Search: “salmiya”

The padel obsession has gotten so out of hand that courts are starting to pop up inside malls. Symphony Mall in Salmiya now has a padel court inside and oddly, I don’t think that’s even the weirdest place a padel court has popped up in Kuwait. I think the weirdest is the one located inside a car paint protection center and then there is another one located inside a car garage. I don’t think padel is even a thing anymore, is it?

If you’re a bubble tea fan, a Redditor posted a list of popular boba places in Kuwait. I’m not a fan of bubble tea but ironically like half the places on her list are located on my street in Salmiya.

Check out her list by clicking here.

Wooden Bakery is one of the most popular bakeries in Lebanon and they’ve just opened up their first location in Kuwait. It’s a small store in Bustan Mall next to Fanar in Salmiya, but they had a nice variety of Lebanese breads and biscuits including kaak termisyeh which is Lebanese dried bread that goes perfectly with tea.

They also bake fresh fatayer and a small seating area inside the mall in case you want to sit and eat. They’re open from 7AM to 11PM and here is their location on Google Maps.

Last year I bought a vintage map of Kuwait and although there is no date on it, I think it’s from the early 70s because there is a Hilton ad on it and Hilton opened in 1969. You can view a photo of the map on my twitter and right now I’m trying to scan it so I can make a proper copy available online. The only issue is it’s taking too long to scan one section at a time with my small scanner and then stitch it together in Photoshop.

Anyway, one thing that caught my attention was an ad for Golden Beach Hotel. Not to be confused with the Golden Beach Casino that was located in Salmiya, Golden Beach Hotel was located where the National Assembly building is today. I hadn’t heard of the hotel and couldn’t find any information online so I left it at that. But then yesterday, while trying to dig up information in one of my books on the Spring Continental Hotel that was located in the Dalal Complex in Salmiya (where Video Club used to be), I found a photo and information on the Golden Beach Hotel. So here is the obscure info that nobody requested:

Golden Beach Hotel
Telephone: 39521
Location: Arabian Gulf Street, Kuwait

Rooms: 44
Baths: 44

Single Occupancy Prices
R/Bfst K.D. 5.000
Half K.D. 6.000
Full K.D. 7.000

Double Occupancy
R/Bfst K.D. 9.000
Half K.D. 11.000
Full K.D. 12.000

Breakfast K.D. 0.350 / 0.450
Lunch or Dinner K.D. 0.900

If you want to check out higher-res versions of the images here, they’re also on my twitter account.

Update: So my mum just saw the post and messaged me to tell me she spent a night at the Golden Beach Hotel in December 1972. She was heading to Abadan in Iran from Lebanon to see her aunt and she took the Kuwait Airways flight which transits through Kuwait. When she got to Iran turns out her aunt hadn’t gotten her a visa so they sent her back to Kuwait. Her flight back to Lebanon was the day after so she spent the night at the Golden Beach Hotel.

Once she was back in Lebanon her aunt got her the Iran visa and she headed back again. This time on her way back to Lebanon during her stop over in Kuwait she saw an ad to become a flight attendant for Kuwait Airways and she applied. And that’s how she became a flight attendant. So because of this random post I found out how my mum became a flight attendant.

On Thursday morning I headed to Dubai in my car for the weekend and just got back last night. I had a few things I needed to do on this trip, first thing was to stop at Abu Dhabi since I have a car being restored there and I needed to check on it and take it out for a test drive. Then I needed to head to Dubai because I had some things I needed to install on my car at Arctic Trucks (Mountain Top roll cover and sports bar, and Rival4X4 skid plates). Finally, on my way back I also needed to stop over in Khobar for work.

Kuwait to Dubai is a very doable trip. Its long, and it’s not something I’d do often, but it would be something I’d be willing to do if I needed to get something from Dubai which we don’t have in Kuwait. Like a couch or something, I don’t know, I just like the idea that if I found something in Dubai that I can’t ship to Kuwait or bring back on a plane with me, then I can just drive there pick it up and come back.

So here is everything you need to know in case you want to do the same trip. This also applies to driving to Qatar since you drive by the Qatari border on the way to the UAE one.

Trip Duration
I left my place in Salmiya at around 6AM, and got to my hotel in Abu Dhabi by 6PM Dubai time (5PM Kuwait time). The trip took exactly 11 hours including stopping for breakfast, a few photoshoot stops, and all the border crossings. If you’re heading to Dubai directly just add another hour on to the trip.

Google Maps
Trusting Google Maps will take you on the best route is not the best idea in the world but it’s something we do. At one part of the trip it made me exit the main highway and go through a tiny road where I swear I read a sign that said for use by ARAMCO contractors only. I wasn’t sure if 30 minutes later I’d end up at a security gate and have to turn back, I just hoped I’d end up back on the main road eventually. It did take me back to the main road but this brings up an important thing which is my trip could be different from yours. Yesterday coming back from Khobar Google sent me on a different and nicer road than my last trip back so just be aware of that.

Kuwait to the UAE Borders
I’ve already covered driving through Saudi in my previous post and the same rules apply here again. The Saudi leg of the journey although long actually passed by really quickly. The thing about driving in Saudi is the roads and scenery change very frequently. There isn’t just one straight highway from here to UAE and so the journey feels a lot more interesting since you drive through a variety of terrain and road types. You could be on a highway for 30 minutes, then a back road for 30 minutes, then driving through a coastal town for an hour, then through sand dunes for another hour, etc. The only issue I faced on this trip was the lack of fuel stations.

I think I counted 8 fuel stations that were open from Kuwait to the UAE borders, and that’s including both sides of the highway. This was the only thing that made me anxious on the way because I didn’t know if I’d find a gas station on the road ahead or not. Google Maps isn’t helpful and at one point when I needed fuel I used Google Maps to find one in a village I was driving by and Google Maps took me to a gas station under construction, and then another gas station that turned out to be a garage. So in case you need them, here are some fuel stations where I filled up at:

First stop after the Saudi borders. There is a McDonalds there so you can also have breakfast: https://goo.gl/maps/LFhKgeHkmmekjxUi8

Second station I filled at. This was in a village when I wasn’t sure if I’d find another station on the highway ahead (turns out there was): https://goo.gl/maps/CUh3oL2nteFyhfNx7

This is to where you should fill up instead of the village station I mentioned above: https://goo.gl/maps/k6zDv9PrLGMvf3FL9

For my third stop I used this station. It’s located on the other side of the road but it’s easy to U-turn to and get to. It’s located in a beach town called Salwa and it’s near the Qatar border: https://goo.gl/maps/dbY3HRz4dr7bv9Hq9

Last station before UAE border. You should fill up here before crossing into the UAE. https://goo.gl/maps/U7sdkoJRGd868hMD6

So basically there were around 4 fuel stations on the way to the UAE with the rest all closed down, abandoned or located in villages and towns out of your way.

Qatar
As I mentioned at the start of this post, you need to drive by the Qatar border to get to UAE. At one point you’ll get to a roundabout where if you go straight you get to the Qatar border, or if you turn right you head towards UAE. Because I didn’t cross into Qatar and experience the trip to Doha, I didn’t make this a Qatar guide as well.

UAE Border
Once I got to the UAE border the process was fairly easy at the Saudi side. It was just me and another car crossing at that time. The guy at the window didn’t even take my passport, I had opened my passport to the visa number page and held it out of the window to give it to him and he just looked at the number and typed it out on the computer and handed me a slip. The UAE side of the border was super nice, multiple lanes and looks like a proper border. I had to drive through an X-ray machine first before arriving to passport control. Even though I usually use the eGate when I arrive to Dubai, after giving the border guy my passport he told me I needed to drive around to the immigration building and get my passport stamped there. It wasn’t busy so the process there was also fast, I filled up a paper and had my iris scanned and then got the passport stamped. I got back into my car and then drove through the border. I had to get car insurance before leaving the border, the minimum duration was 2 weeks and it cost 210AED.

UAE Border to Abu Dhabi
As soon as you get into UAE you’re suddenly on a proper 3 lane highway with a speed limit of 160KM/h. The fuel stations on this road are also a lot nicer than Saudi, and the convenience stores and bathrooms at the stations are proper. I stopped at the first one to fill up and get a sandwich and coffee for the remaining leg of the trip. This was actually my least favorite part of the whole trip. It was around 3 hours of driving in a straight line going 160km/h with the exact same scenery. It was super boring.

Abu Dhabi and Dubai Toll Gates
So this is something I was hoping to work out but couldn’t really do it properly. So Abu Dhabi has toll gates on the road called DARB. I couldn’t figure out how to get it working with my Kuwaiti license plates and I need to check and see if I have any tolls so I can pay them before I get at fine. In Dubai they use Salik and I picked up a Salik tag with 100aed on it from a gas station on my way to Dubai. I couldn’t get it set up. Firstly I couldn’t access the Salik website using my phone data (you can’t use the App btw if foreign plates). Then when I did access the website using a shops wifi, it wouldn’t send me the OTP to my phone to verify. Luckily Google Maps has an option to avoid roads with tolls and I used that. Next day I set up Salik with my friends phone number who lives in Dubai and it worked. But it also told him that it would take up to 5 days to activate. They then called him this morning because they needed my car chassis number, he gave them my number and they spoke to me while I was typing this post up. My Salik is now active and any toll gates I passed under while I was in Dubai will now be deducted from my Salik account.

The best option to keep things simple is tell Google Maps not to use roads with tolls.

UAE to Kuwait
On the trip back to Kuwait I stopped in Khobar. I was meant to spend the night there but I ended up arriving quicker than I expected and once my meeting finished I realized I could make it to the Kuwait borders by 6PM (when there would still be some light). On the way back I left Dubai at 6:20AM (so 5:20AM Kuwait time). I headed to Khobar first, took the scenic route and stopped a few times for photos. I got to Khobar at 1:40PM (so 2:40PM Dubai Time). I was done with my meeting by 2:50 and figured if I skipped lunch and stopped for fuel only once I could make it to the Kuwait borders by 6PM. You do not want to drive on Saudi roads in the dark. I crossed the borders by 5:53PM. What sucked was that Google this time took me through a very scenic seaside road back to Kuwait and I couldn’t stop to take pictures because of my schedule.

Cost Breakdown
Here is the cost for the journey that includes my fuel stops and car insurance:

Saudi
138SAR – Saudi car Insurance
78SAR first fuel stop
95SAR second fuel stop
50SAR third fuel stop
53SAR forth fuel stop

UAE
210AED – UAE car Insurance
155AED – fuel stop

on the way back:

UAE
190AED first fuel stop
113AED second fuel stop
145AED third fuel stop
37AED forth fuel stop

Saudi
61SAR first fuel stop
111SAR second fuel stop
65SAR last fuel stop

Conclusion
I liked the trip and I didn’t find it really that exhausting. I’m not sure how many speeding tickets I got on this trip. On the UAE road where the speed limit was 160KM/h, I got flashed twice going 155KM/h. I was on cruise control and Waze was saying 155, and my car speedometer was saying 155 and I still got flashed, but only on by two cameras. I’m hoping those were just average-speed cameras that take photos of every car, I hope. Then in Saudi, the speed limit is mostly 120 so I would drive under 140. I’d pass by 20 cameras with no issues and then one would randomly flash me. No idea whats going on there. But, I did get flashed at one point for going over 140 but that was my mistake since I didn’t have it on cruise control and didn’t notice my speed.

Hopefully this guide is helpful in case you want to make this trip. I might have missed something or not covered a subject so if you have a specific question, let me know in the comments.

While prepping for my previous post on Pinot, I was going through some old emails and found one where he sent me photos of the old Al-Manara Bookshop that was located in Salmiya next to The Video Club.

Al-Manara was a fairly popular bookstore but there aren’t any photos of it available online. It’s one of those places you never thought about photographing and eventually it’s gone. The photos were taken on March 28, 2008 with a Nikon Coolpix P1.

via Pinot

I used to be a huge Subway fan back when I was in university in Lebanon and then again once I moved back here and started work. Then around 10 years ago I stopped eating there until just a few weeks ago.

Back in April, I posted about how the Subway brand changed ownership in Kuwait and moved to Kout Food Group. They ended up opening their first location in Salmiya next to AUK and it’s probably the nicest Subway I’ve ever been to anywhere.

Firstly there is a drive-thru, but more importantly, the branch is super clean. It’s tiny but everything inside looks really appetizing and the store smells of freshly baked bread. I tried it for the first time a few weeks ago and since then have been back a bunch of times. So if like me you wrote off Subyway years ago, its worth giving another shot now. Here is their location on Google Maps.

Aqua Motif is a local business that creates custom aquarium reefs. Just going through some of their work on Instagram makes me want to get an aquarium even though I have zero interest in fish. The one pictured above is their Kuwait skyline reef but they’ve got some other amazing ones including (and completely random), a Gorillaz band reef.

They’re located in the Pearl Marzouq complex in Salmiya but you can check out their work on Instagram @aquamotif

Yesterday I passed by the newly opened Ajas’s Film Lab to check the place out. According to their bio, they’re meant to be the best place for all things film related but I don’t know how accurate that is. The store is small and fairly empty with mostly just a counter in the back and a small fridge filled with disposable cameras and some film. They had three kinds of film, one black and white, and two colored. The black and white is priced at 5KD while the colored were 8KD each. The disposable cameras were also 8KD.

Their main service though is developing films but turns out they don’t print them. They just develop your negative roll and then scan and email you the digital photos. The main reason I shoot film is so I can print film so it was disappointing they didn’t offer that service. The cost for developing and scanning your film is 5KD.

The place isn’t cheap but I think they’re trying to offer a nice trendy place for people to get their film developed. The developing and scanning cost is OK I guess at 5KD, there are cheaper places but not by much. When it comes to film rolls though I think they’re too expensive. I buy my color film rolls for 4KD from random studios around Salmiya where they still sell film (they aren’t expired), so I definitely wouldn’t pay 8KD.

If you want to check Ajas out, they’re on insta @ajasfilmlab and here is their location on Google Maps.

For a list of places that develop film, check out this link. For black and white film, Studio Khemia sell rolls starting at 3KD and also offer workshops where they teach you how to develop and print your black and white rolls, check them out on Insta @khemiae.darkroom

Good Game, the popular tabletop gaming store which opened back in 2013 in Sanabil Tower has now moved back to Sanabil Tower (Google Maps) after previously moving to Salmiya. They didn’t move back into their old store in Sanabil but instead got another larger corner store. I wasn’t really a fan of the Salmiya location since it wasn’t very cozy but the new store sorts that out.

If you’re a fan of tabletop gaming or if you feel like getting into Dungeons & Dragons after watching Stranger Things, check them out @goodgamekw

Back in March, I posted about my trip to Khobar and Bahrain along with a detailed step by step guide of the requirements and the journey. This morning I drove to Saudi again but this time I headed to Riyadh. I left my apartment in Salmiya around 6:20 AM and made it to our office in Riyadh by 12:40 PM. This included a bunch of tops along the way for treats, fuel, bathroom breaks and photography. Not too bad.

The most surprising thing was the fact that 95% of the trip was on a two-lane two-way road. Right after I entered Saudi, Google Maps made me exit the main road onto a small side road. I thought it must have mixed up or that this small road would lead to the large highway but it didn’t. The road stayed that way till I got to Riyadh. It was pretty freaky at first since cars would be speeding toward me going over 120km/h and I’m just hoping they don’t hit me head on. But after an hour into the trip, there were no more cars on the road. It was very serene.

It was such a nice drive and the scenery was pretty nice in some parts. There was one long strip of road that lasted maybe two hours where there was nothing around except for red sand dunes. No people, no gas stations, no buildings, nothing. It felt great being out there alone.

The trip didn’t feel like it was 6 hours long and I would definitely recommend it if you like to drive.

The other day I was walking in old Salmiya and noticed they had removed another tree, the 26th one on the street. And yes, I’ve been keeping count. Previously, 25 large trees had been removed when they turned the street into a pedestrian-only one and I posted about that here.

It was bound to happen since whoever worked on the project decided it was a good idea to bring the road right next to the tree and I guess the low-hanging branches might have been causing an issue with traffic so they removed the tree. I still don’t understand why they couldn’t have kept all the trees and integrated them into the street like the tree in the picture above?

There is still a line of trees left which I’m expecting to be removed any day now, I should probably take pictures from now so I could post before and after photos once they remove them.

Below is the list of events for this weekend. As usual if I missed anything please let me know in the comments:

Thursday
Exhibition: I Am Here – Manuella Guiragossian
Exhibition: My Name Is Woman – Maha AlAsaker
Exhibition: Deconstructed Phyche – Sheikha Al Habishi
Exhibition: “The Mystic Letters” By Antonella Leoni
Perfumes, Cosmetics & Watches Exhibition
Musical: MAMMA MIA!
Movies at the Park: Mr.Bean’s Holiday
Talk: Save the Turtles
Bel Canto d’Italia Recital

Friday
Perfumes, Cosmetics & Watches Exhibition
Musical: MAMMA MIA!
Kuwait Kayak Fishing Championship
A Walk In Tunisia – Omrani’nd The Crew

Saturday
Exhibition: I Am Here – Manuella Guiragossian
Exhibition: My Name Is Woman – Maha AlAsaker
Exhibition: Deconstructed Phyche – Sheikha Al Habishi
Perfumes, Cosmetics & Watches Exhibition
Grand Mosque Tour
Sunrise Yoga with Hiba
Miseen Scene: Z
Musical: MAMMA MIA!
TrashTag Kuwait: Salmiya Park Cleanup
TrashHero: Blejat Beach Cleanup
Coffee Sunset Cruise
Stranger Things Watercolor Experience

My favorite Bahraini grills spot is still Ghadeer al Bahrain in Salmiya, even though after the pandemic they had to increase their prices by around 100 fils. But last night, I decided to try another Bahraini grills spot in the city called Tekka Lumee. This past winter whenever I drove by Tekka Lumee in the evening it would be super packed with people, they actually had to expand their outdoor seating and double the size because of their popularity. I was with a friend in the city last night and we were originally planning to walk over to Little Ruby’s for dinner when we decided to give Tekka Lumee a shot.

Tekka Lumee is a small place across the street from the newly opened Assima Mall. Unlike Ghadeer al Bahrain which has been around for 30+ years, Tekka Lumee is a new concept that opened up over a year ago. Their menu has a pretty good variety of items and you can check it out online here. We ended up getting hummus to start with and Tekka Lumee grills, Tekka Yogurt, Kebab Special and Special Tawooq for the mains.

A couple of minutes after placing the order the food started coming out. First the freshly baked Irani bread with the hummus, and then all the grills. If you’re hungry and don’t want to wait too long for your food then this is the place to come to. I quickly started digging into the food and right away knew what I liked and what I wouldn’t order again. Both the Tekka Lumee and Tekka Yogurt were great, especially the Tekka Lumee which had great flavor. The Tawooq was the third-best item, I usually wouldn’t order chicken at a Bahraini grills place but was curious to try it here but wouldn’t have it again. The most disappointing item though was the kebab, it was fairly dry, a bit bland, and was the only thing that we didn’t finish on the table. It sucks because I usually like ordering kebab with my tikka but wouldn’t do so again here.

Even though Ghadeer al Bahrain is a low-end hole-in-the-wall restaurant, I do feel like I have to compare it with Tekka Lumee only because they both basically sell the same food. Pricewise Tekka Lumee is surprisingly pretty good, their grills are around KD2.500 a plate and contain 5 skewers. What is important to point out is their skewers are longer than that of Ghadeer and contain more meat, so you could say close to double the size of Ghadeer’s. This means price-wise it’s fairly competitive to Ghadeer Al Bahrain even though it’s a much nicer (cough cleaner cough) place with a better dining experience. Tastewise the tikkas at Tekka Lumee were great but the kebab as I mentioned was a disappointment. The kebab at Ghadeer is much better but I’d still go back to Tekka Lumee for the other items (and for the bread which was crazy good). The total for two people including 3 drinks came out to around 13KD. If you want to check the place out, their Instagram account is @tekka.lumee, and here is their location on Google Maps.

Saveco supermarket no longer have any locations left open and their Instagram hasn’t been updated since April. Their original location in Al-Rai which opened back in 2014 was demolished a few months ago, their Avenues location closed down last month, and their Wholesome Foods organic supermarket concept in Salmiya has now been taken over by Sultan Center.

I used to pass by their Avenues location whenever I visited the mall since they were on my way out when heading to my car, but during the pandemic, it was also my favorite supermarket to go to since it was always empty while most other places were overcrowded and chaotic. They were meant to open a new “Urban Market” in Shuwaikh but I’m not sure if that’s still happening. My contact at Saveco no longer works there and when I asked them on Instagram about it they didn’t respond to me. The sign is still up so maybe they decided to close all their locations and just focus on this new concept, we’ll have to wait and see.