Since we’re in the “Back To School” season, i think this site will help many of you guys. Its basically an online store that specialized in any stationaries and office requirements, from pencils all the way to school bags and everything else. It deliver too.

LINK

About 2 weeks ago, when I was in france, I found out that we were having ummawash o hasho rebyan for dinner. I wasn’t really surprised, coz that day it was cloudy and raining, and Kuwaitis can’t be Kuwaitis if they do not eat ummawash or m3addas when its raining! its an unwritten rule.

I asked about the history of this Kuwaiti dish and learned the following:

Kuwaitis back in the day didn’t have refrigerators and they had to be creative and mix it up a bit when it came to cooking. They ate mostly grains with rice, dal (3adas) with rice and other stuff. Sheep were available and was a step up from plain rice, or rice with dal and fish dishes. Chickens weren’t widely available as it is now, chickens were expensive and most of the time a chicken dish would be cooked only for a sick person within the family (morale boost ). In the summer they had all sort of sea food: Fish, Shrimps, Crabs and so on. But in the winter it was harder, and I think more expensive for people to get fishes and sea food in general, and thats why they started drying fishes and shrimps. The dried shrimps proved to be more resilient to the invention of refrigerators, whereas dried fishes are no where to be found on the Kuwaiti menus (and thank God for that! imagine coming home from work to find an ugly dried fish on the table..).

Inspiration for this post.

Update:
Apparently the Kuwaiti menu have atleast one dish of dried fish, that is Marag Khobba6. I have never heard of it.

We went to the chalet today and saw this on the side of the road leading to Alkhiran/Alzour area. The camel was dead and the car was very badly damaged. I took many pictures but when I saw them on the laptop’s screen they were very graphic. Poor animal. I hope the driver isn’t badly hurt.

These are the new numbers effective on october. From the picture it shows that Zain numbers will begin with a 9, Wataniya with a 6, 2 for the landlines and Commercial lines will begin with 1.

Thanks Abdullah

fire-without-matches-or-lighter

Got this in an e-mail from INM.

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.

Me and my family and Yousef will be going to Dubai today just for the
weekend. We’ll be posting from there, everything will go as usual but expect more mobile blogging

An excerpt from the official site:

“The Tiger Woods Dubai, a member of Tatweer, is a private residential community and resort that will include the world’s first golf course designed by Tiger Woods – Al Ruwaya.
Embodying Tiger Woods’ vision of creating a spectacular, challenging golf course, Al Ruwaya, will be a 7,800 yard, par 72, 18 hole championship course with dramatic elevation changes, lush landscaping, stunning water features and an overall design that will challenge and entertain golfers of all playing abilities.
Luxurious residential and hospitality components will include residences, a boutique hotel, a well-being spa, a fine dining restaurant, a professionally staffed golf academy and clubhouse.”
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posted By Yousef

My vacation is finally coming to an end. I’m leaving this beautiful place tomorrow back to Kuwait. I spent over two months here, and I still have it in me to stay for an extra year or two..

I took my suitcase and checked it in at the airport so i wouldn’t feel rushed and in a hurry on the day of flight. The bag was heavy and there was possibly a 2 or 3 kilos of excess weight. We did some precautions and brought an extra bag with us to lighten mine just incase it needed some lightening, thank God that didn’t happen, coz we were lucky to have dealt with a guy, not a girl, at the check-in counter. Girls at check in counters are crazy, no offense, but the ones I dealt with are.

Anyway. I hope the weather in Kuwait isn’t too cold coz I didn’t pack any warm clothes.

We just bought a new cooler that deals with these large bottles but the problem now, where can I buy a new empty one? i dont want to subscribe with Alroudatain or Abraj company which delivers these kind of large bottles, What i want is to get one so i can fill it at home. Does Anyone know any place in Kuwait that sells them?

My Mother and I were in the car the other day. An old guy with black clothing and a black hat wanted to cross the road and i stopped for him. Mom then pointed out that this guy is a jew.

This got me thinking about how we’re always taught to hate the jews, never talk to them, not be friendly with them..etc.

Me: How come we’re taught not to like and interact with jews?
Mom: No, there is nothing wrong with befriending the jews.
Me: But we were always lectured on how its almost a national duty not to like them.
Mom: We don’t like Israel. The country and the government but not the jews themselves. The prophet (PBUH) had jews connections and did trade stuff with them.
Me: oh..
Mom: We were talking about the jews in Kuwait the other day and flana (a relative of ours) told me this interesting story about them living in Kuwait back in the 30’s.

There was a street in Kuwait that was famous coz a lot of jews were living there, they called it the jews street, “fereej ilyohood”. they lived among us till the 1930s. They used to come visit every once in awhile. They liked my mother’s mother. They left kuwait in the late 30’s to Israel. They were rich people; they did a lot of lending and saving, they also had lots of gold. When they decided to leave Kuwait to Israel (via boats to Basra, Iraq), the news travelled fast (back then everybody knew everybody else, literally) so some young men from various Kuwaiti families (young guys from the royal family too) wanted to steal the jews’ gold. They waited till it was dark and no one was around, then went to the jews’ boats and dug holes in them. When the jews set sail in the early morning the day after, the boats started leaking and eventually they started sinking.

Almost all of the jews lived in Kuwait and left with no harm and were treated nicely. Only a small group were targeted by an even smaller group of Kuwaitis (Sawwadallah wyoohom) and when their boats went down, they left a lot of gold behind.

PICTURE

Just found out that my mom is reading our blog now and she is trying to capture the Kuwaiti/English language ( 3, ‘3, 5 and 6).

As seen above she wrote in her note the keys to read welcome aboard mom

Yes, it just begun! want some?

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….

My father used to take us to this restaurant when I was a kid. Back then I didn’t care much for staying in the restaurant, I was more interested in the swings outside.

The place was run by a nice old lady, her and the cook were the only 2 people working there. Now the old lady has left and her daughter took her place. We went on friday and were greeted by the Chef, he showed us to our table, gave us the menus, brought the drinks, cooked the dishes, presented them and gave us the check!

The dishes are amazing in this little place. They’re very simple and not a whole lot of choices are there to choose from, but from my experience, you cannot go wrong with their limited variety, well.. if you’re going to order a goose liver or a monkey’s feet thats another issue.

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^Click on it for a bigger version.

This castle or château as they call em here in france is not so far away from our place, its less than 10 minutes away by car, and yet this was the first time we tried to take a closer look.

I like old buildings and the history behind them. I looked this castle up in google and it turned out to be older than what I thought. It was built in 1328 and owned by the Compey family of Geneva, it was passed to other owners later. In 1589 it was taken by force by the troops of Geneva who entered the Savoie region, till 1606. it is owned by a farm now.

Castle’s Location.

I was supposed to be back today from my short trip to Oman, but since I finished work earlier than expected I decided to cut it short and be back a day earlier. I didn’t tell anyone that I’d be home earlier, and I did manage to surprise them all. When I came into the living room, my wife was there, and she was not expecting me at all. After the salams, She was started acting all weird and started shoving me toward out of the living room to another room, that was weird so I asked her “whats going on!” and she said “Nothing!” I didn’t know anything about it till I went to get a glass of water and saw gift boxes on the dining table, being wrapped, and the whole table was messy from all the gift wrapping paper and stuff.

When I saw the gift, I got excited, but still didn’t know it was for ME! and I asked her whom is the gift for? and she said “You, it was supposed to be ur birthday gift.” My birthday is in september.. so she said that I can have the gift now, but this is it!

Thanks Ahmad for Conspiring with your sister, again. You both got me an amazing gift.

Just got an sms from Ahmad telling me Sultan Center Souq Sharq is closed because they had a fire!

Can anyone confirm it? Got any pictures to show us?

Thanks Ahmad

UPDATE: just got the picture from Ahmad.

^Click on the picture for a bigger version.

Aix Les Bains is a beautiful and quiet place in france and it overlook one of the most picturistic lakes I’ve seen. The first time I ever been there was when Mom insisted we go see the place where the pasha (of an old egyptian movie) supposedly spent his summers. The pasha had a really good taste, I liked the place a lot.
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