[Events] The Last Reef 3D Launch at TSCK

February 20, 2012  |  Events, Fun, Previously

Two weeks ago I received an invitation from The Scientific Center Kuwait (TSCK) to attend the premiere of their latest 3D movie “The Last Reef” translated and narrated by the amazing news anchor Mr. Yousef Mustafa. (Note: Headphones with the English version of the movie are available for Foreigners or those who do not speak Arabic)

Last Reef

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[Events] Khaleejesque Magazine Launch

February 16, 2012  |  Events, Previously

A week ago (February 5th 2012 to be precise) I was invited by the lovely people from Khaleejesque, one of the first online “Khaleeji” lifestyle magazines to unveil their very first print issue at 360 Mall which is now available practically everywhere.

Khaleejesque

The event featured printed pages from their magazine showcased in 360 Mall with everyone going around checking out the beautiful artwork/photography and getting a chance to meet with the lovely creators.  I arrived that day early and got a chance to speak to most of the lovely people behind this venture.  I spoke with Fouz Al Sabah one of the main team members and the creative director, and got to understand that they are aiming to release this magazine as a quarterly issue aimed at being more of a “coffee-table” magazine rather than a time-bound magazine you see everywhere.  They want to give their readers pieces which will always be there and have some amazing pictures to go with them simply so you can save that magazine and refer back to those images and well they didn’t fail in that area at all.

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[Previously] The Cutest Baby Blogger at Vinny’s

February 10, 2012  |  Events, Friends, Previously

It has been a while and I’ve been meaning to write but I kept procrastinating and postponing the transfer of the photos from my camera to my computer and when I did, I enjoyed my Instagram shots more than anything else but I’m slightly off topic here.  Let’s start over.

Earlier this year, the blogging team from 7ajidude invited us to celebrate the winner of “The Cutest Baby Blogger Instagram Challenge” at Vinny’s which is located in 52 Degrees in Al Tilal Complex.  So on a Thursday evening of January 5th Lujain, my sister #3 (aka Your Battlefield) and I headed over there to have a lovely dinner with friends and well I can honestly say that they are more like family as well.

Vinny1

My sisters and I arrived very early, even Dudette wasn’t there yet but nonetheless we took it as an opportunity to walk around a bit and have both sisters of mine get scared from a cat (yes they don’t like cats).  But soon enough Dudette made it and started setting up when we were just walking in.  The place was beautiful and all ours! We monopolized the place to the final extent, Vinny’s had provided us with lovely name badges (not that most of us needed them) but Dudette did the most awesome thing by placing comments underneath each one :P I was known as “The Sabyak Baby with Garfield Touches” (roughly translated as ‘The Tomboy baby with Garfield touches’).

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[Events] Gulf Run Al Falah Car Wash

January 24, 2012  |  Events

 

Last Thursday (that is January 12th) I was invited by the awesome Marzouq and amazing Gulf Run Social Team to attend the Al Falah Car Wash and watch the cars get their hair did and nails did! I kid! I mean getting washed and have the stickers put on.

 

It was an awesome event filled with sexy delicious beauitful cars! I absolutely loved them to pieces! (To the extent I’m getting my old car “Audi A4″ cleaned and detailed professionally by Al Falah Car Wash – more on that later) and I am considering Foil Art because of the work that I saw.

I arrived shortly after 8 with my princess Lujain, yes everyone thinks that I am her personalized Kris Jenner but really I’m hoping she’ll learn something from all of this and she does love cars and gadgets so maybe she’ll take into my footsteps rather than my sisters :P

Anywho we arrived, and were greeted by Marzouq who was shocked to see Lujain for the first time (he heard about her endlessly) and then shown to where the cars were being washed and primped and cleaned and all that jazz!

Both Lujain and I snapped our pictures met our fellow bloggers (Q8Stig, of course he has to be there, where there is a car there is a Stig :P) And I got to meet Mark for the first time which was awesome (Hey Mark!) There was a cool Shawerma stand for those coming to watch and a place to hang out as well as an awesome DJ belting out awesome beats!

Anywho, I leave you with the pictures and more to come about the next event which happened to be the Gulf Run Car Show at 360 Mall.

Toodles!

P.S. For even hotter and sexier pictures check out the Gulf Run Blog.

Al Danah 1 Million KD Draw with Rwaished & Najwa

January 5, 2012  |  Events

Yesterday I was invited by the lovely peeps at Gulf Bank to attend the press conference held to announce the celebrities who will be drawing the lucky winner of the 1 million KD grand prize of Al Danah Account.

The celebrities were Lebanese singer Najwa Karam and the ever so amazing Kuwaiti singer Abdullah Al-Ruwaished!

I grabbed my sister D (aka #3) and went there to check out the conference lots of questions were asked mostly pertaining the celebrities lives and such of which one question was asked of Najwa Karam, asking her if she had her own official twitter account.  Her answer was No! She’s technologically challenged and well it’s okay she doesn’t need it :P

Abdullah Al-Ruwaished was ever so warm and charming but he didn’t get the lot of the questions as most press coverage was fascinated by Najwa Karam but he was asked the question of why didn’t his last album get the marketing coverage that is usually done for all his albums.  To which he responded that his album came out at a difficult time in which the Arab region area was experiencing Arab Spring and therefore it couldn’t get it’s full push in terms of marketing but it will soon.

I had fun and keep an eye out for today where the winner of the 1 million KD Al Danah prize gets announced (I hope Mommy wins! So I can get an interest free loan from her :P) Watch out, it’ll be at the Avenues at 7pm!

If you’re going be careful it will be crowded as hell.

P.S. More pictures coming soon. Also the event will be live streamed on the Gulf Bank Website :D

National Geographic & Zain Augmented Reality & Gifts

December 24, 2011  |  Events, Shout Outs, Social Media

National Geographic Channel in collaboration with Zain Kuwait brought over an “Extraordinary, Indescribable” experience over to Kuwait with their Augmented Reality.

Zain natgeo

What is Augmented reality?

Well in a way it is standing in front of a screen and seeing yourself up there projected with dinosaurs, leopards, astronauts, and more.  [My weird explanation of what it could be :P]

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A dolphin visiting two awaiting boys

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The view from up above, basically you stand in the yellow square and see yourself!

I got a chance to visit them today at 360 Mall where they are available until Sunday the 25th of December from 10 AM – 10PM!  If you’ve got kids, younger siblings, kidnap kids (oops I mean your cousins obviously) then head over there and let them try it out.  I personally wanted to try it out unfortunately wasn’t able to because well I’m old :/ And those who were in line were all kids half my size.  One thing would’ve been cool though is to have more characters but who knows 2012 will be the year of technological genius so we might get even more awesome things!

Way to go National Geographic and Thanks Zain for bringing over this awesome thing, you are forever blowing our minds with everything!

But wait there is more, earlier on Wednesday I received an amazing gift from the amazing Social Media Team at Zain, Thanks guys! I received an awesome BBQ Set!

ZainGift

Packed in an amazing huge bag which wasn’t that heavy but it was amazing how things were neat and compact! In it were 2 chairs, 2 blankets (extra warm and fleecy!), grilling tools and a nice sized griller!

Zain Gift 2

What a way to pass by the cold wintery days than by wrapping yourself up in the blanket sitting outside and enjoying the amazing weather BBQ-ing kastana or hotdogs/burgers.

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Thanks Mohammed for the awesome gift and really thanks to the whole team for it! You never cease to amaze me!

 

P.S. Thanks to Swera from Crazy Yet Wise for allowing me to steal her photos! I just love the colors of her wall and I could never take pictures as awesome as that!

 

[Event] Redbull’s The Art of Can Exhibition

December 3, 2011  |  Events

I stumbled upon this exhibition completely by accident, you see I was headed to 360 Mall with family and friends to watch the latest movie “Jack & Jill” and once we were done we started to walk around the mall.  All of a sudden I saw a familiar face and this strange sign that said “The Art of Can” it grabbed my attention it was weird and cool at the same time.  I was intrigued so I headed over to say hello to my friend Joumana and was welcomed inside to take a closer look at the artwork being exhibited.  I was excited but unprepared, but thanks to my iPhone 4S I don’t need to carry a fancy huge camera because all the pictures you are about to see are taken by my trustworthy phone! And they are amazing.

Who: Redbull

What: The Art of Can Exhibition

When: December 2nd, 2011 (Private Viewing)

Where: 360 Mall, Exhibition Hall

I might’ve flooded your instagram and twitter feeds with pictures of the event but I was so happy and it was so cool.  It was an exhibition, no words were exchange (at least not that I know of) but people were allowed to roam around the room perusing the art displayed while a piano player provided us with the ambiance and set the mood for the room.  Catering was provided so guests could have some juices and little appetizers and you were given a chance to snap away at the art pieces.

The piano player

The exhibition is being displayed at 360 Mall in the Exhibition Hall and will be available from December 3rd – December 17th.  If you truly loved the pieces I have chosen to display here then please head over there and check out the rest of the exhibition!

John Fernandes' "Power to Transform"

So without further ado, I give you the art pieces!

We left a short while later with a booklet with all the featured pieces and a CD.

The exhibition booklet & CD

 

Thanks to Joumana for letting me check out the exhibition and great job to everyone there!

[Previously] Sumo Time with BEST Al Yousifi

December 1, 2011  |  Events, Previously

Just a short recap, I’ve been posting about events I attended in a short series I’d like to call “Previously” I hope to be wrapped up with all of them during the week so I can move on to bigger fish to fry.

Who: BEST Al Yousifi

What: Grand Re-opening of Al Rai Branch with SUMO

When: October 30,2011 evening time

Where: Al Rai Branch next to Lulu Hypermarket

What Happened:

So previously BEST Al Yousifi invited the female bloggers to get to know us, but that was not the only thing the meeting was about, it was mostly an invitation to their grand opening of their new showroom in Al Rai right next to Lulu Hypermarket.

What was special about this event was that they had flown in a Japanese Sumo wrestler “Yama” for the opening and everyone was in awe of how big he was (but for me I felt he was an okay size maybe I’ve been desensitized by modern day television, he weighed more than 300KG).  I was welcomed by the lovely Ms. Amtar and the marketing team where I was given my name badge and given a quick tour of the place before heading to the temporary location where the bloggers were waiting until our numbers were full.  When there were quite a few of us there, Mr. Abdulaziz Al Yousifi, the President of BEST Al Yousifi welcomed us and gave us a little history about the place and asked for our opinions.  Later on we were shown back into the showroom to meet with the Sumo Wrestler.

Everyone was lining up to take pictures with him while a few of our blogger friends attempted to tackle him and bring him down. Unfortunately no one was able to unseat him as the victor.  The awesome thing about the pictures was that BEST was printing out the pictures taken with their photographer and giving them out to the Bloggers instantly (Gosh I miss the good ol’ days of instant photography you would have hard copies of your pictures to look at whenever you want!)

After the pictures we were given a tour in their store which was recently expanded and re-opened for customers making it the largest electronics store in Kuwait! This was my very first time to visit a BEST Al Yousifi store and I must say that I really enjoyed the visit.

Thanks to Ms. Amtar Suhail and the marketing team at BEST Al Yousifi, it was a lovely event and may you have many more successful store openings. And thanks for the gifts as well!

P.S. I’ve been there so far 4 times and counting! I like to spend my salary on electronics! :P

P.P.S. The largest TV was there which was 152″ and was being sold for 183,000KD the price of a house really.  I wonder who would buy that!

P.P.P.S. My ultimate best coverage of the event was at 7ajiDude’s Blog [Link] and PinkGirlQ8′s Blog [Link]

Website: http://best-denki.com

Twitter: @BestAlYousifi

Facebook: Click Here

[Previously] I Crushed IT Real Good

December 1, 2011  |  Events, Previously

Just a short recap, I’ve been posting about events I attended in a short series I’d like to call “Previously” I hope to be wrapped up with all of them during the week so I can move on to bigger fish to fry.

Who: Al Zanki Enterprises

What: Crush It! Seminar

When: October 26, 2011 Morning & Evening

Where: Marina Hotel & Salwa Al Sabah Hall

What Happened:

The big day of learning all about how social media can turn anything into a successful business as long as you knew how to use the power for good had arrived.  And thanks to the sponsors Burgan Bank, the Bloggers who were part of the “Crush It” project were given a free pass to attend the seminar, but that was not all.  Bloggers were also given a special chance to meet up with Gary Vayenerchuk in person and get to ask him questions and get to know him before the seminar. Therefore this is what happened:

The day started off at 11AM in Marina Hotel Meeting Rooms.  We were attending the special get together with Gary and the team of Al Zanki Enterprises which consisted of Ms. Hind Al-Nahedth (lovely to meet you by the way!) and Mr. Khalid Al Zanki (it was a pleasure although didn’t get a chance to personally talk to you).  Gary and Khalid were a bit late but that didn’t matter because when he got there he made sure to give us new material that would not be available in the seminar as we were going to be there later so it was kind of giving us an appetizer before our main meal! Basically we were given advice as to “How to crush your passion” and how he turned his father’s small business into the big business it is today, by having found a “passionate” aspect of it.  It was lovely and we got a chance to take pictures and sign our books (although I didn’t have the book with me and even if I did it would be an e-Book, try signing my iPad :P)

Afterwards, we were given a break and since I had met my favorite blogger girls (oh okay I don’t have favorites but you were my favorites for the day) Swera, Q8Rain, Dudette (from 7ajidude) and I all decided to grab lunch before the big seminar.  It was a hassle trying to decide what to eat especially since we had a vegetarian (ehem Q8Rain) between us and so we finally made a decision to head over to the Avenues and grab some Elevation Burgers.  It was absolutely fun especially since Q8Rain got lost in the way and we waited close to an hour for them to show up but when they did it was party time!

Unfortunately I had to run out on the girls and head into the office prepare my pages and then head back to the seminar.  It was awesome.  I was late though.  The official time to start the seminar was around 5-ish however it actually started close to 6:15pm as people were running late (yours truly included) it was a big turnout, bigger than I had imagined.  I also got a chance to run into ex-colleagues and friends of mine there which was simply AH-MAHZING (those who I consider friends were Ah-Mahzing the others were okay though :P)

The seminar started, Gary told us a brief summary of his life and how he crushed his passion and afterwards we were given a Q&A session with him.  It ran a bit too long because I personally felt that most questions were repeats and applicable to the person themselves but in the end it was beautiful.  Important things that were discussed were the fact that: social media is the big thing now and taking over the role of traditional media; companies should humanize logos and allow for a better method of communication with their customers; customers require value and noto to be considered as just another number; small gifts to say thank you for a customers purchase goes a long way in establishing a long and healthy relationship; don’t quit your job just because you hate it and think it’s time to follow your passion you may never be able to find it but try to work on something you love while having your job; constantly google yourself and your business to see how good or bad you’re doing; take positive and negative feedback with a grain of salt and know that what’s negative could always be fixed from your side; and most importantly do not absue social media as emails have been abused lately it’s not a ‘push’ system for advertising it’s a ‘pull’ in which you pull in the customer’s feedback.

That was not all, in the middle of the seminar Electrozan, one of the sponsors of the event held a draw on an iPhone 4S and an iPod Touch 5th Generation (White) and unfortunately I did not win it was amazing.  Also at the end of the evening our lovely Social Media team at Zainalso held a draw of their own in which the prizes were an iPad 2 (which Mubarak from HiKuwait won), HTC Sensation, and a Blackberry Bold 9900 (which Q8Rain won) and again I did not win any gadget at this event.  It’s a failure, no I’m just kidding.

All in all, it was an amazing event although it went on long but I had fun and learned quite a bit from it.  Thanks to Hind & Khalid for extending us with this lovely chance to meet Mr. Gary and thanks to Burgan Bank for granting us the tickets to attend the seminar.

[Previously] Girls Night Out with BEST

November 27, 2011  |  Events, Previously

I will be starting a “Previously” category in the next few days in which I write about previous events I went to but was too lazy to blog about.  I loved each and everyone of them but I just was too lazy to write about them much.  Therefore I will give you the ultimate summary of them all in a cool funky way I hope, and share my photos.  Of course my fellow bloggers who have attended have written their posts but I just want to share it with my awesome readers!

Who: BEST Al Yousifi

What: Girls Night Out

When: October 25, 2011 in the evening

Where: Kei Japanese Restaurant

What Happened:

I was invited along with a bunch of other female bloggers to attend a “meet-and-greet” dinner with the lovely people from BEST Al Yousifi at the Japanese restaurant.  Being a Japanese franchise the theme of the restaurant was awesome.  Time was spent chatting and getting to meet other female bloggers without the spying eyes of male bloggers. (Sorry but boys suck :P No really I’m kidding!) Chatting wasn’t the only thing on the menu we got a chance to try or rather I got a chance to try out Japanese food (I have never had any and I don’t think I  will again!).

We were delivered “bento” boxes which had different pieces of japanese food inside and I had the Shrimp Tempura thing the rest was literally Japanese to me! [Note: I do not like to try out new foods if I am not comfortable]

The night then ended with a nice meeting with the president of BEST, Mr. Abdulaziz Al Yousifi, in which he asked our opinions on different things going on and just had a very nice open conversation.  We got to know more about him and his company than a walk in their stores would.  And I got to impress him with my geekiness as I believe I am a full-blown geek hehe.

All in all, it was a great event and one I would love to repeat again.  This was sort of like a prologue to the next event we were to be invited to by BEST Al Yousifi.

Thanks to Amtar Suhail for the invitation and the marketing team!