The other evening I was on my usual not-so-exciting stroll in the local Cooperative store here. Just then saw a young Kuwaiti Kid, maybe 9 or 10, jumping up near the frozen foods counter, picking up a roll of what looked like some pre-printed bar-code labels. The next moment I hear the footsteps of one of the employees running towards him and what followed was a cool chase through the dinghy aisles of the supermarket. He accosted the kid and took away the labels.  I thought that this was much-ado-about-nothing.  Intrigued and amused with the ordeal so far, I asked the store-helper, as to why would a kid want to run away with barcodes stickers which are worth nothing and why was he so adamant to take this away from him? I would imagine them running away with Superman/Batman/Spiderman stickers instead.

What he told me was startling- To say the least!!! This was something which is a real eye opener on what is happening to the future generation of Kuwait.  Apparently these kids take these low cost barcode labels, then attach it to some of the more expensive items and cart them away. THIS IS PLAIN SIMPLE ROBBERY IN DAYLIGHT.

This is something very serious. I think the think-tank of Kuwaitis should take notice. The store-worker who took this away from the kid knows darn-well that he will return back again and again until he succeeds. And, he cannot even call the security or the police, or even their parents, as all his explanations will fall on deaf ears and it will cause him more trouble from his store manager or the parents, who would usually be well-connected and will side their children.  By the looks and the dressing the kid did not look like he comes from a poor destitute family. Im sure the kids know that they are above the law. This is really alarming!!!!… Who said you need to go to Nigeria or LA or NY to notice the state-of-the art ideas on robbing/stealing/deceit.  You can find it all here from the young minds, in Kuwait.

Hi Michael,
Your article today on “Deadliest Bombs in Iraq made in Iran” made interesting reading.  However, is this helplessness that you are trying to portray on part of our Military and Pentagon/WHitehouse?  So what, if they are made in Iran or in Timbuktu.  Who cares, as long as we can enforce ourselves as the saviours of the world and display our might, although that may be for a perfectly illegal cause.

A good story would be to find a parallel between Saddam Hussein’s Invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and Bush’s invasion of Iraq in 2003.  Iraqis were made to pay for all the war damages and expenses to Kuwaitis and the Allied forces. Who will pay the damages to the Iraqi’s and the neighbouring countries for the losses?

Some room for thought eh????

Im not sure if you would reply to me on this, but it would be great if you can write about the parallells on this. Anyway, we forget to ask the question, why are we in Iraq????????

Regards
AA

Upon arriving in Kuwait and having taken my apartment, I wanted to apply for a telephone line, but was told that I need to wait for my residence formalities to be complete. And lo and behold, once that was done after a great wait for two months, I like an obedient alien went to apply for my long overdue copper talk connection (Telephone).  I was asked to go back to my apartment and get the Box number written in some code on the MoC Box (Ministry of Communications) in my building.   Once I got that, I was the unfortunate one to live in Salwa area, where all the exchange points and the cable is full and I was told that until a new cable is put in,  I would not be able to get a telephone line. The obvious answer to when this could be possible was, :INshalllah a month or maybe six months”  I know what this means.  I can easily multiply the figures by a factor of two or three. 

Thanks to the great planners at MoC.  Unfortunately I learnt that all the planning engineers in the past were expatriates who would do their due duties on time with more care and concern for this country.  However they were sacked some time back due to the Kuwaitization drive and of course, one can understand the plight of the department and in reality see the results. Hey boy, you cant apply and get a telephone here!! Even Kuwaitis are standing in queue and we don’t have a line for them.   As if I would be paying lower or came from a Lesser God.

Anyway, me being myself, I decided not to give up. Started flipping my wings around and none could help. The wastas were at very high levels and for a trivial thing like a telephone line they could not be wasted!!  Finally as God would want it, help came in the form of a Guardian Angel, who came in and in a days time, get me the necessary signatures with “No Objection” imprinted on my otherwise colourless application form. 

And thanks to him, today I have a telephone connection at my home.  Without which I was a faceless stranger, anyway.   Would this change anything… I guess I have to wait and watch!!! 

This is my first post on my move back to Kuwait after almost a decade. Although I’ve been coming on and off to Kuwait, but being here, settled and starting a full life ahead is different. However, I have begun to regret the decision due to the rampant corruption, the sad governance and the pathetic state of affairs here.  It seems to me that the clock is really moving backwards in this country. Look at the basic infrastructure, it has gone from good to sad to bad. The roads have not been paved for decades. Salmiya is full of drainage water on the roads as well as potholes reminiscent of a bygone era of a third world country.  The immigration policies are archaic. The development on scientific, research, education and human resources is in reverse gear.  The population has taken to drugs in such an alarming rate, that its hard to imagine the future of the generations here. 

On the other hand, the corruption has gone much beyond the Wasta levels in almost every concieveable facet of life. Just the other day, I was talking to a new found friend and I was aghast at knowing the levels of corruption at highest levels, wherein complete consignments of equipment are an eye-wash and nothing gets in or out of the stores, except the delivery notes and the payments to the suppliers.  The same equipment comes out in Hawally stores and Shuwaikh and gets sold at prices much lower than the market.

I still hope that sanity reins in and the administration takes note and comes down strongly on the ones in power and the bureaucracy.  Otherwise only the grilling of ministers will make the headlines and the progress of the nation will continue to slide downwards.