Archive for April, 2010

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

One thing I love about our group of friends’ birthdays is that they drag and drag and drag. We will be celebrating, giving out gifts, wishing all the best for like a month! Every year we go through a very thorough thinking process to decide what gift to get for the special girl. We reach points where we demand the birthday girl to give us her list of gifts to buy or at least choose from. Putting the whole burden on the birthday girl who sometimes does not know herself what she wants.

When my birthday came this year on the 16th of April. Here comes the pressure!

You gotta tell us what you want!

Come on list the gifts we don’t have much time!

Your birthday is coming soon you better act on it!

Of course there is some exaggeration here because we actually do it with love :P

Anyhoo, I said you know what? I don’t want a gift. I want us to hang out somewhere and just have fun! I told my friends this gift can only come from them as no one else can make this happen to me but my dear friends!

And it was like Halleluja!

My friends booked Sahara resort for Friday.

We thought of Sahara because we have been there before. Big villa. Private Swimming Pool. Cool Design.

And we went …

Let me remind you all of what Friday weather was like…

Dusty. Windy. Rainy. The whole works!

I forgot to mention that we planned a BBQ party.

And a BBQ party we did!

We arrived in the after noon. My poor friend dips herself halfway in the swiming pool just to come out 2 minutes later freezing as the water was very cold. So we all decided to dip our legs in the pool and enjoy the windy weather with the Ipod music.

We then started making the kebabs and tekkas into sticks for grilling. We also made the Arayes.

Grilling time came. We bought those ready grill kits from TSC. We set them on fire in the swimming pool area and began grilling. Everything was flying around us! We could not even see if the meat was fully cooked or not. We were laughing out hearts out from the whole thing!

Time to eat. Half the portions were burned. Some went back and forth to the grill several times as they were not fully cooked. Some were cooked to perfection.

It’s evening time now. Three of us dared to get in the swimming pool one more time. Surprisingly, the water was much warmer than the afternoon. Specially that it was still windy. The only explanation we came up with was that the swimming pool lights managed to warm up the water as they were very warm to the touch.

The pool. The music. The cool breeze. Pure fun.

We ended the evening with a game of BINGO!

I won three times in a row and was kicked out of the game and forbidden to play!

Honestly guys, this was my best birthday gift ever. Nothing tops having a blast with your best friends. Love You All :*

Comic Relief

My Weekend

This is where I am now. Will tell you all about it when I go back home :)

FLIPFOLD

I have been eyeing this product for quite a long time now. It’s the perfect tool to fold shirts, towels, pants and other garments for the closet. You get a perfect, crisp, flat uniform fold and a perfect size.

Anyone knows if  I can find it in Kuwait? If not I will end up ordering it from the States through their website. Link

Check out this clip from the “Big Bang Theory” *Huge Fan Here!* to see Sheldon in Action with his FLIPFOLD.

Nail Salons/Spas in Kuwait

I have faced this a lot.

I’m suddenly in the mood to get a mani/padi alone or with my friends  and our favourite place is fully booked.

For your short notice appointments, here is a small directory for all the reputable Nail places in Kuwait that I know of. I have tried the first 4 on the list and I highly recommend them.

  • Nail Polish 2535-2546
  • N-Style 2571-9050
  • Bubbles Nail Spa 2296-0930
  • Betty Boop 3535-6065
  • Elche Spa & Salon 25752050 ext 2222 / 4444
  • Me Time Nail Spa 2259-8025
  • Cleo 2240-1010
  • Nail it 2265-8869
  • N Bar 2575-7540
  • Glamour Salon 2262-6677
  • Laila Harmony 188-6655
  • Alaa Beauty 2564-8880/2
  • Dashing Diva 224-53990
  • 20.24 K Nail Spa 2259-8008
  • Gossip 2571-5401
  • Triple Beauty Salon 2534-6488


If your favourite place is not listed, feel free to let me know and I will add it.

Comic Relief

My Birthday Cake

As yesterday happened to be my birthday, my dear friend surprised me with this beautiful “Berkin” cake specially ordered from Crumbs. The attention to detail was remarkable. It really made my day :)

You may contact Crumbs on 2263-6614.

My Experience with Flex Fitness

I have tried as much as I can to avoid writing this experience, but unfortunately I was not left with much choice.

Flex is known as one of the best Gyms for ladies in Kuwait. And with its recent expansion, it was clearly my first choice when I decided to join a gym back in February.

So I joined. And it turned out to be a big mistake.

The gym can accommodate a large number of members. The parking can not …

They have a huge parking problem. Huge. I’m talking you are better off finding a car park in Marina Mall on a crowded evening on the weekend than to find a parking spot for your car at Flex. I never knew about this problem. Had I known, I would have never subscribed to the gym. Apparently it started when a men’s gym opened next door.

Everytime I go there I have to circle the block for 30-40 minutes waiting for someone to get out. There is valet parking but the problem is you don’t see them because they are like 1 or 2 men trying to park every member’s car. To me, they are almost never around.

I have raised this issue to the Gym Manager more than 2 weeks ago and requested a refund. She of course gave me the “No refund Policy” reply. Then she showed me an abandoned parking place in the back and asked me to park there as it’s mostly empty. I swallowed my frustration and agreed to give it a second chance.

I mananged to park there once only. The next time I went it was completely full. I had to circle the block forever until I could not bear it anymore and I called the gym complaining. The manager came running outside to take my car and she was trying to convince me that everything is ok. By then, I have reached my limit and demanded to meet her inside her office. You can imaging all the mixed feelings of anger, frustration, and exhaustion that I had. I was furious. I had a very stressful day at work and decided to hit the gym to blow off some steam. It turned out to be the cherry on the top.

I clearly stated that this is not acceptable and I demanded a refund. The manager kept denying that they have a parking problem and it is my problem that I don’t leave my car in the middle of the 2 way, crowded, congested street and leave the key inside until the valet notices it! I told her this will mean blocking the whole street when no one will be able to move and the valet is no where to be seen. The manager clearly admitted the following:

  • I’m not the first one to complain.
  • They don’t have a parking problem. It’s they way people drive that causes the parking mess.
  • When asked why they don’t inform new members of this problem before they join, she replied that of course she will not tell anyone willing to join the gym that they have a parking problem.

I insisted on a refund. She finally agreed to escalate my case to the management and wait for their reply.

The gym never called for 3 days. I chased them with my calls until I got the reply to my case. The reply was that top management decided that I can use the valet parking and there is no refund since my subscription is 3 months and I alomst utilized 2 months of it.

There was absolutely no effort is acknowledging or even trying to solve my case. They kept offering me the same solutions that I clearly stated are of no use.

Now I’m down KD260 for a gym that I can never go to because there is no where to park my car in.

There is one thing that I need to clarify here. This post is not an attempt to get the attention of Flex Fitness or its management. I already tried in so many ways to end this peacefully. I’m not the kind of person who causes chaos or likes to draw attention to get things solved.

This is merely a warning to any lady who thinks of joining this gym. If you don’t have a driver or somebody to drop you, you will be wasting your money and your complaint will be faced with negligence and ignorance, as long as you paid your subscription in full.

My Battle with Lifestyle Change

I always had this ultimate dream of having a complete lifestyle change in the way I eat. I want to have a healthy breakfast, healthy lunch, healthy dinner, and 2-3 snacks a day.

My approach to accomplish this is to a do a gradual change of the way I eat. One meal at a time.

I started with my breakfast. And I succeeded. It’s been like one year now for me to have the following breakfast everyday:

  • 2 brown toast (140 calories)
  • Zaatar (0 calories)
  • 2 small Pinar labneh (50 calories)
  • 1 cup of fresh milk (half & half) with coffee and Splenda sweetner. (120 calories). If at work, I have french coffee with Splenda also.

Total = 310 calories

The only times I skip this is when I have breakfast at a restaurant, which is like once a month. Sometimes if I want to indulge on the weekend, I have the following with my Coffee:

  • 2 Brown Toast (140 calories)
  • 1 scrambled egg, no oil (90 calories)
  • 1 slice of cheese (50 calories)

Total = 280 calories

But the problem comes next. I can’t seem to change the way I eat my lunch. Having an 8-4 job makes it very difficult to have a healthy lunch. I try sometimes to prepare a sandwich the night before, but this lasts like a couple of days. I then go back to either having a lunch break with a friend at a nearby restaurant, or starving myself until 5 pm until I reach home and want to eat everything in sight.

I always think that I if I had a less stressful job, I would be able to eat healthier. Yet I refuse to accept this as an excuse. I believe if I made it a habit to have a healthy breakfast, I can make it a habit to have a healthy lunch, and ultimately a healthy dinner.

I would love to hear suggestions from you, healthy people, on what you prepare/bring for your lunch at work (Unhealthy people please stand behind me in the line :) )

I want to reach a stage when I don’t think twice on what to have for lunch.

Just like my breakfast.

A habit.

The Making of Omani Halwa at Fereej Swaileh

Last week we deicded to head to Fereej Suwaileh for an after work lunch/dinner. We always order home delivery, but this was my first time visiting the restaurant, which deserves a post on its own by the way.

Of course if you haven’t tried Fereej Swaileh food yet, you immediately should. It is the “It” place for traditional Kuwaiti dishes.

Anyway, I was surprised to see that they had their own traditional Kuwaiti/Gulf dessert shop inside the restaurant. All kinds of rahash, darabeel, halwa, and cakes. What is really interesting to know is that they make their own Omani Halwa. I managed to capture the short video above of the process. The pot reminded me of “Sharshabeel/Gargamel” pot in the “Sanafer/Smurfs”!

My friend got the rahash with biscuits dessert. If you love Rahash, the taste is out of this world!

Fereej Swaileh restaurant is located in Salmiay, Salem Al-Mubarak street, next to Marks & Spencer, 1st floor. Their contact number is 2575-5991