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“It must be **** being an expat…. Walking down the street feeling unsafe and unsure of how the day might go”

That’s the comment one of our readers left on the last blog post. How ironic.

Yesterday, I, the Indian expat, was walking down the street with the wife after a fantastic day of bumming around old Salmiya. Marina Mall was about half a kilometer in front of us and we were intending on grabbing some cold drink to ease the heat a bit. All in all a very good mood.

Suddenly we hear a commotion to our left, on the road. A Kuwaiti teen has slammed the door of a taxi, and is jumping and prancing about gleefully. He is literally jumping and laughing as he hurls various well known arabic insults at the Pakistani Taxi driver. From what I surmise, it is obvious that the kid has not paid his taxi fare and he is mocking the taxi driver, humiliating him in public. The taxi driver gets out and yells at the boy, the boy is still laughing and literally dancing, clapping and grabbing his crotch as he mocks the taxi driver. All those famous Kuwaiti swear words about mothers and mother’s anatomies are being spouted with a wide, shining smile.

A passing teen smiles as he sees the scene. He asks the other boy what’s happening and then they both end up laughing as if this is the funniest thing in the world. This smelly brown person is angry because he expects money for his work and that is frickin hi-la-rious! The first boy then goes up to the taxi driver in a threatening way, and the taxi driver leaves in a hurry.

I am standing right there with my wife, my fists clenched in anger at this mockery and humiliation.

But I’m invisible to these kids. After all, I’m just part of the servant class - the servant class that works but needs no money, and exists otherwise only to provide as amusement. Been there. Done that.

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Article in Human Rights Paper a while ago (edited for brevity)

Hasina, one of 70, 000 Bangladeshi workers in Kuwait, works from dawn to 2 a.m. Taking care of nine children, their parents and grandparents, cleaning, washing and feeding the children. She was illegally moved from one house to another –relatives and friends of her employer– to clean and cook with not one free day. For all that work load she was supposed to get around $90 a month. Yet for over two years Hasina only received three such salaries.

Hasina was beaten repeatedly by her employer’s wife. She either used a thick stick or any other heavy object at hand. The father of the family and his five sons, raped Hasina repeatedly, leading to her pregnancy. On learning of her pregnancy she was taken to the nearest police station and accused of committing adultery.

Hasina wanted to verbally defend herself, or show the officers the numerous bite marks all over her arms and back. “The police officer frowned at me and ordered me to shut up.” she later told her friend.

Hasina has been jailed and is awaiting a court ruling. She is likely to be deported. She, her husband, and family had sold most of their possessions in Bangladesh to finance the trip to Kuwait. Now they are penniless and Hasina will pay the price for being dishonoured and defiled.

The Kuwaiti Ministry of Home Affairs commented on the US State Department report of 2007, “The State of Kuwait opens its arms to those incoming workers and even provides them with all available job opportunities, unlike many other countries which combat and deport them on the grounds of fighting illegal immigration”. Furthermore, Kuwait suggested that the country should be recognised for their outstanding efforts in Human Rights, rather than criticised.

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So I sit here, at work, writing this post
I’m taking a long vacation, longer than my normal vacations, and I’ll be back to blogging soon
For you see, my life is changed now, am no longer single, I’m now married
Some of you may know my lovely wife, her blog is Ra7alah
For […]

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Came across this interesting link. I’m not sure but i guess it’s a recruitment interactive video game website developed for the british army called [Start Thinking Soldier].

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What is Financial Regulation ?

Financial regulations are a form of regulation or supervision, which subjects financial institutions to certain requirements, restrictions and guidelines, aiming to maintain the integrity of the financial system. This may be handled by either a government or non-government organization.

Roles and Goals of Regulation:

1. To enforce applicable laws
2. To prosecute cases of market misconduct, such as insider trading
3. To license providers of financial services
4. To protect clients, and investigate complaints
5. To maintain confidence in the financial system

Source: Wikipedia

Obama’s Financial Regulatory Reform:
Obama has proposed a Financial Regulatory Reform which address five key objectives;

1. Promote robust supervision and regulation of financial firms.
   • Financial institutions which are critical in keeping the market stable should be subject to strong supervision and regulations.
   • New powers are given to the Federal Reserve to supervise all the firms that could pose a threat to financial stability, including those which are not banks.
   • To improve inter-agency cooperation and to identify financial risks, a new council will be formed, called Financial Services Oversight Council.
2. Establish comprehensive supervision of financial markets.




• Additional power to Federal Reserve to oversee payment, clearance and settlement systems of financial systems
• Comprehensive regulation of all over-the-counter derivatives by the Federal Reserve (A type of financial derivative that has its transaction directly negotiated between two parties rather than through an exchange. Some financial derivatives, such as a swap, a forward rate agreement or an exotic option, are usually done over the counter.)
• New requirements for market transparencies, stronger regulation of credit rating agencies.
3. Protect consumers and investors from financial abuse.
• A Consumer Financial Protection Agency will be established to protect consumers across the financial sector from unfair, deceptive and abusive practices.
• Improving the standards of the providers of consumer financial products and services, whether they are a part of a bank or otherwise.
4. Provide the government with the tools it needs to manage financial crises.
• Issues of non-bank financial institutions, whose failure could have serious impacts on the market, to be resolved by an overseeing authority (Federal Reserve)
• Revisions to the Federal Reserve’s emergency lending authority to improve accountability.
5. Raise international regulatory standards and improve international cooperation.
• International reforms to strengthen the capital framework; improving oversight of global financial markets; coordinating supervision of internationally active firms; and enhancing crisis management tools.

As one can notice in the above propositions, that more power has been vested in The Federal Reserve to monitor, control and supervise financial and non-bank institutions.

What will be pros and cons of such a reform and how will such a reform have global impact?

What are the macro effects on the Gulf and how will an individual global citizen affected by such a reform?

To more on the above questions, stay tuned to watch more updates.

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