Kuwait Couple and Police
This is a very strange report from the Daily Star. There was a similar report in the Thursday Kuwait Times, which claims there were two couples. Is there a police blotter where newspapers get their information, or do they use inside sources? The stories in each newspaper have different details, and sometimes the details vary significantly.
Culprits Freed, Cop Detained
In a very strange incident, the head investigator at Mubarak Al-Kabeer Police Station has ordered the detention of a first sergeant and released two persons who humiliated the policeman, reports Al-Anba daily.
A police source said the first sergeant arrested a 22 year old man and a 41 year old woman who were inside a car parked in the Abul Hasaniya at 2:00 in the morning, and asked them to hand over their identification documents but they refused to heed the policeman’s request.
The threatened to harm the first sergeant and dismiss him from service, but later handed over their IDs to another policeman who rushed to the area after receiving a call from the first sergeant.
The two persons were released and the policeman was detained but Director of the Security Directorate in Mubarak Al-Kabeer Brigadier Mostafa Khan and his assistant Brigadier Ibrahim Al-Tarrah ordered the immediate release of the first sergeant and referred the case to another investigator.
My comment: I cannot begin to figure out what happened in this story. It could be a hundred different things. The woman could be in the car with her son, escaping from an abusive husband. Or they could be unrelated and naked. There are endless possibilities in between those extremes. We don’t know.
The sergeant could be doing his duty and unjustly punished by superiors using wasta, or he could have exceeded his authority and been let to skate. We don’t know.
Stories like this in the papers mystify me. It all depends on the “police source” and his particular bias.
Emergency Lane Rant
It’s not your arrogance that drives me totally crazy, as much as the fact that your arrogance puts us all at risk.
First, you are driving too fast, and weaving between cars. Yep, it looks like fun, but you’re cutting it a little close, brother. And if you are young and have all your wits about you, you might do OK, but if you are tired, if you are drinking, if you are on drugs, your reactions are impaired and so is your judgement.
We can’t help but bear witness to your carnage along the sides of the road. It’s not like they sit there for weeks. The tow trucks haul them away, and they are replaced overnight with new, bloodier, twisted wreckage. The highways are littered with your crumpled bumpers, and shards of your shattered windshields.
Worse, as traffic piles up, and ambulances arrive to try to save those who survive the impact, no-one moves aside! When time is critical, when seconds can literally mean life or death, the ambulances are stuck trying to get past cars which won’t move out of the way.
As for the rest of us, stacked up along the highways, waiting for the wreckage to be cleared, it doesn’t help to have these drivers zipping by in the EMERGENCY lanes. Hello???? What part of EMERGENCY is so hard for you to understand?
You’re not special. We all have places we need to be. And – you are in the emergency lane. You endanger us all.
Pope Reinstates Islam Department
According to Catholic belief, the Pope, the head of the Catholic church, is infallible. When he downgraded the Council for Interreligious dialogue, and merged it with another office last year, many people thought he had made a big mistake.
So the re-instating of this department can be seen as an admission of the mistake.
I think this is a brave move. For the head of a religion larger than most nations to make a mistake, and then acknowledge the mistake, and even better – to correct a mistake – that takes a lot of moral courage. Bravo, Pope!
Here is the story, from BBC News:
Pope reinstates Islam department
The Pope has been repairing damaged relations with Muslims
Pope Benedict XVI has reversed a controversial decision he took a year ago to downgrade the Vatican department which deals with the Islamic world.
The Council for Interreligious Dialogue will be restored to its former position as a department in its own right.
It is not clear if the department’s former head, British archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, will also be reinstated.
His removal was seen as a sign the Pope was more interested in improving ties with other Christian denominations.
The BBC’s David Willey in Rome says that by reversing his decision, which was interpreted negatively in the Muslim world, the Pope has tacitly admitted that this was a mistake.
Relations between the Vatican and Muslims have deteriorated over the past year, particularly over remarks made by the pontiff during a visit to Germany last September, in which, some thought, he appeared to equate Islam with violence.
The Pope insisted his words had been taken out of context and that he meant no offence to the Muslim religion.
Merger reversal
In a rare about face, Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone told the Italian newspaper, La Stampa, that the Council for Interreligious Dialogue would again become “a dicastery in its own right”.
You can read the rest of the article here.
Cat Meat Rumors Refuted (Ho ho ho ho ho)
Front page of todays Kuwait Times is this article:
KUWAIT: A ministry of Commerce official denied rumors that a local restaurant has been closed for selling cat meat. According to Ali Baghli, assistant undersecretary for commercial supervision affairs at the Ministry of Commerce, no violation has been registered against the Arabic restaurant in the Jahra governate as of yet. . . .
My comment – So here is what we know for sure:
A ministry official says the restaurant has not been closed for selling cat meat.
He says no violations has been registered AS YET.
He does not say the restaurant was not selling cat meat; he is saying the restaurant was not closed for selling cat meat.
What was interesting, is that both the Kuwait Times and Arab Times, when they reported this cat meat restaurant closing, said that because of connections in the government, this restaurant was unlikely to stay closed.
It is not unlike Make This Case Go Away where two youths are caught with a maid they have abducted and raped, they fight the arresting officer and bite him on the hand, they confess to what they have done . . . and no violation is registered, because the police officer is pressured by his superiors to drop the case.
It’s not like your next schwarma is guaranteed not to contain fresh cat meat. It’s only guaranteed not prosecuted.
If I sound angry, I am. Police and law enforcement officials are supposed to protect the public – that’s you and me. When the system is broken so badly that laws are not enforced against the transgressors, and worse, when courageous policement are punished for doing their job, it is a very very sorry state of affairs.
And I am convinced that God has a very special place in hell for those who abuse the trust the public places in them.
I sure wouldn’t eat any schwarma in Jahra.
Doha Additions
The rate of building in Doha is astounding. You have to wonder, sometimes, how the building inspectors can keep up with it all. I am guessing in Doha they lose one or two workers a week to unsafe construction practices, and I wonder at the quality of the construction . . . .
I particularly love this building, facing the Gulf. I call it the Doha twist. I think it has a spectacular look:
They have been working on the foundation for this building for years now, with nothing to show for it. The design of the building totally cracks me up.
From time to time, in both Doha and Kuwait, I have seen honest-to-God wild Parrakeets, Flamingos and Cranes. But when we say that the crane is the Qatar national bird, this is what we mean:
Travel Karma Failure
I have really good travel karma – most of the time. Even when things go wrong, something good comes out of it. And before you read any further, you must know that during this trip, I had a really good time, surrounded by friends, good conversation, a lot of laughter and a very understanding husband – it had a happy ending. But this was a serious travel karma failure.
Oh, I had planned to carefully – fly out early, my friends pick me up, we loll around the pool catching up, grab a bite to eat, and eventually they drop me off at my hotel where I hook up with my husband.
Only this is what I saw on my way to the airport:
And this is what I saw as the plane was delayed – and delayed – and delayed again:
And this is what the airport looked like as more and more planes got delayed:
After – literally – hours, we board. We are rolling away from the airport when a guy a couple seats up from me says . . . something . . . to the stewardess and the guy across from him. As the plane continues rolling, I watch the guy across the aisle get up, go to the galley and make a phone call. The plane keeps rolling rolling rolling, but . . . rolls to a stop and all kinds of vehicals come out to the plane.
They all have a discussion:
But you know this part of the world, everyone has an opinion and wants to be heard. Back and forth up and down the aisle. The entire Qatar soccer team weighed in on this one:
Somehow, it all got resolved. I get to Doha – not early morning, but six at night. I’ve already told my friends to forget picking me up in peak traffic time, but I would see them the next day – we already had plans. But the topping on this perfect day is that my suitcase didn’t come. People were sent looking here and there, and another hour passed.
No suitcase. No explanation, but they assure me the suitcase is still in Kuwait. Get it here, I tell them, I need it. Send it to my hotel. And I rush to duty free to pick up some face cream and mascara and lipstick – you know, the essentials. When I get to the hotel I realize I have nothing, but the gift shop, thank God, has very large T-shirts I can sleep in, a hairbrush, a toothbrush and even underpants.
My greatest fear, as the suitcase continues to NOT show up, is that I will never see it again. It is a great suitcase, and inside it is my computer power cord. Normally a balanced, easy going person, I have bad dreams, angry dreams, frustrated dreams and I wake unrested, and wanting clean clothes.
My husband, not normally known for his patience, was very tenderly patient with me. I think he was more than a little bewildered to see me so bent out of shape. It was probably funny – if you weren’t me.
For three days, for every event, I wear the same clothes. Three days. The bag finally showed up this morning – still at the airport – just in time for my return trip to Kuwait.
Now that, my friends, is a SERIOUS travel karma failure.
The Old American Hospital
I discovered the beautiful building we park in front of when we got to church is the Old American Hospital. I don’t know what it is used for now, but it has been beautifully renovated.
From Kuwait Toplist Places of Interest.
Old American Hospital:
Located on the left side of the gulf street facing the bay, stands the old American Hospital. This was the first hospital run by the Christian Missionaries. An architecture from the early part of the 20th. century.
Emergency Service in Kuwait
I had an emergency. Now YOU may not consider it an emergency, but I have a piece of equipment, and I have a major project and a deadline, and to meet that deadline, I need that piece of equipment. And, of course, that piece of equipment began to fail me.
Not to worry. I had heard of a place in Kuwait that could fix my machine. I had that pit in the stomach feeling, like “why didn’t I do some homework and find this place before my machine needed fixing. . . ” Do you ever say things like that to yourself?
And of course, because I was desperate, when I would go into stores and ask if they knew where this place was, I was told, over and over, there was no such place.
Until one brave young Pakistani guy contradicted his employer and told me where he thought the place might be. Because of one way streets, and a convoluted traffic pattern, it took me several more passes before I spotted the place – which fortunately had one very small sign in English, as I can’t read Arabic very quickly, I still have to sound out all the letters until it sounds like a word I know. Like I am really good at “sharia” being street, but not very good at things I don’t see all the time.
And, by the grace of God, not only do I see the store, but there is – and this is truly a miracle – a decent parking spot fairly close to the shop. Thanks be to God.
I went into the shop, and there is another woman there, with her machine. I tell the man behind the counter that I have a small emergency. He doesn’t understand me, but he understands my tone, and sends a man to help bring in my machine.
It’s like the stand-off at the OK Corral. She looks at my machine, evaluating whether her’s is better, or mine. Seconds tick by, and she smiles, and the crisis is averted. She tells the man she will be back for her machine, which he sets aside to take a look at mine.
My machine is one of those simple machines, you are supposed to be able to do almost everything yourself. He does everything I have already done, and sits back, stumped. We both know what the problem is, and I know he can’t fix it. He calls a friend. He orders tea. We sit and talk as customers come in and out, checking on their machines, asking prices on new machines. We are speaking in Arabic, a language we both speak badly, so conversation often lulls. I’m not sure his friend is coming.
Finally, I pack up my machine, and of course, as soon as I get ready to leave, the friend arrives, and we need to unpack it again. Ten minutes, and my machine is good as new. He tells me what the replacement part would cost in Kuwait (if he hadn’t been able to fix it) and I gasp in horror – I will have to look for a replacement part this summer, back in the US, because I have checked online and yes, they are expensive, but cost about the same in dollars as it would in KD – i.e. $49 vs KD 40. Aaarrgh.
I’ve spent two hours sitting and drinking tea in a shop that is sort of air conditioned, but the door was always open. I am hot, and sweaty, but my machine is fixed, at least enough that I can work on my project.
This is not the way it would happen in the United States. In the United States, I might get some sympathy, but I would not get same day service. I would have to leave my machine, I would have to be served in order, and I would not get my machine back until it were fixed, if it were fixed – people are not so good at fixing old things in the United States, you have to be really lucky. Mostly, when machines break, you buy a new one.
So I am feeling really lucky, really lucky, really blessed, to have had my machine emergency in Kuwait, where things are done differently, and my machine could be fixed on am emergency basis, while I waited.
P.S. The man who fixed my machine earns KD 80 a month – $280 for my US readers.
Kuwait Times?
I heard today – on Global Voices Online: Kuwait that the Minister of Information has rescinded the restrictions on publications.
Either my Kuwait Times was stolen this morning, or it never came. I have tried to reach the Kuwait Times online, but get only blanks. Is there something going on?
Recent Comments
intlxpatr on Shampoo Ginger tigerbutterya0c5ff1d… on Shampoo Ginger intlxpatr on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… John on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… intlxpatr on British Soldier Kidnapped, Esc… Wikipedia Donate Button
Amazina
Early Voting in Florida
Here There and Everywhere 