Advice re moving to Kuwait

glad to see ur thinking of goin' Q80 SJC

as far as family friendly; i would say yes, u can think of Kuwait as PG Dubai. as someone that was born and raised here, yes, i can vouch for that point personally.

given ur current location, i presume u'll go for English as opposed to american schools, it will be useful for u to check out this thread here by SaharEl about schools in Kuwait.

creature comforts,, u'll have to be more specific. given that kuwait is a muslim country, alcohol and pork are not allowed. still, it doesnt mean that u cannot go to the embassy and toss back a few, nor does it mean u cant get pork here. u'll just have to be careful.

other than that, any other creature comfort you have, you are sure to find in the Sultan Center, the no. 1 mega-mart for westerners in Kuwait. u can even request them to bring in some of your creature comforts should they not be stocking them.

the local food speaks for itself, and there are plenty of different cuisines for you to sample, ranging from Kuwaiti to Arabic dishes (sweets included), Indian, Chinese, Italian, Egyptian, the possibilities are limitless. Kuwait is one big eatery.

as for ur friends remark; yes, it is indeed easy to make local friends, u'll find quite a few friendly locals here, such as Mishary and others. bear in mind tho that Kuwait is composed of 3 million people, 1 million locals, 2 million expats, so theres a 33% chance that the person u meet in the street is Kuwaiti, or at a party

Anything else? feel free to ask

I agree with Legacy and consider us your friends you got 2 now

Thanks for the replies, guys. Yes, really interested in trying Middle Eastern food. We've lived in India which was great on the food front and the last few years have been in Korea which was also very interesting, but my knowledge of Middle Eastern food is limited to a "Persian" wedding I went to back for some friends back in the UK. The food there was amazing though, so hoping to be dabbling with more of that kind of thing!

Not bothered about the no alcohol rule. It was pretty much the same where we were in India and I didn't miss it there. I don't drink much since having kids anyway!

Have seen there's also a football (soccer) league in Kuwait too, so pleased there's games I can take the boy to. That's been a lot of fun in Korea and Kuwait's pretty small, so am guessing it must be easy to get around all the different stadia.

Can I ask, is there much in the way of live music performances? I don't necessarily mean western music; I'm not expecting the likes of AC/DC to be setting up concerts every weekend. But are there places where it's easy to go and watch local musicians play?

The other thing I was going to ask is, are there a lot of beaches around. Seems there's a lot of coastline, so guessing a Saturday afternoon on the beach must be a popular pastime, especially given the warm weather?

Thanks again for the replies!

what are you exactly searching for ?

well in terms of music, id suggest you visit these guys right here Kuwait-Music brings all musical aspiration in Kuwait together in one neat website, they also have a facebook page.

the musical scene in Kuwait has started to look up, i know that in october Kuwait's opera-man had a show at 360 Mall, so there could be changing tides.

if not, fear not, enroll your kids in NES, they have an annual "Battle of the Bands".

Theres also bands that play at restaurants etc such as Switchback, so ur musical tastes, altho a bit watered down, will never the less be taken care of.

Legacy - great site that. Thanks! And it looks like there's loads of interesting live music happening. That's good news also. Am liking the sound of a move over there more and more.

Ace - nothing exact really. Obviously there is specific music I listen to at home, but when it comes to seeing music live, I'm pretty open minded about it really - especially when in a new place!