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I found out the other day that you can actually order items from Amazon.co.jp and have them shipped to you via a mail forwarding company called Tenso to your Aramex mail forwarding mailbox in New York. This opens a whole new door on gadgets we can buy and price wise it seems pretty reasonable.

Basically you need to open an account with tenso.com who are a company that specialize in forwarding products from Japan to other parts of the world. Their prices are ok, I checked how much it would cost for 1KG and it turned out to be approximately KD10 including their service fee and shipping fee. Once you have an account with them (free to setup) you can order items from Amazon Japan and pay with your Kuwaiti card or order from other Japanese websites or even the Japanese eBay Yahoo auctions. When you place your order you give them your Tenso address in the same way you give US sites your Aramex address. Once the package arrives to your Japanese mailbox they will ship the item to your US mailbox. They sadly don’t ship directly to Kuwait. They also don’t ship batteries so if you order say a camera, they will remove the battery before they ship it to you. You also might have to pay US customs depending on the items you order.

I know there are quite a few negatives but it’s still good to have this option. Check out tenso.com by clicking [Here]

Update: I was just told another option for buying from Japan is using the site From Japan. From what I understood they ship to Kuwait directly as well. Check them [Here]

Here’s a quick spoiler, I’m very disappointed. When I first saw pictures of the X100 I fell in love with it right away but after playing with the camera all day I’m having trouble understanding how Fuji went wrong with this. The issues this camera has aren’t major but there are many which I am going to try and go through some below.

The first issue is with the Menu/OK button on the rear (pictured above). I read a lot of complaints online about how the button is too small and very difficult to press. I thought psshhht whatever, can’t be that bad. Well it IS that bad, I don’t know how the engineers at Fuji missed this but the button is tiny and nearly impossible to press. Every time I try to press it I end up pressing up or down instead. It’s really bad and very annoying when you’re trying to quickly select an option or delete a file since you keep missing the OK button and spend wasted seconds going up and down instead.

The second issue is with the focusing. It doesn’t focus! It’s ridiculous how terrible the focus system on the camera is. At first I thought I was having problems focusing on low contrast objects but I was just checking some portrait shots I took today and I don’t think any one of them is focused properly. Another issue with the focus is the fact the camera thinks macro mode is like a mile away. With most cameras you need to activate the macro mode when you get super close to objects but with the X100 you have to activate macro mode on objects that are more than 50cm away. And if that’s not bad enough after you’re done taking a picture in macro mode the camera puts it back in regular mode so if you have to shoot another shot in macro you need to activate it again. Finally when in macro mode the optical view finder turns into an electric view finder (which I hate) so during my shoot today the camera spent a lot of time swapping between the two modes and it annoyed the hell out of me.

There are some cool things about the camera, just not enough to make me want to get it. I love the retro look and the metal body although I do wish it was a bit heavier. The X100 has something called a hybrid viewfinder where information is displayed on top of what you’re seeing through the viewfinder. Hard to explain but imagine looking through a view finder and seeing information displayed on top of your subjects [Check this visual]. Some reviewers online complained about the start up speed and recording speed but it didn’t cause me any issues when I was shooting.

Now compared to my GF1 I prefer the GF1 in every way except for two things, the knobs and the optical view finder. I really like the exposure dial on top of the X100, it’s similar to the one I have on the Canon G11 and it’s a knob that should be on top of all the cameras. The shutter speed and aperture ring around the lens are also two things the X100 has and I wish the GF1 had as well. Lastly I wish the GF1 had an optical viewfinder like the X100. The X100 has both an optical viewfinder and an electronic one which you can swap between. I don’t care for the EVF, I have it on my GF1 and would rather have a proper optical viewfinder instead like the X100. Size wise the GF1 is slightly smaller and heavier than the X100. Focusing, although the GF1 isn’t that great focusing and although it gives me trouble every now and then it’s like ten times better than the X100, that’s how bad the X100 is.

Basically because I got to try out the X100 I’ve decided to cancel my Amazon.com order and stick with my Panasonic GF1. I really really wanted to love the X100 but I didn’t enjoy using it and if I’m not going to enjoy using it then whats the point in getting it? Now keep in mind my review was based on my experience with the camera in one day. There are a ton of better reviews online which I’ve listed at the end of this post. But personally I had issues with the camera shooting today and ones that would effect my ability to take shots the way I want. I’m not a great photographer and need every help I can get out of the camera and I felt the X100 was holding me back with some of it’s annoyances. Below are some pictures I took with the X100, they’re not as is from the camera since I’ve color processed them.

The X100 is available on Amazon for around $1,200 [Amazon Link]

Here are some reviews online:
Luminous Landscape 1
Luminous Landscape 2
The Pictorial
DigitalRev
Steve Huff Photo 1
Steve Huff Photo 2
Steve Huff Photo 3
Enticing the light 1
Enticing the light 2
Enticing the light 3
Photo Radar
ePhotozine
DC Resource
135 Street

Since on Friday I didn’t cheat the way I wanted to I decided I would sneak in 1 kebab sandwich from Dandosh after my gym yesterday (don’t tell Fahad) based on the recommendations of some readers. I made sure I carried only 500 fils with me since I wanted to control my intake and 500 fils would buy me just one sandwich which costs 300 fils. I ordered my kebab with just tahina and fries and started eating it. It tasted like every other kebab I’ve had and was actually kind of let down. Then suddenly the aftertaste kicked in, wow what a shocker. I don’t know what’s in the sandwich but the aftertaste is just incredible. It has a slight tingling sensation since it’s kinda spicy but not too much and for some reason this tingling sensation kicks in around a minute after finishing the sandwich. Since I only had 200 fils left I checked to see if I had any change in my car and I found exactly 400 fils. So I went back and ended up eating two more sandwiches. I think they have the best kebab sandwiches in Kuwait, I left after 3 sandwiches still wanting more… or maybe it’s because I’ve been deprived from this kind of food for too long. Here is Dandosh on [Google Maps]

Paris Hilton has a reality show called My New BFF which I’ve watched once before by mistake. The show is about Paris Hilton looking for a new best friend and it involves a bunch of guys and girls all trying out for that position. Well the show has now moved to Dubai and one of the contestants is a Kuwaiti girl called Reem Al Alnezi (pictured above). The Dubai version of the show doesn’t have any male contestants which means I am not in the running to be Paris Hilton’s best friend. That’s ok though since the only thing we had in common anyway was our love for Hardees.

Here is a link to photos from My New BFF Dubai [Link]

Thanks Fatemah

Kuwait’s being mentioned on a bunch of celebrity gossip sites because of a Rihanna ad that got censored here. Funny. [Link]

Apparently it all started from [Here]

Hearts of Palm is a short movie set in August 2nd 1990 and deals with Kuwaiti students living in Miami Florida during the Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait. It’s written and directed by Faisal AlNashmi, a film student studying in the University of Miami. I’ve seen quite a few short movies related to the invasion but they’ve always been from the perspective of people inside Kuwait so I thought it was interesting for this film to be from a perspective of the students studying abroad. I can imagine it must have been very difficult for them being all across on the other side of the world and not being able to do anything other then sit and watch the news. [Video Link]

I got a nasty chip in my windshield the other day from a flying pebble and if that wasn’t bad enough the chip happened right up in the middle of my line of sight. It was extremely annoying and I wanted to fix it right away so I ended up taking it to our friends at Al Falah Car Wash since they recently started repairing windshields.

It took them around half and hour to repair two chips in my windshield (the new one and an older tiny one) and now my windshield looks new again. It cost me around KD5 plus I tipped the repair guy. They did a great job so I highly recommend them plus you can get your car washed when you’re done.

Things I’m craving:

– Caesars pizza (pictured above) and hotdog rolls
– Apple Pie from Choowy Goowy
– Shawerma from Dandosh
– Kit Kat Chunky Hazelnut
– Quarter Pounder with cheese from McDonalds
– Little Ruby’s french fries
– Goowy hot chocolate cake from Chocolate Bar
– KDD Silver ice cream
– Chocolate pudding from Slider Station
– Diet Coke

Sadly I don’t think I am allowed to have all that even on my cheat day so I’m going to have to choose…

They’ve activated the new clock road sign near McDonalds on the Gulf Road and it turns out they’re using a new screen for it. Unlike the first generation signs in which they used two smaller screens, the new sign uses one larger higher resolution screen which is much better. No more squinting trying to read the messages, they should be much larger and clearer from now on.

This must be fake (I hope) but it’s still funny:

It’s like a safari, only better
“Safari” is the Swahili word for adventure and that’s just what we have in store for you.

We sail up and down the coast of Somalia waiting to get hijacked by pirates. We encourage you to bring your ‘High powered weapons’ along on the cruise. If you don’t have weapons of your own, you can rent them on the boat.

It’s $800 a day plus $25 a day to rent an M-16. [Link]

Thanks Darth Ibrahim

Last weekend I decided to try and walk home from work. The distance was around 12KM and took me 2 hours and 20 minutes. Today I decided to try and beat the time and try to get home in 2 hours or less. So I ran, and ran and ran. I don’t think I’ve ever ran as much or as far as I did. It wasn’t non stop running since I’m not that fit but I ran a lot more than I walked. To my surprise, I managed to cover the exact same distance but this time in 1 hour and 39 minutes! Not bad for a guy who can barely make it on a treadmill for 30 minutes. The above time is todays run while the below time is from last week.

According to the Freedom of the Press 2011 survey release, Kuwait no longer tops the Arab world in freedom of the press, that position now goes to Lebanon. Previously Kuwait was always on top but this year it dropped from a global position of 115th last year to 124th place in 2011. You can check out the full results and press releases [Here]

Below is the freedom of the press ranking for the Middle East and North Africa:

1- Israel
2- Lebanon
3- Kuwait
4- Algeria
5- Jordan
6- Egypt
7- Qatar
8- Iraq / Morocco
10- Oman / UAE
12- Bahrain
13- Palestine / Saudi Arabia / Yemen
16- Syria
17- Tunisia
18- Iran
19- Libya

I just found out we have a KitchenAid dealer in Kuwait. I never knew there was one locally since I never saw their products in any store but it seems that’s because in Kuwait they cater mostly to businesses. KitchenAid is an extremely popular brand for kitchen mixers which are used a lot in cooking shows. According to the dealer the mixer costs KD130 after discount which when compared to the KD75 selling price on Amazon… it’s nearly double. But ordering from Amazon isn’t an option since it’s pretty heavy and you have the voltage difference.

The KitchenAid dealer turned out to be the Blendtec dealer as well. Blendtec is a very popular blender and they’re the same ones used on the website Will It Blend? in which they try to blend random everyday objects.The prices of the Blendtec blenders start at KD370 which is more than double the prices on Amazon. Ouch!

In any case if you’re interested to know, the dealer is called Mabrook and their phone number is 24818242

The Dalsan Women Association are having a book donation campaign to collect books to send off to universities and other educational institutions in war torn Somalia. Students in Somalia have a severe shortage of books in university libraries especially scientific ones and donating at least one book will help students get a better education and a brighter future. I know a lot of people have books they finished reading or haven’t opened in years and now there is a way these books can help people. So if you have books you don’t need then drop them off at the Kuwait Writer’s Association located in Adeliya opposite Kazema Club or if you prefer you can send them to the Somali Embassy in Bayan Block 7 avenue/jaddah 8 street 1. You have the whole month of May to drop of books!

I’ve had a lot of iPods but I don’t think I’ve been impressed with one recently as much as I have been with the latest iPod Shuffle. I got it to use while I am running or walking since the new Nano although small and light, it doesn’t have any physical buttons which makes it difficult to control without looking at the screen. The Shuffle on the other hand is super light and has buttons which for me makes it the perfect iPod for exercising.

Of course the downside is that there is no screen.. you would think but it isn’t. The shuffle has a nifty feature (like the nano) called voice over. There is a little button that you press and a guys voice comes in over your music to tell you what song is currently playing. Click that button twice and the voice tells you how much battery is left. Hold down the button and the voice will flip through your playlist and when you decide on one just press play. This feature is extremely helpful since it really allows you to control the shuffle and find out what you’re listening to all by just feeling your way around the buttons.

Price wise the shuffle is cheap. Sheeel had them on sale for just KD10 and I should have bought one then but I didn’t, instead I bought one from the market for around KD17. Still not too bad, it’s more expensive than Amazon but if you include the shipping cost it comes out the same. The Nano sells for around KD50 here as well so the shuffle is less than half the price. Really the only problem I have with the shuffle is the fact that there is no hold button which is annoying since I accidentally managed to press the forward button a few times by brushing against it. Because of that I was going to give the shuffle a 4.5 out of 5 BUT, I just decided to check the manual and make sure there isn’t a way to put the shuffle on hold and guess what? Turns out there is a hold mode, I just need to press the play/pause button for 3 seconds to activate it. So now it’s perfect. If you’re looking for a music player you don’t want to worry about scratching, breaking or losing and if you prefer physical buttons over a touch screen then the Shuffle is perfect for you. Final score is a 5 out of 5.