Yashmagh

Qatari men, like most men in the Arab world wear head gear known as yashmagh. It consists in Qatar of three pieces the names of the individual pieces I am unsure of. There is a skull cap which is then covered by a large sheet or towel. This is held in place by two circular bands. Some of the bands have long tails hanging down the back. Qatari men wear a red and white sheet or just a plain white. We were unsure of the meaning of the different variations so I asked a colleague of mine to explain. It was quite simple in the end. The red and white sheet is the winter sheet. It is made of cotton and so is slightly heavier. The white sheet is a much lighter material and being white reflects the sun better, making it cooler in warmer temperatures. The tails are just degrees of formality and to some extent personal preference. Men wear their yashmagh with pride and take care to keep it looking tidy. It was interesting last week when the temperature suddenly jumped from high 20s to high 30s there was an almost overnight transformation of the group I am associated with from red and white to white.

New Foods

While a couple of the team went to the souks to pick up some clothes they were having made the lads went for a wander to look at the falcons. After an hour of so we decided to stop for a drink in one of the many eateries in the souk area. We sat up on the roof of one of the restaurants drinking Perrier. I decided to have a look through the menu, not that I was hungry, just more out of interest. The first couple of items that caught my attention were liver, kidney and brain sandwiches. This was quickly surpassed by the Camel Kofta. the highlight, which I ordered for the experience was the camel foot with chick peas. It came in a wonderful tajine and was well spiced. For the record... the meal was consumed.

Cover Up

I went to one of the big malls during the week. I needed a new belt and tie pin so had a wander around. It coincided with the opening of a new department store in the mall so thought I would try my luck in the new shop. It was 5 to 6 and the opening was to occur at 6 o'clock so decided to wait around and see if I could pick up an opening bargain. Outside the shop a large crowd was forming. It was predominately woman in abaya with their children. I felt decidely uncomfortable being a single male. While there were other men around they were with their families. So I moved slightly away. What I found interesting was that there were western woman in the crowd also. While they were appropriately dressed from a western sense I felt they needed to cover up. This was further highlighted this evening walking down the corniche. A young woman was running along in tights and a three quarter skin tight top on a Friday evening. The one evening that many of the male workers have off and congregate down near the water. It felt totally inappropriate. I not sure if I'm becoming a prude or whether I believe that as visitors to this country we should respect the cultural beliefs of our hosts.

The Sand Course

We were given the opportunity to try out the sand course, which is a half hour drive south of the city. I had spoken with someone here about the course so was really looking forward to the opportunity. The temperature was around 35 degrees the day we played with a gentle "Wellington" wind blowing. I had a need to go to the loo when we got there but chose to carry on. During the course of the round (9 holes) I drank 4 bottles of water (2.4 litres) and completely lost the sensation to go to the loo. It was if my body reclaimed every possible ounce of fluid it could muster! We will try and play a game in the height of summer just for the experience (on the grass course) of playing in 50 degree heat.

The fairways are rolled and you take a small green circle of artifical turf with you. If you land on the fairway you are able to place our ball on the turf to play off. You play with yellow balls as these are higher visibility. There were water hazards on the course. The water table is very close to the surface so salt water forms craters around the course. If you land in the rough you have to play the lie, although you can move the ball with your club within a foot radius. The rough is rubblely sand and I took the opportunity to purchase on advice an extra club to be used in the rough. After nine holes he club is scratched and dinged. It has then a hammering. (note: I was sharing the universal rough club with my playing partners and only required a few occasions myself :-) )The greens are called browns and are slightly elevated. They are made with sand and oil (two resources they seem to have plenty of). They are packed hard and a fie layer of sand is spread over the surface. They are beautiful to putt on. t was a great experience which I hope to have again before I leave

The Inland Sea

We went for a day trip to what is known as the Inland Sea last weekend. It is in the south eastern corner of the country and close to where Saudi Arabia and UAE connect. The road took us two thirds of the way while the rest of the journey was over sand dunes. This was a great trip and while you may of seen in a previous video post some of the exploits of the local population in the dunes our trip, while thrilling was not as high risk. To get over the dunes they travel at up to speeds of 80-90kms and when you reach the crest of the dunes you are still travelling pretty quickly. There isn't a universal system for travelling around the dunes so you can at any point in time have another 4WD or dune buggy, motorbike coming head on the other way.

Al Corniche

Julia's Taxi Ride

What you do on your day off

City of Cranes

Driving out to the golf club to watch the rugby we passed a new area of development. The picture represents a common scene in Doha - construction. It is thought that the city is growing by close to 20% a year. For those who struggle with maths that means that the city is increasing in size by 1 fifth every year. From what we see as we drive around this figure is very accurate.

Team Medical

We had a fantastic experience when we went for our health checks as part of getting our work permits. Steve had organised for us to go on Thursday morning and had warned us that it would take several hours for the process. We arrived at 7.30am and had to wait for Steve to turn up with the paperwork and our passports. The building is segregated so we stood in the middle. We were approached by a Qatari gentleman whom I greeted. He wanted to know who we worked for and why we were waiting. Steve turned up as we conversed with him. He told us to follow him. It turned out that he was the Director General at the commission and so he took us and organised for us to have our examinations. These were completed in 15 minutes. Steve had left us as he thought it would be hours before we would be finished. He couldn't believe it when we rang. We were invited into his office to share coffee while our blood test results were processed. The commission handles approximately 2500 people per day and is testing the equivalent of half the entire resident population of the country each year. He was a fascinating man who was genuinely helpful. He was also very proud of his organisation and what they were achieving. We were very privileged to get such an insight

Day Off

Friday is the day off for most of the construction workers here in Doha. Buidling construction comes to a stand still, as does most things on Friday during the day. Behind our hotel is a large carpark area. Many of the Indian community play cricket in the carpark. There can be as many as 10 or 12 games going at once, all over lapping. Many of these men have their families back home and are working here to support them.

Lost in Translation

Sometimes things happen and you’re not sure whether it is a random event, the way things work around here or something that is lost in translation. Julia didn’t get very much sleep on Thursday night. She got a call at 2.45 am from the people down in the laundry to tell her that it was ready and that it was outside her door. She stumbled out into the corridor to find it sitting there all neatly folded. Exhausted she went back to sleep only to be woken by the phone ringing at 6.30am. This was here wake up call from last Wednesday. Something got lost in translation. The service is great just sometimes foreign to us.

On Friday morning I collected my laundry up and placed it in the bag and filled out the forms. I forgot to ring them to come and collect it before I went out to watch the Crusaders play. Got back from the rugby and had to get ready for our desert trip. Couldn’t find my laundry bag anywhere. Came back late that night after trip and there it was all cleaned, folded and put away. ☺

A Wealthy Country

A picture is worth a 1000 words.

A dust storm in the background

For you Ailish

We went to visit a hotel called La Cigale. In the foyer they have this wonderful food section including chocolates. Yes Ailish that wall is large glass containers of chocolates. I have tried to capture people in the bottom of the picture so that you get a sense of the scale of the glass containers

Did you enjoy the salad??

We ate at one of the restaurants at the hotel. It was Morrocan. We had the chef's special which included a wonderful salad. This came to the table as a series (7-8) of small dishes ( a meal in itself). we worked through the dishes and were able to identify most of the dishes. One dish we were stuck on. I thought it was a goat curd of sorts. Chewy yet not quite cheese. After having several mouthfuls in my attempt to identify the dish I sought advice from our waiter. "That dish sir is lamb brains...did you enjoy?"

The Hotel

We’re in this wonderful 5 star hotel until we move to our apartments. It was great to get laundry done and connected to the net. We're not sure how long we'll be here as accommodation is at a premium. We'll make the most of it while it lasts. The hotel staff are great as they now know us by name down to if we like tea or coffee with our breakfast. We were at dinner last night and John had to shoot away before we had finished to make his Skype call with Kay. We were just finishing off with a green tea. He gets a knock on his door five minutes later... they had brought it up to his room so that he didn't miss out.

Settling In

We’ve been here four days now. Apart from constant thoughts of Kim and the kids (and of course the team from school ☺) I have felt very comfortable in this country. The team here have been fantastic. With our late arrival they have had to rethink the induction for us. We’re pretty resourceful as a team so are slowly becoming more and more independent. Damian and Stuart have been exploring the city while we go to the office so are finding there way around. They have done most of this walking, which is an uncommon sight for westerners in this city

Myths Debunked

Myth 1: A desert is not all sand dunes. Doha appears to be built more on rock than sand. It’s rubble-like in nature and not at all like the classic desert (the sort with large sand dunes) I had expected. These are a long drive out of the city. We hope to get out there next weekend so will post photos.

Myth 2: Sandstorms are not like in the movies. We have had a couple of sand storms since we have been here. I got a text from Lynley asking how we were enjoying our first sand storm. We thought it was fog. It looked like clouds / fog in the distance rather than stinging sand in the face. There is no sand flying in your face its more like a very fine dust. I found I needed to wear my reading glasses inside once I had been out, but wasn’t sure if this was due to the dust or the air con.

Life is Good

Doha feels very safe. I feel very comfortable in the city. I went for a walk on my first day here. We were in a different hotel (that is another story) down near the souqs (shops / markets). It is truly a wonderful mix of cultures. I watched as a ute with six people in it dropped a wheel as they passed through an intersection. Sparks flew and there was this sound of metal on road. They all got out in turn and inspected the damage. It appeared as if this was a regular occurrence. My initial impression of this place is an acceptance of cultures. If you accept some basic principles of Islamic living (no alcohol) then life here is good.

First Impressions

Doha is developing. Never have I seen so much construction going on in one place. Be it skyscrapers, houses, commercial buildings or roads. It is all happening right across the city. It feels like a race and it’s happening quickly. There is not the red tape you would find back home. Construction is a little different so the life of a building is a lot shorter also.

But wait there's more!

Plane breaks down and so we have two nights in Melbourne (watched some water skiing on the Yarra). We get up this morning at 3-00am to catch a bus at 4 to the airport. A random 200+ people arrive simultaneously to a queue for the flight. It was dependent upon how your bags came out of the buses or whether you joined the flight in Melbourne so just turned up from home. My team jumped the gun so I end up 3rd to last in the line (it took two hours to check in). Behind me was a nurse from Lower Hutt, who happened to live in the umu for 18 years and a young woman from Melbourne… As I discovered through our lower hutt conversation the young woman had lived in Wellington for 5 years before moving with her husband to Aussie. Now she is obviously European by her accent…. Can you guess where this is going Ailish? Where are you originally from?? “Serbia”… you wouldn’t happen to know Sasha and Sandra M? I haven’t met them but know the name and know of them.. What’s the chance??

Two Degrees

John is one of the team on this trip. Never met him before, wasn’t sure who he was so did a google (that’s for you matt!) and found out he lived in the valley.

So there I was playing interclub two weeks before I was heading out. Played a guy named Bruce from Shandon. Got to talking re jobs etc and I explained my plans for spending some time in Qatar. His response … you going with John, he’s our club captain…one degree. So get to the airport and see a guy checking in with clubs. Put two and two together and sure enough I approach him at the baggage claim and meet John. So I’m sharing this story on six degrees with John and Damian over a drink waiting to board the plane. The conversation gets to some reference to Greymouth (I think we were originally talking roads) and John indicates his connection with the place. I explained my dad came from that way and that my grandfather was a lawyer there as well the family ran the totes at the Greymouth races. John’s reply was “yeah they were manual totes and your grandfather ran the totes right up the coast. Two degrees.

Melbourne

Each step of the journey takes you in a more culturally diverse environment. Melbourne is far more multicultural than Paraparaumu or Putaruru. Walked into town after a late breakfast of foods we will see little of in the coming months. Caught the tram uptown to Victoria Market. I’ve been for visits here everytime I come to this city. A great place to people watch as well as see and hear the food sellers in action. Wandered back through town and spent an enjoyable afternoon with Damian and Colleen on the Southbank with drinks and music followed by a slow walk back to the hotel along the river bank, taking in the water skiing jumping and other interesting sites. Will get to our destination eventually.

Trouble in Transit

It's 9am in the Hilton in Melbourne and I shouldn't actually be here. The balloons have just landed in the park. Had three hours sleep from the time I was able to communicate with those waiting to pick us up at the other end so I may "relax" a little on the flight to Dubai. We should be somewhere over the Indian Ocean at this time. Two guys tinkering on the engine for a couple of hours couldn't solve our problem so the flight was cancelled. As the sign says "relax"