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Digtxl_Pickle t1_itdplxu wrote

Reply to comment by DennyJunkshin86 in Iraq, Algeria, Oman, Kuwait and Bahrain Affirm Support for OPEC+ Production Cut by millennium-wisdom

I lived in kuwait for 9 years and moved back to Europe at the end of 2020.

People always make fun of Dubai for being a dysfunctional city with a facade of a utopia. Kuwait is very much the same but worse. The adverts make it look outstanding but after living there for nearly a decade I can tell you the economic gap is far too big.

Their answer for the decline of the oil industry is to move to tourism (much like Dubai) however they are working against themselves. The entire country is really just one big city surrounded by inhospitable desert. Alcohol and pork is banned (the former being a bigger deal), is completely covered in litter and from my experience (being gay) is full of people that want to decapitate the LGBT. Last I checked there is a reward for anyone that can make a test for a "gay gene"

As you can tell I have a little pent up anger about this so apologies for the rant.

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DennyJunkshin86 t1_itdwj0w wrote

No need for any apologies. I like hearing from someone who was actually there. It sounds like you have a up close and unique experience. Can I ask how in the hell did you find yourself there for so long? I'm American and I don't have a passport and don't care to travel much. My roots are firmly planted. So switching up countries of residence is very interesting to me. Any good stories you care to share?

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Digtxl_Pickle t1_ite07ek wrote

^I ^hope ^you ^like ^reading

It was slightly above average money and there were no taxes (one of the few upsides) as well as long holidays because noone wants to work in 55C (131F) heat. Being white, male and straight (closeted) I never had a problem however that wasn't the case for so many friends.

I had a friend who was late 40s and was moving from India. He was getting paid well and was happy (we worked in contracts) however not long after he moved the company nicked his passport and demoted him to working on 200 Kuwaiti Dinar (~ $645 in today's money) per a month. Not a week. A month. He had to pull his daughter our of a good university and send his wife back to India (she still had her passport). He ended up having to live in a two bedroom flat with 40 other guys who took shifts sleeping. We wanted to help and we gave some aid but this is just one of the many horror stories and we couldn't help everyone. Heck I got payed more than my boss' boss simply because he was Sri Lankan and I was a privileged westerner.

In the kuwait there are rarely any good stories. There aren't any pubs (sorry is my brittish showing) so there isn't too much banter and because not many people are fully fluent in english its a community where everyone know everyone and gossip spreads like wildfire. Shut yourself off for half a year and you'll never get back into the insular community.

Kuwait was the best and worst thing that ever happened to me. I am so glad that I got the experience of another culture from a young age (just coming out of the prolonged schooling process) because it opened me up to so much. I understand alot more about Arabic, Islam and people compared to alot of people here in the UK however it also put me through some of the darkest times of my life. If your not careful you can very easily feel cut off from life however if you aren't cut off, the community is so kind and everyone really looks out for each other. Only the people with incredibly high social status will care about your skin colour or (surprisingly) your surname.

There is light at the end of the tunnel though (despite this article being a bad example). Kuwait being very densely packed really suffered quite a bit during Covid and led to the government trying to get the 3/5 of the population working on nothing to want to leave. Hopefully this means that they might start to care.

TL;DR: Stay as far away from the kuwait as possible but definitely visit the middle east. Oman, Bahrain, Qatar and the UAE were all absoluley spectacular although they suffer from the same prejudices.

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StellaBaby_Forever t1_itglaxl wrote

I have a love/hate relationship with Kuwait as well. I associate it with some of the best and some of the worst parts of my life. I learned so much when I was there and grew up a lot.

My experience was a bit different because I was there to be with my then girlfriend (now wife), who is a Kuwaiti citizen. Technically she’s half Kuwaiti, half European. But, we’re both women, so it was obviously super secret. I got to see the cultural side of Kuwait that a lot of expats don’t see since Kuwaitis are pretty private, which I feel lucky for.

Kuwaitis can be unbelievably generous to their friends and family, which is wonderful, but to strangers they can be very cold. They may have always been this way, but I know that the Gulf War really fucked their ability to trust strangers.

The trauma from the war is strong, and I feel that it is the cause of a lot of problems still. Foreign media outlets didn’t really cover it well, but Saddam committed thousands or war crimes against Kuwait. 605 people were abducted and have never been found. Others were tortured to death in front of their families. Iraqi soldiers stole or destroyed anything they could get their hands on. They left land mines all over the place, sometimes disguised as toys specifically to kill children.

The place is a mess, but I have this strange affection for it anyway.

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Buddhahead11b t1_itf7ve6 wrote

With all the money they have they still haven’t cleaned up all the fucked up buildings from the invasion back in the 90s. Fuck that place. It’s funded by indentured labor and propped up by oil.

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