So, it's Saturday morning again. Roger's doing his zen practice and I'm sitting near an open window listening to a few birds singing and that's all. The feeling reminds me of the quiet of the farm in Glen Nevis.... ultra-soft breezes in a quiet world. Actually, except for the traffic on the roads and the obscene crowds at the malls, Doha is quiet. I am very relaxed here, even at school where I am very busy. But things move along there and when we leave we go out to a quiet world. Roger, who drives a lot, might not agree because every time we are on the roads we are close to having an accident. Yesterday, our friend Judy was sure that someone tried to force her off the road because she's a woman. I guess assumptions can't be proven though.
We're starting our "Coming Home" List. Is there anything that anyone wants us to bring....?
Today, we're going down to the Souq Waqif (the new old souq) to look for Christmas gifts. Strangely, they do have Christmas lights and decorations etc. They are very good at getting what the ex-pats want. Ex-pats make up 80% of the population here and want their things from home. We have learned where to go for British foods and American foods... I think Canadian foods are considered American. Sometimes our favorite cheese will be there and the next 3 times it will be no where. Sour cream seems to be a problem. This week we have lots of business to do... I have to get my driver's licence and we have to go to the Liquor Distribution outlet and Roger has to apply for his exit visa for Christmas. He is pretty good now at knowing how to get places. He found a shorter, more efficient way to get to Villagio (huge mall!). This mall has Starbucks and Virgin books (the only bookstore with English books) and very high-end stores from all over the world like Monsoon and Oasis as well as very very very expensive jewelry and home stores. There is a canal inside with gondolas and gondoliers, and a skating rink... and a croissant costs over 2 dollars. Another striking thing is the huge number of EXPENSIVE stores for children. These babies are cared for by maids as their parents shop... the maids wait patiently outside stores, go in and take the bags and follow them from store to store.We went to a talk at VCU (Virginia Commonwealth University) last Monday by an American from seattle named Chris Jordan. He's a photographer on a mission to expose the effects of 'consumerism' and waste in the states. He takes statistics like how many aluminum cans are thrown away every minute and creates a photograph that uses that many cans. They are huge canvasses with a sad message. He had been in Doha only a day and with intense passion he asked the Qatari people to reject this SUV consumerism... to take a different path than the USA. He said they still have time to do this. But he hasn't seen the malls... the SUVs on the roads, the clothes in the stores, the garbage on the beaches and on and on. We (who are also not experts) believe that it is too late for them. One of my students said his family has 30 Toyota Landcruisers and Ferraris and Mercedes and Cadillacs and 2 private jets and private yachts and 'farms' all over the world. His father has gone for surgery in Germany. Every time we go out to eat (which is what we do with others) we spend over $150. There are less expensive places and we do try to go there. Today at the Souq we'll eat at an Iraqi restaurant that will be delicious...the best hummus we've ever had with delicious Iraqi bread....huge grilled pitas (about 1 1/2 feet in diameter). There is also an Art Gallery that we want to visit...an exhibition of Syrian artists.
6 hours later....We're back from the Souq. It wasn't at all crowded and we had a great lunch at the Iraqi restaurant...for 4 of us it was about $70. That is a marked difference from the Four Seasons Hotel last weekend where lunch cost just Roger and me over $150.00 and all I had there was a club sandwich!!! We found a few little things to bring home... very Arabic things... but it closed at around 1 pm and won't open again until 4 or 5 pm. Then it will be very very crowded. Roger took us on an expedition out to the sea about 1/2 hour away. It was so very quiet out there. We saw some Qatari girls playing in the sea wearing their abayas. They were having more fun than any young people we have seen here.Today for some reason, we've been more aware of the quiet world we live in. We live out of the city and sometimes feel isolated from the real Doha but there is much construction going on...maybe there is nothing like hills to hold the sounds in... the desert just goes on and on. It's getting dark now and we are going to watch a movie... then 3 weeks to go and we'll be home. School starts again tomorrow... then we have exams next week, then parent interviews the week after that and then we fly home!!! Hurrah. xoxoxoxoxo
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Saturday morning
It's my Saturday morning (written on 8th November)(Friday here) and life feels quite normal. Roger has gone out birding with friends ( I declined the invitation). They will see Flamingos among many other species. This morning we slept in until nearly 6 am. and had good Bodum coffee (Starbucks). We really can get almost anything we want or need at the big stores here.
One, The Family Food Center, is our current favorite...we drive over when the traffic isn't at its worst and buy a bag of chips or something like milk....the other day a completely covered woman asked me for help finding some sour cream. Her English was excellent but we never found sour cream...not this week I guess. Their choice of nuts is the best we have found. That's something I suppose. It is around what we call the 'scary roundabout' though so it takes lots of courage
to make the trip and we always breath sighs of relief when we get home. We prefer here to the big malls (3 of them) that rival malls anywhere. We are actually uncomfortable going to them because they have what are called "Family Days" when the 'bachelors' who are the labour force are not allowed in. The security stops them at the door. We think we should each bring them in as a part of our 'family'. The maids and servants have to go in though to carry bags.
Last night after school Roger and I drove downtown (the traffic, the traffic) to the Tennis matches. The top 8 women in the world are playing here in a new stadium finished almost overnight because construction wasn't even close to being completed 2 weeks ago! They do work 24 hours, 7 days a week. Luckily Roger knew where he was going because the parking was a mess. We got lucky though and parked fairly closely to the ticket booth. Tickets were only 10 Rihals (about 3 $) because all the best seats were reserved. When we asked to buy tickets they sent us and many others in free. They had airport security inside but none of us had tickets. However, they had forgotten to let the ushers know that we didn't need tickets so we had to explain over and over again why we were allowed to find a seat and watch the matches without tickets. It was bizarre. Our seats were great. We were able to see the sweat and hear the grunts. So we watched Jancovic and Kusnetsova play and then Venus and Serena Williams...free! The tickets for the semi-finals (Saturday) and the finals (Sunday) are apparently sold out, but I think we could go down and get in easily. It was the biggest party atmosphere we have felt here. It was almost as chaotic as Trinidad but was missing the music and the rum.
We watched the election results at school with our students who were mostly Obama supporters because he will take the troops out of Iraq. They also worry a little bit about a war with Iran that would be catastrophic for the Gulf area. Their fathers are hugely wealthy businessmen mostly with holdings all over the world. A couple of them are major shareholders in Bombardier for instance and the students have spent time in Quebec with their parents. The class system is
entrenched and everyone knows and accepts their place in it. They are so amazingly aware of the need for education in order to retain their position in the world. They know that money is not going to be enough when their oil and gas supply is gone but they also know how much money they have. They talk (the students) about their 30 Land cruisers and their Rolls Royces and show us their gold watches and cell phones (over $10,000 US) and talk about never having to line up for a plane...they get driven out to the plane on the runways. It would be impossible for them to fly economy anywhere. There are so many rules and prohibitions.
This morning, I am sitting near an open window listening to the birds. It is so very quiet most of the time and now the heat is gone. It's about 25 degrees and the wind is gentle. Now, when I leave for school around 5:30 am the sky is bright pink and red and the air is, if not cool...at least not hot. The only sounds we will hear this morning are the sounds of the call to prayer. There has to be a mosque within a 5-minute walk from your home so there are many mosques within our view. A lot of people have their own mosque within their compound which also has 2 or 3 smaller homes for the wives. Each wife has her own home that is a replica of the main house. There are many things that are not a part of our culture but we are not here to change theirs. The system runs well for them. We are definitely not part of their world. It is next to impossible to become friends with one of the 'families'...to get to know them. They value their traditions and guard against change.
The situation at school is not much different from any school I've been in. The admin team is usually wrong,etc. The teachers are overworked, underpaid, underappreciated, and generally perfect!!! I try to stay under the radar as much as I can but being me I can't help getting involved in some of it. I am trying to back away from conflicts though...smiling lots. The teaching is hard. Some of my grade 12 students have reading comprehension scores at the kindergarten level! No one has a comprehension score above grade 6. They don't want 'baby' stuff to read... but they can't read text that is even newspaper level. I am working on sentence structures and verb tenses right now. It's a tough job. I do like teaching though!
I miss you all....We'll be home in less than a month now.
One, The Family Food Center, is our current favorite...we drive over when the traffic isn't at its worst and buy a bag of chips or something like milk....the other day a completely covered woman asked me for help finding some sour cream. Her English was excellent but we never found sour cream...not this week I guess. Their choice of nuts is the best we have found. That's something I suppose. It is around what we call the 'scary roundabout' though so it takes lots of courage
to make the trip and we always breath sighs of relief when we get home. We prefer here to the big malls (3 of them) that rival malls anywhere. We are actually uncomfortable going to them because they have what are called "Family Days" when the 'bachelors' who are the labour force are not allowed in. The security stops them at the door. We think we should each bring them in as a part of our 'family'. The maids and servants have to go in though to carry bags.
Last night after school Roger and I drove downtown (the traffic, the traffic) to the Tennis matches. The top 8 women in the world are playing here in a new stadium finished almost overnight because construction wasn't even close to being completed 2 weeks ago! They do work 24 hours, 7 days a week. Luckily Roger knew where he was going because the parking was a mess. We got lucky though and parked fairly closely to the ticket booth. Tickets were only 10 Rihals (about 3 $) because all the best seats were reserved. When we asked to buy tickets they sent us and many others in free. They had airport security inside but none of us had tickets. However, they had forgotten to let the ushers know that we didn't need tickets so we had to explain over and over again why we were allowed to find a seat and watch the matches without tickets. It was bizarre. Our seats were great. We were able to see the sweat and hear the grunts. So we watched Jancovic and Kusnetsova play and then Venus and Serena Williams...free! The tickets for the semi-finals (Saturday) and the finals (Sunday) are apparently sold out, but I think we could go down and get in easily. It was the biggest party atmosphere we have felt here. It was almost as chaotic as Trinidad but was missing the music and the rum.
We watched the election results at school with our students who were mostly Obama supporters because he will take the troops out of Iraq. They also worry a little bit about a war with Iran that would be catastrophic for the Gulf area. Their fathers are hugely wealthy businessmen mostly with holdings all over the world. A couple of them are major shareholders in Bombardier for instance and the students have spent time in Quebec with their parents. The class system is
entrenched and everyone knows and accepts their place in it. They are so amazingly aware of the need for education in order to retain their position in the world. They know that money is not going to be enough when their oil and gas supply is gone but they also know how much money they have. They talk (the students) about their 30 Land cruisers and their Rolls Royces and show us their gold watches and cell phones (over $10,000 US) and talk about never having to line up for a plane...they get driven out to the plane on the runways. It would be impossible for them to fly economy anywhere. There are so many rules and prohibitions.
This morning, I am sitting near an open window listening to the birds. It is so very quiet most of the time and now the heat is gone. It's about 25 degrees and the wind is gentle. Now, when I leave for school around 5:30 am the sky is bright pink and red and the air is, if not cool...at least not hot. The only sounds we will hear this morning are the sounds of the call to prayer. There has to be a mosque within a 5-minute walk from your home so there are many mosques within our view. A lot of people have their own mosque within their compound which also has 2 or 3 smaller homes for the wives. Each wife has her own home that is a replica of the main house. There are many things that are not a part of our culture but we are not here to change theirs. The system runs well for them. We are definitely not part of their world. It is next to impossible to become friends with one of the 'families'...to get to know them. They value their traditions and guard against change.
The situation at school is not much different from any school I've been in. The admin team is usually wrong,etc. The teachers are overworked, underpaid, underappreciated, and generally perfect!!! I try to stay under the radar as much as I can but being me I can't help getting involved in some of it. I am trying to back away from conflicts though...smiling lots. The teaching is hard. Some of my grade 12 students have reading comprehension scores at the kindergarten level! No one has a comprehension score above grade 6. They don't want 'baby' stuff to read... but they can't read text that is even newspaper level. I am working on sentence structures and verb tenses right now. It's a tough job. I do like teaching though!
I miss you all....We'll be home in less than a month now.
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Camping & Camels
There is something thoroughly romantic about camping in the desert. Evenings are (relatively) mild, night skies are crystal clear, & there are no bugs. What more could one want? Sixteen of us headed west on Hallowe’en towards Dukhan & the Rasa Brouq peninsula which is said to provide the best camping in Qatar. Our convoy consisted of four SUVs (all four-wheel drive) & two saloon cars. As we turned off the highway onto the desert track that would eventually lead to the beach where we would set up camp, it was immediately clear that the saloon cars would not make it all the way. After a couple of kilometers we abandoned the cars, one with its passengers (family of four), the other with all its gear, to wait until two empty SUVs could return to pick them all up. So we traveled on, sometimes on well worn tracks & sometimes just plunging across the desert. After another half hour or so we saw a small village on the horizon with a mosque surrounded by houses & old stone huts. What a surprise when we discovered that this was a set built in 2000 by Qatar Television for the filming of a series called “The Sons of the Wolf” (“Eial al Deeb”). This soap-opera style movie was set in the Qatar of five hundred years ago & the set was designed to last ten years, with the hope that more movies would be made there. Still waiting! On we went & reached our camp site fifteen minutes later. “Camp site” is a bit of an overstatement. There are no facilities, no electricity, no water, & you have to bring your own wood if you want a fire. Eventually, everyone was reunited with their gear & we had a couple of hours to swim, set up tents, & begin preparing supper. The water of the Arabian Gulf was the best we’ve been in since we came to Qatar & we made the most of the opportunity. Food was plentiful & well cooked over the open fire (wood & charcoal) & we sat around the fire at the edge of the water & just talked & listened to a guitar. We even ate smores! The night was so pleasant & we had a great sleep, waking to a splendid sunrise which heralded a full breakfast with oranges, French toast, & very good coffee. We had to be back in Doha by noon so packed up early & shuttled back to our saloon cars. Luckily there was a GPS with us, otherwise we would have had real problems trying to find the car in the shimmering heat of the desert. Just before we rejoined the road we came across a group of camels & made the most of their tameness for some good photo ops. They are not wild & do belong to someone but spend most of their lives wandering freely over the desert. A fitting end to a wonderful trip.
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