Kuwait

7th annual Kuwait National Baseball Tournament

March 11, 2015Posted By: MitchExpat Life, Kuwait, Sportsthemightaswellers View all 3 comments

Last weekend, I was luckily enough to be selected to umpire in the 7th annual Kuwait National Baseball Tournament hosted by the Kuwait Little League. I umpired 7 games during the tournament, and had an absolute blast! Teams from all over the Middle East participated, including the countries of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and United Arab Emirates. It was a busy few days, but it was a ton of fun and a well organized event, with some outstanding teams participating!

One of my favorite parts of the weekend was the atmosphere! The fans had so much energy, for the entire weekend! They were chanting, clapping, singing, and even playing bongo drums. The atmosphere felt more like a World Cup Soccer game than a youth baseball game, but it was so much fun. They were cheering so loud, that I could hardly hear myself calling balls & strikes behind the plate sometimes. At one point, between innings, I asked the catcher, “Isn’t this awesome?!” By the look in his eyes I could tell he was so jacked up, and he answered with an enthusiastic, “I LOVE THIS!” The atmosphere was like nothing that I have ever seen at a baseball game before, it was so awesome!

Everyone who participated in the tournament was super friendly. It was fun to meet people from all over the world and share our experiences from living abroad together. A majority of the participants were expats from the U.S.A. or Canada, who are currently working in the Middle East in the oil industry, as teachers, etc.

This tournament concluded the Little League season here, which started last September. I thought my season was going to be over too, however I was invited to umpire in a regional baseball tournament in Dubai next month! One of the tournament organizers was in town for the Kuwait Tournament, approached me after one of my games, and extended an invitation to me. I’m super excited about the opportunity to participate! (and I get an all expenses paid trip!) Apparently teams from all over the world (including the U.S.A and Australia) will be playing in the Dubai tournament.

I’m a little bummed out that the Little League season is over. I can’t express enough how much I enjoyed my time this winter with everyone. I made some great friends and memories, that I will always cherish. Regular season games are played weekly on Fridays here, so it became a part of my weekly routine to see everyone at the ballpark. I was able to umpire a lot of great youth baseball games, some adult softball games, a few girls softball games, and even a couple of championship games this season! I’m already looking forward to next season!

My 1st Round of Golf at Sahara Golf Resort

March 7, 2015Posted By: MitchFriends, Kuwait, Sportsthemightaswellers Leave a comment

Last summer before we moved to Kuwait, we had the daunting task of deciding what we were going to bring with us. One of the most important things to me, was my golf clubs! I knew we were going to have a ton of free time here, so I thought it would be a great time to perfect my golf game. I figured I could golf here all winter, then when I returned to Minnesota in the summer, my golf game would be so awesome that I could beat all of my buddies!

Last September I checked out the best course in Kuwait, called Sahara Golf Resort. It was absolutely beautiful, and without a doubt, the nicest and fanciest golf course I’ve ever seen! The membership prices were ridiculous, but the course is open to the public, so I decided to just pay the green fee when I was able to get a round in. At that time, it was sooooo hot outside, that I decided to wait until winter for it to cool down a bit.

A couple of weeks ago we had a day off during the week, so a friend and I decided to go try out the course for the first time. If you golf during the week, it is 35 KD ($120 USD) but if you go on the weekends it is 50 KD ($170 USD). The fee was for 18 holes, a golf cart, and unlimited use of their practice facilities. We made the most of our day and went early, so we could hit enough balls, to shake off the rust that has accumulated over the last few months.

The 18th green, with the Clubhouse in the background.

The course was absolutely incredible! The facilities seemed brand new, the service was great, and when you were on the course, it hardly seemed like you were even in Kuwait! The only downside to the course that day, was how brown the grass was. Apparently whatever kind of grass they use, goes dormant during the winter months. The Golf Pro there said that by the end of March, the grass will be back to the lush green grass I saw when I was there in September.

The cool thing about this course, is that the entire thing is covered in lights! Since it can get so hot here during the summer months, nobody wants to be outside golfing. Therefore they installed stadium lights on every single hole, so you can go golfing at 10pm if you wanted to! Also, about 8 holes of the golf course are located within the infield of the local horse racing track. During our round of golf, I heard a thump, thump, thump, thump, and looked up to see a couple of horses taking some practice laps. The horses were huge!

If you look closely in the middle of the picture, in the background, you can see one of the race horses practicing.

We enjoyed a great day out and a fun round of golf. I did notice that my golf game is substantially better in Kuwait rather than Minnnesota. I think it’s because there isn’t booze here to throw my game off! It is pretty expensive to golf at this course every weekend, but I’m hopeful to get a few more rounds in before we leave in June for the summer. Once it starts heating up here, I’m definitely going back to try a round of golf under the lights! For more info on the Sahara Golf Resort, you can visit their website HERE.

Check out all of the stadium lights surrounding the hole!

Bowling Night with Friends

March 5, 2015Posted By: MitchFriends, Kuwait, Sportsthemightaswellers Leave a comment

When we moved into our apartment here in Kuwait last August, we were excited that there was a bowling alley just down the street. However we’ve been here for 6 months now, and still haven’t been there! So the other night, when a few of us were just lounging around and looking for something to do, I announced, “let’s go bowling!” There was 8 of us, who made the stroll down the street, for a fun night out.

It was all smiles, until the game started.

We decided to split the group into two teams: The Oldies vs. The Youngsters. I was on the “old” (I prefer more mature and wiser) team and Rachel was on The Youngsters. We decided that the losing team had to buy the winning team a schwarma from our favorite food stand. The match was on!

Ethan with his famous “double fist pump” after a STRIKE!

The competition was fierce! All friendships and relationships were tossed out the window. After all, a free schwarma was on the line!

Adam was super focused, and led the Oldies to 2 victories!

I’m proud to announce that The Oldies won! We decided to play a second game, and this time a cheese fatayer was on the line.

Group Shot

And . . . . The Oldies won that game too! We haven’t cashed in our winnings yet, but we will soon. It is kind of a bummer that Rachel and I were on separate teams though, because basically I’m buying my own schwarma and cheese fatayer. I guess I get bragging rights though!

Of course the best part about bowling is the awesome shoes!

It was a spontaneous night out, and we had a ton of fun. We shared a bunch of laughs and enjoyed some friendly competition. Sometimes it seems like the best nights out, are the ones that are unplanned. We love nights like these!

Mitch’s Monday Happy Hour – February 23

February 23, 2015Posted By: MitchKuwait, Monday Happy Hourthemightaswellers View all 3 comments

Happy Monday Everyone!

I’m super excited right now, because tomorrow we leave for Egypt! We are traveling with a few friends for a 4-day weekend to Cairo. We plan on relaxing, seeing the Pyramids and Sphinx, and drinking beer! Lots of beer! We are so thankful for our new life and the opportunities it provides us to see the world! After this trip, Rachel will be able to add Africa to her list of continents she has visited, and tied with me at 5 of the 7. I’m not sure what the internet accessibility will be like in Egypt, so you probably won’t hear from us on here until next Monday for our weekly Happy Hour. Until then, here’s what we’ve been up to:

Since we arrived in Kuwait, we’ve experienced a few sandstorms. However, none compare to the one we had last Friday afternoon. It was a beautiful sunny day outside, when suddenly all of the buzz here online, was about a fast approaching sandstorm. In the horizon, you could slowly see it moving towards the city, like something you would see in a sci-fi movie. Within minutes, in completely engulfed us! You could barely see across the street, and you could hear the sound of sand tinging against our windows. It started to clear up later in the evening, but it takes a few days for the visibility to return to normal. The worst part though, is the thin layer of dust you find in your apartment. Luckily for us though, our maid comes today!

Here’s a picture from our roof top, with the sandstorm fast approaching on the horizon.

The sandstorm has arrived!

One thing that has been hard getting used to here in Kuwait, is the lack of seat belt use in automobiles. Adults hardly ever use them, and kids don’t either! Apparently there aren’t laws that require them, so it is rare to see a child in a restraint system. Even babies who are only a few months old, are usually just sitting on an adults lap. Often times, they are sitting on the driver’s lap! As the kids get older, they have free rein around the car. It is not uncommon to see kids hanging out windows or sunroofs as the car is speeding down the highway in excess of 65mph. It is hard to watch, especially for how many accidents we see on a daily basis.

Nothing like driving behind a car with a kid hanging out the sunroof. You see it all of the time!

I love drinking coffee! I like it strong and black. I never add milk, cream, sugar, or any other junk to it. Here in Kuwait though, I often have to proceed with caution. The coffee here is served in tiny little glasses, similar to the size of a shot glass (just a few ounces). The first time I was offered a cup at a friends house, I thought to myself . . . . “could I have a bigger glass? This is going to be gone in about 2 seconds!” However when I tasted it, it packed a punch! There was enough caffeine in there, to shoot a tingling sensation up my spine. Apparently they don’t mess around with the watered down crap that I’m use to back in America. Instead, they put the equivalent of about 10 cups of coffee into a 3 ounce glass. Every time I drink it, it still makes me pucker!

My 3 ounce shot of coffee.

We hope everyone is doing well, until next time!

-Mitch

Golfing at the Sand Course

February 20, 2015Posted By: MitchExpat Life, Friends, Kuwait, Sportsthemightaswellers One comment

A few weeks ago, I was talking to a guy who was telling me about a sand golf course here in Kuwait. I had never heard of a sand course before, but it was described to me as, “a golf course without grass.” Say what!?!?!?!?! He went on to tell me that they give you a little piece of grass that you carry around with you. Before each swing, you put your ball on your chunk of grass, and swing away.

Here is what the tee box looked like at each hole. They each had a little black rubber mat, that you could jam a golf tee into to set up your shot. It was super weird hitting on an elevated platform, where your shoes would stick to the mat, and you were constantly worried that if you duffed your shot, you would snap your driver in half!

Here’s my buddy Adam teeing off at one of the holes.

Here is Adam with a shot in the middle of the fairway, no it’s not a sand trap! You can see the little chunk of grass that we used to hit the ball.

At this course, you definitely wanted to play down the middle of the fairway. The “rough” was like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I was constantly looking for snakes, scorpions, and whatever else lived in there!

Another shot of the rough.

Here is a picture of Adam’s approach shot at one of the holes. You will notice that the “green” is even sand. The greens (or perhaps I should call them browns) were a bit more firm than the rest of the course. It seems like they sprayed oil or something on them to keep them packed and somewhat smooth.

Trying to make a putt at this course was nearly impossible. The greens were so bumpy, and you were hitting through sand and rocks.

You can get a good luck at the greens in this picture. Check out all of the footprints! Apparently they go out every morning with a broom and sweep them, to try and smooth them out a bit.

I got pretty excited that I was this close to sinking a decent putt, based on the conditions, but of course . . . . . . I came up short!

Here is a view looking back towards the tee box at one of the holes. Everything was so brown and dead! At times, it seemed like we were on another planet, like Mars!

Here is one of the sand traps at the “sand” course! They were so deep, that you could barely see the green if you were trying to hit out of them. The entire thing was coated in concrete too, so you had to be super careful, especially if you would skull one. Next thing you know, you would end up taking one between the eyes.

I don’t know what the heck these things are, but they were all over the golf course. They seemed like they were some sort of vent or something, from an old oil well. They were making a slight humming sound.

This is my golf ball at the end of my round. Before I started, it was brand new! When your ball is skipping through the sand and bouncing off rocks, it endures quite the beating. It was completely messed up!

Wow, what an experience we had! It was a ton of fun and it will definitely make for some fun stories to tell our friends and families about next summer. It was about $7 for 9 holes. While it was fun to get out and hit some golf balls, I highly doubt I will be back here again. It was a cool experience, but I would hardly call it “golf.” It was more like a round of “desert ball!”

Mitch’s Monday Happy Hour – February 16

February 16, 2015Posted By: MitchKuwait, Monday Happy Hour, Sportsthemightaswellers Leave a comment

Hey everyone, welcome to this week’s Happy Hour! Here’s what we have been up to . . . . . . . . .

We had a 3-day weekend this week, so I enjoyed a day out on a new golf course. It is still under construction, and currently only 9 holes are open, but it has grass! I went out by myself, and apparently they only have 4-person golf carts. Driving the thing around the course was like driving a school bus around. It was a decent course, and pretty close to our house. It is located out in the desert, and I saw about 40-50 camels on the side of the road while I was driving there. Then at one of the tee boxes I looked over, and noticed a bunch of camels at a farm. It was yet another reminder that we live a pretty cool life! I mean, how many other golf courses can you stare at camels from the tee box?????

The camels are located in the center of the picture, near that tan colored camper.

We found a new walking trail this week in the suburb of Jabriya. We were so excited about this one, because it is lined with trees! (which are super hard to find here in the desert). Every weekend, we have been going on walks in the different areas of Kuwait City. We usually find a nice area along the beach to walk, but it was fun to find a different area this weekend. There are not a lot of sidewalks or walking trails here, so unfortunately we always have to drive to find a nice place to walk. The temps have been in the mid 70s lately, the weather has been absolutely perfect to be outside and enjoying whatever kind of nature we can find.

Here is a quick snapshot of the the Kuwait’s signature water towers. I’m not sure if all of the Gulf Countries paint them like this, but you can find them on a lot of artwork, postcards, t-shirts, etc. They are all over the city, and always in clusters of 9. It is such a nice splash of color in an otherwise brown, and dusty country. At night, they light up with a bright blue glow.

Kuwaiti Water Towers

On Friday night, a group of us went into downtown Kuwait City to view the light show on the Kuwait Towers. They are located right on the Persian Gulf. At the end of the month, Kuwaiti’s celebrate their independence and their liberation from Iraq during the Gulf War. For the entire month of February, there are lots of parties, celebrations, and national pride displayed wherever you go. The Kuwait Towers have a laser light show every night that is pretty sweet. The Towers have been closed for renovations for a couple of years, but we have heard rumors that they are expected to reopen at the end of the month. You can go inside them and view the entire the city, and there is also a restaurant in them. We are excited to check them out when they open!

The picture on the left is of the Kuwaiti Amir and the picture on the right is the Kuwaiti flag.

There is a ton of Kuwaiti pride this month.

My 5th grade girls soccer team was supposed to have their first game last Thursday, however it got canceled due to a dust storm! The girls were pretty bummed, but now we have two games scheduled this week. Anytime the wind blows hard here (over around 20 mph) dust fills the air. It doesn’t labor your breathing or anything, they just recommend not doing excessive physical exercise in it. After a dust storm, it seems like it takes 4 or 5 days to fully clear the air. I felt so bad for one of my players, because she wore her soccer uniform, new cleats, and shin guards the entire day at school! From 6am until I told her the game was canceled at 1pm. I don’t know how she could wear shin pads that long!!!

Strike 1 . . . Strike 2 . . . Strike 3 . . . You’re Out!

February 14, 2015Posted By: MitchExpat Life, Kuwait, Sportsthemightaswellers Leave a comment

Since moving to Kuwait, it seems like we have so much more free time on our hands, to just relax, enjoy hobbies, hang with friends, etc. We are no longer homeowners, who are constantly working on renovations, mowing the grass, or chipping away at the “Honey Do List.” While I miss tinkering in my old garage, my free time here has allowed me to do some things in my life that I have always wanted to do, but couldn’t ever find the time. One of those things, is umpiring Little League Baseball!

Before moving here, I read online about the Kuwait Little League. I sent an email, and before I knew it, I was attending my first Umpire Clinic of the season. The unique thing about the league over here, is that the season runs from September to March. Baseball players are always known as the “Boys of Summers,” however since it is so hot here, they play their season during the (cooler) winter months.

The Kuwait Little League is just like any league you would find back in North America. There is multiple age divisions ranging from T-Ball to Seniors Baseball. This year I chose to umpire the Majors Division (ages 11-12). I would estimate that about 60% of the players and coaches are expats from countries other than Kuwait (U.S. Canada, Australia, Venezuela, etc.) Teams practice twice a week, with games on Fridays.

The Little League Complex here is gorgeous, and opened just a few years ago. There are 4 fields for T-ball, Minors, Majors, and Seniors. There are lots of common areas, an office, playground, multiple batting cages, and 3 concession stands! One of them sells your typical concession food (hotdogs, hamburgers, popcorn, candy, etc.), there is also a coffee shop, and the other is a Taco Bell! Yes, after a long day of umpiring, you can grab a chalupa and some cinamon twists!

I have a ton of fun umpiring and have met some great people. It is a very close knit community among the players, coaches, and umpires. The thing I enjoy most is watching the kids develop their skills during the course of the season. Back in September, there were a lot of walks and not much action in the games. However the players have come a long way this season, just in time for the upcoming tournaments which begin in a few weeks.

This year we are sending a Majors All-Star team to a tournament in the Phillipines, Dubai, and they will also play in our national tournament here in Kuwait at the beginning of March. I have already been asked to umpire in the tournaments, which I’m pretty excited about. They typically pay for your flights, hotels, food, and compensate you for each game. I’m hopeful that I can make them fit into my schedule, because I would love to go.

In addition to umpiring Little League Baseball, I also umpired some softball games for the adult league. From September to December, Kuwait Little League offered an Adult Softball League, and we had 16 teams register. It is a co-rec league, and I had a ton of fun. I would usually do 4 games a night, and got to know a ton of people. I’m hoping next year that I can join a team to play with too!

Kuwait Little League is a great organization to be a part of, and I’m so glad that I was able to get involved with them. It has become a part of my weekly routine, every Friday I head to the ballpark. A lot of our students also play in the league, so it is fun to see them playing a game that I enjoyed so much as a part of my childhood.

We Found a Bookstore!

February 12, 2015Posted By: MitchExpat Life, Kuwaitthemightaswellers Leave a comment

Before we moved to Kuwait, we made sure to fill up our Nook and Kindle with as many eBooks as possible, because we had read online that bookstores were hard to find. However a few weeks ago, one of the parents at our school was telling us about a new bookstore that had just opened here, and they had a great selection, especially for kids. Rachel was looking for a specific book that she wanted for school, so after work one day, a bunch of us went on a little adventure to find it.

The crazy adventure all started AFTER we arrived at the bookstore! It was located in a mall, and super easy to find. We got there at about 2:30pm and found this sign, stating that the store hours were from 2-11pm:

Open Hours: 2-11pm

However, the store was CLOSED! It wasn’t all that unusual that it was closed, because most places here in Kuwait close for “lunch” between about 2-5pm, then reopen from 5pm-11pm. However we were bummed, because we drove all across the city, and the hours were posted! After peeking through the glass windows, we saw the worker sleeping inside, in the children’s reading nook. So . . . . . we politely began knocking on the window until she woke up!

She finally came to, and gave us a nasty look. You could tell that she wanted 10 more minutes of sleep, however there was a bunch of teachers outside ready to spend money! She meticulously (and dreadfully slowly) put the children’s nook back in order before she greeted us with a warm welcome and let us in.

Once inside, we were super excited to see the nice selection of books they had for all ages! You could even get a Ronald Regan book:

Anyone looking for a Ronald Reagan book?

About half of the books were in English and the other half were in Arabic. Here’s a few of the Arabic children’s books I found:

Notice the book spines are on the right side? That is because in Arabic, they read from right-to-left, opposite of English.

Rachel was trying to find her book, but soon realized that they were not in any sort of organized order! She asked the worker if they had the book she was looking for, and after a quick search of their inventory on their computer, the worker confirmed that they had a few copies. So the search for the book (more like a needle in a haystack) began. After about 30 minutes of looking through hundreds of books, the search was called off. Bummer, we didn’t find it!

So many books, but none of them were organized!

One of our friend’s bought a bunch of books he was looking for, so the trip was definitely worth while. We might try to go back in a couple of months after they get more organized. The worker said they had just opened a couple of days prior, so they just kind of tossed the books on the shelves without organizing them. Regardless though, it was a nice little outing after school.

It was fun to see the different variety of books they had!

They even had Barack Obama’s book Uncle Dougie!

Mitch’s Monday Happy Hour – February 2

February 2, 2015Posted By: MitchExpat Life, Kuwait, Monday Happy Hour, Travelthemightaswellers Leave a comment

As Salam Alaykom!

***That is how you say hello in Arabic! It is pronounced Ahl sah-LAHM ah-LAY-koom and is the typical greeting here.

We’re back to work now, after our awesome 3 day weekend! As always we jam packed as many things as possible into our weekend. If we were meeting for a happy hour this week, here’s what I would have to share with you . . . . .

We booked 2 trips this week! The first one was for our trip to Jordan in April for Spring Break. My parents are coming to Kuwait for a few days, then the four of us are heading to Amman, Jordan for a week. We have been talking about doing this trip for a few months, but we finally purchased our tickets from Kuwait to Jordan. We are super excited, as it is going to be more of an “adventurous” trip rather than a “chill at the beach” kind of trip. We are going to rent a car, and traverse the countryside and explore the Dead & Red Seas, visit Petra, camp in the desert, and some other stuff. It feels good to finally have it booked so that we can start finalizing our itinerary and get our accommodations settled. This weekend we also booked a trip to Cairo, Egypt! We are going there for four days at the end of the month with a couple of friends. We are excited to visit the Egyptian Pyramids, Sphinx, and explore the history of the country that dates back hundreds, and hundreds, and hundreds of years! We found a nice 5 star resort for super cheap that we’re going to stay at. We “upgraded” our room (for $12) so we have a view of the pyramids from our balcony. SCORE!

Photo Courtesy of: http://www.famouswonders.com

On Friday, a group of us piled into our car and headed south towards Saudi Arabia to visit one of our favorite beaches at Al Khiran. We went earlier this year, and you might remember that Rachel wrote a little blog about it here. The air temperature was in the 80s, but the water was ice cold! We just chilled out at the beach, got some sun, tossed the frisbee, and just hung out with friends. It was a great way to spend our afternoon!

After last weeks ridiculous round of golf at the local sand course, I had the itch to do some more golfing. So on Thursday, a buddy and I headed to the Sahara Country Club here in Kuwait City. It was a BEAUTIFUL course, definitely the nicest one that I ever played on. The grass wasn’t as lush and green as it was when I was there in August, because apparently the type of grass survives better during the intense heat of the summer months. I guess it goes dormant during the winter months here (70s-80s) and was a bit brown. Regardless though, we had a great time and it was so nice. The course also has lights on all 18 holes, so we are going to try and go again in a few weeks and play at night. Here is a link to the course we played: Sahara Country Club.

This weekend I also scored a few freebies! In our apartment building (all teachers that we work with) I found out that someone had an old dryer they wanted to get rid of it. Apparently it worked fine a few weeks ago, until it suddenly stopped working for some reason. They said that they weren’t very handy and didn’t want to bother trying to fix it, and just wanted it gone. I jumped at the opportunity to tinker on project, so we are the new owners of a broken dryer! Then about an hour later, one of our friends told us that someone was looking to get rid of a broken treadmill. They knew I was pretty handy and always looking for a project, and the next thing you know . . . . . . me and a friend are humping a huge broken treadmill back to our apartment. So for the first time since moving to Kuwait, I have myself a “Honey Do List.” I bought a few basic tools this weekend, and am going to start tackling my projects during my spare time. You may think I’m a hoarder for collecting this broken stuff . . . . . but I’m pretty excited to have something to tinker on. I’ll keep you posted if I’m able to fix them.

That’s all for now folks, we’ll see you next week.

Mitch’s Monday Happy Hour – January 26

January 26, 2015Posted By: MitchKuwait, Monday Happy Hourthemightaswellers One comment

Happy Monday Everyone!

We are back to work today after enjoying a busy, fun, and exciting 3-day weekend! It was our first long weekend in a long time, so an extra day off to sleep in was much appreciated. On Friday afternoon, we found out that school would be closed on Sunday, due to the death of the Saudi Arabian King Abdullah. The Kuwaiti Government announced 3 days of mourning, so all government offices (including schools) were closed Friday-Sunday. This was perhaps the busiest weekend we have had since being in Kuwait and it made us so thankful that we had a car. We probably put a couple of hundred miles on as we traversed the city/country. Here’s what we are up to:

On Friday, a few of us took a road trip to the highest point in Kuwait, Mutla Ridge. It was about an hour drive from Kuwait City towards the Iraqi border. It is out in the middle of the desert, and there were quite a few people camping, having picnics, dune bashing and four-wheeling. We drove the ol’ Durango to the top, enjoyed the sights, and took a little walk around. It was so nice to be out in nature and just chill outside. After awhile, we were going to take off, when we found a guy renting four-wheelers on the side of the road. Of course we had to do it! So we went ripping around the desert for an hour and had a blast. We took some fun pictures with our nice camera, so we’ll post those at another time, but here is a quick one that I took with my iPhone.

Rachel ripping around at Mutla Ridge

After our time in the desert, we stopped at Street Fest. It was a big block party in downtown Kuwait City, with different vendors selling all sorts of food, merchandise, clothing, jewelry, food, etc. We got some dinner from one of the food trucks and enjoyed walking around and checking everything out. I love festivals like this and it was super nice. Here’s a crappy iPhone pic I took:

Street Fest 2015

On Sunday, I spent my day off at the golf course. Me and a buddy tried our luck at one of the sand courses here called Ahmadi Golf Club. Your are basically playing a round of golf in the middle of the desert, without any grass! They give you a little piece of fake grass that you put your ball on before each shot. I’ll post some more pics and share some of the funny stories another time, but here is a pic of my buddy in the middle of the fairway on hole #1.

Fore!!!!!!!

I ran to the Ace Hardware last week to pick a few things up when I saw something strange . . . . an entire section of ice scrapers!!! I laughed to myself and thought, “why in the heck do they have ice scrapers here?” Then I realized that most people who walk past them, probably have no idea what they actually are. Maybe people buy them to scrape stickers off windows? Or maybe they buy them to use as back scratchers? When I first found out that they had an Ace Hardware here, someone described the store as, “they literally picked up an Ace Hardware from Minnesota, and dropped it in Kuwait.” They even sell humming bird feeders (there’s no hummingbirds here), riding lawnmowers (there is no grass here), and tons of other super weird things. Without a doubt though, the ice scrapers are the craziest I’ve seen yet!

Such a nice variety of ice scrapers at the Kuwait City Ace Hardware!

The Might as Wellers

The adventures of our life as we try and live by the mantra "might as well."