Pyramid Mosque and Gulf Road
My friend and I were driving by this mosque when she sighed.
“We used to think this mosque was huge,” she said. “You could see it from far away. Slowly, slowly, it just disappeared.”
The mosque is now surrounded by tall buildings, and, indeed, if it weren’t for it’s unusual shape, you might barely notice it across from the Holiday Inn, while driving on Gulf road. There are all kinds of buildings along Gulf road, apartments, hospitals, office buildings. They are doing amazing things, twisting glass and concrete spires up into the heavens. The pyramid mosque is dwarfed by these towering buildings.
We also saw these amazing signs along Gulf Road:
If there were one or two, I would not have taken a photo, but there are like EIGHT of these, four on each side of the road, and a lot of flashing lights. I checked the red sign – remember my Arabic is basic – and I could see two “mamnuas” (forbidden) but I didn’t see “foto” or “suraa” so if it says “no photos” will someone please tell me right away so I can take this photo out?
Shiite Mosques?
On the same road as the earlier photo taken in Mubarak Al Kebir, just along the road (I think it is 250) was this mosque. It has writing on it, around the top, but the dome is not green. It has lights at night. Is this a Shiite mosque?
This mosque in Fehaheel doesn’t have writing, so I think it is a Sunni mosque, but it is so PINK and so pretty – and mostly the more delicate mosques are Shiite. Is this one Sunni or Shiia?
Dreaming of The “Not-So-Big House”
I’ve been dreaming lately of the house I want in my future. I’ve visited a couple houses in Kuwait lately, houses I liked a lot, with beautiful spaces, intimate dining rooms, a variety of ceiling heights, cozy seating areas that invited conversation and large, light bedrooms that also had seating areas, grown up retreats with Jacuzzi style bathtubs and places to curl up and read, along with a whole lot of closet space.
I told you a while back about a book we were told about, Sarah Susanka’s The Not So Big House Book. The book is about making every part of your house work the way your lifestyle needs it to – cutting out space wasted on impressing other people and maximizing areas of the house where people actually hang out.
As she introduces the book, she talks about how you throw a party and everybody ends up hanging out in the kitchen, that the living rooms we create are not welcoming, and she has good ideas how to make all the spaces in your house more welcoming.
She emphasizes also the use of high quality materials and workmanship.
I know that a little bit of heaven for me is getting up every day and looking out on the Gulf. I know that when I am working, I work facing the same view. It gives me such joy. I might get some of the same satisfaction overlooking a forest with wild animals (I know AdventureMan would love to have that not-so-big house be in Africa! Imagine! You’re sorting through your books and an elephant sticks his trunk in!) or the Puget Sound with the Olympics in the background. I know I am addicted to big windows and watching the weather change.
I need privacy. I don’t want other people looking in my windows.
My best friend has a round dining room table, and my sister, and my Chinese friend tells me those are the best for family “energy.” I want a big round family dining table, in wood, like my sister and like my friend.
I love glass brick, and would love to have it in bathrooms and entries and have walls of it letting light stream into and through my home.
I love glass tile, especially the watery shades of aqua blue and aqua green.
(photo courtesy Bedrock Industries)
I love light wood floors, honey oak, birch, even knotty pine planks I had in an old German house where I once lived. I love the feeling of wood underfoot; it is gentle and forgiving, and so classically good looking.
(Photo courtesy Pennington Hardwoods)
I love second floor loft libraries, overlooking the lower living areas of a house.
Dream along with me.
Think about YOUR house. Now, close your eyes and think about what goes into making a house your very own special hideaway. What makes it special for you? What would you do with your living space if time and energy and money were of no importance?
Big Plans, No Action
Hmmm, let’s see . . . plans drawn up, billions allocated for renovation and restoration and blah blah blah and nothing happens. Good ol’ Kuwait? Nope! The tragic quagmire of post-Katrina New Orleans. You can read the entire article at The New York Times.
By ADAM NOSSITER
Published: April 1, 2008
NEW ORLEANS — In March 2007, city officials finally unveiled their plan to redevelop New Orleans and begin to move out of the post-Hurricane Katrina morass. It was billed as the plan to end all plans, with Paris-like streetscape renderings and promises of parks, playgrounds and “cranes on the skyline” within months.
But a year after a celebratory City Hall kickoff, there have been no cranes and no Parisian boulevards. A modest paved walking path behind a derelict old market building is held up as a marquee accomplishment of the yet-to-be-realized plan.
There has been nothing to signal a transformation in the sea of blight and abandonment that still defines much of the city. Weary and bewildered residents, forced to bring back the hard-hit city on their own, have searched the plan’s 17 “target recovery zones” for any sign that the city’s promises should not be consigned to the municipal filing cabinet, along with their predecessors. On their one-year anniversary, the designated “zones” have hardly budged.
“To my knowledge, I don’t think they’ve done anything to any of them,” said Cynthia Nolan, standing near a still-padlocked, derelict library in the once-flooded Broadmoor section, which is in the plan.
“I haven’t seen anything they’ve done to even initiate anything,” said Ms. Nolan, a manager in a state motor vehicles office who has painstakingly raised her house here nearly four feet. “It’s too long. A year later, and they still haven’t initiated anything they decided to do?”
The library still bears the cross-hatch markings made by emergency teams in the days immediately after Hurricane Katrina, to indicate whether any bodies were inside (there were none).
The city official in charge of the recovery effort, Edward J. Blakely, said the public’s frustration was understandable, but he suggested that bureaucratic hurdles had made moving faster impossible. Mr. Blakely said crucial federal money had only recently become available, the process of designing reconstruction projects within the 17 zones was time-consuming, and ethics constraints on free spending were acute, given a local history of corruption.
More Minarets
Twice in the last year, I have seen new mosques, or mosques undergoing renovation, like this one, stop, the first new minarets torn down and newer, longer, thinner minarets go up. Literally about twice the size of what went up originally. This is the end result of the Fehaheel mosque along Gulf Road – actually, I find these minarets very elegant.
In Qatar, we used to go looking for the older, state-built mosques. Most of them, the little area mosques (there is supposed to be a mosque within a five minute walk for every person) are still working mosques in Qatar. In old Kuwait city, they recently renovated some minarets that I see in very old photos of Kuwait.
Minarets
You’d think I would pick up on things sooner, but here’s the problem. When you don’t know something, you often don’t even know you don’t know. In a recent post on an Al Ahmadi minaret one of my commenters asked if I couldn’t tell it was a Shiite minaret. At first, I thought he was being funny, but it nagged at me, so I started asking around.
It turns out almost everone except me can tell the difference. Most say, as I would, “oh you just kind of know, it looks more Iranian” but occasionally someone will say something concrete, like “if it has a green roof on the minaret, it is Shiite” or “if the windows look like keyholes, it is Shiite.”
Who would know? Not me! But I am learning.
So, help me out here. This mosque near City Center on 5th ring. Definitely Shiite?
This mosque is in Qurain – I love the very purpleness of it. Is this a Sunni mosque? I ask because the windows look kind of like keyholes.
Now – services. I’m an Episcopalian, a sub-sect of Christianity, and I can walk into almost any Anglican/ Lutheran/ Catholic church in the world and even if it is in another language, I have a pretty good idea what is going on, because we are liturgical, we follow a pattern of worship, and the three services are very similar, with very subtle difference. In fact so subtle I probably couldn’t even tell you what the differences are. Islamic services are also considered liturgical – having a set pattern of worship.
So if you were Sunni or Shiia, and walked into a service, could you tell a Sunni service from a Shiia service? Are there differences?
I am sorry to be so ignorant; help me be less so!
Anything but Pedestrian
Yesterday on 5th ring, we saw the beginnings of the new pedestrian overpasses, which are anything but pedestrian in their design.
Look at that! Not only do they honor the architectural element of the wind tower tradition in Kuwait, but they will also allow pedestrians to cross safely to the other side. For all the derision we heap on highway planners here, they deserve a big pat on the back for these.
From Wikipedia on Windcatchers: A Wind Tower (Persian: badgir, Arabic: “barjeel” or badghir(from Persian)) is a structure seen on ancient buildings of the Middle East, particularly Iran and Bahrain. This acted like a natural air conditioner creating a soothing effect in the harsh conditions of the desert.
Saudi Women Only Hotel
From today’s BBC News:
Saudis open hotel for women only
The Middle East’s first women-only hotel has opened in Saudi Arabia.
It will cater primarily to businesswomen, who work completely covered from head to toe in public and have to observe strict segregation.
The hotel, in Riyadh, has 25 rooms and boasts fine dining and conference facilities, as well as a range of health and beauty treatments.
Its executive director said the response to the idea of a hotel just for women had been overwhelming.
The Luthan Hotel & Spa is owned by a group of 20 Saudi princesses and businesswomen.
It hopes to attract expatriates from the nearby diplomatic quarter as well as local women.
It is the first spa hotel in the kingdom available to women all the time – pools in other hotels are only open to women on certain fixed days or hours.
You can read more about the hotel HERE
Church Blocking the Way
I can’t help being a little cynical and a little sad. I have often wondered how long a very visible church could last in a very visible location. It always made me proud that Kuwait was so tolerant to allow Christian worship to take place side by side with Islam in Kuwait. So now the church is impeding progress, and has to go?
From the Arab Times:
Church, cafe blocking way
KUWAIT CITY, March 17: ‘Minister of Public Works and State Minister for Municipal Affairs Mussa Al-Sarraf is determined to remove all obstacles facing the First Ring Road expansion project,’ Al-Rai daily quoted Assistant Undersecretary for Road Engineering Affairs at the Ministry of Public Works Hussein Al-Mansour as saying. The Minister instructed officials to find solutions to the problems, especially for buildings which block the road’s expansion like the church near Jahra roundabout and a cafe, he added.
According to Al-Mansour, the ministry will not be able to complete the project due to these obstacles and ‘it is likely to cost the ministry a lot of money as the contractor will ask for compensation for the delay.’ He said the ministry is waiting for a temporary location for the church and is trying to find alternate arrangements for the cafŽ to hasten the execution of the project ‘which will help in easing the traffic problems in the country.’
More Mubarakiya Sights
It seems to be heating up quickly. The months when perusing the souks in daylight hours are coming to an end. We are trying to make the most of it while we can. A few more quick snaps from the Mubarakiyya Market on a quiet Friday:
Vegetable market public art I hadn’t spotted before:
Traditional clothing-seller:
Bath supplies:
Foodstuffs:
Those of you who live here walk right by these stalls all the time, and never notice that they are disappearing. I have been perusing old books about Kuwait, even some not so old, and Kuwait is changing so rapidly that even books only 10 years old or so have become outdated by the rapid passage of time.
For those of you not in Kuwait, there are malls. There are SO many modern malls. As in other countries, some are more upscale than others, but they are malls. In most, you are not supposed to take photos. In most, you will see the same stores you will see in any other country. Mubarakiyya is special because it is still an active market in the old style.
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