn’t usually do like riding my bicycle.

Yesterday I went riding with Nat and the weather was surprisingly great. We rode from Marina Mall to Scientific Center, a short route since we didn’t want to take a longer one in case our bikes had developed problems after a year of storage. Imagine riding all the way to the Kuwait Towers and then finding out the bike has a problem and you have to walk back all the way to Salmiya. It would suck…

Riding the bicycle is really different from the motorbike. For one thing falling off a bicycle is no longer a big thing. Nat crashed yesterday when her bicycle slid on a curve and she just got up and continued riding. When the same thing happened to me with my motorbike I ended up with road rash, a fractured wrist and a large repair bill.

There are two brands of bikes I would recommend people getting, Trek and Cannondale. I personally prefer and ride Cannondale. When it comes to road bikes I would go with Trek but for mountain bikes Cannondale all the way. The Cannondale dealer is located in Shuwaikh, you take the first right after McDonalds on Canada Dry street and once you reach the small round-a-bout the dealer would be on your right hand corner. Trek on the other hand is available at GoSport in The Avenues and eXtreme Sports at Marina Waves.

If you are looking for a place to ride, the Gulf Road is a good place to start. For a short trail you can start off at Marina Crescent and ride all the way to Scientific Center and back. For a longer trail you can go from McDonalds on the Gulf Road and head all the way to Souk Sharq and back. Both routes use a sea side trail away from dangerous car traffic.

Cannondale have soooo many hot bikes to choose from, my favorite being the Gemini but the prices can get ridiculous with models costing KD1000 and up. You can spend a lot less of course, a member in the forum recently purchase a Trek for only KD148 and you can even get bikes for under KD50 even although I wouldn’t recommend them at all. The difference between the cheap and expensive bikes is usually weight, quality of parts, the frame and the finishing. Cheap bikes are usually heavy, equipped with the crappiest brands and handle like crap.

There used to be a riding club that met up every Friday at like 7AM to go riding but I don’t think they do that anymore. If anyone knows of another riding club please leave it in the comments below.

Just a heads up to everyone who is thinking of purchasing an iPhone to use in Kuwait. Although you can unlock the iPhone now for free, it’s currently not working properly with the Zain network. You can send make but you can’t receive calls on your iPhone. K.theKuwaiti is currently trying to find a solution for this and once he does he will publish it online. Everything else works including sending and receiving SMS’s and GPRS.

Update: According to a reader the iPhone will work with the Zain network if you have a new 128K sized sim card. Does anyone know how one goes around to getting a 128K sim card from Zain?

For people who aren’t going to fast during Ramadan, a great solution for lunch is microwavable meals. I have a decent collection of reviews of some meals available at local supermarkets and I will be adding more during the month of Ramadan. For now here are the ones I have available:

Microwave Meal: Chicken Masala
Microwave Meal: Beef with Classic BBQ Sauce
Microwave Meal: Beef Patty Sandwich Builder
Microwave Meal: Manicotti
Microwave Meal: El Charrito Grande
Microwave Meal: Fried Chicken Meal
Microwave Meal: Chicken Fingers

A friend of mine at work just came back from Spain and while there she got me a gift from the Lomography Shop. This reminded me of my Holga camera which I haven’t used since the last time the sky was blue. Shooting outdoor pictures in Kuwait during the summer sucks because we don’t have blue skies neither do we have any clouds. This is why my favorite time of the year to take pictures is during the winter.

Holga is this really cheap camera I bought awhile back which takes pictures using medium format film. Since the camera is cheap the pictures have this really strange feel and effect to them which ends up making all the pictures look really trendy.

I have some pictures I shot with the camera attached to this post which I took 2 years ago at Marina Mall and as you can see you could never achieve the same with a digital camera. Now the coolest thing about the Holga is the price, it costs just $20 on Amazon. Thats a really good deal. [Amazon Link]

So yesterday I was kinda pissed that I forgot my phone in Dubai but now I am actually enjoying it. It’s been a peaceful day so far and although I should be getting my phone back tomorrow via DHL I think I am going to keep it turned off and see how long I can last without it. If I want a pager (beeper) can I still get one here in Kuwait?

I love Muthana Complex in Kuwait City because it has a lot of interesting shops and the latest I found is called Tea Art. Tea Art as you can guess from the name specializes in Tea and their stock is all imported directly from China. They sell Black, Green, Oolong, Pu-erh, White, Blooming and Red Tea. Their prices range greatly and they even have tea that costs over KD2,000 for 100 grams. I asked if I could try it and the answer was simply no, expensive teas can not be tried before purchase which sucks. Imagine dishing out KD2,000 for tea only to find that it tastes horrible.

They have cheaper teas that cost like KD600 and KD700 and for us regular folks they have tea that cost under KD20 and even under KD10 per 100 grams so it not all super duper expensive teas. Cheap teas (under KD20) make up the majority of their products.

If you are a tea fan they are located on the ground floor of the Muthana Complex next to elevator 6. Their phone number is 2490404.

www.teaart-me.com

I was trying to figure out if I should get the iPhone or the iPod Touch for Nat and in the end decided on the iPhone. The iPhone has a few extra features over the iPod Touch, it has a phone (duh..), it has bluetooth, a digital camera and the battery lasts slightly longer. The price difference between an 8GB iPhone and an 8GB iPod Touch is also just $100. Now the downside is that the iPhone needs to be unlocked to work in Kuwait. I figured if I couldn’t figure out how to unlock it I will just end up with an iPod which can browse the web and take pictures which really isn’t that bad. You can check the side by side comparison on the features by following this [Link]