Viva España 1/2

First of all, I feel obliged to like to thank Mark for the advices he bestowed when I was up to buy my new Digital Camera. Thanks again, with a D-SLR like the Nikon D50, my trip was well documented.

Moreover, my heart goes to May Shidyak and her family. Terrorism will never silent honest voices around the world.

And back to Spain, I had a great time & company this summer. I’d like to thank Paco, Rosana, Florencio, Minoo, Pliar, Fernando, Mamen, Agatha, Christina, Mourad, Massi, Na’ema, Miriam, Pepe, Nadia, Hasan, El-Jefe, Anna & M for all the help they offered. (I hope some of you read blogs ;)

This year I tried as much as I can, to avoid ‘Homeis’ (i.e. Kuwaitis), not that I don’t like them, but to get a real sense of a vacation abroad, I can dwell with them for 11 months and that’s quiet ample. Maybe that’s what I’m doing now.

For this post, let’s start with Cordoba. One of the greatest cities in Europe, if not the world (and I’m not exaggerating). History swirls the air, every corner has a story and every brick include talks for itself. It was (with Baghdad) two of the most populated cities in the world around 10 centuries ago.

The jewel of the City is La Mezquita-Catedral, wich was a mosque (Al-Masjid Al-Jami3), after the Spanish Reconquest a cathedral was inserted in the middle, so now it’s two temples in one. Inside “La Mezquita” (the way people of Cordoba like to call it) you can travel in time just by turning your head from right to left. With La Juderia (Jewish Quarter) as well, you can explore three different religions, in one place.

Of course, I didn’t miss the opportunity to capture the sense of Cordoba with my camera, or try to. (Photos from Cordoba).

In Malaga, we attended the annual fair (Feria De Malaga). A week in august that marks the Reconquest of the city. We had fun as everybody did. People were singing, dancing, playing or drinking almost all the time. (Photos from Malaga).

One day, we decided to go to Cadiz (aka “The Little Silver Cup), so obvious it’s the city of the football team, which is doing well (nowadays) in the Spanish Liga, as far as I know.

Due to the snaky, narrow, windy and high mountain road to Cadiz, the mission was NOT accomplished. My friend who was driving is phobic to heights (I don’t know what do they this condition).

Instead, we made short visits to Tarifa & Algeciras (Europe’s Gates to Africa).
While Tarifa was filled with surfers because the Mediterranean and the Atlantic bump into each other there and the waves & winds are Ideal for surfing. Algeciras was filled with immigrants (from morocco) and with ‘Hasheesh’. As Fernando puts it, in Algeciras instead of saying ‘Hola’ you’ll be greeted with ‘Queres Hasheesh’!
(Photos from the road trip).

To be continued …

Citibank in Kuwait

So Citibank will open in Kuwait, plus 3 other foreign banks.

If anyone knows the other 3 , please mention them, it will be of help. Thank you.

Form the weekly Kuwaiti Cabinet statement:
وقال ان المجلس اطلع على تقرير بنك الكويت المركزي في شان الطلب الذي تقدم به (سيتي بنك) لافتتاح وتشغيل فرع مصرفي له في دولة الكويت ونظرا لما يمثله ذلك من اضافة طيبة تعكس مكانة الوضع الاقتصادي في البلاد فقد قرر المجلس الموافقة على طلب (سيتي بنك) لاقامة فرع له في دولة الكويت

Sources:
Reuters (English)
KUNA (Arabic)

Back to Normality

I hope everyone had and having a good time, and like to thank my dear fellow bloggers who wished me a good vacation.

It’s my first vacation since I started blogging last march, and I felt an empty space while being abroad without checking and reading blogs regularly. Anyway, here I am back to normality.

I’ll try to focus my upcoming blog entries (posts) on my vacation, by moblogging for a period of time. Only a limited number of photos will be posted, while the rest will be available at my flickr photostream.

Vacation

Don't imitate, INNOVATE (2)

So who copied who?

iDip Makeover

I don’t know if anyone noticed that the blog’s background is not 100% black anymore, it has been changed to “dark grey-ish” black, and since that change I had the intention of a mokeover for my blog.

The Makeover is almost done:

1- I added a phrase to the blog’s description, and it reads: “where a kuwaiti bloke thinks loudly”, scroll up to read.


2- I added a flickr badge.

3- I changed my profile’s picture.
It used to be a Photoshop illustration of my eye. Now it’s a new “a la Picasso” avatar.

The old one


The new one

(Link: to create yours).


4- I used to collect or copy links I’m interested in from the internet to the blog, now I created a new blog: “iDip’s Scrapbook”. I moved the bulk of copied material to my scrapbook, to keep things organized & 'cleaner'.

5- I created a third blog called “The MoleBlog” and it’s dedicated to MoleBlogging, MoleBloggers & related stuff.

Your suggestions and recommendations are always appreciated.

Life goes on ...

Yesterday, with King Fahd passing away, sadness draped every Kuwaiti whom will never forget what the Late King of Saudi Arabia advocated to our country & to the security of our up-roared region. And today we observe 15 years of the barbaric invasion that raped our beloved homeland overtly and relentlessly.

Treacheries are hard to be forgiven, but could be forgotten to take our chance and look into the future. A betrayal by a neighbour is hard to digest, even harder to overcome, but with people like Kuwaitis we’re better off.

Despite all the criticism we have about what’s currently going in Kuwait, we can’t generalize and see such criticism as an indication of a worse era. We criticise because we dare in a free country, because we love it & care.

Every one has his/her own kind of this awful memory. I experienced the occupation immaturely, and year after year, I understand more and more, feel firmer to sadness, indifferent to tragedies, and in the same time more caring about others.

I remember being abroad when all the mess started, foreign channels frequently broadcasted news stories of the Iraqi deployment. After we flew back to Kuwait, my family continued talking over and over about Iraqi troops near our borders, and I was wondering “why all this?” “Iraqi troops are next door since God knows when!” and what I meant with “God knows when” was that Iraq is in a war with Iran – being unaware of the end of their nonsensical war.

In the second day, the sorrow doubled in the family, a relative was missed. We found out (after days of searching and calling every creature on earth) that he was in a prison somewhere in Kuwait before taking him with scores of kuwaitis & expatriates to Iraq’s dungeons. In the following two months, our neighbours’ son & two distant relatives faced the same fate. Our relative came back after about 9 months in prison, but unfortunately, the other three are still missing.

After 15 years, I still remember what happened in various spots in Kuwait. Some people take you back to memories you did almost forgot, while others leave you in a doubtful position, where you ask yourself “was this country occupied?”.

Finally, I hope every dweller in our “land of plenty”, will take sincerely advantage of the change that morphed Kuwait, without harming others & him/herself, rather than being frustrated in a selfish way by insignificant affairs.

==========

Memory flashes:

بيتي وبيقول بيته

راجعة أرض الكويت كان تسمع صوتنا

FREE KUWAIT

راجعين يا أغلى بلد