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Mark posted his top 5 video games last week, but 2016 was a great year for video games and it was challenging for me to narrow the list down to 10 yet alone 5. There were a lot of great games from AAA studios and a lot of great games from smaller studios. There were also few games that I loved playing that didn’t make it to the list, games that people should still check out like Hitman, Dragon Quest Builders, Pokemon Sun/Moon and the Division. 2017 is looking promising as well, so fingers crossed! Check out my favorite games of 2016 below.

Usually I let my brother write all the video game posts but in this specific case I wanted to share my favorite games of last year. I went through a lot more games than usual this past year but the list below are of the ones that did it for me:

Incase you missed it, last week I posted about a bunch of teens who were able to sneak onto the roof of Al Hamra Tower. While checking the instagram account of one of the teens called Abood, I realized that sliding around the roof of Hamra Tower was probably one of the safest things the guy has done.

Abood who’s instagram account is @pk_spark enjoys climbing on top of towers and recklessly sit or stand right on the edge. The photos definitely look cool on instagram, but damn its also so not worth the risk. You can check out his public instagram account @pk_spark for a ton of photos, but he also has a YouTube channel with a bunch of videos (mostly parkour stuff) [Here].

A reader recommended I put together a list of places which visitors to Kuwait could check out on a short trip. It was pretty difficult to put the list together since I didn’t want to make the list too long but also struggled with places like Al Shaheed Park (Would tourists want to visit a park?). With that in mind, below is the list of my recommendations. If you have better suggestions which I’m sure you do, let me know in the comments and I might add it to the list.

Places to Visit

Kuwait Towers: I like standing under the towers and looking up more than I like going up to the towers. The observatory deck might be worth checking out if you’re interested in seeing the Kuwait City skyline although I personally don’t think it’s that great of a view. The windows are also usually dirty and at night you can’t see anything outside because the observatory deck is too brightly lit on the inside. The restaurant in the Kuwait Towers isn’t that bad, but there are better places to have a meal.

Water Towers: I recommend the water towers in Adailiya since they’re located inside the park and so you can walk up to them very close. They were also recently painted so they’ll look good in photos (pictured above).

Maritime Museum, Modern Art Museum, Dickson House and the Amricani Cultural Center are all located right next to each other so you can cover them all in 2-3 hours easily since neither of them is that big. [Link]

Souk Mubarkiya: A must visit place if you’re looking for an old traditional market.

The Avenues Mall: I know its a mall but it’s a great one and in the summer it’s probably the best place to go if you want to shop. You’ll find everything there from high end designers to IKEA and a ton of different places to eat at.

Al Shaab Gate: There are a few old city gates left but I’d recommend visiting the one adjacent to Al Shaheed Park since the area around it was recently renovated.

Jaber Al-Ahmad Cultural Centre: Beautiful architecture and a large garden with an animated musical fountain to check out. If you’re lucky there might be an event or show taking place during your visit so check their website for tickets. There are also restaurants located at the centre in case you want to have a meal there.

Restaurants

Cocoa Room: My favorite breakfast place and is usually always busy.

Street by Al Makan: Good food, gets pretty busy at night mostly with a younger crowd, located in a trendy area. Also walking distance to Souk Mubarakiya. Pass by Vol.1 located under it for coffee after dinner.

Solo PN: A very popular pizza place thats always busy. Recently won an award for the 3rd best pizza in the world.

Al Shemam: Located right in the middle of Souk Mubarakiya next to the vegetable market. Has great grills (fish, meat and poultry) but is also a pretty ghetto looking place so not for the squeamish (pictured above).

Freej Suwaileh: A very popular and affordable Kuwaiti cuisine restaurant that’s open till 5AM.

Dar Hamad: A high end Kuwaiti cuisine restaurant with a beautiful interior.

Events

There are always events taking place so if you’re looking for one to go to during your visit, make sure you check out the events page [Here]

Off the Beaten Path

Friday Market: A large flea market that takes place on Fridays, usually gets really packed and you can find lots of random things for sale there from old gaming systems to washing machines and furniture. Although you might be tempted, avoid the animals section.

Salem Mubarek Street: A street stretching out around 2KM filled with shops on both sides. Used to be extremely popular in the 80s and early 90s (pictured above).

Al-Rehab Complex: If you’re into video games you’ll love this complex since the mezzanine floor and basement are filled with video game shops. By filled I mean every single shop there is a video game shop, easily over 50 shops.

Ice Skating Rink: Popular in the 80s and early 90s but not very popular nowadays. Worth checking out if you’re looking to cool off during the hot summer months.

House of Mirrors: The House of Mirrors belongs to Lidia al-Qattan, the widow of Khalifa al-Qattan, a renowned Kuwaiti artist. She started decorating one small wall with mirrors and through time more and more walls were decorated until the whole house inside and out was covered with mirrors.

I tend not to post about instagram businesses mostly because the majority are not that interesting but, @brushed965 is one I think is actually pretty cool. For a price, Brushed 965 will customize your personal items like wallets, purses and sneakers by painting them. Its a great way of customizing a popular item like a Chanel or LV purse. Based on what I’ve seen on their instagram account, their work ranges from simple monograms to detailed illustrated designs like the one above.

If you’re interested to check out their work or to commission a job, check their instagram account is @brushed965

A reader just passed me a link to an interesting Economist article which I thought would be worth sharing on the blog. The two paragraphs below kinda sums up the article for me:

Innovative Dubai is the comparison that most frustrates Kuwaitis. That is in part because Kuwait was once the Gulf’s trailblazer. It set up the world’s first sovereign-wealth fund in 1953 and was a leader in health care. It started one of the first airlines in the region. But the decline of Kuwait Airways is instructive. As its fleet aged and losses piled up, carriers from Qatar and the UAE began offering better service and more routes. Politicians have talked of privatisation. But parliament, reluctant to mess with one of the country’s biggest employers, has frustrated these efforts.

…

The government’s failings extend to public services. It has neglected public hospitals and schools. Low electricity prices and a sweltering climate make Kuwait one of the world’s biggest consumers of energy per person. But the government, which is the sole provider of electricity, has invested little in infrastructure. Parliament has delayed efforts to boost the supply. In 2014 a power outage shut down all three of the country’s oil refineries, crippling fuel production for a week. Endemic corruption completes the dismal picture.

It’s not that long of an article and is worth reading fully, so check it out [Here]

The picture on top is currently my favorite Kuwait skyline photo and was taken by @ziadgram

The movies below are now showing at Cinescape and Grand Cinemas:

New This Week:
I Am Not a Serial Killer (6.2)
Italian Race (7.5)
Man Down (6.3)
Underworld: Blood Wars (6.7) ♦

Other Movies Showing:
Allied (7.2) ♦
Arrival (8.4) ★
Bleed for This (6.4) ♦
Doctor Strange (8.0) ★
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (8.3)
Ghost Coins (7.5)
Hacksaw Ridge (8.8) ★♦
Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (7.4) ★
Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (7.2)
The Accountant (7.8) ★
Trolls (6.7)

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.
★ is for movies I’m interested in. ♦ implies movie might contain censorship.

I’ve been getting a lot of people asking me if owning an old car is a pain in the ass. Like how difficult is it to maintain? Is it reliable? How practical it is as a daily driver? I got my Datsun back in April and I’ve been driving it every day since, so I think I’m now qualified enough to answer some of those questions.

Classic Cars Expectations
First thing you need to do is manage your expectations with the car. You’re not buying a brand new car off the dealership lot so you need know that the car won’t be perfect. My car for example has a bunch of quirks if I can put it nicely, here are some of them:

– I need a new gearbox, right now my gears jump to neutral randomly when in 1st, 3rd or 5th gear. New gearbox with installation will cost me just KD150, but I’m not in the mood to get it done because end of the day my gearbox is working fine, it’s just a bit annoying. I’ve got a temp fix right now which is, whenever I am in one of those gears, I just keep my hand on the gear knob so it doesn’t jump out of place and it works. Simple.

– When I close my drivers door it automatically locks. So I ALWAYS make sure the keys are with me before exiting the car.

– When I fill up gas I spend the rest of the day inhaling gas fumes in the car.

– Speaking of fumes, if I have one window open, the cars internal air pressure changes and starts pulling in exhaust fumes from the rear. So I need to either have both windows rolled up or both windows down. So if a passenger rolls down their window I roll down mine, if they roll there’s up, I roll mine up. No biggie.

– When I go through a drive-thru car wash I get soaked a little while sitting inside the car. It leaks water from on top of the door and it’s not because of the rubber seals which I’ve already replaced. The car is just so old that the body has warped a bit and so the doors and rear hatch don’t properly seal.

– It’s really loud, old cars had no sound insulation and I can’t really converse with anyone inside the car. The sound of the road, wind, engine and exhaust just doesn’t make it possible.

These are just some of the “quirks” and I’ve got a bunch more. So when you get an old car expect there to be weird issues. My car is 43 years old and I’ve accepted all the issues that came with it and they don’t bother me at all.

Governments all over the world are still trying to figure out how to control the use of drones due to their rising popularity, and Kuwait is no different. Early this year I shared a proposal by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation on limiting the use of drones in Kuwait. One of their proposals was to ban the use of drones over congested areas or private properties and it seems this is now officially a law. According to a new article on the MOI website, they state that it’s now against the law to fly drones over homes or other private properties which don’t belong to you. Violating this law will result in either a prison sentence of up to 3 years, a KD3,000 fine, or both.

Personally, I have mixed feelings against this law. I can certainly understand where they’re coming from, it would be fairly easy to spy on people using drones and I’m sure a lot of “voyuerists” are already doing this. But, I don’t really like the idea of banning everyone from flying drones because some people are misusing it. That would be like banning all telescopes because some people use it to spy on their neighbors. I would prefer they punish abusers severely and let everybody else continue to fly drones wherever they want. But since this is Kuwait and law enforcement isn’t that great, then it makes sense to just ban everyone since that would be easier option of the two to enforce.

The article on the MOI website is only available in Arabic and I haven’t been able to find an English version of it yet. The english articles on the MOI website haven’t been updated since May for some reason, so if you can’t read Arabic you’re going to have use Google Translate like I did. Here is the [Link]

Thanks Adly!

Back before the iPod came out and Apple became popular, there was an Apple store located across the street from Salhiya. As a teenager I used to walk by the store and dream about owning a Power Mac which I thought back then was one of the hottest looking computers on the market. Fast forward around a decade later and that Apple store was abandoned. I ended up taking some photos of it in that abandoned state and published them online as part of my Miskan project. The photos got picked up by the likes of Engadget and Gizmodo since the store was like a time capsule. After my 15 seconds of fame that was it.. until this week.

Somehow the photos have started making their rounds around the internet again, they first got posted on reddit and then the popular YouTuber EverythingApplePro who has like 3 million subscribers shared the photos in his latest video. Gotta love the internet. My pictures make it in his video above at the 2:10 mark but you can check out all the photos I had taken back then [Here]

I eventually ended up getting the vinyl ‘Think Different’ campaign banners that are in the photos. I still have them tucked away in my closet and from what I’ve been able to gather, they’re now worth a nice penny or two.

Thanks Salah!

With all the media hype over the elections on the streets of Kuwait and all the rage over president-elect Trump, I thought I’d take a crack at being a devious politician, too. With each one of the candidates making promising ideas and creating alliances for votes, I thought about sharing with you what I would promise if I were to run for office (in terms of music). I’ve been working in the Music industry since 2002, and feel like I’m at the very least, credible enough to have an opinion. So, if I were to run for the head of Culture & Arts to get my shot at the oval office, my campaign slogan would be: “We are going to bring back music and we are going to build a wall around it”. Even though it sounds outlandish and vague, unlike my other candidates, I am going to show you my plan.

First thing I would do in Office is to locate or create, a credible Art Fund that was financially generous when it came to experimenting with new ideas, like having musicians play at airports on arrival? Sure, why not. This Art Fund, think of it like a Bank, would see itself as the stimulus towards creating a music culture. Art Funds are not a new concept, there are plenty all over the world, but unlike them I would outsource media and events creation to third party companies. Because this is where Art Funds go bad. “But, why Amin?” you might ask, “Why not just keep it all in-house?” Because Art Funds often underestimate the amount of work and field experience that goes into properly executing Public Relations and Event Production. For example, the head secretary should not work as the ticket seller and host on the mic, too. Not outsourcing is usually what determines where an event falls on the fine line between what I like to call “small firework shows” (successful, fun events that bring in crowds, but don’t really go anywhere past that point) and symbolic strategic shows that are impactful or open to stimulate the economic growth of an industry. So, yes, outsource PR and Event Production to third party companies, and throw in a Talent Agency to collaborate with the PR and Event Production companies, and let the Art Fund focus on curating and investing in the Arts.

This is just a quick follow up on my previous post on KBC. Back in October I posted about the new initiative by the Ministry of Commerce called Kuwait Business Center (KBC). They setup KBC to make it easy for individuals to establish a company in Kuwait by allowing them to apply for one online, and then just visit their offices once to sign some papers. Since I posted about KBC I’ve had two friends set up businesses using their services and they’ve lived up to their promise.

In both cases, setting up a company took around 10 days and just one visit to their main office in Ishbilia. The KBC staff according to my friends were also very nice and helpful. So if you’re planning to open up a company in Kuwait, this is currently the most efficient way to do so. Check out the KBC website [Here]

My friends over at Beattie + Dane worked on this hilarious campaign for Al Munayes Tea called “Bou Salem”. He’s a funny character that is pretending to run for a seat in the upcoming parliament elections. There are two videos out so far, the one on top is the first video that was released in which the character Bou Salem was introduced for the first time. The one below was the second video and is of Bou Salem day dreaming while drinking his tea which made me laugh out loud when I first watched it. Kinda makes me miss not working in advertising anymore.

Note: The video on top is in Arabic

The movies below are now showing at Cinescape and Grand Cinemas:

New This Week:
Allied (7.2) ♦
Arrival (8.4) ★

Other Movies Showing:
Bleed for This (6.4) ♦
Doctor Strange (8.0) ★
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (8.3)
Ghost Coins (7.5)
Hacksaw Ridge (8.8) ★♦
Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (7.4) ★
Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (7.2)
Ouija: Origin of Evil (6.8)
Raven the Little Rascal – The Big Race (7.6)
The Accountant (7.8) ★
Trolls (6.7)

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.
★ is for movies I’m interested in. ♦ implies movie might contain censorship.

The movies below are now showing at Cinescape and Grand Cinemas:

New This Week:
A Street Cat Named Bob (7.4)
Bleed for This (6.4) ♦
Complete Unknown (5.5)
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (8.3)
Ghost Coins (7.5)
Raven the Little Rascal – The Big Race (7.6)

Other Movies Showing:
Deepwater Horizon (7.2)
Doctor Strange (8.0) ★
Hacksaw Ridge (8.8) ★♦
Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (7.4) ★
Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (7.2)
Operation Chromite (6.3)
Ouija: Origin of Evil (6.8)
Shut In (N/A) ♦
The Accountant (7.8) ★
Trolls (6.7)

Numbers in brackets refer to the IMDB rating at time of publishing.
★ is for movies I’m interested in. ♦ implies movie might contain censorship.