Zizou

Im gonna try to keep this one short and to the point, because Im getting complaints from some people who say "your blogs are too long !".  Dunno if thats just an excuse as to not to hurt me for not reading my blog or not, but Ill keep it short-ish and less philosophical for this one.

Oh, and its not depressing this time.  Maybe thats where my creativity stems from?  Depression? Or maybe online-venting-your-feelings is such a release that equates to punching a wall when you're angry or kicking a table, hurting your toe and then punching the wall for doing such a stupid thing.

Anyway, I went to the Zoo!  In Kuwait.  (I can hear you all the way from here you cheeky bugger for laughing.  You know who you are Fajardo.)

It was a trip that happened out of the blue.  I got one of those annoying phone calls where the person on the other line asks you to make a decision on the spot.  And they make it sound so matter of fact that its such a normal thing to make a life changing decision in an instant.

That person was my beloved sister.

"Abdullah, we're going to the zoo.  You have to decide now because we're car pooling, and if you dont come with us you're not going."

End of story.

But first off:

1. The way she said it was so matter-of-fact that she made it sound that the zoo was a place we hung out at everyday, and this wasn't the first time we go since I was 10 years old.

2. Why the pressure?  Is it not enough that my day job tends to force me to make many decisions that kill or save a life under pressure?  Now I have to do that when im deciding to go to the zoo of all places?

3. Why couldn't I just meet them there?  Why was car pooling an "order"?

I guess it was a big sis sorta thing.  Or maybe cuz they knew that if they tried any other way the zoo would probably close and the elephant would have gone to sleep before I even came to a decision.

Either way, I went, and so did the kids (who I presume were the main reason behind us going and it wasn't just an attempt to get me out the house).  And I have pics!

Crocs!

Oody wondering what the hell those small hairy things are

Oody and Big Sis posing with an elephant .. strange sentence.

Closest thing to a camel I've seen at the zoo

Oody is mildly interested at this point

Really dont know what kinda pose Big Sis was pulling here

A Bear .. also doesnt have a clue what Big Sis was posing about

Typical arab test is throw your son in with a bear and see who wins.  Test of manhood. 

"I whooped that bears ass .. "

Anyway, as we agreed.  Short and sweet.

Its a trip to the zoo, what more do you want me to write for Gods sake? ;p

Forgetting Sarah Marshall

Life's interesting.  Seriously, in all aspects.  سبحان الله

I mean, is there anything else in this world besides this entity of "life" that can turn a moment of utter euphoria into your worst hellish nightmare?  And vice versa.

Really, think about it.  You're Bayern Munich in the champions league final, you're leading Manchester United 1-0 and its the dying seconds of the match.  Its literally the end, even the guy placing the ribbons on the trophy, YOUR trophy, places your colours.

And in then in the blink of an eye, two goals rush into your net, and you lose the thing you worked so hard to gain all your life.

On the other hand, take Ted Williams.  A homeless guy in the states, happened to be holding a sign that claims that he has a "golden voice" for radio voice-overs.  As fate would have it (or luck to some of you), a journalist happens to be passing by recording this and is mesmerised by what he heard.  The guy is the next Morgan Freeman.  He's currently working for the Cleveland Cavaliers, who also happened to have bought him a house to live in.

Well, the reason this whole "life" thing got me thinkin was because the other day I realised I wasnt a happy chappy anymore.  I was in heaven 4 months ago, nothing could get me down.  Hell, a nurse in Aberdeen once called me "the singing doctor" cuz I was crazy enough to sing and whistle in between patients.

I would've called myself "wacko jacko", but people are different.

But life couldnt get any better, I was doing everything right, and everything was going my way.  In every aspect.

Today, what a fall from grace.

I missed my old life.  Dearly.  The fare-weather days in Aberdeen with the boys, doing what we liked, when liked only because we "liked" to.  And it wasnt anything spectacular or anything particularly dangerous or naughty.  Im talking about simple things I do here as well.

Lazying around, watching tv, ordering food and watching the football, going to Tesco's at 3 am only because we thought that early morning was the most important time to fill the fridge.  Deciding to travel to Newcastle at 1am, which is a 5 hour drive, because we were bored at 1am just then.  Oh, we were on the way to Edinburgh when we decided "screw you Edinburgh, we're driving right through and out your bum and a further 3 hours, cuz we want to".

Its different here.  Its home, dont get me wrong, there is so much to love about it.  But, its different.  The narrow minded folk tend to outnumber the wonderful openminded, "normal" people, and unless you have the willpower to go against em and persevere, your life will be exhausting.

Take something as simple (or complicated) as a relationship, if its not a certain way / shape or form, and it doesnt suit what most people take as "normal", you're suddenly an alien.  Why? Because some people dont like change? Cuz some people cant handle certain things, they automatically assume others cant?  Because the road these people are choosing isnt as simple as you planned for them to be?

So you're left with two choices, elope or join forces with the dark side.  (hey, they got cookies!).

Coping with the present isnt difficult.  When you're raised and surrounded by the perfect family and friends, with the perfect girl by your side, you'll prosper.

Its letting go of the past that haunts you.  The good ol' days as they call em.  Well they called it right, they werent just good, they were great.  But if you've got one foot in the present and one foot in the past, you'll be crawling your way into the future.

So if you dont sever ties with the past, rest assured, the past can be cruel and sever ties with you, because its not meant to be in your present.

When that happens, you'll feel down, but dont worry, you'll persevere.  You did before.  This isnt any different.

You just wish from the bottom of your heart that it was.


Life.  There aint nothing like it.

Pigeon Market

Yeh, you non-Kuwaitis reading this, you read right.  The title of this blog is "Pigeon Market", and thats where Ive been today, with non-other than the King Ali himself.  Kuwaits "pigeon market" / سوق الحمام even though its got more than pigeons.

One thing to keep in mind though, is that because you find many things on the cheap there, it attracts some dodgy people at times.  So we had to act "tough" to blend in.  Its difficult when its me and King Ali, especially in Capri shorts.

Anyway, this place has every kind of animal you can think of.  Well, not EVERY kind, but seriously, very close.  My dad used to take me when we were kids on an almost weekly basis, mainly because I used to buy fish or small chicks when I was 7, and we all know that chicks and fish have a lifespan of 1 week.  Worldwide.  Its just how it is...

But seriously, the things you see there are just wonderful and sad at the same time.  You see all the cat species you can think of, monkeys, rabbits, birds, parrots, and of course pigeons.

But then you see something like this:

Pink & Green dogs.  Yes, they're real.

Seriously, what the hell? (Stop laughing you heartless people :p)

I mean, ive heard of marketing strategies before, but this is just a bit overboard wouldnt you think?  Seriously dude, pink and green DOGS?

One lady came by and let the guy know what she thought in no uncertain terms.

"Why would you do such a thing, how would you feel if someone coloured you pink?"

"مو حرام عليك؟ تبيني الونك وردي؟؟!"

To be honest, in all my years going there with my dad, that was a first.  We did however see something that was quite "aww" and quite cool at the same time.  We've been holding back on the "ooh's" and the "aah's" as part of the blending in strategy.

But that all went out of the window when King Ali said "Alaaaaaaaaaaah, Chiiiiwaaawaaa! (chiuaua)".  Talk about blowing our cover for F**ks sake..

This chiuaua was one of 6 or 7 dogs in the trunk of a Jeep.  Not any Jeep, it was on with a surround system and tv on top that played Michael Jackson songs and looked like a nightclub for .. dogs.  It was THAT cool, honestly.

Here it is:

And then you had the parrots that I usually wouldnt video record.  But these guys were all red and stuff, they deserved to be taped:

In case you havent realised by now, King Ali is starring in this blog for today.  We all need our five minutes of fame.

All in all, I guess it was a change from the regular routine, but we didnt buy anything this time round.  Scouting the area for now, and here is one last thing we saw that Im pretty sure wasnt there 14 years ago when I went with my dad ...

Multi-Storey Parking!

No, thats not a hill, we dont have many of those in Kuwait.  Its the sand-hill thats there temporarily while they dig around a construction site.

Cars have parked up there.

This stuff doesnt surprise me anymore, but its still funny.

New Pitch in Town

Fresh out of Sheikh Jaber Stadium \ ستاد جابر where Kuwait was playing Bahrain in an "International Frendlies" week. We lost 3 - 1 by the way.

To be honest, I was surprised with the stadium.  In a good way more than bad actually.

It was actually an excellent stadium.  The pitch was great, the seats were good.  The architectural design was amazing.  Even the design of entering and leaving the stadium was such that it meant even the "hawash" / 3agad / حوش / "Chavs" couldnt mess it up, and there was no resulting walking-traffic.

Panorama of the inside of the Stadium

Video of players entering the pitch

Even the toilets didnt disappoint.  Well, not as much as I thought.  It made my day knowing that one guy left a present in one of the cubicles.


Warning, a not-so-pretty picture ahead.

What the F .. ?

Lovely.  So from what was in front of me I gather someone shat himself, threw his pants next to the toilet, and left?

The parking lot though, was something else ..

The pitch can hold up 60,000 people approximately, give or take the odd hundred here and there. Parking-wise fits about 20,000 cars. I would say the maximum number of people that showed up to this match would be 6,000 - 8,000.  So you would expect a lot less chaos than what we saw.

Yet still, people were parking ON the pavement, disabled parking, blocking other cars, right next to the stairs, etc.. even though 12,000 other parking spots were available!!! Shit3alim ib hal nas??

Anyway, so me and my friend were driving down the road away from the stadium, and we reached a roundabout where we saw a jeep with a guy poking out of the that car roof window thing, mitlathim, and dancing.  Hatha wint ma6goog 3 - 1 ..

So like decent people, we took an "upside-down" (U-turn, you non-kuwaities) at the roundabout, only to see 5 cars take a U-turn by going the wrong way at the roundabout to "beat the traffic".

i.e: these guys were coming HEAD ON towards us - driving the wrong way round the roundabout to take the last exit.  Naturally, we went " BEEEP " until they stopped, and we went on our way. After a few songs, a couple of dances in the car later, we reached a traffic light, and the following happened.

Note, I am NOT MAKING THIS UP:

A white jeep was asking us to put our window down. I thought he wanted to ask for directions or something, this was a dad with like 6 kids in the back.

The conversation happened in Arabic, so naturally Ill write it in arabic first, then translate.

Me: هلا يبا؟

Him: خير اخوي؟

Us: ؟؟

Him: طاقلي هرن؟

Us: يايني عكس السير الله اهداك

Him: انزين؟

Us: امخالف و بغيت تدعمنا

Him: عادي

Us: عادي؟؟

Him: اي عادي

Us: lol .. ok. تفظل.

Now in English:

Me: Yes daddy?

Him: Whats wrong?

Us: ??

Him: You "tooted" your horn at me earlier (at the roundabout)

Us: Oh you mean when you came at us head on after your illegal upside down?

Him: Yeh, and?

Us: Um, its illegal. And you almost crashed into us.

Him: Its ok.

Us: Its 'ok'?

Him: Yeh, its ok.

Us: lol .. ok. Carry on then.

So, what do you say to someone like that.  This was a father.  6 Young kids were in the back of the jeep, what message does that send to them?  Its ok to break the rules as long as you stand up to yourself even though you make a complete fool of yourself?

What a strange feeling of anger and laughter at how a beautiful country such as Kuwait can turn immediately into a shit hole because of people like that, and those IN the stadium.

I give the stadium a year. After that, I hope someone would go and take a picture of what remains of the seats there, and tell me what else you find in the toilets.

Hal nas mara7 ikhaloon il deera ib 7alha...

10 Things you can accomplish in 1 month.

Strange title, isnt it?

Well, I did a little bit of research (google), and apparently there quite a few things you can do in a month, but we'll get into these a little later in this post.

Oh, I finally managed to get my paperwork evaluated from the Ministry of Higher Education, or at least in the process of being evaluated.  If you have no idea what im talking about, refer to my older post "Welcome to Kuwait" to understand in more detail what the whole story is about.

In short, I need to get this "to whom it may concern" letter from the Ministry of Higher Education that basically states that this lovely guy (me) has not faked his 7 years in Aberdeen (Scotland) and this Bachelors in Medicine and Surgery is actually REAL.  Please employ him sometime this year.

This is because a lot of people, ya36eehom il 3afya, have forged their certificates, and are sitting there proud owners of a Bachelors / Masters / PhD in whatever you want and reaping those benefits.  This has forced the ministry to clamp down on such people by having to evaluate every single degree 10 times.  In chaotic fashion of course.

Why oh why, cant someone categorize anything?  For goodness sake, if you own an iPhone, you would know that you categorize your apps based on CATEGORY.  For example, if you own 6 music apps and 1 app on how to eat chocolate, you dont put them in one folder.  Its simple, honest.

I graduated from the UK.  So put me in the "United Kingdom Graduates" category.
So I studied medicine, as many before me have.  Put me in the "Medical" category.

Then look for my folder, and boom, there it is.  Take it, evaluate it, give me the letter so I can go start ploughing through the spiderweb that is the Ministry of Health (a process which in itself takes approximately a month to complete and get appointed somewhere).

Does that happen? Yeh, right.

I sent an email to the dean in the Uk so I can get the very same letter which I needed to finish something when I was over there.  That was 6am of a certain day.  I got a reply saying "... come pick it up from the secretaries at 12pm".

Something similar happened when I went to the MoHE (I cant be assed writing "Higher Education" every time, come on guys).  They gave me a letter / receipt sort of thing, which stated the date I applied for evaluation of my paperwork and the date Im meant to come and pick it up.

For those who are arabic-illiterate:

Name: Abdullah Mohammed Abdulrahman Al-Taweel
Date of application: 19/09/2010
Date of receipt of letter: 19/10/2010


Note: Please arrive after 11am to receive your "to whom it may concern" letter.  Piss off if you come before then.


Yes, you are reading it correctly.  1 month.  1 whole month to hang around doing nothing to receive a simple "to whom it may concern" letter which I received in 6 HOURS while I was in the Uk.  If this meant that by the end of this month I'll be working somewhere and making some money, then no worries.   But no, this is simply the starting point of a long and tedious process anyways.  At this rate I'll probably be employed late 2011.  Maybe.

What could they possibly be doing with my paperwork that it takes a whole month to process?  Honestly, it boggles the mind.

Lets say for example, You want an iPhone 4.  Not any kind, you want the most legit iPhone 4 there is.  So hire my services, and you say "3baid, you have these 10 shops to go to.  These are the people I trust that have the most legit iPhone 4.  So lets say you send me to 3laiwi's shop to buy an official iPhone 4.  I go, come back with the iPhone 4 and yet still you check the bottom of the box to make sure it says "official Apple product"?

Thats exactly whats happening here.  You sent me to the United Kingdom.  You gave me a whole host of specialities and cities to apply to.  After 7 whole years there,  I hand you my bachelors degree and yet still you evaluate it?  Fine, evaluate it, but 1 month? FFs ..

So I'll leave you on a lighter note;

10 Things you can accomplish in 1 month:

1. Give a 1 month notice to your employers when you're quitting a job.

2. Get pregnant

3. Deliver the babies that you were pregnant with. (dunno whats up this and the previous analogy)

4. Take a minimum of 30 poops. (thats if you're a 1-a-day person)

5. Unlock Adelheid in King of Fighters XIII (I havent played this game, but apparently you can)

6. Listen to 14,400 songs that are 3 minutes long each.

7. Fast Ramadan again.

8. Write a book.  Maybe 2.

9. Fly to the moon and back to earth 5 times. (Check it out, here and here)

10. Drive around the world .. (Nah you cant, couldnt think of a 10th one.  Maybe you can?)

Welcome to Kuwait

After 7 years of med school and work in the Uk, you could say I sorta "acclimatised" to the way things work over there.  And on the most part, it really wasnt that complicated.


They say wait in the queue and you'll be served, they mean it.  Fair enough, sometimes the queue is as long as f**k, but you will get what you came for in the end.  Things are sign posted, "turn left here" or "jump here" or "speak to that person", and no matter how weird the situation is, at the end of the day, you'll get what you came for, regardless of how long it took.


Which brings me onto my point.  The whole reason I started blogging in the first place.


"Takhalof" \ "تخلف" / "Backwardness" / "Retardation" of this society.  It is increasing by day and night and in the 7 years I was going back and forth on holidays to Kuwait from the Uk it is progressively getting worse.


Dont get me wrong - I Love My Country - its given me loads and I wouldnt be where I would be without it , but my qualms are with the people.  The strange and bewildering thing is that its the common things you'd expect to find in an arab society, that tends to cherish its culture and tradition so proudly, that are missing!


Heres my story of the day:


So I went to the Ministry of Higher Education (which has moved to the freezone, hiya) to start what I was told a long cycle of events that would eventually lead me to getting employed and making some cha-ching.  The actual process is a bit overwhelming, but the first step was "get a to whom it may concern letter" and make your way to the ministry of health.. not too difficult..


Or so I thought.  Maybe I was mislead into this false hope that things may get done a bit quick since in my experience a "to whom it may concern letter" is simply a template on a computer screen.  Its 2010, not 1020.  Or maybe what was more misleading was the fact that while I was packing up from Scotland I wanted such a letter in the last week I was there, and I simply emailed the lady at 5pm and got a swift reply asking me to pick it up at 12pm the next day.


So I went to building 1, and was told to go to building 4 and get a number (like the ones where you press a button, get the number and wait your turn sort of thing) and bring it back to her so she can send my folder across to "get it done" basically.  So far, so good.. Order, i like this..


In building 4, I notice that its kinda .. full.  Quickly, I head to the machine, press the button and wait.  Nothing.  Press it again.. and wait.. nothing.  Ya baba, yala I need the number.  Nothing.
Then a guy comes up to me and says "Okhoy, ana yay min il sa3a 7 am, imbakhshish il security, oo makhithli raqam.  Raqmi 587, wana akhir raqam"


So I went and checked the opening times.  8am.  Its 8:15am now.  No way could 587 people have come and gone in 15 minutes.


Here I stood thinking .. He came at 7am, gave the security a couple of KD, got a number a whole hour before the place even opened, and hes the LAST number?  Number 587?  So, 586 people before him came and did the same?  What time did they come?  9alaw il fayir oo yaw?  How much did the security guy make?  Am I in the wrong profession?;p


So I went back to building 1, told that lady the story, and she said "wala shasawee yakhoy, ta3al youm il a7ad winshala takhith raqam".  Its Wednesday sweetheart, and people apparently dont work Thursday / Friday / Saturday here.  Or afternoons in general.


What do you say to people like that?  
What do you do when people who had just been praying day and night during Ramadan, being honest and sincere, come and do that just get their paperwork done?
What kind of place are we living in when il was6a isnt a privilege anymore but a necessity?
What do you do when the people who refuse to get things done with was6a get shat on, get nothing done, and basically get screwed?


The topic title is actually something thats been repeated to me many times since I told people the story.  I told my friends, family, strangers, and I get the same reply.


"Welcome to Kuwait"