Search: “kuwait”

I posted about Auction it TODAY last month. They are a company in Kuwait that take care of selling your stuff on eBay. Well I was checking out what they were currently auctioning off on eBay and I ended up finding some strange items. Keep in mind all this stuff is located in Kuwait which makes the actual items strange. Like the Food Dehydrator or 35mm camera. If you check their previous sold items you will find even stranger stuff.

You can check out their auctions by clicking [Here].

Tonight at 10PM local time Amazon had a special deal on the Xbox 360. The were offering it for only $100, the catch.. only 1000 pieces. I knew I didn’t have a chance when I saw that deal plastered all over the web including places like Digg and Gizmodo. Still, I decided to give it a shot and see if I could be one of the lucky 1000.

At around 9:45PM I started refreshing the offer page every 20 seconds. By 9:58 Amazon’s servers got overloaded and the page stopped loading. So using two computers I started opening the same page in like 20 tabs on each computer. Finally two of my tabs loaded and I saw the Get this deal button. I quickly pressed it but my other tabs started loading and I noticed the same page now was saying Sold Out. I was hoping that since I clicked the button already I would be counted as one of the first 1000. Around a minute later one of the tabs where I had clicked the Get this deal button loaded and Amazon was asking me what 11+16 was. I quickly loaded up the calculater (yes I suck) and calculated their question and entered it and pressed Get this deal for a second time.

Sadly, by the time the third page loaded around 10:13PM I got a message telling me the product didn’t exist. The 1000 Xbox 360’s got sold out in under 15 seconds. With our lousy internet connection here in Kuwait I didn’t stand a chance. But, at least it was a fun experience.

Here are some screen grabs of the two pages aftr I clicked the first Get this deal button.

Second page message
Third page message

Late last month I posted about how Showtime were still taking money from me every month even though I canceled my account. Well I finally spoke to a guy at Showtime who told me he would solve my problem by making sure they cancel my subscription and then refund me two months worth of subscription fees by the next day. I was like fine, great.

A few days later I call the guy up again telling him that I still hadn’t received the refund. He told me he had deposited the money into my account and it should be there. After further investigation it turns out the guy deposited my refund in the wrong account! He told me that its too late now and he couldn’t take it back and that I should contact the other person and try to get my money off of him. I told him I wouldn’t do that and that he should solve the problem. He then sarcastically told me fine, he would pay me the refund from his salary. I was like whatever you want to do, do it. I just want my refund.

Since that day I haven’t been able to get a hold of the guy again. He won’t return my calls and I have been leaving messages on his voice mail and still no reply. I don’t think my troubles with Showtime will ever finish.

update: I just got off the phone with the COO of Global Direct. He told me I will get my refund within the next 2 days. I told him that it wasn’t about the money but the actual process I had to go through to get my account canceled. He assured me that Showtime was going through a major restructuring of the customer service department and all the problems I faced will be fixed.

I found out last minute I had to go down to Dubai for work and since Gitex had just started, finding a room was practically impossible. Finally though the travel agent came through and found me an empty room and booked it. I have to say it was the crappiest hotel I had ever been to. The whole place looked like a bathroom and smelled like one that had just been cleaned. They had these air fresheners that spray perfume automatically located all over the hotel but they just reminded me too much of bathrooms.

If the look of the hotel wasn’t enough to put me off, before we got the room key they made us sign a paper which said if any of our stuff goes missing in the rooms that they wouldn’t be responsible for it. Not only that but inside the room there was a framed photocopy of a similar paper stating the same thing and another A4 sheet located on the table also saying the same thing. As you can imagine I didn’t want to leave anything in the room and I didn’t, I kept my backpack with me the whole time.

Traffic in Dubai because of Gitex was just a disaster. It was always at a complete standstill, a real mess. One cab driver told me things get even worse in February during the shopping festival.

The weather in Dubai was also a lot hotter then Kuwait. Its currently freezing here. Froze my ass off tonight while leaving Maki at Marina, even had a jacket on and it wasn’t enough!

I wanted to visit Gitex but I finished my work around 8PM and Gitex closes at 7. Why can’t they stay open till like 10 or something like exhibitions that are held in Kuwait? Its like people need to take a day off work to pass by them.

I went to Ibn Battuta mall. Its not as big as Mall of the Emirates but its still a lot bigger then Marina Mall and the whole thing felt very Las Vegasishy.

I still can’t believe I was in Dubai and didn’t get to pass by Gitex!

I found this at the Dubai Duty Free. If beer was legal in Kuwait I would definitely setup a draught beer system at home. This one cost only $250.

I think everyone in the Dubai Duty Free figured I lived in Kuwait because I was walking around taking pictures of the bottles of alcohol. Moskovskaya is my favorite brand of vodka. Its the only one I can drink straight up without mixing it with anything.

Someone posted this comment under a Jazeera Airways post of mine:

dear sir,
i m an indian i like to go back to india for 45 days i m in kuwait now. is there booking open 4 dec 2006 2nd and third week & what are the fare rates two way or a single way coming from india back can i book it online. pls give me a complete detail and easy way to check the online fare rates to india from destination and from kuwait to uae that is ras al khaimah. thanking u. waiting 4 ur reply.

and this is an email someone sent me regarding the new Symphony Mall opening in Salmiya:

Savio wrote:
could you send us some information on the space available at the symphony mall along with area and prices.

Just finished checking in to my flight. Airport security today is just overboard. Jazeera Airways and British Airways check in stations are located in the same area and it seems because of British Airways security was extremely tough… not the usual laid back chatting with friends while ignoring the metal detector beeps. I had to actually take off my belt while some other guys were told to remove their shoes. Had to wait over 30 minutes in the security check line. Usually the lack of decent security at the Kuwait Airport pisses me off, but after seeing what good security involves, I am glad we lack security “most of the time”.

Just found out I have to leave to Dubai tomorrow morning for one night which means I will be back on Monday night. I am traveling with Kuwait Airways so pray for me.

update: Luckily Jazeera Airways have a better timed flight, so I am going to be flying with them instead.

Both GAP and Banana Republic will be opening up at the new Avenues mall early next year. Although I am not a fan of either of them but at least they are new brands in Kuwait.

Since I am not a big fan of Mac City because of their extremely high prices I like picking on them a lot. The other day I posted about how Mac&More honor the warranty on Apple products purchased abroad and I decided to see if Mac City also honored the warranty.

Well I just got off the phone with Mac City and it turns out although they are official resellers in Kuwait they do not honor the Apple warranty unless you purchase the Mac from them. The guy I spoke to told me I should call Dubai and see if they would fix my laptop under warranty or I should send it back to Amazon.

I told him no thanks and closed the phone. One more reason not to deal with Mac City.

I found the easiest way to order flowers today. I needed flowers for Nat and I didn’t have time to pass by this place near my home so I searched online and found a site called Q8Flowers.com. They had a decent variety of flowers available, they accepted Knet and best of all they had same day delivery. I sent her the bouquet called Soul Mate which is a mixture of pink and purple roses. It turned out to be pretty cool and large. Here is a link to the site. [Link]

I am also reading many positive comments regarding ClicknBuy. Seems they are quick to deliver and very cheap. Its pretty cool seeing all these local e-commerce sites starting to pop up.

I was thinking today, maybe I should start video blogging. I have a miniDV cam, there is YouTube and I already have a blog so its very easy to just start adding video blogs here. The thing is though, what can I video blog about? Anyone got any ideas? Anyone outside Kuwait who wants to see a video of a certain place here? Should I do a documentary on something related to Kuwait? How about videos of popular places in Kuwait like Kuwait Towers, Zoo, Entertainment City? What would you guys find interesting?

My motorbike license test is on Wednesday so today I went to bike practice with Nat so I could train a bit before the exam. It was my first time back on the bike since my crash over a month ago. I wasn’t on the Ducati today, I was back on the Bajaj Pulsar. At first I was afraid I had forgotten how to ride but I managed to get a hold of things quicker then I had anticipated. My wrist is still killing me and it was hurting quite a bit while I was riding but its not that big a deal. I just want to pass my test and get the license and then I can give my wrist all the time it needs to heal. Can’t wait to get back on the Ducati and ride again.

When I was in Canada I got introduced to Poutine and ever since its been a favorite dish of mine every time I visit Montreal. Around a year ago I found out New York Fries had opened up in Kuwait so I went to check it out because I knew NYF from Canada and they used to have Poutine. NYF had opened up next to Souk Salmiya and my first experience was a mess. Firstly it turned out they were called New York Friez not Fries meaning they were just copying the name and look of the original franchise. Secondly although they did have poutine on the menu they couldn’t make it right. Poutine is french fries topped with cheese curds and brown gravy but I got served french fries with chili and cheese. According to them it was because they had run out of gravy. I was like fine but you should have told instead of trying to pass me chili cheese fries as poutine.

Anyway that was the last time I went to them until today. I was meeting up with Nibaq near Johnny Rockets Salmiya and I noticed New York Friez had opened up right behind them. I was like let me give them another chance. I go in and ask the waitress if they have poutine, she was like yes and she showed it to me on the menu. I tell her great can I have one. Then I was like wait, how do you make your poutine, whats in it? She was like chili and cheese and fries. I was like thats not poutine, poutine is cheese, gravy and fries. She went to the back asked the cook and came back and told me no poutine is chili, cheese and fries. I was like no thanks and walked out.

Things like this piss me off. If you look at the picture I took from their menu you will notice they can’t even spell poutine right. In UAE they have the official New York Fries but sadly they don’t have poutine on the menu. But at least there they don’t try passing chili cheese fries as poutine to their customers.

Here is info on poutine at Wikipedia. [Link]