Who are the people in you neighborhood....

Today I decided to get out and walk around our "neighborhood". Our apartment is a complex called the Dina Dana Apartments, named after the daughters of the owner of the school. The complex is 12 years old and is often referred to as the dunes. This refers to the fact that when the complex was purchased, there was very little developed in the area and you literally drove across sand to get to the housing. 

Here are some older satellite photos to give you a sense of the growth...

2004 - virtually nothing....

2010 - Dina Dana Towers being constructed...

Neighborhood growing....

2018 

Thankfully, it is more developed than this now, however, with development comes people, traffic, trash, etc. From all I can gather online, Kuwait expats are predominately from India, Egypt, Bangladesh, and the Philipines. Our "neighborhood" is a series of apartment complexes that house all these expat workers. With that, let's take a walk...

For the sake of reference, here is our apartment with respect to the country.

Kuwait isn't very big....you can drive across it in a few hours.

OR

The size of Haute Pyrenees?

 

Maybe Somerset and Franklin counties combined?

Close up of our neighborhood.

Today, I walked....

I am going to add photos that I saw along the way to give you a sense of what this area is like...
It isn't....very pretty...

Our home, we have the apartment that you can just see above the wall. The facility is guarded 24/7 with wonderful, helpful team. The building on the left is the "family building" and the one on the right is the "singles building".

This is the empty lot next to our place. Most afternoons, there is a group of men that play cricket in this dirt lot. 

Facilities here are split by gender. This is a small gym/spa for "ladies"

The planning of buildings here is quite different. In most urban areas, the first floor of residential apartments is where they put the commerce/stores/etc. Here, in most instances, the stores are little stand-alone building in front of apartment buildings. Some are quite small!!!

Platinum Gym facilities with a McDonalds attached....

The side roads and parking areas are a mess...no upkeep, no real plan.

They have many places that are western or straight up American. 

According to news reports I have read recently, expats are trying to squeeze into apartments to save money. This has lead to many open/empty apartment buildings. 

An older store that resembles the Sanford and Sons...Not really sure what is inside...

Another example of a store stuck to the outside of a building...

I have walked by this while they are working...it is frightening to see the difference in safety equipment and organization of similar construction in Boston or NYC...

This area is NOT very walkable. This is one of the rare instances where there are sidewalks...it is hard to get on and off this island, as there are very few traffic lights here, people drive like lunatics and there isn't anything such as "pedestrians have the right of way"

Another view looking back at our apartment. the new building on the right with the yellow is apparently another new school that is "opening in 2019" according to the sign...I have never seen any activity that it is opening soon...

Fancy water fountain...

These buses pick up batches of workers and drop them off all around our area 24/7. Presumably, they work in the oil fields in some capacity. 

Side roads, as I said, this area isn't pretty....

Not sure, but I think this is/was some sort of market that they set up. the trash in the foreground left is always there, but they were definitely standing over the items on the boxes as if they were for sale/barter? I didn't explore any closer....
BTW, this was 11:15 am, at least 38 Celcius...

A side alleyway...

Delivery is everywhere here....literally everything is available for delivery. This store clearly moves some food! Again, it is remarkable how small these places are. In that little square is a few small tables, a counter, a place to cook, a place to store the food and hopefully a place to clean...

Building happens, it is clear that cleaning up after the building, not so much...

I am not sure why they don't just tow it away...after the 5th or 9th sticker saying this car must move???

This newish Hypermarket is literally right behind our apartments. It is super convenient as it has everything from housewares, food, clothes, toiletries etc.

And that completes the tour. As I said, it isn't a pretty area, but, for at least the next tow years, it is home. So far, for the most part, we go to school, we come home and stay in our apartment complex. We taxi to get groceries or the mall and this neighborhood isn't a place we will likely do much in.