Sharon and Jacques’ Excellent Blog

So I never thought I would say this, but I went to Kuwait for the weekend. Not exactly Niagara on the Lake, the cottage or wine country, but hey, a place to go. Jacques and I went to visit friends who just recently moved there with their three kids. We got really cheap flights and for less than $100 we had a weekend trip planned. I was curious to see what another part of the Middle East looks like, and a bit concerned because of the war that took place in 1990 with Saddam Hussein invading.

We arrived in a reasonably sized airport and made our way to customs. We knew a Visa was needed so we proceeded to the “others” counter to get our proper paperwork. This side of the world seems to be all about rubber stamps and pieces of paper with pretty shiny stickers. Oh yeah, and making sure your money gets lots of fresh air out of your wallet. Unlike parts of Asia, the middle east is pretty good about respecting the line. That is to say, somehow if you line up you generally can follow the person in front of you and get service. Facing a line of officious looking guys in uniform, we stood in line and handed over our passports for the pretty shiny stickers we needed. The hardest question for us to answer is “where are you staying”. I have learned to write it down and carry it in my passport, along with the right map to sort of get us where we are going. In this case we were staying at SALWA, block 10, street 8 house 118 2nd floor, flat 3. Hey at least it’s not in Arabic!

Stamp stamp and we were off to Customs and Immigration. We arrived just as a flight from Bangalore got in and we were caught in a tide of people pushing and shoving. Suddenly we were at the back of a line with a long wait in sight. Jacques the ever prepared pulls out his PDA and settles in for a long read of his book. I looked around and noticed we were the only white people in a sea of caramel. Reminds me of Canadian comedian Russell Peters who says eventually with global travel and mixed marriages we will all end up beige.

From out of nowhere, a very officious security guard vigorously signals to us, waving us his way. Oh crap I think, this is not the place to get strip searched. Jacques makes his way to the guard and I follow (being the meek wife). Actually, he is bigger than I am so he cuts a swathe through people in a way I never could. The security guard puts his arm in front of the next person in line, and tells us to go straight through the gates, no questions asked! Cool I think, we are finally rewarded for not butting in line these past 5 months.

We spent a fun weekend in Kuwait, going to souks and the famous 3 needles that were bombed out. We went to a great cocktail party and had a few drinks (in a place that is supposedly dry). I even tried the moonshine (blech). Believe it or not, we even ate fantastic sushi! Sad to say goodbye to our friends, we then made our way to check out of Kuwait and the Customs again.

We were once again stuck in the masses at the back, so jokingly I said to Jacques “Look big and look white”. Ten seconds later, a security guard waved us over to the front of a line. We walked over when all of a sudden, three people pushed in front of us. My life flashed before me at the security guy tore a strip off those people. I swear I thought he was going to pull his gun as he cursed a blue streak in Arabic. The man was not going to have his power over the queue usurped by anyone. He then escorted us to the counter where we produced our passports and the papers with the pretty shiny stickers and we were on our way out of Kuwait.

Come to think of it, we seemed to be the only ones in line with pretty shiny stickers. Maybe they have more power than I thought!