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Some of you already noticed that I changed the blog banner last night from the “THEBSIDES” to “The A-SIDES”. Continuing to use the term B-Sides didn’t make sense since 2:48AM wasn’t the B-Side anymore. Originally during my Miskan project I needed a place to dump photos and talk about things that didn’t have room on Miskan (remember I was limited to 1 post a day) and so 2:48AM was created and the B-Side tag slapped on.

My Miskan project ended 5 years ago and 2:48AM no longer was the B-Side, instead it became the A-Side and I don’t know why it took me so long to change that.

So 2:48AM is now the A-Side but that made me realize something. When the blog first started I used to post 5+ posts per day. As the site grew and my readership base grew I started becoming a lot more picky to what to post and what not to. This is why I decided to create a B-Side to 2:48AM, a place where I could post stuff that wouldn’t usually make it on my main site here but was still content that many people would find interesting.

2:48PM [The B-Sides] is now live and you can access it by going to www.248pm.com or clicking the link on the far right of the navigation bar on top of this site. Starting today you will have a lot more posts and content to shift through so I hope everyone enjoys it. Any comments, feedback and ideas are always welcomed of course.

A reader emailed me to tell me that Kaifan Co-op recently installed Cash Guard machines. I’ve seen them before I think at the Shamiya Co-op and thought they were pretty cool. Basically it’s connected to the cash register and once your total is tallied up you pay the cashier and they place the money into the machine which then spits out the change if any.

Now I’m curious to know how much money was actually going missing from the regular cash registers that the Co-ops had to resort to installing these what I am guessing expensive machines? I found a video on YouTube on how they work which you can watch below.

[YouTube]

Thanks Laila

I just got an email from someone telling me he’s been getting lots of phone calls regarding my post about Sidekick Academy. It seems by mistake I typed the wrong number in and people have been calling him all day. The correct number for Sidekick Academy is 99975562.

Sorry about that!

Since when does Kuwait have a cricket team? It’s kinda like when I first found out we had a baseball stadium. [Link]

Update: Here a more pictures of the baseball stadiums. [Link]

It’s been awhile since I posted about Mishaal Al Roomi. For those of you who are new to the blog and haven’t heard about him, Mishaal is a young and extremely talented weather forecaster whom I’ve posted about a number of times before. He had a website which he used to update daily with the weather forecast even though he was only 17 years old. His site ended up having technical problems and then the updates suddenly stopped. Well he emailed me today telling me that his website www.q8weather.com is now fixed and getting updated daily.

So if you want to get an accurate weather forecast you can now head over to his website and check out his predictions. I’m also going to check with him and see if there is somehow I can implement his forecast into the Kuwait Blogs app. Here is a link to his 5-day forecast which is what I used to check [Link]

If you’ve missed the previous 3gal self defense videos click here and here. [YouTube]

I know being 40 isn’t like being #1 or in the top 10 or top 20 but it’s still an accomplishment since Kuwait according to Newsweek is the best Arab country in the world. The results were based on Education, Health, Quality of Life, Economic Dynamism and Political Environment. Kuwait came in 24th place for Quality of Life while it loss mostly in the Education category coming in 76th place. That’s not good news. Lebanon on the other hand didn’t even make the list! Now that’s embarrassing. [Link]

Thanks Ahmed

After reading an article in Arab Times about the Zoo management accepting criticism I figured with that the Kuwait Zoo had turned a new leaf and has changed for the better. Well I was there today and nothing has changed.

To be fair, the 3 new bear enclosures are a huge improvement over everything else at the zoo. They’ve also fixed the Bony sign by covering up the bottom right part of the B so that it now looks like a P. And that’s it. Thats the only two things that have improved.

The worst part about the whole zoo has to be the security guards. People were feeding the animals, throwing bottles of water at the animals, throwing garbage and jumping over the protective barriers while the security guards did nothing. I went up to one security guard and asked him if it was allowed to feed the animals, he told me no it wasn’t. I then asked him why he was letting people feed the animals or kids throw bottles at the bears. He pretended to be dumb and asked me who was doing that, I just pointed to the crowd standing next to him and told him they all are. He just looked at me confused and wondered off. A few minutes later we were near the monkey cages and I noticed two little kids over the fence feeding the animals with their parents proudly standing and watching. What was even more terrible was the fact there was a security guard sitting on a chair also just watching. I went up to him as well and asked him why he wasn’t doing anything about the kids over the barrier. I asked him what if one of the monkeys bit one of the kids? He just smiled back at me, he didn’t care.

As you can see in the picture above the two kids are over the barrier. In the second picture below you can see the security guard in the chair watching the kids in the background over the barrier.

Everywhere I looked there were people just throwing stuff at the animals and no one was doing anything about it. But the thing is, it’s not their fault. People aren’t expected to know they can’t feed the animals and I only saw one “Don’t feed the animals” sign in the whole zoo. It’s the job of the zoo to educate people, they should put up signs in multiple languages telling people not to feed or throw stuff at the animals and they should be located outside all the cages and enclosures. It’s then the job of the security guards to enforce the rules when they are broken. In both cases the zoo has failed miserably.

Two years back I posted about the possibility of Kuwait building nuclear plants, well it looks like they’re going to be building four! I just hope they don’t put the guy in charge of the sewage treatment plants to handle the nuclear power plants. [Link]

Before I started 248AM I had another blog called Miskan. Before Miskan I had a photo blog (that sadly doesn’t exist anymore) called Moblogging in Kuwait. Before Moblogging in Kuwait I started off blogging at qHate.com back when the only bloggers around were just me, Nibaq and Zaydoun from Kuwait Unplugged. Thing is I’ve posted about so much stuff in the past 7 years that I’ve completely lost track of what I’ve posted about and what I haven’t. For example it recently came into my attention that I haven’t posted about Q8Books or the original Kuwait Bookshop although I could swear I’ve posted about them before. Turns out I discovered both those places back during my Moblogging from Kuwait project in 2004 but only mentioned it briefly on Miskan and with a picture on Moblogging from Kuwait (actually called Nat my girl friend in that post back then!) yet I thought I had done a proper post about it here on 248AM. Anyway since I haven’t I figured I would do so now.

Q8 Books
Q8 Books is the only used books shop I am aware of in Kuwait. There actually aren’t that many places that sell used anything here in Kuwait which makes Q8 Books even more special. The place is filled to the brim with a ton of used books ranging from novels, kids books to cooking books and more. The owner of the place is a great guy who opened the place and runs it out of passion. They even have a website that contains all the books they have in the shop, how cool is that? The store is located on the mezzanine floor of the shopping center behind Johnny Rockets Salhiya. For store opening hours and to check out their collection of books you can visit their website www.q8books.com

The Kuwait Bookshop
Everyone knows the large Kuwait Bookshop located in the basement of Muthana Complex in Kuwait City but very few people know about their first and original store located a few hundred meters away. The original Kuwait Bookshop location was the first English bookshop to open up in Kuwait (so I was told) and the location is still open and active. Although the Muthana branch is pretty cozy the original branch is even cozier. The store is two stories with the top floor being my favorite since it feels like it contains hidden treasures. I’ve been there a few times and never seen anyone in the shop but the employees tell me they do get a lot of customers. The original Kuwait Bookshop is located near Restaurant 99 on the Sheraton Roundabout.

Note: Off topic but I think Moblogging from Kuwait was my best blog so far. Sadly it was hosted on textamerica.com which shutdown and took my blog with it. Luckily most of it is still archived on web.archive.org although 99% of the pictures aren’t. It’s still fun to flip through and read my old posts there. I used to post from my Sony Clie UX-40. To read my old posts, follow [this link] click on the first image and then keep clicking next.

I passed by the old photographer this weekend. In our previous meeting I had asked him if there was anything that can be done to help him out and he had told me he needed a few days to think about it and a few days had passed and I was curious to what can be done. I was already brainstorming a few ideas in my head trying to think about what can be done to help him get back to his feet but I really couldn’t come up with anything long term. So I passed by again and we had another long chat.

He’s 80 years old and not in the best of condition. He has an employee he doesn’t trust, a store that only does photocopies, and he makes just enough income to feed himself and put a shelter on top of his head. He told me that he thought about restructuring his shop, to get into digital photography or at least upgrade his machine in the store. But he told me it would take to long for him to start making profit and he’s 80 years old and doesn’t have that much left to live. He then told me he thought about going back to his village in Lebanon but what would he do there? He doesn’t have anyone. His family all passed away, he has a half brother who he hasn’t spoken to in years but he’s also very old. He doesn’t have anything to go back to. He then moved onto the subject of death and how his family all passed away without every going on a hajj. He told me he doesn’t want to die without ever going to hajj.

I don’t know much about the hajj or how much it costs or if he actually can go being so old (I’m sure there are some kind of groups where young people help the elderly or something). If anyone would like to help me send the old man to hajj or at least if someone can post details on what the trip involves and who I could contact for information that would also be helpful.

In case you missed the previous posts here are the links:
In Kuwait since 1959
Update on the old photographer

Last year I posted about a bear that was being sold in Kuwait. After readers started contacting Animal Friends they launched an investigation and with the help of the government helped seize the bear. So where is the bear now and how is he doing? Well it looks like it’s at the Kuwait Zoo and judging by the video above having a great time. I haven’t been to the zoo for ages but the bear enclosure in the video above looks pretty good and large. It looks like I need to pass by the zoo soon and update my pictures. [YouTube]

Thanks sinful eyes

Last month I posted about Aysha, the Bahraini blogger who found out Al-Qabas newspaper had stolen a picture of her and published it in the newspaper without permission. Well Al-Qabas posted an apology a couple of days back… and posted her picture again.

If you remember, my whole issue was that the newspaper took a picture, my picture, from my blog without my permission. So, when I was informed that there would be a published apology on their site and the newspaper I never, ever imagined that they would actually REPRINT my image. Are they kidding? Are they seriously that naive or genuinely apologizing? My whole issue to begin with was having MY image plastered/printed in the bloody paper to begin with. They must be joking right? A cruel, pathetic joke!

You can check out her full post on her blog [Here]

First of all I would like to thank everyone for their support. Other than the tons of comments offering assistance I got a lot of emails and calls offering to help the old guy out. Regarding his residency that’s been sorted out. He’s just been running around a lot trying to get it done and as an 80 year old traveling by bus from location to location it can be extremely exhausting in this weather.

I passed by him tonight to get a better idea on how we can help him out and I honestly still don’t know what we can do. The only service his shop currently offers is photocopies for 100 fils. I was there for 2 hours tonight and only 1 person came in to get a photocopy done so that’s not really a source of income. There are two things he seems to be bothered about, one is the fact that he doesn’t have a store sign. The second is the fact he bought a small Minolta DiMAGE X1 for like KD10 from this lady who was traveling and he can’t get it to work. It took me a few seconds to figure out the battery needed charging and she hadn’t given him a charger with it so that’s why it wasn’t working. I need to find a battery charger for it and then teach him how to use it. He doesn’t have a computer so not sure what he is planning to do. Oh and I also brought along my laptop with me and introduced him to the internet. It was pretty weird trying to explain how the internet works and helping him pronounce Google which he kept calling Googen.

Anyway I’m going back again on Wednesday, I told him to think about what he needs or what would help him out and he promised to think about it and get back to me on it. While there he insisted on inviting me to a cold drink which was an RC Lemonade which I thought was pretty old school. I’ll make sure to keep everyone posted if there is anything we can do but for now I think everything should be ok.

I was wondering around tonight when I stumbled across an old photography store. Some pictures in the display grabbed my attention and when I looked inside I spotted an old man sitting reading the Koran and two other interesting photos. I decided to go in and check the photos out and I ended up spending around an hour there talking to the old man.

I won’t mention the photographers name or the shop location since I want to give him his space and privacy but he’s a Lebanese guy who ran away from an abusive father and took the bus and came to Kuwait in 1959. He hasn’t left since… not even once. He worked a variety of jobs here and there and in the end became a journalist and took some really great photos, some of which many of us have come across in one point in time or another. He ended up opening up his own photography shop and it’s been there ever since. Today the shop doesn’t sell anything, he doesn’t have any customers nor even a store sign. He broke the sign ages ago because to keep it up he would have to pay a fee of KD25 a year which he didn’t want to. He sold all his negatives to a newspapers years ago for KD200 and has a few photos he kept which he was selling framed for KD25 a piece but someone bought his photo and then made copies and started selling them for KD1 so that income stopped.

While there I spotted some old cameras behind an extremely dusty display that looked like it hadn’t been open since the 80s and my God what a beautiful camera collection. He had cameras from the 70’s and early 80’s still boxed brand new! He even had the beautiful rangefinder Konica S3 from 1974 which I had purchased used off eBay for KD60 last year, except he had a brand new one all boxed up and priced at KD45! He also had two brand new Nikon F3’s from 1980, a Vivitar 35EE, a Vivitar 35EF, Mamiya 135AF and boxed up Hasselblad but I couldn’t tell what model it was. I really want to buy them all but I don’t think he wants to sell them. He’s pissed off at the whole world, he’s depressed, he’s really old and he doesn’t want to sell anything. He told me 5 months ago his residency expired and he’s now living in Kuwait illegally. He feels that he’s been forgotten and no one cares about him or remembers him. How could someone who’s been in Kuwait for 50 years non stop still require an ikameh to live here? It made me realize that if I lose my job tomorrow I would have to leave Kuwait as well except I am young and I could always move to Lebanon and start a new life or something but this old man, where would he go? He’s easily at least 80 years old, he doesn’t have any family, never married, no relatives and he hasn’t been to Lebanon in over 50 years neither does he want to go back…

I had to leave but told him I would come back again since I wanted to listen to his life story and maybe give him some recognition with my blog. I also promised him the next time I go back I would bring my laptop along since I was telling him about the Internet and he told me he had heard about it but had no idea what it was. I told him I would come back and show him since he seemed eager to know how it worked and who invented it and how it looked. I asked him what time to what time I could find him at the shop he told me 24 hours. Turns out he lives in the shop.