Saw this cookie tag in a meeting. It’s either Moroccan or American, can’t be both!

^He sent me this picture with a very mean subject line! I’m so envying him right now and I have a strong feeling that he’ll choke on the first thing he put in his mouth 😛

Note to Mom: I know you are reading this post, look, I know I said that I won’t travel with you guys this summer, but I’m having second thoughts now.

Ana ga3ed ebhal7ar wohwa raye7 “iteshagag fe roboo3 swaisra*”!!

*in which Kuwaiti (mosalsal) soap opera was this line said and by who? First one to give the correct answer will get a standing ovation from Mishary.

I came across the image above while on wikipedia and it reminded me of some images I took back in june when I was in Montreux.

The pictures are of the same view. The old one is a painting, obviously, a 200 year old painting of Montreux and it’s lake by an artist named Joseph Mallord William Turner. It was painted in 1810. The picture on the other hand was taken in june of 2008. Almost 200 hundred years ago Mr. Turner sat somewhere close to where I was taking pictures and made that painting. Two images of the same place that are 200 hundreds years apart.

^Click on the picture for a bigger version.

Pictures were taken in Geneva on 8/8/08. It’s a 3 wide-angled pictures merged to form this panorama view.

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….

My brother once told me not to try any chinese restaurants outside of Kuwait. He said that the chinese restaurants in Kuwait are very careful when cooking the dishes, they don’t want to alienate their Kuwaiti customers by cooking real chinese food, coz sometimes its too much for them to handle. My Brother basically said that in Kuwait they cook Kuwaiti friendly chinese dishes.

My brother’s favorite chinese restaurant in the world is Peacock in SAS Hotel, since Peacock is highly overrated in my opinion, I tried to take his advice with a grain of salt. I wanted to prove and make a point to myself, that there are good chinese restaurants out there, somewhere.

Today, I was out by myself, and I like to try new places when there is no one around. The reason I don’t prefer eating at new places with people with me is coz I don’t like the disappointed look and the “its all your fault” stare when the food turns out to be inedible (which often is the case). Anyway, As I was saying, I was out by myself and wanted to try a chinese restaurant, to prove a point. I entered the first restaurant I saw. Its called Chez Leung. There was no one inside besides the 2 chinese guys eating at a table near the kitchen and talking with the waitress, they were her friends, I think.

I chose a table and sat. I inspected the place for awhile, thinking to myself “this looks like a nice authentic restaurant. Look at the plants, the frames, the little plastic kitty waving, the plants again, the music… err.. the music?!” the Eagles “Hotel california” was playing from the speakers. Not so authentic. I was expecting some whiny girls singing words I don’t know. The waitress came, very friendly, took my order then went to the kitchen, all the while smiling like she’s just seen a friend. I took out my laptop, no wifi signal, returned the laptop back only to find the waiter standing next to me with my starters. The dish came out fast, definitely not a good sign. My starter was chicken on toast with sesame. It tastes bland, I couldn’t really taste the chicken, it tasted like a dessert called Samsamiya, Which I hated since I was little. My brother was half right by that now. But there was still hope, a chance for me to be right for doubting my brother. Not so long after she took my first dish, she came back with the main course, Hot & Sour chicken. It did not look very appetizing, and the mood they’re trying to set with the music is not working out well. By now George Michael’s “Careless whisper” was playing, followed by “you take my breath away”, Savag Garden’s “I knew I loved You”, Bryan Adams’ “Everything I do”. At first I was blaming the radio for playing all those songs, but after hearing them all back to back it was clear now that it wasn’t the radio playing all those songs, it was a them.. the restaurant! coz no radio would risk its reputation by playing all these sappy songs consecutively! (unless its 99.7 RKFM).

I finished eating and asked for the check. I couldn’t have been more off with the restaurant choice. The food was horrible, The place was not as authentic as I hoped for (I saw a ketchup bottle) and the music selection was… no comment.

I paid and headed to the door, A song started playing as I was stepping out the door, I couldn’t really catch it, it went something like this “If… I.. Shoould stay.. I would only… be in..”

ADDRESS

I happened to be in Geneve today and happened to remember that I wanted to take a look at the new iPhone which incidently was released today and I, most probably, would’ve taken it to the cashier and paid for it immediately, no matter how pricey the Les offres d’abonnement (subscription plans) were.

I entered the shop and went to the machine to take a number to wait inline, there weren’t much people in there and that was no surprise, coz the french and technology do not mix, its like mixing chocolate with cheese or socks with slippers or boxers with dishdashas (the latter can be possible at times). The machine had a piece of paper on it, and in big letters I saw the word iPhone. I managed to understand half of it and I learned that I should not take a piece of paper and wait inline, instead I should go directly to the iPhone employee. I looked around and sure enough there was a lady with many iPhone brochures in her hand hanging near the iPhone stand talking to some guy. I went to her and asked her if she spoke english and she did “Just a Littol.” She asked if i’m interested in buying one and I said yes, she then handed me a piece of paper to write my name down along with my number and address. I wished I haven’t asked her why, I wish I haven’t already saw the iPhone and played with it and saw it’s back and asked for the white version. She told me “we will put you in a list and then we will call you when we have more iPhones.” Again I wish I haven’t asked about the the waiting list either.. “over 530 people in the waiting list. just for this shop. other shops may have less people in the waiting list” she said, “maybe you wait for 1 month to buy the iPhone,” she concluded. On my way out, as i passed by the number-giving machine, I realized that the paper i read earlier is there to let us know that the iPhone is SOLD OUT and that if we want to put our names in the waiting list we shouldn’t take a number, instead go directly and talk to the iPhone lady.. (fe6een fe6een!)

And thats how my wish of iny a7ir Mishary and Hamad went down the drain. Just like that.

Appleinsider has a thread going on about how it sold out all through switzerland, and maybe even throughout europe.

All I ended up getting was this piece of information: 519 SFR (134KD) for the 8GB and 619 SFR (159KD) for the 16GB. It’s a 2 years plan but you can always throw the simcard away and pay nothing more than the price I just provided. And one more thing, the 3G iPhone Feels/looks Good. A phone like this requires constant network connection so that the user has the liberty to use all its features. To know more about this contact Advanced Telecom Systems.

I received an email today from Swisscom telling me the 3G iPhone is going to be released the day after tomorrow. I read their page and I think it says that I can’t buy one without subscribing with their service. How am I supposed to buy this thing without letting them charge my visa for 12 or 24 months? I know there must be a way but at the moment I just don’t get the whole thing. Read their subscription’s details HERE.

This is going to be my first ever iPhone. 😀

Swisscom.

Mont Salève (1380m) is in france right next to the swiss borders. Its one of the nearest mountains to geneva and once you’re up there, you’ll have a panoramic view of geneva and all the cities next to it. I think I can see all the way to lausanne (I think Montreux is blocked by the Mountains near Evian).

You can go up there either by using the Telepherique (Cable car) or by car. I prefer using the car, gives a sense of adventure (I’m afraid of heights). We went there last week, by car ofcourse, my brother was in the driver’s seats, driving the manual car (which makes our heads go back and fourth with every gear shift!). The trip took less than 15 minutes. There is a little cafe on top (many cafes) which overlooks the whole thing and just a few meters away from the cafe there is this flying-edge where (crazy people, as mom would refer to them, elmeyaneen) jump off and fly with their parachutes.

This is the stadium where some of the UEFA games were held.

The giant football hovering over geneva’s skies.

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We went to an italian restaurant the other day, it was recommended by Hamad’s boss. When we first saw the street it’s located in and the neighborhood we had our little doubts. We know that restaurants in europe and especially in switzerland aren’t flashy and the best restaurants always look kinda cheap, but still, the place looked weird for some reason, maybe being behind the train station and all.. I don’t know. We wanted to sit outside but the waiter told us that we only have this cramped table to sit at coz the other section is not being served for the night. We didn’t sit outside and went in. The restaurant is small and not so cozy, there was a football game being played on TV and italian waiters arguing loudly. My brother couldn’t have been any happier, being an AC Milan fan and all, he couldn’t have wished for a more italian restaurant to be in.

We sat and the Pizza oven was right next to us, the smell was killing us, it smelled so good inside! we skimmed through the menu. We knew we’re going to order pizzas for starters, it was only a matter of quantity and we all ordered the same maindish (by accident, I’d like to believe), a home made tagliatelle with creme and mushrooms.

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We went to Gruyère the other day. We go there mainly to indulge in cheese. They’re the number one source of the best cheese in switzerland and maybe all of europe. We go there prepared, we don’t eat anything heavy before heading to Gruyère. We order their raclette; a block of cheese they put under a some tiny cheese heater/griller (shown in the pictures), and their fondue which also is made of melted cheese. And for the dessert, we either order their hot chocolat viennois or their denmark icecream (I once ordered both and felt sick afterwards). Everything there is to die for. I’m gonna leave you now with the pics, 19 pics to be specific 😯

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I used my wide angle lens again, I took this picture of the church (completed in 1272) while holding the camera well below my knees just to be able to capture the whole church, and I still managed to miss the top cross. oh well.

Now, photography gurus, I have a question for you, I can’t get the fuzziness out of the trees, and any moving object for that matter. I tried to sharpen the image, did the smart sharpen thingy but it didn’t help. Any advice? and yeah I’m asking coz I’m using HDR without a tripod. 😀

Click on the image for a bigger & fuzzier version.

😀

2 days ago we were at a cafe and I wanted a nutella crepe. I asked for Crepe avec chocolat, then I said avec nutella, But the lady at the counter replied with a superior tone I didn’t care for “you’re in switzerland you should eat the swiss chocolate, not nutella.” I think chocolate crepes are supposed to be with nutella not any other kind of chocolate, and I told her so as she was already in the process of making the crepe with her swiss chocolate.

I liked the end result. I liked the flaky/powedery chocolate she poured over the crepe and how it melted. Nutella would’ve been 10 times better, thats for sure, but it was good nonetheless.

I hate snobby europeans.

After 2 planes and a taxi we arrived at 9 something yesterday. We were all exhausted and wanted to sleep, but no, we had to get our rented car from europcar, and we did, then went to GÉANT to stock up on everthing. Then finally returned back home, where I happily drifted out of consciousness.

I went outside, After taking a 2 hour nap, and took some pictures of the cherry tree near us. Labeeba, These pictures are for you 🙂 I was planning on taking pictures of that tree even before anyone told me coz the cherries looked great!