Forgive me if this is old news, but I saw Al Kalha restaurant the other day in Mishref’s international fair ground (arth alma3areth). Its a palestinian (or Jordanian, not sure) restaurant. My roommate back in the UAE was a Kalha addict, he loved their falafels.

Their Phone # 5390043.

The conveyor belt at the suitcases’ X ray machine before the check in cunter, Dubai Airport:

One by one, the bags started to rise and fall over each other, the place was getting crowded, lots of people in one place trying hard to find and pick their bags, thats when I noticed that the little blue box containing our phones and wallets was about to get nudged out of place and all the things would fall into those little silver rollers. “Please! Hold the machine! just stop it for a second.. our things are falling” I said to the Emarati lady (clown face) operating the X ray machine. Her reply was: a disgusted look, a very obvious change in her face features that implied even more disgust, and a squeaky whiny “Whaaaat?!!”. Me and INM asked her again to stop/hold the machine coz we can’t find and pick the bags when there are lots of other bags piling up by the second.. She stopped the machine to say “I can’t stop the machine!!” “You just stopped it!” INM pointed out. She gave another condescending reply and showed disgust. We picked our bags and started walking toward the check-in counter. We were a good distance away from her when I said to INM “she don’t know how to operate the machine” (mat3arf teshte’3il).

Next thing we know, someone barked nearby and came up to us. He was a nobody, a tiny officer, who I think was employed to fill a void that never existed. He was Emarati too. The guy (greasy hair) heard my comment to my friend about clown face and was offended on her behalf. She did NOT hear me. He raised his voice and began motioning with his hands and asked many questions. “Yes I told my friend that she’s doesn’t know how to operate the machine. I don’t think she’s doing her job properly, thats just my opinion” I said to greasy hair, and he started to bark even more and asked for our passports (the passports were with Mishary, and he was at a counter very far away from us) He demanded the passports and INM went to bring them. Long story short, the guy took our passports, asked about our take-off time, and we told him that its on 8:20. He gave us a look that said “You might not be on that plane when it takes off.” Seeing him in that pose trying a bit too hard to fake authority was a sight out of a sitcom.

A little while later many officers came and started questioning us. We told them what happened. No one believed us. Greasy haired nobody said “He yelled at her to stop the machine then yelled again and told her how she’s not doing her job properly and how she can’t operate the machine. He was yelling at her!” Me and INM couldn’t believe our ears. The guy was lying his face off! We asked him if that is exactly what happened? “Wallah thats what happened!” He lied. We raised our hands as to say “We can’t compete with a lier”.

The questioning lasted a good 30 minutes. Me and INM stood our grounds. We did not offend clown face. She did not hear us. We did not want her to hear. greasy hair heard us and he told the girl what we said. But now that we’re painted guilty and liars, I stopped talking to the guys and asked clown face one question..

Me: Was I standing facing you, yelling at you and saying….etc?
Clown face: You said mat3arf teshte’3il.
Me: To you? Did you hear me? Was I standing there and yelling at you with those words?
Clown face: she was portraying 2 looks now. *disgusted look* and *I can’t believe he’s talking to me and no “sorry” came out yet* look.
Me: Did you hear me say that to your face, Was I Yelling?!!
Clown face: What difference does it make!? You said it!!
Me: I’M ASKING YOU! JUST ANSWER THIS ONE QUESTION!

You see if I got to prove that she did not hear me and that I wasn’t even addressing her with my remark, let alone YELLING, I would prove that greasy hair was lying and clown face too was not saying the whole truth and that they had no case. The other officer sensed where I was going and stopped me “You don’t get to ask questions, only we do.”

Clown face: At first I was ready to forgive them but now I want to take them to the airport police office! (Her demand was ignored by everybody).

She was expecting a “I’m sorry” from me. Poor thing.

Nothing got to me till now, nothing. Not until the fat officer started handing us our passports.

He said many things. 2 things stood out:

1- Keep your opinions to yourself the next time, We don’t want to hear them.
2- We, emiratis, don’t insult employees while they’re doing their jobs (the way he said was a direct stab at my country and it offended me as a Kuwaiti).

I was offended by Dubai’s airport employees. We were talked down upon. Implicitly called liars many times. Treated as if we were criminals.

And all that for what?

For asking clown face to hold the X ray machine to stop the bag piling on top of our stuff and then telling my friend (far away from her) how I think she’s incompetent.

ma agool ila…. Malat 3albamyah.

We’re back and we’re so exuasted.. Moreover tomorrow DAWAM (work)! But we had a hell of a lot of fun there, we enjoyed it till the end.

Thanks to everyone in the group.

We arrived at Dubai’s airport 40 minutes late due to some annoying bearded guy who refused and his family to sit in the seats they were given. The guy didn’t stay onboard for long coz he didn’t accept the seats given and they didn’t have any choice other than letting him off the plane. The reason of the delay and the apologies were announced over the speakers atleast 5 times, They were quite mad at the bearded guy when they phrased the reason. Anyway, As soon as we arrived we rented a car and headed to Burjman. We window-shopped for a bit and then went to The Noodle House; The happiest place on earth.

I’m a big fan of The Noodle House. I used to eat there 2wice a week when I was studying there.. I was happy they decided they wanna eat there. It’s been like 5 months since I last ate there, and I missed it.

The food is unparalleled, no matter where I go and how many chinese/Asian dishes I try, The Noodle House remains the best in every way.

We’re planning on taking Dubai by storm and make the most out of the little time we have here.

Brief History:

The restaurant was recommended by 9K2HN. He ate at this restaurant with his family and cousins more than 20 years ago. He came to know about this restaurant when they were staying in one of Geneve’s hotels back in the mid 80’s. Back then they weren’t familiar with the country as much as they are now, so they asked the hotel and were recommended this restaurant. They took a taxi and went there. They liked it and kept the restaurant’s card. In the coming years, whenever they wanted to go back to this restaurant, they’d go to the Noga Hiltion Hotel (Now its Kempinski) and take a taxi from there to the restaurant coz its so hard to get there without a taxi. fast forward to yesterday.. 9K2HN, his brother and me wanted to go back there. He dug up the restaurant’s card and used modern day technology to get there, A.K.A. the GPS. The waiter was very surprised to see the restaurant’s old card with us, He said he recognized the logo but not the card itself coz its too old.

According to 9K2HN, the restaurant is still as it was over 20 years ago. Its basically a villa somewhere in geneve (I don’t think I can get there without a GPS either). You can choose to sit inside or in the terrace. The inside of the restaurant feels like you’re in a hut or cabin. The restaurant specializes in Grills. They bring you your own little coal filled barbeque grill and you do the grilling. You can choose one or a mix of their boneless meats. They offer: beef, lamb, chicken, duck, turkey, fish, shrimps and squids. Each dish comes with fries and an appetizer of your choice (smoked salmon, salad mêlée/mix…etc.

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master, over at fyonkat just wrote a post about her embarrassing encounter with a waiter in geneve, Read it here, and She inspired me to write about my own embarrassing encounter with a waiter. It happened in 1996. Here is how it went:

Me and my friend were sitting in a cafe near the lake. We ordered cokes and the waitress brought them over, she was very friendly and all smiles.

I tend to spill drinks at restaurants. Sometimes when I try to describe something my arms make drawings in the air and other uncontrollable motions. Lets just say I can’t sit at a cafe or a restaurant without making a scene and most of the time the spilled drink finds it’s way to my shirt, and this time it was no exception I spilled the coke all over the table with one swift motion. The waitress came running and said “C’est pas grave” (no problem) and brought a towel and started to clean the table.

Waitress: So…who is the pig!
Me: *pointed at my friend* HIM! he’s the pig! He spilled it!

The waitress smiled.

Friend: Me.
Me: *I was amazed at how he was ok with being called a pig*
Waitress: what day you were born?
Me: 1st of january.
Waitress: wow! 1st of january! on new year!
Friend: and I’m on 25th of december.
Waiter: WOW! he’s on new years and you on christmas!

We all laughed and chatted for awhile and then she left. I then asked my friend about the “pig” thingy and then he said..

Friend: She did not say PIG! she asked who is BIGGER! OLDER! not who is the pig!

Ohh….. hehe… Errrrrr….

We just added a new “sharethis” option to the site. It will enable you to email and share the posts you liked with your friends and family. The link can be found under each and every post in the site.

Am I the only one who still listens to the Aladdin soundtrack? I especially enjoy it when I can’t sleep, I just put it on and try to sleep and it usually works.. I love this soundtrack. To date I think it hasn’t lost it’s touch and is still fresh.

Speaking of sleeplessness.. Don’t you hate people who can’t sleep while the TV is on? I have a friend who cannot sleep with the TV or ANYTHING else on. Let me explain further more.. This friend of mine cannot sleep if the receiver displays the time, the bathroom-boiler’s light is on, the space under the door is letting light in, the mobile’s tiny light is blinking or the window’s shutter is not fully shut. Now, in all honesty, don’t you think people, like my friend, should get a training course on how to properly use their eyelids?

Yes, we had a mini twister here in Kuwait! This mini twister was around 10 meters long and 2 meter diameter.

Here is a better video

Ali caught it when he was near Boubyan island in north kuwait.

Thanks Ali.

We were at the barber today and I told my cousin about Skype and how we can use the software to talk to each others while I’m away through audio chat and how its a good software for chatting…etc. Then someone there told my cousin that they sell skype credits in Alshamiya Co-op. For those of you who use this program but can’t buy credits online coz of their credit cards not being american issued, this info could really be helpful, if proved to be true. He said just go to Alshamiya co-op and ask for the skype cards and they’ll tell you where to find em.

Can anyone confirm this info? And can Skype credits be bought anywhere else in Kuwait?

Skype

We woke up around 9 and went to this indian restaurant which is about 15 minutes away from the chalet. It was my first time to eat there, they used to bring food from the resaurant for dinner or lunch, but I never went there myself.

The Baith 6oma6 (Eggs with Tomatoes) was gewd. Their Tea with milk was good too, but not as good as the UAE’s Karak I used to drink in Sharjah.

Since i was young in high school i grew up watching my grand father collecting mesbahs (rosaries), after he passed away my father took over this hobby, and continued collecting and having his own collection. The bag contains some rare and very precious ones, collected from more than one country. He also, sometimes, buy his own rock and custom made his mesbah.

And now back to my beginning, since i was, at the time, in high school i couldn’t afford them coz the price range starts from KD 40 to KD 950 per mesbah so i decided to go with the plastice ones which only cost 500 fils

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Last saturday I took a dip in the sea. The sun was as big as the sky, or so it seemed. The water was cold, I don’t know why I thought the water would be much warmer. Before I got out I rode the banana with 2 other guys. Its funny how one minute you’re chilling in the sea and next you’re on this huge inflated banana trying your best to hold on to dear life! But, yeah, I was the first to fall after the longest 5 minutes ever and To this second my leg hurts. mako layaqa.

Some of the guys I know really think they could get a nice tan in the summer, they use different kind of tanning creams to get that perfect tan, which never happens The idea makes me laugh really.. So, let me break it down to you. Average Kuwaiti guys when exposed to the sun for longer than an hour tend to end up looking like cockroaches lol don’t deceive yourselves into thinking otherwise.. ok?

We went to Nino and ordered 2 of their certified angus beef, and we asked for a medium cook. we got 2 well done steaks instead. My friend started eating his and I returned mine. after waiting 10 more minutes I got a rare steak.. so I sent it back again. My friend was half way through his steak when they finally brought my medium cooked steak.

Things I don’t understand:

1- Why do restaurants always hear welldone when I say medium?
2- Why do restaurants punish customers who return steaks?
3- why did my friend eat his well done steak when his original order was a medium steak?
4- if it doesn’t really matter what kind of steak he ends up eating, why then did he specify?
5- How come I return my dish twice and end up eating after my friend’s done eating and get nothing more than a little lame apology from the waiter?
6- Why are people considered difficult when they refuse to eat things they did not order?

If we all became indifferent to what kind of steaks we end up eating then the whole steak-cooking system would become obsolete! I won’t let that happen!

Today i got this picture from a friend, do you notice anything unusual? Yeah they took the dowaniya to the roof! so that it wont be considered a violation by the government (ta3adeyat) wallah ya3jebony ely efakroon chethy! I bet he didnt think twice if the building can handle it or not.. Just a silly question what if the building couldn’t handle it? chethy 3adey bas emoot ely dakhel?!

Today i got an email from pumkinah telling me that McDonald’s does offer home delivery. but wait! where is it available?! its available in Bangkok! yeah pumkinah is now in Bangkok, i hope they offer delivery all over Kuwait soon

Any way thanks pumkinah and have fun there

We went to the Boat show in Al Koot Mall last friday. Now I know nothing about boats but I really liked it, I thought it was very nicely organized and the people seemed to enjoy their visit.

The show was divided to 3 areas, one was in the fountains’ area, they built a little wooden bridge on top of the water that takes you all around that section of the show (as shown above). It looked very nice. The 2nd area was in the Marina in front of the fountains facing the sea (shown below) and the last area was near starbucks, just outside the mall.

This boat looked amazing.

I want to try this one day.

The boat I liked the most!

One of the better moments I had in this show was with this picture here (I took around 7000 pictures just to get 1 right). I’m not really a fan of boats, can you tell?

You better click here to read the rest of this post and see the other pictures

I was told that the tickets are selling out, especially the better ones. Thankfully we, I mean loco, managed to buy us 2 tickets. I hope everything goes well coz there are unsettling rumors going around and canceled appearances on BET, TRL and The View, I just hope she makes it to Dubai.

If you’re planning on getting good tickets, book through the internet coz they’re sold out in most outlets in Dubai.

Source: loco

I was in the belajat street with my wife the other day and I noticed some new kind of traffic lights with 3 reds in them and they flash continuously. When I got a bit closer I read a sign nearby that says something like “if you see the flashing lights you should come to a complete stop! coz it means either the Amir is coming in or getting out of his house. They are located in front of the dar salwa palace.

And today i got a phone call from Ali saying the same thing, plus, now they are adding some kind of a bridge (I don’t know what to call it) with some sensors or cameras, I’m not sure what’s their purpose. Ali said that these little bridges are being constructed in Fahahel high way. Any one knows what are these thing for?

Thank you Ali.

My friend had this nice ice cream (above) in italy last summer and it looked really special mostly coz of the novelty factor imo.

But I have good news for you guys (minus good), Its available in Kuwait now. Somewhere in Hawally, I’ve been told.

Thank you loco for the 1st pic and Kuwait & FoOD for the 2nd pic.

Edit:

Its in Hawally near GUST and its called 3alam il ice cream (Ice cream world). “they say its not as good as it looks.”

Thank you Om FasoOoL for the information