It seems there is a new bill passing in the parliament in Kuwait. It is now official that within the next few days a law will come to passing that all gyms have to be completely segregated. Now that the religious right has a majority in parliament they will be passing more of these kinds of laws which is very sad. It seems Kuwait keeps going backwards more everyday.
There are so many problems being faced in Kuwait, but they seem to be free enough to make ridiculous laws. We power and water issues in all the areas, our country’s infrastructure needs an overhaul, our medical services needs a major overhaul, our communication infrastructure is abysmal and no plans have been set forth to at least solve these issues over the coming period. It is very sad that we are in this state, and I wonder what else they are going to propose.
There are both mixed and segregated gyms available for people to choose from. So people do have the choice of either and it really isn’t an issue that I think parliament should be taking up.
Link: Flickr
This was a bit of a hot weekend and going to Kubbar didn’t seem like a bad idea, I wanted to jump in some water too cool off. Took about 20 minutes to get things ready on the boat, and waiting for a few people before heading off to Kubbar. It was hot as hell on the deck, and I wanted to jump right into the water but the water in the Marina is somewhat disgusting so I opted out, instead I was rubbing ice cubes on my head which melted rather quickly.
We were pumping up the kid’s toys, and a small boat just before heading off. By the time everyone got there it was already a little late but we took off to Kubbar. My nephew wasn’t sitting too still in the beginning but later on he was standing watching everything going by and those large tankers, they are really big. Sitting with my camera in my hand ready to snap away, I was like to catalog the outings to Kubbar since its always a point of interest for people.
Around 25 minutes later we arrived and it looked like a parking spot all around it. I wish our government would take an initiative and fix the island up a little bit. Not necessarily setting something up but a little depot with some maintenance to make sure that the island remains clean and maintained.
The first spot we stopped had a very strong current, I jumped right into the water which felt amazing, but within seconds I was pulled at least 3 meters away from the boat and you could feel the current while swimming, I looked like I was stationary. We moved to another spot which was much better but lots of boats were around us, I managed to snap some pictures but it was getting hot and I wanted to remain in the water. The best part is eating watermelon while swimming, there is something about the mix of the sweet taste while you’ve been tasting salt water for that whole period.
It was refreshing, and music blaring from multiple directions and all different kinds. The best part is seeing so many people enjoying themselves.
I feels like early 2007 when I would get on the block list of some of the banks in Kuwait. It seems that some IT guys in the banks are getting too trigger happy with their content filtering hardware/software. I have clue what reason they would block a blog, I don’t think the content is offensive to anyone, but I do find it is a bit entertaining that they would even be bothered by my blog. Well, we shall see how long it takes to unblock my blog.
Thank you sender
I figured I would pay through the MOI Kiosk for my fines, I was curious to see what I had. I remember that I had a few speeding ones but I wasn’t sure if I was caught. There is a rule stating that if two cars are adjacent to each other when the camera goes off they throw out the picture because they wouldn’t know which car it is. I always tend to be speeding in the other lanes and not in the left lane, just a habit that has helped keep me below the radar.
The funny part is the fines I did have:
- Illegal parking 5 KD
- Parking on sidewalk 10 KD
- Illegal parking 5 KD
- Parking in restricted area 10 KD
- Speeding 30km/h above speed limit 30 KD
If it is 30 above the speed limit they just fine you, if it is 40 km/h they take your license. I have seemed to have found the fine line and managed to keep myself out of too much trouble.
It has been over two months since they said this machine has been launched, and over two years since they said they would do it. We were walking in the Avenues and saw the MOI machine in operations and decided to try it. As an idea of the service it isn’t a bad idea, but overall I think its lacking a lot.
- The keyboard isn’t functional, you can only use the touch screen
- Only violation payments are possible
- Its really really ugly, they could have taken it to any Industrial Design Engineer to make it look better
- It prints on full A4 paper for your receipt
- The payment works and you can pay your fines except for very high speed fines
- You have to go through the KNET payment gateway to pay for your fines and they charge you an extra 500 fils
- The cash acceptor doesn’t work
After all this time to work on this machine and they came out with this result its a big disappointment. They could have done a much better job and launched it a lot earlier.
So I went to Rihab on Friday since it was early in the day and I felt like checking out the new games out. It was windy as hell and as usual there was very little parking, so I fond a good parking spot on the side walk which didn’t block anyone. I went in and I remembered that the Kuwaiti Center closed down from 3baid‘s post, but I wanted to see if Abdulbasit really was gone.
When I walked to the first floor I saw the door open to the Kuwaiti Center, but when I walked in, I didn’t know anyone there. For years I was going there, but it seems things changed. I checked out a few games and bought two games, but they weren’t even giving deals to people. At that point I asked what happened to the people who were here before, he said one guy went to Canada and another guy retired, which didn’t make sense, but I played along bought my games and left.
Now this turned out to be interesting event, I went into work early Friday morning to finish up a few things. After that I got a call from the guys that they are heading to Avenues for breakfast, I got there around 10:30 am and we decided to eat at Pauls. Pauls has good service but bad service which is a bit annoying, I noticed that there were Italian flags all over the Avenues but I thought they just made a mistake and forgot the black part of the Kuwaiti flag, but turned out it was a full on Italian Event. Then my friends tell me they saw a couple of Ducatis in the mall so I had to investigate.
Turns out there were some Ducatis, Maseratis, and Ferraris inside the mall. I was admiring the machines these kids were all over the machines and it was really annoying since they didn’t have any idea what they were scratching. There was a couple of Ducatis, a Hypermotard, Monster, 1098, and the Limited Edition Bimota. Its very nice that they do these types of events in the mall.
Around 11 am I got a phone call telling me that the school was packed with people so I decided to go vote later in the day expecting people to go eat lunch. Went around 12:30 pm met up with my father and brother, and we went it. There was very little presence of the candidates up front unlike in 2006. No tents, no ice cream, no buses, no huge banners, nobody running after you as much, it was different for sure.
Inside they were very organized breaking up rooms by letters. My brother and father were in one room, within 15 – 20 minutes they went in voted and were heading home. I was with a very long line, I didn’t up waiting about an hour and 5 minutes before finishing up voting. They shouted my name 3 times when they took my citizenship card. When I looked at the sheet it took me sometime to find the candidates I wanted to vote for, and I triple checked it to make sure I got it right.
I left after some time, and later in the day I took my mother so that she could vote. The police man said that I couldn’t approach the school but I ignored him knowing that she sometimes has difficulty walking and the police officer up front told me that I can not enter and he was polite about it, he said it was his orders. He was very polite about it so I told him I will wait on the road, its frustrating knowing that my mother might have difficulty I wouldn’t be able to be next to her. If it is a medical case then they should make an exception, but this is the case you just have to deal with it. After some time she came out a bit tired, but they let her through due to medical reasons. But this year it seemed very organized unlike last time which was a large fiasco.
I don’t know what exactly but there is this feeling of wanting to get over this. I think that we want to see the results of these candidates and what exactly they are going to do. I’m fed up with them running us around and not doing anything, so my spirits weren’t as high as it was in 2006 about the parliamentary elections.
Link: Flickr (Cajie)
6:10 am – woke up
6:30 am – breakfast
7:30 am – Met up with family to go to the funeral in Sulaibikhaat
8:10 am – Arrived, there was some traffic and police regulating traffic. Seemed more organized then before.
9:10 am – They were praying
9:30 am – Condolences were to begin, there were a lot of animals around. They started pushing so we left the line it became insane.
10:00 am – The National Guard stepped in to organize these people, and it did work out.
11:10 am – We gave our condolenses and left, just before the Al-Sabah Family left.
11:30 am – Went to work to finish up a few things
12:45 pm – Went home to get some food and some sleep
There is just a sad feeling, Sheikh Saad was loved by the people of Kuwait. He cared for Kuwait and all developments in this country were due to him and Sheikh Jaber. We have lost some good and irreplaceable men. No matter what they did you always knew that they loved Kuwait and its people more then anything else. I even felt saddened by the day, I knew I had work but it didn’t feel like a work day or a holiday, something just didn’t feel right.
Link: Flickr
It has been an interesting day, a bit on the sad side, so I thought a change of venue would do. Called up Monichum to see if he was up for a ride right around sunset, he was up for it. So we got ready, and 20 minutes later we were at the Miseela gas station filling up our tanks, mine was almost empty. We knew that everything was shutdown for the day, and Monichum told me the 2nd ring road and the sea side are packed every inch with cars so we should avoid that area. We decided to head down Bida’a for bit, and when passing by the palms it looked dead up front then heading down the street the it looked like traffic was at a complete standstill, we decided that we would head back at any sign of traffic. We took the U-turn and came back, even at Arjan/Chic everything was shutdown.
He said he heard that the Starbucks at the airport was open, since we just wanted something cold to drink we might as well try. We kept getting texts from people to avoid certain areas from traffic, but the 6th ring road was fun as usual and the airport road was lots of fun. We got to the airport parked our bikes in an open area. I think they should start fining people for parking in handicap without a plaque, just like the states a $250 fine would keep you out of that spot for sure. We even told two people not to park their cars there, it pisses me off.
So we went inside the airport and it was packed, it even smelled bad at the entrance. Once you get in you can breath, and to our surprise the Starbucks was open. As we were walking to it we kept saying hello to people we knew, and they were just going there instead of staying home. We left after finishing the cold drinks, the funny part is I think we spent more time saying hello to people then sitting there. We wanted to be riding but we needed a cold drink and a quick stop, and as it turned out the Starbucks at the airport was the only one.