With so many gadgets around and so many social networking platforms, there is a chance for interaction between the opposite sexes like not time before and this raises many issues.
One of them is: If you are a woman in a serious relationship with a man, is it ok to have photos of other men in your mobile phone? Other men can include acquaintances, male cousins and relatives, celebrities, public figures.
Dear Jewaira
I need EC pill .. (morning after pill). I know it’s not technically available in Kuwait.. but i was told it’s available under the radar. The thing is I don’t know where to start looking. .. If you could post something about it ? Maybe you heard something about it ? I don’t know, I just hope and pray you could help..
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Dear Readers,
Any suggestions can be sent to my email on the contact page in the white box.
Thank you
Jewaira
In an interview on KTV 1, Dr. Massouma Mubarak discussed the issue of violence against women with an emphasis on regional and local problems.
She identified all forms of violence against women that could entail psychological, verbal, as well as physical abuse.
According to Dr. Massouma, the number of reported cases is higher in the past years not because there has been a rise in violence or abuse but because some women no longer regard it as shameful to go to the police station and complain. Tolerance of all forms of abuse has decreased and more women are aware of their rights. She mentioned that there are no official statistics in hand but according to a lawyer she knows, there are about 368 court cases a year concerning abusive partners.
On a worldwide basis, regional or local figures may seem low but this does not paint an accurate picture of how matters are. The figures may be much higher but there is still a taboo against reporting abuse. Not only does a woman fear repercussions but also there is a lack of public women shelters where women who suffer abuse can seek protection.
One of the worst forms of violence against women are the honour killings prevalent in some countries in the region where a female can be killed upon mere suspicion of involvement in scandal.
For me, it is the most taboo subject. I abhor the idea of child marriages and it is one of the worst types of abuse.
But last night, in my dreams I was a man. Perhaps in my twenties.
I dreamt I was a man, betrothed to a very young girl, promising not to consummate our marriage till she became of age. But being a man, I could not restrain thoughts of physical encounters. I felt it would be alright to kiss her.
The sexual overtones of the dream were clear. The marriage was not consummated within the dream but there was an intention to gradually work towards that when the girl was ready.
I awoke confused and unfocused. To dream of being in a role I detest is odd. And to feel so male added to my confusion.
RFID is radio-frequency identification.
Many countries including Kuwait, are supplied RFID tags from French company Bluelinea to monitor newborns. Tags can also be used to monitor the elderly and the senile.
It seems like a wonderful technology and I’m sure we’ve all had moments when we have wished we could magically locate something (like a lost item) or someone by some remote control. Parents who have briefly lost their kids in the mall or outdoors know this feeling.
But is it just the beginning of the end of personal privacy? Will the RFID tags get out of hand?
Will the day come when instead of our Civil ID card we will have a chip implanted in our body?
It’s scary to think how we are slowly being programmed to accept losing privacy.
According to various Internet sources and news items, it seems that taking photos around Kuwait with your camera is strictly not allowed unless you obtain permission from three different ministries.
In the pre-FLICKR age, pre-hi-tech age, going around with a camera in Kuwait was not really smiled upon. It made people nervous and it made officials nervous. Photographs have to represent the best aspect of our country and there was some control over what public image was allowed to represent it.
In brief, photographers and hobbyists were not so common in the past and you couldn’t just go around with a huge camera and take photos of whatever pleased you.
In recent years, with the onset of digital photography, interest has become widespread and simply searching online under tags such as Kuwait pictures will turn up a great array of professional level photographic captures by some really talented Kuwaitis.Kuwaiti photographers have bloomed and should be appropriately recognized.
But it seems things are set to change.
Now a muted discussion, a low warble, is going on by disgruntled photographers who feel that they are being clamped by the ministries and their new guidelines. People are wary of having their cameras taken away or being arrested for doing something illegal.
Although this issue was discussed earlier in November on an Al-Watan TV program, I have not really seen the text of these new regulations and I am having a problem finding the actual source of this news other than an article in the Kuwait Times.
However, it could be that with the increase in hobbyists/professionals and the ease with which they can procure expensive camera equipment (including large lenses), there is a need to control who is photographing what and why.
It seems to me that regulators from the ministries should convene with representatives of local photographers to discuss all aspects and implications of regulations instead of an outright ban.
“The 3rd I” is the name of a project commissioned by Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art which will open December 30 in Qatar.
The 3rd I project is unique. Iraqi-American visual artist Wafaa Bilal has had a camera surgically placed in the back of his head. Bilal will wear the camera for a year and it will transmit images to a monitor at the Mathaf museum every minute for the duration of the project. It’s unclear whether images will be streamed live to monitors. In addition, there are privacy issues to be dealt with. On December 15th, details of the project will be revealed.
How controversial will this be in the land of Uncle Sam and what are the implications for privacy? It feels like we are living the future.
I think if this project is commissioned by Qatar, then perhaps it should take place in Qatar and then we can get an eyeful of what happens behind this chap’s back every minute.
Dear Readers,
It’s not a new problem. It’s a recurrent one. But it affects people in different ways.
Please advise.
Jewaira
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Hi Jewaira,
I came across your blog site when I was searching for Kuwaitis marrying non-Kuwaitis. I then stumbled on the blog post with the 200+ replies. It was very enlightening to read all the feedback.
I am located in the US, originally born in China… so I am Chinese, but fairly Americanized.
I am madly in love with a guy from Kuwait, who’s 8 years younger than me. I am in my early 30s; he’s 25. He is a student here.
We fell in love madly and I can’t imagine the day when we will be separate. However he made it clear from the beginning that he already has someone he will marry in Kuwait. He said he has known her since they were children. He dislikes my questions about his religion. He says that he likes me a lot but there’s no future between us for all the obvious reasons. His family ties are so strong, and he has close ties with his brothers and sisters. They are all best friends including the girl that he is going to marry. He says he will never live in the US and he will return immediately to Kuwait once he finishes his studies, and that he is also obligated to work for the Kuwaiti government for 5+ years.
I know this sounds so stupid on my part, but I can’t help myself, even with all the clear information that this will end in pain and suffering guaranteed for me.
I know most people who read this will think he’s just trying to have fun (which he is I am sure) while he can and then he will go back and marry to what he knows and is comfortable with.
I just can’t get over it, I know every day I am with him, I am giving up a piece of myself… He said he’s taught from when he was born to use his head and not his heart. He says he can control his feelings perfectly, 5% heart, 95% logic/brain.
I am slowly going insane… I know this will not end well, and I need to terminate what we have, but i can’t bring myself to do it. We are so happy when we are together and even though I have been with many guys in the past, I have never fallen in love like this. 
Please help with any advice you may have.
Y.Y.
KUWAIT CITY, Nov 19: Securitymen apprehended an Egyptian artist while he was drawing a portrait of a naked woman at a famous beach in Salmiya. He was referred to the concerned authority for necessary action.
I have many questions:
1. Isn’t a portrait a representation of the face? How can it be a portrait of a naked woman?
2. Is drawing in public a crime punishable by law?
3. Who reported this man?
4. Was the subject of his drawing lying unclothed on the beach while he drew her?
5. What concerned authority was he referred to and for what necessary action was taken?
5. And finally what was the name of the famous beach?
Some people embark on armchair spiritual pilgrimages. Others go on more arduous quests to relieve the soul’s disquiet.
Journey to Mecca is a beautiful IMAX film depicting Ibn Battuta’s perilous Hajj journey in 1325 from Tangier to Mecca.
This year, South African Natheem Cairncross, 28 and Imtiyaz Haron, 25, traveled by bicycle on a 9 month journey to Makkah.(Blog Cape 2 Mecca Cycle) Now that is a journey of a lifetime. Good for them.
And some people go on scientific missions but end up awed by the wonder of it all from a higher vantage point: The Nile River (link http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1329943/Female-astronaut-looks-Earth-window-space-station.html )
Astronaut T.C. Dyson in contemplation (Link http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1329943/Female-astronaut-looks-Earth-window-space-station.html )
The Kuwaiti saying goes:
Fog sheinah, gwayat 3aynah
فوق شينه قوايت عينه
Literally, not only is he ugly but brazen and shameless too .
Police have arrested four cross-dressers for stealing jewelry from a store in Salmiya, reports Al-Watan Arabic daily.
According to sources the suspects entered the store and asked to see jewelry and one of them stole a diamond ring while the shop owner was busy presenting the jewelry items to others.
The vigilant shopkeeper called the Operations Department of the Ministry of Interior when he felt the diamond ring was missing. Cops rushed to the store and took the suspects to Rumaithiya Police Station.
As the suspects and the shop owner were driven to the police station, everyone was under the impression that the suspects were women but while checking their identities police discovered they were cross-dressers. They have been referred to the Morals Investigation Department.
Gonna squeeze you dry, honey - A cartoon by AbdulRahman Al-Zahrani - AlWatan online newspaper Saudi Arabia
With the Eid season upon us, some men seem to be feeling the “crunch” – no pun intended.
Close Up On Kuwait (1962) directed by Rodney Giesler
On YouTube
Interesting mini-documentary on Kuwait when times were different:
Mistress:
Be generous
===
I want your pudendum
to be like an Arabian
sheep:
shaggy,
hairy,
and with the deep promise of lean, local
goodness.
===
I want your rump
to be like an Arabian
sheep:
fat-tailed,
smackable,
and fertile as the
Nejd valley.
Residents from the French village of Cap d’Agde are outraged at the label of “European capital of debauchery”.
For the past 40 years, Cap d’Agde has been home to a fenced off naturist resort where nudists go about their daily life in communion with nature.
However, it seems that for some visitors to the colony, nudism is equated to sex and open air exhibitionist sexual activities. This upsets traditional naturists. The village population swells from 300 to 40,000 in the high season and the increased public sex is distressing to the locals.
According to the article in the Guardian: “Cap d’Agde naturists interviewed by journalists spoke of witnessing orgies, voyeurism, fellatio, genitals being ‘waved in people’s faces’ and people being tied to signposts and whipped.”
It sounds like Pinocchio’s Pleasure Island
Every morning
I put the kettle on and make some tea
with loose leaves
and leave it to simmer on the stove.
I have a special milk pot in which I heat up my milk. It is usually skimmed although I prefer the way full fat milk merges with the black Sri Lankan tea.
Milk laced with ground cardamom makes the experience even better.
I like to drink only the tea I make myself. I dislike tea left in a thermos.
I prefer to drink it piping hot off the stove.
I don’t normally strain the tea leaves.
I’ll tell you why.
I love to taste one or two leaves as they inevitably pass between my lips. I nibble on them, and squeeze the extra flavour with my teeth.
Almost always, I look on with fascination at the tea leaves left on the side of my mug, forming a figure to ponder.
Sometimes those figures inspire me. Sometimes images formulate, and leave me pensive, as I make my way back to the kitchen, to replenish my cup.
I nearly always go for a second cup. That’s the one that goes “bing” in my head. It sedates me.
There were times when I have had to give up my tea with milk. I didn’t really listen when the dietitian advised me against tea with milk. How could I enjoy plain black tea in the morning? And then during times of fasting, the morning cuppa would be abolished. Various alternatives were enforced, but none tasted like the morning chai and haleeb.
Tea with milk can be consumed alone or along with baqsam or darabeel which are dunked into the liquid until softened. The best baqsam is crunchy, light, and holds together long enough after dunking to be pushed into an expectant mouth. The best darabeel is coated with an extra dusting of cinnamon.
The best thing about drinking tea with milk is the way the hot liquid streams down the throat. It satisfies.
Sometimes I am lazy and don’t feel like making tea, or going to the trouble of making it and waiting for it to get to the right consumption point.
So I make coffee instead. Instant coffee.
Many moons ago, my German friend was horrified that I drank instant coffee and for a present, she gifted me with a coffee percolator. I used that for a few years.
But then I always come back to Chai haleeb. It is synonymous with comfort, and grandmothers.
An interesting production to look out for :
In the Next Room a play by Sarah Ruhl
Unidentified Woman #1: Have you ever had this sensation either?
Unidentified Woman #2: Where you feel a shiver all over your body, and you feel like wetting? And your feet get very hot as if you’re dancing on devil’s coal.
Unidentified Woman #1: or you see unaccountable patterns of light, electricity under your eyelids, and your heart races, and your legs feel very weak, as though you cannot walk.
Unidentified Woman #2: And your face gets suddenly hot, it’s a strange sort of sunburn.
Unidentified Woman #1: Or is there red splotches on your entire body?
Unidentified Woman #2: A strange rash here.
Unidentified Woman#1: And a feeling of burning as you will get no relief, and your mouth is dry. You lick your lips and you find your face is making an ugly expression, so you cover your face with your hands.
Unidentified Woman #2: And sometimes the great outpouring of liquid and the sheets are wet. But it’s not an unpleasant sensation but a little frightening. Is that real?
(Soundbite of audience laughter)
Unidentified Woman #2: Has that ever happened to you?
Unidentified Woman #3: I do not know. The sensations are so contradictory.
Unidentified Woman #2: Does anything unite them?
Unidentified Woman #1: Well, many of them are down below.
Unidentified Woman #3: Oh, I see. Well, the things you describe, some of them seem to be sensations that an invalid would have or someone with a horrible fever but others sound like sensations that women might have when they’re having relations with their husbands.
(Soundbite of audience laughter)
Unidentified Woman #1: I’m sorry. Perhaps you’re joking. Perhaps I should have said..
Unidentified Woman #2: With their husbands?
Unidentified Woman #3: How interesting.
Unidentified Woman #1: Those sensations you were describing, they’re not from having relations with your husband?
Unidentified Woman#2: Good heavens, no.
(Soundbite of laughter)
(Transcript from NPR’s Female Sexuality Takes Centre Stage with “The Vibrator Play”)
On one of the forums here in Kuwait someone asks:
“Where is Titanic Building in Salmiya? Are you referring to Al-Mohallab Complex near Hawally? Can you please guide me the way to Titanic Building?”
Recently, members of the Indian community in Kuwait organized a Diwali celebration (festival of lights) in the Titanic Building complex in Salmiya. Because fireworks works went on beyond the permitted 9 pm limit, and also due to roadblocks created by the congestion, local police intervened. Eighteen people were arrested. Some people complained about the arrests. Others criticized the use of fireworks in densely populated urban areas.
Perhaps organizers in the Titanic Building should consider renting out a stadium or a more suitable venue next time and think of garnering the support of the many local Indian entrepreneurs for such projects instead of risking the lives of people and also going through the same problems year in year out.
Sounds like a war going on:
Numerous reasons, mentionable, and some not so suitable to disclose. The taste of Tabasco on the tip of my tongue. I salivate. Like when I think of the way you slipped in last night through the dark curtains and upfront, arrived at my bed side, pinching nipples into existence. You are artist. You are god. You are composer.
My nipples resemble tiny crimson hibiscus buds, and my body, living, breathing, electrical, is the trunk. Envelop me like soft, moist earth. Sustain me. Feed me. Enter me. And I retain.
I spill over. Into you. Over you. Through you.
My head spins tales. My eyes roll skywards, my sight boring holes into the ceiling above us, and you take me to a place where my screams are feral, and guttural whispers are exchanged in fleeting moments. And only we will hear the sound waves.
I possess life. A spring flows through me untapped by your undaunted fingers. Play me. Make music. And I will sing us to sleep.
I paint us in large canvasses. We imprint our depths onto wall murals, seeking to retain something of your scent. And my spring.
But the night is dark. And morning light erases what has passed here.
Wash the white sheets, and hang them out. Kissed by early sunshine. Imbued with the scent of plumeria blossoms.
Now play me on the green grass. All over again.
e Elimination of Violence against Women