According to a recent article in The Telegraph, Kuwait is one of the top 20 fastest growing travel destinations in the world. The article doesn’t mention why or how that came to be, and I also couldn’t find their original source of data, so I don’t really have more more information other than the ranking. Kuwait was also the only Arab country to appear on the list which you can check out below:
The top 20 fastest growing travel destinations
1- Sierra Leone +310%
2- Nepal +39.7%
3- Iceland +39%
4- South Korea +30.3%
5- Moldova +28.6%
6- Chile +26%
7- Vietnam +24.6%
8- Japan +21.8%
9- Liechtenstein +21.7%
10- Kiribati +21.6%
11- Kuwait +20.7%
12- Madagascar +20%
13- Cyprus +19.8%
14- Georgia +19%
15- Turks & Caicos +17.5%
16- Cook Islands +17.1%
17- Slovakia +16.9%
18- Kenya +16.8%
19- Tanzania +15.6%
20- Indonesia +15.5%
Jaber recounted an incident that took place in January 2017, while she was in Egypt training for her masters degree. She asked a close friend to take care of the cheetahs, but a fire broke out in the apartment and the fire brigade saw the wild felines and reported them to the police.
“I directly called somebody high-ranking at the police station of the district to replace the mention of ‘cheetah’ with ‘big cat’ on the complaint. It is necessary to act very quickly, so that the wasta works,” Jaber tells MEE.
Owning exotic animals is illegal in Kuwait yet these guys are parading them in this article for Middle East Eye and on their personal instagram accounts. Then to top it off they talk about how they have wasta to help them stay out of trouble and give examples of situations where their wasta helped them out. I really do hope because of this article they’ll all get arrested and their animals taken away from them. [Link]
If you were hoping to watch Wonder Woman over Eid then you’re out of luck. I just got confirmation a few moments ago from Grand Cinemas that Wonder Woman has been banned in Kuwait. The reason given to me was because the lead actress Gal Gadot is Israeli.
Update: I’ve deleted all the comments and closed this post up to new comments. This post is just an announcement and I’m not interested in turning it into a political discussion.
Just digitized this video taken at the Kuwait Ice Skating Rink back in April of 1995. 1991-92 is when I frequented the ice skating rink mostly and back then the music was amazing with hits like Snap – I got the Power and Soul II Soul – Back to Life. Still, the video above should bring back memories and if you look closely you can even spot the arcades in the background.
Gatwa W Gahwa is a cat cafe thats soft launching this coming Saturday. They’re located in the basement of Galleria 2000 in Salmiya and they have around 10 cats which you can hang out and play with. The idea of a cat cafe isn’t new, I got to experience one around 5 years ago when I was in Japan, but this will be the first cat cafe in Kuwait and only the second in the region.
The price for spending time and playing with the cats is KD3.5 for half an hour or KD5 for an hour. They will be offering discounts for those who wish to stay longer and even a monthly membership for those who want to come in everyday. You’ll also be able to book the whole place for book readings or even cat yoga. I was there earlier today and the cats are super cute and really playful. I was pretty surprised at how beautiful some of the cats were, for some reason when I heard they were rescued cats I was expecting to find a cafe fill with street cats but instead all the cats I interacted with were so cute and fluffy.
They’re soft opening from this Saturday and their timings during Ramadan will be 12PM to 4PM and then 8PM to 12AM. After Ramadan their working hours will be 11AM to 10PM. They’ll also have an online reservation system up and running this weekend. For more information check out their instagram account @catcafeq8
PS: Remember Abdulai? He now works at the Cat Cafe!
Update: Their website and reservation system is now online [Here]
Yesterday I headed to Em Sherif with Fajer the lawyer for futoor. I had pre-booked a few days earlier but was on a waiting list and luckily a table freed up so we went. If you’ve never been to Em Sherif before in Beirut or Dubai, it’s basically an upscale Lebanese restaurant with a set menu. The Kuwait location just opened up a few weeks ago in Bida’a behind Palms and I’ve been meaning to try it ever since I found out about it.
The interior is beautiful and very tastefully done but star of the evening had to be the food. The amount of food we ate last night was just insane, I don’t think I’ve ever eaten that much before. The dishes kept coming one after the other and by dish #22 I had to ask the waiter how many dishes in total they were. They serve a total of 35 dishes, thats basically a 35 course meal and it’s crazy. I was falling into a food coma before I even finished having lunch. They really should give you a medal or some sort of certificate for completing the set menu, kinda like how you get a medal just for completing a marathon.
The service was also superb and just the overall experience was fantastic. The cost is KD25 per person (soft drinks not included) and it really is great value for money. Right now, this is by far my favorite Lebanese restaurant in Kuwait and I’ll definitely be going back.
Flight compensation legal services company AirHelp ranked 76 airports by punctuality, quality, service, as well as the social media sentiment of over 130,000 tweets over three months this year. According to the final result, the Kuwait Airport ranked the worst in the world.
I mean I agree that the airport is not the best in the world but the worst seems pretty harsh. Somehow Dubai also came 7th which doesn’t make sense and Los Angeles which I think have a great airport came in 10th. Check out the full article [Here]
The video above is an interview that Generation Iron Fitness Network held with Arnold Classic winner, Brandon Curry on why he thinks Kuwait produces so many great body builders (specifically Oxygen Gym).
Brandon lived and trained in Kuwait before and he thinks Kuwait produces a lot of amazing body builders because of two things; The first is that Oxygen is one the best equipped and body building focused gyms in the world. The second is that when body builders move to Kuwait from their home countries, they are a lot more focused. There aren’t as many distractions like family and the whole social life they had back home. In Kuwait its basically eat, sleep, train and repeat. That actually makes a lot of sense.
New bylaws were passed yesterday that now allow some businesses to operate legally with a license from their homes (aka home business). There are some requirements to obtain this license including the following:
– Kuwaitis only can apply for a home license
– Must be older than 21 years old
– You need permission from the home owner
– The license is mostly for services such as designers, calligraphist, illustrators, photographers, web and app developers, watchmakers, gardeners, technicians, event planners, translators, museums, and so on.
– No cupcakes, or burgers or any other food businesses can be licensed from homes
The Ministry of Commerce does not want to turn residential areas into commercial areas, they still want homes to be homes but a lot of businesses don’t involve a lot of interaction with customers or require customers to come over and so it doesn’t make sense that those businesses require a commercial space. The ministry has stated that the above law will come into effect first day after Eid.
I want to dedicate this post to my dear friend Ahmed Al Gharabally who recently passed away. Ahmed was a lobbyist and an activist that worked really hard on bringing this law to life through @legalizekw, a campaign that was launched to make home business in Kuwait legal. May you RIP Ahmed. It is great to see young Kuwaitis actively suggest new laws, and the new and young minister of commerce and industry Mr. Khaled Al Roudhan has done a wonderful job listening to their suggestions and attending their events.
For any legal inquiries, please email me on [email protected] and my team or I will get back to you within 24 hours.
Post by Fajer Ahmed – Legal Counsel The legal opinions expressed in this post are those of the author Fajer. Opinions expressed by Mark or any other writer on mark248am1.wpenginepowered.com are those of the individual’s and in no way reflect Fajer’s opinion.
eSports is a form of competition that involves video games and it’s a scene thats blowing up pretty big worldwide with teams making millions of dollars off of sponsorships and prize money. If you do a quick google image search for esports stadiums you’ll find photos of large stadiums and arenas packed with people watching gamers compete against one another (similar to the one below). It’s pretty insane really and regionally it’s also starting to blow up. A number of eSports competitions are being held locally and around the region, and one Kuwaiti team has been making waves recently, Evolve Gaming.
Evolve Gaming was formed early this year and is composed of 6 members aged between 17 and 26. Recently they came first in the largest Overwatch tournament in the Middle East and Africa destroying the competition. Overwatch is a multiplayer first-person shooter and Evolve Gaming beat the popular and more established Dubai based team YaLLa eSports 3-0. Even though YaLLa has sponsors, a large fanbase, more support and a proper e-gaming atmosphere, the Kuwaiti team managed to beat them with ease and just a couple months after being formed.
Evolve Gaming is currently ranked as the #1 Overwatch team in the Middle East and Africa and so I got in touch with them recently to get an idea of what our local scene lacks and how I can help. According to a team member I spoke to, one of the biggest issues we have locally is the lack of awareness. Even though the eSports scene is growing rapidly abroad, locally not a lot of people know about it although its starting to pick up with a few gaming tournaments taking place locally like the Kuwait’s eSports Tournament and the Hydra Entertainment Tournaments. Evolve Gaming is hoping large companies will realize this is a growing market and help it grow even quicker by sponsoring local teams and tournaments. By having large companies sponsor local teams and events, it would bring a lot more attention to this sport which will also encourage more teams to formed and more events to take place.
Hopefully my post will help bring a bit of exposure to their community. If you’d like to follow Evolve Gaming they’re active on twitter @EvolveGamingKW. If you’re also a company that is interested in sponsoring Evolve Gaming or a tournament, get in touch and I’ll pass you their contacts.
I had no idea Em Sherif was opening in Kuwait so I was pretty surprised to find out they had recently opened up. Em Sherif is an upscale fine dining Lebanese restaurant that offers a set menu for lunch and dinner. I’ve been to their Dubai location and it’s always a fantastic experience with really amazing food accompanied by a beautiful interior and mood. In Kuwait they opened up at Palms and costs KD25 per person.
I just heard the great news today, a bylaw has been approved from the municipality to allow food trucks to operate with a license. I know many of my clients are going to be happy as previously only restaurants with a physical location were allowed to have food trucks. This is great news for Kuwait but I hope they don’t put a limit to the number of food trucks like other GCC countries (one country only allows 10 at a time!).
For any legal inquiries, please email me on [email protected] and my team or I will get back to you within 24 hours.
Post by Fajer Ahmed – Legal Counsel The legal opinions expressed in this post are those of the author Fajer. Opinions expressed by Mark or any other writer on mark248am1.wpenginepowered.com are those of the individual’s and in no way reflect Fajer’s opinion.
