We sit on one of the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world. We have the budget, the land, the geographic position. And somehow we’ve managed to turn all of that into a country that feels, on most days, like it’s running on autopilot toward nowhere.
Not failing. Not collapsing. Just stubbornly refusing to grow. Refusing to ask more of itself. Settling into a comfortable mediocrity while the rest of the region builds skylines and systems and ambition out of the same sand we’re standing on.
The infrastructure is failing. The schools are frozen in time. The government has perfected the art of appearing busy while nothing moves. And the businessmen, the same families, the same names, the same contracts, have built a system so perfectly sealed that ambition from the outside doesn’t stand a chance.
But what breaks me isn’t the broken systems. It’s the broken will.
Because when you actually try, when you show up with an idea, with energy, with a genuine desire to make something better, people look at you like you’re the problem. “Why would you do that? What’s the point?” As if caring about where you live is somehow embarrassing. As if the highest aspiration available to us is a salary, the weekend , and a flight out every few months.
We wave the flag louder than anyone. We perform Kuwait on National Day like it’s a production. And then we go home and live entirely for ourselves, for family, for tribe, for the next vacation, and call it a life.
Patriotism here is a costume. You wear it twice a year and hang it back up.
We have everything we need to be exceptional. We’re choosing, every single day, not to be.