Search: “sti”

To view the websites statistics, go to https://248am.com/stats

I noticed many bloggers are moving around lately either from blogger to WordPress or from Blogspot to a hosted blog. Well I found a link that can help you find free web hosting with no ads. There are a whole variety of hosts, some offering more web space, some offering more bandwidth but they nearly all allow you to setup your own domain. So if you are interested in moving to WordPress or off blogspot and need hosting, this link will help you find a free host. [Link]

Now in case you’re interested, here is a coupon for a $50 discount at my favorite web host DreamHost. Just use the code FIVEZEROOFF when checking out.

With iTunes 4.9 you can now browse, find, sample and subscribe to thousands of free podcasts — radio shows delivered over the Internet to your computer — then sync them to your iPod and listen anytime, anywhere. [Link]

Just found this via waxy, its very scary, you won’t believe it… [Link]

I was googling “Kuwait Blog” and to my surprise our (Rampurple, nibaq and mine) old blog qHate came out as a first result. So I decided to google a variety of words and checked how qHate ranks, below are the results:

Kuwait Blog (Rank 1)
Kuwait Blogs (Rank 10)
Kuwaiti Blogs (Rank 15)
Kuwaiti Bloggers (Rank 3)
Blogs from Kuwait (Rank 12)
Kuwait war blog (Rank 2)
Rampurple Blog (Rank 2)
Nibaq Blog (Rank 5)
Mark Blog (Rank not in top 500)
Wolf Blitzer suspicious of six foot one Arab males (Rank 1)

Someone in the office just told me that they recently have been busting in on pirates in Hawalli and they are broadcasting the busts live on TV. COPS style. Anyone know anything about this or seen it?

I decided to share with everyone the statistics of 2:48AM from the day 1 which was February 19th till the end of April. The list is displayed as Date followed by amount of unique visitors.

Feb 2005 557
Mar 2005 1961
Apr 2005 3144

To see how many visiters have been coming in day by day detail click on more below.

Question: What tips can you give mark regarding domain registration? in terms of url name, company, pricing, and so on..

Answer: I am gonna divide my answer into two parts, Domain Registration and Web Hosting.

Domain Registration
I get my domains from Directnic.com. I have been using them for a couple of years now since they first opened up. They offer domains for 15$ a year. There are other registrars like Joker.com who provide you with domains for $7 a year. I haven’t tried those registrars and I wouldn’t risk it also. There are some unspoken services which are offered and I don’t know if these other registrars offer it. For example with Directnic, incase you forget to renew your domain they will still hold the domain for you for up to 40 days. Then after the 40 days pass they will still hold the domain for you for another 30 days but you will have to pay an extra fee to get it back. Then after that they will let the domain go into public domain. With other registrars they might not hold the domain for you at all, some might even charge you an extra fee if you forget to renew it by 1 day.

Webhosting
There are thousands and thousands of providers to choose from but I will make it easy for you. If you register with Directnic, they provide you with free hosting for your domain but you will have their banner on your site. For a small yearly fee they can provide you with simple bannerless hosting. Now if you need something better then there are two ways you can go. Windows or Linux hosting. For Windows hosting I would recommend Fasthosts. I have a reseller account with them and have been using them for over 5 years now. They are VERY reliable with maybe only 1 down time in 5 years. They have excellent service, and their servers are very fast. I would also recommend Interland as a second option here. They also provide reliable Windows hosting for a decent price. For linux hosting you have a lot more cheaper options. If bandwidth isn’t an issue then I would recommend Interland here again. They are a good hosting provider for newbies. They have a very good “Help & Advice” section with lots of information for beginners. If bandwidth is something you need, then I would recommend Powweb. PowWeb offers 5GB of bandwidth a day for as little as 7$ a month. But the downside to Powweb is that their backdoor where you set your web settings and emails isn’t very easy to use at all. Other providers you might be interested in are: Addr, Dreamhost, Pair, iPowerWeb and LunarPages.

Today morning on my way to work I saw a funny bumper sticker on the car infront of me. Click here to see it.

I keep passing by this sign on my way to the office and I seem to be the only one who gets it. Fist for Security & Safety. Get it? Fist… like in fisting? Urgh.. nevermind…

So back in January I posted about the situation with Royal Pharmacy, recently though I found out more interesting details.

Not sure if anyone noticed but ALL pharmacies are now rebranding. Pharmacies can no longer have franchise branding. So no more Royal Pharmacy, Al Hajery, Al Mutawa, Pharmazone, Boots, etc.. Instead each pharmacy needs to have a different name, You’ll also notice they all have the official government pharmacy logo on their signages now.

Really weird I wonder why this sudden change.

I’ve been publishing my annual Ramadan buffet list since 2013, which means I’ve built a pretty solid and interesting archive of pricing data over the years. Below is the list of Ramadan buffets, updated for 2026. The list divided into two parts, hotels and restaurants. If I missed a place let me know in the comments, especially really cheap/affordable buffets.

If there has been an increase or decrease in price compared to the previous year then I’ve also highlighted that.

HOTELS

Al Jahra Copthorne Hotel & Resort – Taima’a Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD9.5
Telephone: 24590000

Arabella Hotel – Icon Rooftop Lounge
Buffet Price: KD18
Telephone: 22277744

Arabella Hotel – Envy Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD16
Telephone: 22277744

Courtyard by Marriott – Atrium
Buffet Price: KD17 (+2.000)
Telephone: 22997000

Crowne Plaza – Al Ahmadi Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD17
Telephone: 1848111

Four Seasons – Jawaher Tent
Buffet Price: KD28 (+1.000)
Telephone: 22006000

Four Seasons – Li Beirut
Buffet Price: KD27 (-1.000)
Telephone: 22006000

Grand Hyatt – Miral
Buffet Price: KD22 (+2.000)
Telephone: 22007698

Grand Majestic Hotel
Buffet Price: KD7.950 (-0.050)
Telephone: 22254700

Hilton Garden Inn – The Avenues
Buffet Price: KD22 (+2.000)
Telephone: 22262000

Jumeirah Messilah Beach – Majliss Tent
Buffet Price: KD28 (+4.000)
Telephone: 22269600

JW Marriott – Terrace Grill
Buffet Price: KD27
Telephone: 22063636

Kuwait Continental Hotel
Buffet Price: KD9.5 (+1.550)
Telephone: 22527300

Marina Hotel
Buffet Price: KD20 (+3.000)
Telephone: 22230030

Millennium Hotel – Lamar International Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD15
Telephone: 22050505

Montrose – Free Zone – Bays Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD14 (-1.000)
Telephone: 22055700

Movenpick – Al Bida’a – Breeze Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD18 (+3.000)
Telephone: 22253100

Park Inn by Radisson
Buffet Price: KD18
Telephone: 22068540

Radisson Blu – Al Bustan Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD19.5 (+1.000)
Telephone: 25673000

Safir Hotel – Fintas
Buffet Price: KD16 (+4.100)
Telephone: 25455555

St Regis – Diamond Ballroom Tent
Buffet Price: KD30
Telephone: 22422055

Symphony Style Hotel
Buffet Price: KD15 (+1.000)
Telephone: 25770000

SVN
Buffet Price: KD19
Telephone: 1876777

The Regency Kuwait – Silk Road Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD24
Telephone: 25766666

Waldorf Astoria – Oxio
Buffet Price: KD29 (+1.000)
Telephone: 24774414

RESTAURANTS

Almayass
Buffet Price: KD12 (+0.500)
Telephone: 25761001

Assaha Lebanese Restaurant
Buffet Price: KD14 (+1.250)
Telephone: 22533377

Babel
Set Menu Price: KD14.950
Telephone: 22081111

Dar Hamad
Buffet Price: KD16
Telephone: 22275555

IKEA
Set Menu Price: KD2.95
Telephone: 1840408

Jihan Khanah
Buffet Price: KD10
Telephone: 1819991

Kuwait Towers
Buffet Price: KD13
Telephone: 24965500

Leila Min Lebnen
Set Menu Price: KD12 (-3.000)
Telephone: 22996414

Mughal Mahal – Hawally
Buffet Price: KD6.45 (-1.000)
Telephone: 22626782

Naranj
Buffet Price: KD12
Telephone: 22268666

Paul
Set Menu Price: KD12.5
Telephone: 22208204

Saraya Palace
Buffet Price: KD8
Telephone: 25712998

Vapiano
Set Menu Price: KD7.950
Telephone: 22597171

Villa Fayrouz
Buffet Price: KD12
Telephone: 22650052

I just downloaded this great looking Ramadan app called “Siraj – Your Ramadan Light” by a developer called Forsan. It’s got a really cool simple to understand interface and is great for knowing what time Suhoor and Iftar is as well as all the prayer times.

Ramadan apps shouldn’t feel outdated.

So I built one in pure SwiftUI that feels like a modern iOS product.

Meet Siraj 🌙 pic.twitter.com/6cLuBMGcYv

— Forsan (@forsan87) February 17, 2026

Forsan wanted the app to feel calm and have an animated live sky that changes from Suhoor to Iftar throughout the day. It has a clean countdown, no clutter and the following features:

• Accurate prayer times
• Live fasting countdown
• Qibla compass
• Daily Quranic duas
• Widgets + Dynamic Island

The app is free to download, no ads or anything. Link

Back in 2020 I posted about the Extreme Sports van parked outside Green Island renting bicycles to anyone who wanted to ride up and down the Gulf Road. That was before the waterfront makeover and the addition of dedicated bike paths.

A few days ago, Extreme Sports soft launched their first Extreme Bike Rentals storefront on the Gulf Road pathway outside Green Island. They’re planning to open four more spots along the Gulf Road, with approximately one new location launching every 10 days.

The other locations will be next to the Kuwait Towers, opposite the Kuwait Society of Engineers, next to Villa Fayrouz, and next to the Swimming Pool Complex.

They have bicycles and tricycles available to rent in adult and kids sizes, and they haven’t increased their prices. It’s still just KD3 per hour. At the moment they’re open from 6AM to 10PM, but during Ramadan the timings will change to 3PM to 3AM. @extremebikerentals

eL Seed, the popular French Tunisian street artist known for creating large scale murals that blend Arabic calligraphy with graffiti, is currently in Kuwait. The National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters invited him to paint a mural around the Abdulhusain Abdulridha Theater in Salmiya as part of an overall revitalization and maintenance of the building.

I always thought the building looked dull and lifeless, but the burst of color from eL Seed’s mural has completely transformed it. The mural should be finished by tomorrow from what I’ve been told. I was going to wait until it was finished to take photos, but the sky and light yesterday were perfect, so I had to take my pictures then.

If you want to pass by and see them working on it, you still can. The Abdulhusain Abdulridha Theater is located in Salmiya across the street from the Kuwait Bowling Club. Here is the location on Google Maps.