National Day

February 24, 2008 | Filed Under Main | 12 Comments

Today and tomorrow are national holidays for most of Kuwait (I say most because I am working and so is the guy who got me my coffee this morning…). Today is National Day which recognizes Kuwait’s independence from Great Britain and the start of a sovereign nation. Tomorrow is Liberation Day, which is the celebration of (you guessed it) Kuwait’s liberation from the Iraq invasion. It seems that – among other festivities – these holidays are celebrated by people roaming the streets, waving flags, singing, honking horns and spraying everything they see with silly string and foam. Crates of this stuff have been sold in every store all week. The festivities shut down many roads, including Gulf Street.

My apartment building is on Gulf Street.

I have found a back way there of course (or I would not be in work). But the celebrations actually seemed to start over the weekend, as I discovered on my hour crawl on Saturday night down Gulf Street. Police were everywhere and I think their main goal was to keep traffic slow… because the streets were filled with groups of young boys walking back and forth across the highway, spraying cars with foam. Not only that, but younger kids were in cars (not driving of course) and spraying foam out the windows. It seemed mostly aimed at other cars with children in them. They would spray each other, sometimes hanging out windows, sometimes popping their heads out of sunroofs. It actually looked like a lot of fun. Somehow – I escaped the foaming, even though I was eye to eye with a can wielding youngster a number of times. I was kind of disappointed…

Lastly, I have officially completed one of the major “expat” rituals in Kuwait – my homemade wine is bubblin’ away as we speak. It should be ready by St. Patrick’s Day.

Cassettes

February 20, 2008 | Filed Under Main, Music | 5 Comments

So, where do you buy your cassettes?

Right. That’s what I thought. Frankly, I can’t think of one store that sells a new release on cassette and only one or two that sell used cassettes.

Well here in the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council, which includes Kuwait, Bahrain, UAE, Qatar, Oman and Saudi Arabia), all your cars come standard with a cassette player. And since radio here is a bit miserable, you will need to use that option. Much Arab music is readily available on cassette (even at Virgin Records). Luckily there are a few shops that have enough of a selection of Western music to keep a music-head like me happily tooling around Kuwait. This is what I have so far:
Foo Fighters – In Your Honor
Moby – Play
Kaiser Chiefs – Yours Truly, Unruly Mob
Jimmy Eat World
Deep Forest
John Lee Hooker – Platinum Hits
Joe Jackson – Jumpin’ Jive
Pink Floyd – Atom Heart Mother
Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – Take Them On, On Your Own

That should work… for now.

I’m In!

February 20, 2008 | Filed Under Main | 2 Comments

Spent my first night in the apartment yesterday.

I want to thank the folks at the Mövenpick Hotel for taking care of me this past month. Now – I am a bachelor. Even drove in to work this morning and it took about 35 minutes WITH traffic. The apartment is nice. Furnished, too. But it will need some work. At the moment it is very… cold. The floors are tile. The walls are white and bare. All the lighting is overhead. And there is no cable or internet. Yet. And yes – my first meal in the apartment was peanut butter and jelly. But I had to work late and then unpack and set up the bed and the bathroom, etc. That was enough to do. I didn’t want to try and figure out the propane stove as well.

But at least I’m here. Now all I need is a store to purchase some big posters and I can have the place looking like a college dorm room in no time! Hell, there’s already a Domino’s Pizza place on the corner…

stuff

February 17, 2008 | Filed Under Main | No Comments

I want to point out that I have added a link to my local paper – The Kuwait Times. It gives a pretty good rundown of what’s happening here (even at the local, police blotter level) and how they see what is happening in the US.

Remember – all US election news will be under the “International” section.

You can also check out the other daily – The Arab Times .

Friday

February 15, 2008 | Filed Under Main | 4 Comments

Yesterday was a good day.

I was up early to drive. Someone at work had given me directions toward where my apartment will be and I needed to do a dry run first before “going live” on Monday. Friday is the first day of the weekend, so there are fewer cars on the road. Thus – I could take my time.

First – I had to put gas in the car. I found a station almost immediately, right on my route. My guess is you want to know how much gas is here, dontcha? Well, I paid KD 2.00($7.30) for 33.292 litres(8.8 gallons) of gas. This roughly translates into eighty-three cents per gallon. Jealous? Next, I had to find the turnoff onto my main road and that was a minute or two away. Left on to Arabian Gulf Street… Which is exactly what it sounds like. It goes right along the water and that is where my building is. It’s a very scenic drive – passing government buildings, shops, the iconic Kuwaiti water towers, parks, marinas and various fast food joints like TGI Fridays. Nice, easy, sunny day ride.

There are also a couple of good stores off this road, so I made a u-turn and parked along the water by the marina. I was warned that the stores lot was a nightmare and they were right. I’m very happy I didn’t go anywhere near it. So I walked over – not far – and started shopping. This particular store is well known in Kuwait and has all your food stuffs, fresh fruits and veggies AND a department store section. But I am there to shop for the apartment. Now – I’m setting up a home here. So as I go from aisle to aisle picking up essentials from toilet paper to salt & pepper to (I don’t know) Pop Tarts… I suddenly remember that I am parked three blocks down and across a major highway with no chance of getting any closer. I stop where I am, pay for what I’ve got and make the first of three trips from the store to the car. All in all – a good days work.

Some things just like home –
1) As I pulled into the Marina Park lot at 9:30am, the basketball courts were already packed with players.
2) There was some sort of street fair being set up in front of the store with balloons, inflated bouncy things and platforms. But right in front of the store itself… were vintage cars! Bel Airs, Impalas and Catalinas from the 60s.
3) At one point while I was walking, a phalanx of bikers roared by.
Not just like home – As I was coming out of the store for my first trip across, the wind kicked up something fierce and started blowing sand and dirt all over. The whole city was shrouded in a dense fog of dirt. The wind didn’t die down so it stayed like this the whole day. Needless to say, I needed a shower when I got home.

Flamingoes

February 13, 2008 | Filed Under Main | 5 Comments

Pink ones. These guys hang out behind my office.

Tomorrow I drive into the city proper for the first time. Keep me in your prayers…

Happy Valentine’s Day

February 13, 2008 | Filed Under Main | No Comments

Yes, we have Valentine’s Day out here in Kuwait. Every year it seems some hard-liners call for it to be banned as “immoral”. But I guess Hallmark is all-mighty.

Bored

February 10, 2008 | Filed Under Main, Music | 7 Comments

Do you ever do this? You’re sitting in front of your computer – and you’re bored – so you play “Where are they now?” with the Google search engine. You start with your name (useless). Then you put in names of kids you knew in high school and try to decide whether they are really that lawyer in Perth or are once again an 18 year old in Syracuse. Then you search for old actors or pop stars you haven’t heard about in years. Now I had a couple of stray 70s tunes in my head, so I went searching.

And do you know where old pop stars go?

Branson.

So – here you go! If you need to see Paul Revere & the Raiders (“Kicks”, “Indian Reservation”):

http://www.dickclarksabbranson.com/

or you long to hear Jim Stafford again (“Swamp Witch”, “Spiders & Snakes”):

http://www.jimstafford.com/

just head out to Missouri

But don’t expect to see Raider’s lead singer Mark Lindsay. He’s now a DJ in Portland, OR:

http://www.marklindsay.com/

Enjoy. I knew you wanted to know these things…

Added to iPod

February 7, 2008 | Filed Under Music | 3 Comments

The connection is better now. Whew…

Vampire Weekend – Self-titled debut. Think early 80s Brit-New Wave. A little English Beat. A little China Crisis. But actually they are four college-age gents from Brooklyn. Light and fun. Just listen to “Walcott”.
Alice In Chains – A collection of my favorite songs from these guys (“Them Bones”, “I Stay Away”, “Got Me Wrong”, etc.) Every year some band comes along who think they sound this good. They don’t.
Holly Cole – “Temptation” With her trio, this is Ms. Cole’s classic album form 1995 of all Tom Waits covers.
The Mars Volta – “The Bedlam In Goliath” Loud, incendiary guitars. Mega-pounding drums. Prog-rock. Proto-jazz. The words don’t make a damn bit of sense, but does that really matter when your ears are ringing?
Four Tops – Again, a collection of my fav singles. One of the best to come out of Motown. Gotta have “Bernadette”.

Also picked up the only two Procol Harum songs I know – “Whiter Shade Of Pale” and “Conquistador”.

Dinner

February 6, 2008 | Filed Under Main | No Comments

Being stuck between the office and the hotel as I am, you can imagine that my culinary exploits are pretty limited. But let me share them with you:

The hotel has three restaurants and I visit them on a rotating basis. One restaurant is buffet style and consists of lamb and rice dishes and chicken and rice dishes, Indian tandoori, kabobs, salad items, and the like. It’s pretty good usually. My issue has been beverages. I can have water, tea, soda and the occasional fruit juice. I saw that they displayed “sparkling” juices so last night I decided to order one of those. It was as if I ordered their finest champagne. It was served by three of the staff with great flourish and the bottle was set in a champagne bucket at my table. Very amusing.

Another restaurant is a faux Italian item that can be very hit and miss. Meats and soups they do very well, the pizza is so-so and some of the pasta dishes work. But when they are bad…! I ordered pasta with oil and garlic (once as a main course and once it came as a side) that was intensely spicy! Impossible to eat. They must have soaked it in red pepper oil for days. Don’t order anything with ricotta cheese – they don’t know what it is. And don’t even ask about the “cannoli”! Honestly, no restaurant should serve an item they have never even seen before. Blech!

The best restaurant is the faux Brazilian place. It serves meat. You can have your meat in tapas configurations. You can have your meat separately, with potato and vegetable. Or you can have them come to your table with big skewers and lop off pieces of meat for you until you beg them to stop. All cooked to perfection. They also do a fine gazpacho soup. That’s where I’m headed tonight.

Recently, I branched out a bit and walked down the street to this little place I saw. It’s a burger joint – literally. For a mainly Arab clientele, they serve burgers, fries, wings and shakes. You can also sit and smoke the water pipe (shisha). And they show sports on a big screen. Works for me. All that was missing is the beer…

The New York Giants

February 3, 2008 | Filed Under Main | 1 Comment

WIN!
??
And Plaxico Buress was right
?!?
And the Patriots didn’t even score 17 points
!?!?!?!?!

Amazing. These guys barely made the playoffs and sometimes during the season they played… stinky. But I saw it with my own eyes. Woke up at 5:30 this morning and blearily started flipping channels to see if anyone was carrying the game. I found it – in German (and they were broadcasting from the game itself). It took me a minute to see clearly enough to tell who was who and another few minutes to decipher what quarter we were in. Sure enough – it was the last five minutes of the game and the Patriots were nonchalantly marching down field to come from behind and score the winning touchdown. (How many times have we seen THAT this season? It almost looks planned…) Touchdown scored, three minutes left and Brady trots off the field to whiten his teeth before interviews.

But the Giants aren’t done! The most amazing thing about the Tyree catch was that Manning even threw it. There were at least three Patriots holding him. And then Buress in the corner with no one around. AND he held on to the ball! Again – who’d a thunk it?

Pictures #2

February 2, 2008 | Filed Under Main | 4 Comments

Ok – here are my best shots from two weeks in Dubai. I didn’t even have a camera until the second week. Kuwait will be dicey as far as tourist shots, but I’ll see what I can manage.

Go here –
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gorkyrises

or click the link that says “pictures”

Endorsement

February 1, 2008 | Filed Under Main, Politics | 9 Comments

Ok – first let me reiterate a truth I have mentioned here before: Politics Suck. There are two constants in politics – the candidate’s lust for power and money and the voters getting the shaft regularly. However, with Super-Duper-Pooper Tuesday almost upon us, I feel the need to offer these words of endorsement:

Vote for Obama.

There are now only four candidates in this race. Romney doesn’t count because he is a total fake who wouldn’t look out of place standing next to some animatronics figures you see in Disneyland. I used to like McCain, the maverick of the Republican Party. But eight years of being bludgeoned by Cheney and Rove have left Mr. Straight Talk a bit punchy. I’m not even sure he knows what year it is. As for Hillary… I don’t like her and I don’t trust her. She is the epitome of DC politics. She double-talks first and answers questions later. Her eyes don’t sparkle – that glint you see is hunger. Hunger for a power she thinks she deserves. For a current example of the Clinton dissembling, just type ‘Clinton’ and ‘Kazakhstan’ into Google Search. And if she and McCain are the nominees – McCain wins.

I’m going for Obama not just because Bill Bradley endorsed him or because he is an excellent and thoughtful speaker. He just seems honest. And honorable. And open to looking at the things we really need in this country. Sure – with politics, you can’t stay clean forever. You’re always going to get some on you. But – right now? – Obama looks like hope. As for experience, well… maybe THAT kind of experience we can do without. Mob bosses are experienced, too. Let’s give ourselves a chance for once of climbing out of the muck. These have been a long eight years…

… stepping off the soapbox…