Robert de Niro and Russian dolls

So before we gallivanted around the Eastern Mediterranean (more of which later), Mr A’s brother, H, came to visit. We showed him all the highlights of this fair city – pointing out the skyscrapers (H: ‘Do you think they’ll turn to each other in 20 years and say “Mate, do you think we went a bit over the top?” ‘), ordering Indian takeaway, lying on the beach etc.

We took him on the compulsory visit to the souq where I found an Arab-family Russian doll: Gulfi man splits in half to reveal his black-abaya-ed wife, who reveals her son in a little white thobe, who has a sister also in an abaya who, finally, seems to have swallowed a capsule shaped camel. You have no idea how excited I was, and am.

I dragged him to a shopping mall where he loved the gondolas, but was particularly taken by the LARGEST SHOPPING TROLLEY IN THE WORLD outside the next door mall.

Of course we also took him to brunch, ate far too much, then rapidly moved in to action as we prepared for the party we had rashly planned that evening. After a speedy zoom round the supermarket and a trawl of backstreets to find the ice factory (cubes, chips or block?), we were ready to set H to work cleaning the kitten room and stocking the fridge while I made dips and Mr A tidied the entire flat. Having not had a party since we arrived we decided to kill many birds with one stone and invite pretty much everyone we knew. I had visions of either a) a fantastic mixture of ages and backgrounds as lots of people milled around our tidy flat sipping chilled white wine or delicious fruit mocktails whilst having fascinating conversations, or b) 6 people standing in our spacious flat trying desperately to find something to talk about since they had nothing in common. Luckily, after a minor blip where Mr A got an urgent work call just as the party was about to start, it all went well. Lots of people came throughout the evening with the mass exodus of parents leaving at 9.30pm replaced by our younger more carefree friends. I drank enough wine to overcome my neurosis about the balcony collapsing under the weight of hoards of people, and found H in the kitchen at 1am teaching an Italian diplomat how to make Seabreezes. A Qatari friend drank copious quantities of red wine (haram) whilst chatting up European women (haram), and everyone ate lots of cake (halal). All in all it was a great success except that my squiffy catering arrangements meant we had 12 leftover baguettes to plough though the following day.

During that week the Museum of Islamic Art finally opened. I will no doubt write more about this later as it is almost impossible for you to imagine how excited we are about this. Not only does it mean there is now a museum in Doha (the ONLY open museum), but it’s actually filled with beautiful things. Really beautiful things. That are more than a couple of decades old. In an amazing building which is well built, and well designed, and open every day, to everyone.

We watched the huge firework display at the VIP opening from the corniche. There was so much gunpowder involved (or whatever the explosives are) that a huge black cloud almost obscured the entire building, but it was still one of the most dramatic and most expensive firework displays I’ve ever seen. One thing this Museum doesn’t need to worry too much about is a lack of funds.

We were lucky enough to be invited to a Symposium during the opening celebrations where the architect I.M. Pei (he of glass pyramids at the Louvre fame) spoke, along with Sheikha Mayasa al Thani (who kept her sunglasses on for the whole event) and her mother, Sheikha Moza (wife of Emir). My name badge was nestling next to Robert de Niro’s on the way in but he didn’t seem to make it.

We went again the following day for the opening of a temporary exhibition, where the Pisa Griffin has been united with another metal animal, both of which are stunning. Apparently this is a Very Big Deal in the Islamic art world. Our friend took us on a little tour of the permanent exhibits and I almost wept at the joy of being in a gallery. I wouldn’t let her take us round all of the galleries because I didn’t want to see too much at once. We’re going to go back on our own and it’s going to be amazing.

So, after a week of almost overwhelming cultural stimuli, manic work for both of us as we tried to clear everything up before going away and mourning for the sleeve of a brand new jumper that the kittens ATE, we jumped on a plane to Cyprus to met Mother and Father Ajnabiya, woefully ignorant of Greek-Turkish issues [to be continued].