Friday, November 19, 2010

Return to Kuwait

Photo: Whatever this iis, it's in downtown Kuwait City. I call this the "corkscrew" building! Not sure who owns it but it sure looks strange!!

Apologies for not posting sooner but I have been so swamped with work, that I could not take time out to tend to my blog. I arrived into Kuwait three weeks ago on October 29 and have been blessed with such amazing weather - no sand storms and no excessive heat. Just sunny and cool/warm weather all the time ... so far!

The first two work weeks (October 31 to November 4 and November 7 to 11) were devoted to meetings and to an SPE (Society of Petroleum Engineers)Oil Conference where yours truly presented a technical paper in front of about 140 people. Thankfully the audience was most receptive and asked many questions. The venue was the Hilton resort in Mangaf, Kuwait. A nice, seaside resort complex.

This past week was devoted to the Islamic Eid Holiday!! The Eid Holiday is actually only about three days in length but the company decided to give everyone off the entire week! I, however, was in the office most of the week. However, I did mange to take off early each day and head into town a few times to enjoy lunch at some local restaurants and take in the scenery.

Just a personal note: like on all my prior visits to Kuwait, I find the local people most friendly and the overall atmosphere quite accepting of Westerners such as myself. Despite the fact that America has a bad reputation amongst Muslims worldwide, the Kuwaitis can differentiate between America and Americans - such as myself. Although they may not like my country's political policies, Kuwaitis have generally been welcoming and hospitable to me during all my travels here in this country.

And now some pictures taken during the past three weeks:

A new unusual building in downtown Kuwait City - about an hour's drive north from where I am housed in Mina Al Zour.

Lots of new buildings springing up on the way into town. These are on Highway 40 ....

Another interesting building ....

Part of the skyline in downtown Kuwait City.

Always need to slow down when passing camels along the road to work in Wafra!!!

I could not resist taking this picture. I had lunch at the TGI Friday's restaurant in Fintas and this place was next door. Nowadays, with everyone being so health conscious, you'd think a name such as this would be avoided!! I Binged the name "Fat Burger" and sure enough there is actually a chain of burger joints in the USA under this name!! Yuk! THE last thing I need in my body is more fat! Couldn't they have thought of another name??!!

Eid Mubarak - Arabic for Happy Eid Holiday!!

5 comments:

Sarah Alia Shahrim said...

Nice pics! I never been to Kuwait and the country has many nice amazing buildings :)

It is shocking in my country if there's a week holiday for Eid Adha except for school holidays (schools always have long holidays for cultural celebrations)

And a big laugh for the Fatburger, im glad there's no such name like that in Malaysia hehe.

chemist said...

Sarah:

Thanks again for stoppping by! I just wish I can get back to Asia! I had been scheduled to go to Sumatra but this visit to Kuwait took so much of my time that I had to cancel my Indonesia visit and come here instead. Never been to Malaysia ... but maybe sometime. Kuala Lumpur is one of the places I'd like to visit.

Traveling Chemist

Ron said...

I can't believe I some how missed the FAT BURGER when I was in Kuwait earlier this year! I am jealous now :)

Safe travels my friend.

Ron said...

Hi Chemist,
Yes, I was in Kuwait around March of this year. I'm pretty sure it was March because I went shortly after covering the earthquake in Haiti.

To answer your question: I had a great time shooting in Kuwait. Not a lot to see outside of the city though. It's a dry and desolate place once you leave the confines of the city. Didn't publish anything on my blog back then because I was shooting for a confidential client. But, I did manage to venture on my own one day and captured a few personal shots. And no, I had no problems shooting pics. I actually took a cab into the city one afternoon and just walked along the sooks snapping to my hearts content. No one ever gave me problems--nor did I ever feel like I was in danger.

Here's a link to my Kuwait album on my facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=406032&id=894760536&l=4f00f55116

Ferdinand said...

Nice pictures but kinda strange a fatburger in kuwait.

Sent from my Playbook