Dolls and Dunes

Hello,

Well, we all remember the bad patch in November / December last year when I drove into the back of a pick-up unprovoked. You wouldn’t have thought it possible, but the past couple of weeks make that look like a fun time. Firstly, we went for supper with Mr A’s parents in an unbelievably expensive restaurant on their last night here. I ordered the chicken consommé with truffles and posh mushrooms. It arrived. Tasty, I thought, I know what, I’ll take a photo of the soup, with the table, all the glasses, the candles. So pretty. And then I dropped my camera in to the bowl, totally submerging it in consommé. I don’t think the waiters training had prepared them for this. The (expensive) camera seems to have recovered but is a little creaky and still smells of chicken.

Then I decided to finally hang up some pictures in our flat. Moving a small table out the way, one of the legs snapped off and the clock on top smashed on to the tiled floor, into a million very expensive pieces. And then to top it all off, I moved my arm while sitting at the computer, and threw a picture frame on the floor. Once again, a million pieces. Luckily I worked my way down in price-order rather than up. Fingers crossed, these things happen in threes and I can now go back to my pre-bull-in-china-shop days.

Mr A’s parents were with us for a week during March, our first visitors. We managed to clear the junk out of one of our bedrooms (how can we have enough junk to fill three bedrooms?) and bought new bed linen to fit the giant-size bed. All very elegant and grown-up, apart from the stench of stagnant water coming from the en-suite bidet which we tried and failed to get fixed until their penultimate day. The man who came to fix it almost didn’t get anything done as he (like others have) walked in to the flat and ground to a halt on seeing our books (of which there are rather a lot). He stood, staring from side to side, saying ‘it’s like a library’. I stood there slightly lamely spewing niceties in inner turmoil. Should I give him a book, because he probably doesn’t have any in his labour camp? Or would that draw attention to the fact that he may not be literate, and is certainly unlikely to be able to read in English? Argh. Luckily, he took the initiative and headed towards the offending bidet.

We went for brunch with the in-laws (a Doha institution, as anyone who lives in Doha will tell you within a hour of talking about what to do on Fridays) and were particularly pleased with the man in the elephant suit who was pursued by small children.

It was actually Good Friday (another glass of Cava, anyone?) and the hotel had put up an Easter-themed display for all to enjoy.

We also went in to the desert on a ‘desert safari’. Mr A had arranged it, and suspected his mum may not enjoy parts, so didn’t tell her anything in advance. Which meant she was unprepared when we drove off the side of a very high, very steep sand dune in a Landcruiser. To be fair, heading at an almost 90 degree angle down some sand, where the Landcruiser is more like a snowboard than a large car, is quite alarming. But also extremely fun. We also went to Khor Al Adaid (the Inland Sea) where you can see Saudi Arabia, and your mobile network thinks you’re already there. The United Arab Emirates mobile networks also think you’re there simultaneously, which is a bit confusing. Our driver was a young Qatari who competed in weight-lifting championships in his youth, but retired because he didn’t want to take huge amounts of steroids any more.

I finally rode on a camel somewhere in the desert, having held out against camels for over a year, because this particular one wasn’t quite as ugly or smelly as most. Then the camel-trainer stood on the back of the camel for ages and made my little adrenaline-filled camel-walk look utterly lame.

In between brunch and deserts we drove to the North-West of the country with Mr A’s parents to find the ‘historic’ Zubara fort – this version built in 1938 no less. It was recently refurbished and is quite a beautiful structure. It’s such a shame that they haven’t kept more old buildings….

In mid March, we went to Damascus for a whistle-stop 48 hours. We are very lucky to have friends who are still there, and they basically organised our whole trip for us – picking us up from the airport, briefing other friends on our movements, organising a barbeque and inviting other friends, giving us their car – the best travel agency you could hope for. Our Syrian friends came round for the barbecue with their 2 year old son who is the most edible small child ever. We all sat around for hours, eating, drinking (I joined them in NOT drinking Arak, they because they’re Muslims, me because it’s disgusting), smoking, playing chess, talking Arabic, drinking tea. R wanted to pray late-afternoon but didn’t know which direction Mecca was so someone found a street map and we tried to work out where was East, while her husband seemed far more focussed on the next cigarette and winning Chess.

We also went to St Patrick’s night celebrations in the Embassy bar and watched Irish dancers (as you do when you’re in the Arab Capital of Culture 2008) and later got very drunk at a friends old-town courtyard house. It was so enjoyable to be back in a city we know really well and we did some high-quality wandering around the old town, bought an Iranian carpet, and tried to store up memories of beautiful old buildings.

We were heartened to see that Assad is still keeping the makers of patriotic banners in business.

Mr A has been busy busy at work. His new building was officially opened by a Minister and he has now been on Al Jazeera twice, as well as entertaining various visitors from the UK, meeting some royal types and going to his first Qatari wedding – lots of handshaking and tea drinking by the men, with the women in an entirely separate (and apparently wild) event in a different building. He’s also having at attack of clumsiness having driven in to a streetlight at work – scratching the car, but more importantly breaking the brand new light, which he eventually confessed to and found out that someone had already already dobbed him in. Then he pulled off a doorhandle to a secure door. Unfortunately, in financial terms, I’m still winning the clumsiness competition.

I’m still working as many hours in 4 days here as I used to work in 5 in the UK. I also continue to bring construction sites to a halt as I attempt to inspect the work in a low-key way. One site I visited last month was still very much under construction so I asked if they had a hard hat I could borrow. The Lebanese manager said he did, but it had been worn by South Asian ‘workers’, implying that it was therefore not suitable. I said I’d prefer a pre-worn hard hat than a major head injury, but his Indian assistant refused to get it for me because it was dirty. I am getting used to attending meetings where the invite email is addressed to ‘Gents’. Luckily the male-bias is balanced out by working with two female architects on a new Church which is good. A site has been identified for it – it’s in Church City of course. The language of building here is also interesting – everything official is done in English, most of the construction managers are Lebanese so speak to each other in Arabic, but the day-to-day instructions are often done in Hindi or Urdu.

Doha had its annual Cultural Festival last month. We visited an exhibition where the Photographic Society put up a load of amateur photos with no labelling of where or when any of them were taken. They also had a display of various old books, with explanatory labelling which enlightened us all.

I continue to have Arabic lessons with my slightly bonkers Lebanese teacher who can’t quite decide whether she loves my colloquial Syrian vocab or is utterly horrified at my inability to speak ‘proper’ Arabic. She didn’t believe me when I said that Mr A spoke good Arabic, so she gave him an oral ‘exam’ when he was unfortunate enough to come home during my lesson. He passed and she declared his Arabic ‘excellent’: phew. On the theme of Arab culture, we headed to the Souq again, where there’s some genuine Qatari dancing on Friday nights. It’s actually fascinating, not least because it’s one of the few times we see anything (apart from abaya-ed women shopping) that equates to local culture. It involves young Qataris (in their long white robes with head scarves) dancing on one leg and spinning around in an almost hip-hop stylee while their head-dresses fall to the floor in the excitement. The other highlight of Souq people-watching is seeing young men greet each other in the street by rubbing noses. Honestly.

The other great news is that I have a new toy – Arab Barbie. Her name’s Jamila (‘beautiful’ in Arabic). She wears an abaya and has henna-ed hands and feet. Curiously her skin is dark until her mid-thigh and then she become pink. Mr A says I shouldn’t be investigating her nether regions.

Until next time… Maa Salame …

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