Kuwait airways Colombo — Kuwait: the unexpected night in Kuwait
(Previous) Boarding finally started. I walked my still-injured legs to the gate, still in the process of collecting myself. Airport bus brought the passengers to the plane.
Prior to this I’ve only flied a Middle-Eastern carrier once (Emirates in 2015). As I saw the Arabic scripts on the plane, I was gradually occupied by thoughts of adventures again. In 2015 we merely had a brief layover in Dubai Airport, not even entering the country. Today would be my first time to explore the so-called “Middle East”.
Based on its routes, Kuwait Airways seemed to focus on passengers flying the South Asia — Europe route. I could imagine it’d be hard to compete with the big 3 luxurious carriers (Emirates, Etihad and Qatar) in the more lucrative East Asia — Europe market.
As the flight departed, a short video of Quran recitation was played on the screen (I couldn’t recall whether Emirates did the same)
Kuwait Airways: probably not as luxurious as Emirates A380, but quite a pleasant flying experience. Fun fact: I took elementary Arabic classes in Harvard not long ago, so I enjoyed deciphering some Arabic languages whenever I saw them. While my vocabularies are very limited, I could at least pronounce what’s written.
Interior look of Kuwait Airways A330. “New Kuwait” is Kuwait’s 2035 vision program, attempting to transform the country into an international financial hub, reminiscent of the Saudi’s 2030. The Arabic scripts reads “Kuwait Jadeed” (lit: New Kuwait).
A meal was served during the flight, but I honestly don’t remember much other than the iconic “Koka Kola” Arabic script on the bottle.
The flight probably took around 5 hours or so, and it was already dark when we landed. Again we took the bus into the terminal. Apparently there wouldn’t be any outbound flight to Amman for the day, but I still had no idea what’s going to happen. As we entered the terminal, all carry-on luggages were screened by a huge X-ray machine. It’s the Persian Gulf after all.
The small hall before visa collection was filled with exhausting and unhappy passengers, arguing with the front desk about the delay. The vast majority of us had missed our connecting flights and were stranded in Kuwait tonight. When I finally got a chance to squeeze through the crowd to reach a rep at the front desk, she offered me a hotel voucher for the night right away. I didn’t realize it was standard airline procedure then, so was super excited with this great and unexpected deal.
Now looking back as a more seasoned traveler, I am a big fan of layovers, intentional ones or not, as they offered some of my best travel stories. It was quite a pity I couldn’t actually enter the country though. Kuwait offers evisa to most Western passport holders, but turns out to be one of the most difficult countries for Taiwanese to visit. There doesn’t seem to be an option to apply for a tourist visa, and the business visa is a lot trickier. Otherwise Kuwait, given its size, would make an optimal 1–2-day stopover trip.
Left: precious Starbuck mugs for Wiew; Center: Kuwaiti children who just returned home from an international event?
The rep at airport accompanied us on the bus to the transit hotel. The hotel was named “Safir”, which apparently was originated from the root for the Arabic word for “travel” (s-f-r). Upon entering the hotel, all luggages were screened through a huge X-ray machine again. The hotel was technically in the airside transit area, but we were still asked to hand in our passports to the front desk until the following morning.
It was quite a luxurious hotel to a budget traveler like me at the time. Kuwait Airways also provided free dinner and breakfast (pictured) for the next morning. An otherwise perfect night — except for my knee that still hurt from the accident in Sri Lanka this morning. The rep at the airport was eating too. He must have been exhausting too.
The airport taxiway could be seen from the window, and I was amazed to spot the Boeing 747 with “State of Kuwait” written on it.
Thus, I slept for one night in Kuwait unexpectedly, which also turned out to be the only night in my entire round-the-world trip to stay in a hotel. Kudos to Kuwait Airways for all the perks (if only I had credit cards with delay insurance coverage at the time…..). Really hope next time I have a chance to fly Kuwait, I could really enter the country, walk around, see some sites and see how people live their lives there. Perhaps at least give us evisa options like most other countries sometime before 2035?
