Categories
Events Kuwait Movies

Cinemagic Screening: The Kite Runner

The Kite Runner

From Cinemagic:

Cinemagic is delighted to announce the return of our weekly screening program. Screenings will continue to take place at our new location in Old Salmiya, above LG Electronics.

This week, we will be screening “The Kite Runner“.

Based one on of the most acclaimed novels in recent memory, ‘The Kite Runner’ is a profoundly emotional tale of friendship, family, devastating mistakes and redeeming love. In a divided country on the verge of war, two childhood friends, Amir and Hassan, are about to be torn apart forever. It’s a glorious afternoon in Kabul and the skies are bursting with the exhilarating joy of a kite-fighting tournament. But in the aftermath of the day’s victory, one boy’s fearful act of betrayal will mark their lives forever and set in motion an epic quest for redemption. Now, after 20 years of living in America, Amir returns to a perilous Afghanistan under the Taliban’s iron-fisted rule to face the secrets that still haunt him and take one last daring chance to set things right.

For its part, Cinemagic Kuwait, is organizing these events as part of its efforts to contribute to the development of an internationally competitive Kuwaiti audio-visual production industry, partly by bringing the filmmakers and audiences together and by Increasing the public’s interest in – and appreciation for – the art of filmmaking.

As always, attendance is free of charge (but seating is limited). Snacks and refreshments will be served. The Kite Runner screening will take place on Thursday, May 1st, at 7 p.m.




Categories
Kuwait Personal

The Phone Doctor

Phone Doctor

I got my Nokia E61i last July so its been with me for nearly 10 months and through this time its been really abused. Whats surprised me the most is how well its held up. It must be the metal casing because I’ve dropped it soo many times, had it slammed into the wall and really not much has happened. Now I did manage to crack the screen slightly when I accidentally dropped the phone from nearly two stories high but thats really superficial compared to the damage that would have inflicted lets say an iPhone.

Yesterday I managed to inflict more damage to the phone after dropping it for like the millionth time. Basically the phone stopped charging when plugged in. The new version of the phone isn’t going to be out for a few months and I didn’t want to get another phone so I decided to pass by the doctor in Khalid Bin Waleed street in Sharq to see if he could fix my phone.

The doctor is a popular guy in Sharq who is an expert in repairing phones. He has a small shop in the same building as the store “My Phone” except his store is in the back side. I showed him my phone and told him what was wrong an he quickly opened it up, checked the phone’s board and found the culprit. A tiny resistor was missing and he could replace it for just KD4 (probably cheaper if I haggled). I told him to go ahead and it took him just another 5 minutes to unsolder a resistor from another broken Nokia phone and then solder it onto my phone and voilà, my phone started charging again.

Life Style

It’s like a drive through phone repair shop. Since the guy is very nice and a real pro I figured I would help send business his way. So if you need to repair a phone, just pass by the doctor, the store is called Life Style (don’t ask) and his phone number is 4455692.




Categories
Information

Back from Jordan

Jordan

I came back to Kuwait last night and I have to say I was pretty disappointed with Jordan. The country is very poor which I found very shocking since I was expecting it to be something of a combination of Lebanon and Kuwait. The King and Queen seem very sophisticated and down to earth which is why its even more confusing why things are the way they are there. The Jordanian people are extremely nice, reminded me a lot of the hospitality of Bahraini people. Things I missed and would like to try the next time I am there: the falafels at Hashem, the burger at Lebnani and the Blouzaat store.




Categories
Events Kuwait

Two events for tonight

First one:

You are invited to attend our “Sidewalk Astronomy” today at Marina Crescent starting 7:00 pm.Department of Astronomy & Space Sciences DASS is bringing telescopes to Marina Crescent to show people features of the night sky, free-of-charge, for anyone who wishes to look through the telescope.

Second one:

Don’t miss the all-new 2008 Jeep Cherokee launch & the Jeep Roadshow even today at 5pm, Souk Sharq waterfront.

The “Sidewalk Astronomy” sounds interesting.




Categories
Funny Kuwait

Engrish of the day

Found these two signs today and thought I would take pictures.

blinds
Blinds in English is plural for window shades.

Bumb
B as in Bebsi.

Update: In case you didn’t get it, the first picture says Blinds which doesn’t mean blind as in the person can’t see. Blinds means window shades so instead of the sign saying the Kuwait Association for blind people its saying the Kuwait Association for window shades. The second picture, bump is misspelled as bumb.




Categories
Automotive Guest Bloggers Information Kuwait

Bad gas

As some of you might have read on SomeContrast, Mishary posted pictures and information about the availability of new gasoline and diesel introduced at the Bayan Station. The prices are 120fils for pink gasoline and 100fils for orange diesel.

I initially thought that this would be a step-up from the current green gasoline, ultra (98 octane). It turns out that someone (insert big name) requested that Kuwait should introduce Euro-Spec petrol (environmentally friendly); and KNPC agreed. Afterwards KNPC realized that their refineries are not ready for producing Euro-Spec petrol, so they imported it from the Q8 system in Europe; hence the higher costs.

The pink gasoline (Ultra-Euro) is 95 octane (lower than green) and the orange diesel is most likely the same as the Kuwaiti garden variety. The only unproven benefit if used on our engines is lower emissions.

Link to SomeContrast. [Here]
Link to Al-Watan (arabic article). [Here]

Posted by K.




Categories
Food & Drinks Kuwait Personal Reviews

Burger Review: Applebee’s

Applebee\'s Burger
The Best Burger in Kuwait Challenge
I’ve never liked Applebee’s because I never had a good experience there. Whatever I ordered I ended up hating and their menu just didn’t have as much variety as I wanted. Yesterday I passed by for the first time in over a year ago and things have changed considerably since my last visit. The menu has a lot more interesting stuff on it and probably the most shocking thing of all, I actually left the place satisfied and thinking about going back.

They had four burgers on their menu but I decided to go with the cheese burger since the other options were a classic burger with no cheese, a cheese burger with bacon, and the last burger was I think a Hawaiian burger with Pineapple (gross!). All the burgers are made using a 100% Angus Beef and cooked medium well.

My burger arrived 10-15 minutes after placing my order and after a few bites I realized that although the Applebee’s burger isn’t good enough to be a contender for the top spot, it was a pretty good burger. It tasted and smelled like it was grilled on a backyard barbecue which is a good thing because barbecued burgers always taste good. The burger was not super thick but was still very juicy and the cheese melted perfectly. Now one thing I found weird although it didn’t have an effect on the taste was that it felt like I was biting into a steak and not a burger. I don’t know if thats normal with Angus beef but it just felt weird.

Overall though there wasn’t much wrong with the burger. It didn’t have this “oh I need to have another one right now” taste to it which is why it didn’t score any higher. But it did score pretty high because I’m giving it a 3.5 out of 5 which puts it inline with the Fuddruckers burger. That alone is an achievement.

Applebee’s is located on the Gulf Road, Mishref and Souk Sharq.
The cost of the Angus Cheese Burger was KD2.150

Previously Reviewed:
Bredz
Fuddruckers
Hashi
Johnny Rockets
Munch
Prime & Toast
Slider Station
Sheraton Hotel
The Little Oven
Wimpy




Categories
Food & Drinks Kuwait Personal Reviews

Burger Review: Fuddruckers

Fuddruckers
The Best Burger in Kuwait Challenge
I was planning on having a burger at Applebee’s today when in the last minute plans changed and I ended up at Fuddruckers. Thats a good thing of course since Fuddruckers is one of my favorite burger places in Kuwait and they actually have my favorite burger, the Triple Cheeseburger. When I first decided on this burger challenge I had a winner already figured out in my head, it was going to be Fuddruckers. Things have changed though.

As I said my favorite burger is the Triple Cheeseburger so thats what I went ahead and ordered. At Fudd’s you can choose the thickness of your patty, I went with the half pounder cooked medium well. I’ve tried all the thicknesses and found the half pounder to be the perfect size for their bun. More places need to offer different thickness patties, especially the burger joints. Anyway the burger arrived open bun without any garnish, you then have to go up to the garnish bar and manually put whatever you want on your burger. I usually put just ketchup on my burger and hot melted cheddar cheese on the potato wedges which is what I did.

I think Fuddruckers might have the best classical burger and even though I had figured before this challenge that it would score the highest, I don’t think thats going to happen. I don’t think its exciting enough, I love it, I think its my favorite burger and although this doesn’t make sense I don’t think its THE best burger. I prefer the Black Widow for example and I also really like the Little Oven burger, two burgers which I hadn’t tried before this challenge. I also have a whole list of burgers I still need to try and I am expecting some really great ones. I really like the Fuddruckers burger bun and I think the beef patty is the perfect thickness although its pretty fatty. The size of the burger is also huge which is why it easily fills me. All this wasn’t enough to earn it the highest score. I am being super tough with these burger reviews so thats why I’m giving it a 3.5 out of 5.

I still have the following burgers I need to try, am I missing anything?
Gaucho Grill, Sheraton, Applebees, Chilis, Ruby Tuesday, Burger Hub, Burger Bar, Burger Boutique, Munch, GBK and Hashi.

Fuddruckers is located on the Gulf Road, their telephone number is 2460110
The cost of the 1/2lb Triple Cheese Burger is KD2.950




Categories
Automotive Internet Kuwait Links

Q8 Showroom now online

Q8 Showroom

Q8showroom.com is now launched although I think its still in trial stage since there are a lot of things that aren’t working right or not working at all. Some of the things also feel like they’ve just been ripped off from Q8car like the drop down list for the car models. In Q8car they have a mistake where they listed Range Rover as a brand on its own instead of it being under Land Rover, on Q8showroom they’ve made the exact same mistake. Even the “All Years” drop down list is a duplicate of Q8car’s.

Overall though the site is much better than Q8car’s but they still need to add a lot more cars to their database. What I want is an option to view larger pictures of the cars (like at least 640×480) and a better search function, maybe I’ll get that in the new Q8car redesigned website. Speaking of which, Q8car had a link up a week ago where you could get a preview of the new look but since then the link has disappeared.

Here’s a link to Q8showroom [Link]




Categories
Information Kuwait

Abyat Megastore soft launch

Abyat Megastore

Abyat the super large home improvement store is supposedly soft launching tomorrow. I hope thats true because its supposed to be wayyy bigger and better than Platform which really sucked. I was going to pass by the BOSCH dealer tomorrow to pick up a Dremel but I guess I will pass by Abyat first just to see what they have.

Thanks Big Pearls

Update: Fixed the Abyat website link. [Link]

Update2: Just got back from Abyat, the security guard wouldn’t let me into the parking lot and when I asked him if they had opened he told me no. BUT, I just got an email from their customer relations telling me the soft launch IS today so I don’t know, they seem to have some miscommunication…




Categories
Automotive Interesting Kuwait

New Petrol Machines

new petrol machines

Mishary from SOMEcontrast took pictures of new petrol machines now installed at the Oula gas stations. They look pretty cool but not to sure if the petrol machine actually accepts cards like in the US or we still need to drive up to the window and pay. Now where are the gas station mini markets I heard we would get after the privatization? [Link]




Categories
Guest Bloggers Internet Kuwait

Fasttelco glitches Google

Cnet

Last week we wrote about the issue Fasttelco users were having with their private information being publicly available online. Cnet/News.com have published an article covering this subject and this is the result of the user (36o/Abdulaziz), who reported the issue on the forum and then passed on the details of the glitch to Google. Apparently, Google have contacted Fasttelco and offered their services to help resolve the issue.

Hopefully some good can come from this and Fasttelco will reevaluate their users security (a price cut and promised speeds would be do wonders too).

Cnet / News.com article [here]
Our original post [here]

Posted by K.

Thanks Abdulaziz




Categories
Information Internet Kuwait

List of torrent sites that will be blocked

This is the list of torrent sites sent out by the MOC to the ISP’s to block (here is a link to yesterdays post in case you missed it). On my offices FastTelco connection most of them are already non accessible.

www.demonoid.com
www.extratorrent.com
www.fulldls.com
www.meganova.org
www.seedpeer.com
www.nfo.co.il
www.piratic.org
www.worldnova.org
www.power-portal.to
www.smartorrent.com
www.thepiratebay.org
www.torrentazos.com
www.torrent-base.dl.am
www.torrentlounge.com
www.torrentplaza.be
www.tvtorrents.com
www.xphilez.com
www.zakatron.com
www.zonaemule.com
www.zoozle.de

Thanks MX5




Categories
Electronics Guest Bloggers Internet

Current DSL Prices (February 2008)

As promised, here is the breakdown of current DSL speeds/prices (as of InfoConnect 2008):

If you are looking speeds of 2mb or higher .. you can’t beat Qnets pricing (infoconnect special). And in addition to a free wireless router you also get a scratch (instant prize) and raffle (Mini) coupons for every 20kd spent. I upgraded my connection to 4mb and ‘won’ a extra couple of weeks on my subscription through the scratch coupons.

For those interested in speeds of 1mb or lower; Zajil is the clear choice with their aggressive pricing structure with 1mb at 300 KWD (almost 1/3 the price of last year).

Apparently, there is a new DSL company called Wasel, which has recently been placing advertisements in the newspapers. And while they might be advertising offering DSL, they don’t have a booth at InfoConnect or even a website; We don’t have much information on their offers.

-Posted by K.

*Prices listed are collected from Brochures, Official Websites and Sales Representatives .. prices displayed are for yearly subscriptions.




Categories
Events Information Kuwait Technology

Info & Connect 2008

InfoConnect

Info & Connect 2008 will start from tomorrow the 3rd of February and last until the 9th. If you are planning on renewing or getting a new Internet connection this would be the best type time since all the ISP’s usually have offers at this exhibit. I tried checking the Info & Connect website for more details but its currently not working which is ironic. Location for the exhibit is Mishref Fairground Hall 4. [Link]