Flirting and "Flamingoes"

The horror of the wrinkle cream incident has been counteracted by a work contact saying he thought I was 21.  Whether he did really think this or actually it was a strange flirting compliment / insult is not clear and  I haven't decided what this means his opinion of my professional demeanor is - does he think I have just left school?  Does he not realise it took eight years to be qualified to choose marble colours?  But he said it, and I might just go and tell Little Miss Beauty Serum.  I'm definitely going to drop mention of 'my husband' into more conversations at work.   

Last week I went to a worker 'breakfast'  that was actually at 5pm because they work night shifts, which involved 120 male construction workers, 3 male project engineers, 5 male contractors, 1 male catering supervisor plus me in a room eating sandwiches.  What with a Security guy saying he 'loved giving his business cards to beautiful ladies' and another guy taking at least twice as long as necessary to consider the plan of his office with me, being the only woman on the project is starting to chafe a little at times, but is improved when senior Qatari managers (who I have never met) give me boxes of cakes and leather diaries. 

However, I must remember that my life is always better than that of others here.  The 'tea boy' (a Nepali man in his late twenties who makes coffee and hot chocolate as well as tea) was asking today whether I know of any spare jobs at weekends because he doesn't earn enough money.  He gets around 800 riyals a month (approx $220 or £150) and spends his weekends sleeping and watching TV because he can't afford to do anything else. I don't have a job to give him, though paying him to entertain the cats has crossed my mind.

Speaking of which, the cats pushed our printer/scanner off the table and it no longer works so added to the cost of two jumpers (eaten), one table (may have been small children) and lost sleep (priceless), things are adding up.  

The weather here is (and sorry to be annoying) amazing at the moment as long as you ignore the minor sandstorm blips.  It's mid-20s during the days and over the weekend was almost perfect despite dire warnings from the Qatar Meteorological Department.  They do seem to be the Qatari equivalent of Michael Fish.  We went to Wakra which is a costal village (town really) just south of Doha.  We'd heard about people going there and had visions of a sandy beach packed out with workers on their day off.  At first all we could find was an enormous pile of sand.  Like seriously ENORMOUS, about 20 metres high, with a bulldozer zooming along the top.  Then we found some police investigating a crash on a dirt track between two cars.  Then we drove off-road past the industrial works and decaying buildings, and found a long deserted beach mostly rocky with the sandy part used as a road by Land Cruisers zooming past.  We drove along for a while before the way was stopped by a mysteriously placed wall covered in graffiti (something of a rarity in inner Doha) advertising email addresses and websites.  Nearby was a blacked-out car with a pair of shoes outside which perhaps contained some people getting up to no good, probably perturbed by me pulling out my camera.

We stopped a bit away from the pimp-mobile to admire the clear blue sky, wade out in the shallows in totally inappropriate footwear and appreciate the flock of large birds hanging out just off the coast.  They looked like flamingoes (pink-ish with bright pink wings when they opened) but my mother-in-law assures us that flamingoes are fresh-water birds so perhaps not; more likely pelicans, Mr A assures me (what does he know?).  Either way they were beautiful and a rare fauna spotting in Qatar watched while eating our picnic, sitting in the boot of our car.

On a lighter note, what the hell is happening in Britain?  When I move away Girls Aloud are a faintly amusing bunch of racist WAGS and now I hear Cheryl Cole is climbing Kilimanjaro for Comic Relief (thanks to daily Facebook updates from G). And Great Britain won the women's bobsleigh world championships?  Cripes.

Short and sweet,

See you soon,

Ms A xx

P.S. There is a little box on the right of the screen of which, in theory, you can type your email address in to and get an automatic email when I post a new blog entry should you be interested.  Let's see how this goes.

Serum and Censorship

Hello,

Well I nipped back to London last week (in an 11 hour journey kind of a way) to see friends, catch up on weddings and hang out with family.  I think I sat next to an arms dealer on one of the flights - he was working on a powerpoint presentation about defence spending in Saudi - though he can't be terribly successful since he was in Economy.  I did all the things I love in London and miss in Doha like drinking copious cups of (normal) tea with my sisters, drinking in pubs, getting wet feet in rain, buying art books, going to exhibitions, visiting architectural salvage shops, buying cakes at Borough Market and eating pies cooked by my Mum.

I am perturbed as I write this.  I have just returned from a shopping trip to stock up on expensive face cream where the sales assistant automatically assumed I required the FINE LINES product. Are people that blunt in London?  I asked whether she thought I needed anti wrinkle moisturiser.  She looked at my face, and declared that it was never too early to start counteracting the signs of ageing!  Cheeky.  To add insult to injury, the anti wrinkle version was about £20 more expensive making it exorbitant rather than merely pricey so I opted for wrinkles.  As I was paying she came rushing up to me with a free sample of Anti-Ageing Serum which implies that she was fearful of my descent into old age.  Or she hopes that I am sucked in by the Serum and spend half my salary on creams from now on.  Her calling me Madam throughout did not soften the blow.

In less personal news, we spent yesterday visiting The Pearl  - 'an island rediscovered' - which is Doha's answer to Dubai's World or Palm(s) .  i.e. not rediscovered so much as invented, reclaimed if you were being generous.  It's still very much under construction and isn't the most beautiful architecture ever.  In fact bits are quite ghastly architecture but as a place to spend the afternoon strolling along the 'boardwalk' (made entirely of concrete) in the sun, sipping hot chocolate it is brilliant (as long as you avert your gaze from the hideous advertising teasers).

I say a stroll - if that seems a bit taxing there are golf buggies to drive you the 50m from your car to the boardwalk.  

All that is currently open is a couple of cafe booths and some banks - once it opens properly we will not be the target market unless we suddenly develop a taste (and the cash) for Armani, Cavalli, Ferrari etc.

Professionally, I have been working almost entirely on a project for a major Qatari gas company which means I spend my days in their office trying to work out how to use their computers and how to obtain a cup of tea.  A request for 'tea with milk' produces a sickly thick liquid, so i now go for 'red tea' which is what I would call black tea with sugar.  As a result of this adventure I have upped my quota of Qatari-contact exponentially and have spent as much time talking to male and female Qataris in the last 3 months as in the previous year.  As everywhere else most are hardworking, focussed and competent; others are not.  All are courteous and straightforward.  Working on a building site highlights that the white thobe men wear doesn't look quite as good with a hardhat as it does with the traditional head-dress, and that a black abaya is the perfect outfit for heavily pregnant women (I hadn't even realised until she stood up). 

I actually sloped off work this morning for a couple of hours in order to go to a lecture at the museum by Oleg Grabar who is the Grand Fromage of Islamic Art and Architecture academia.  I was introduced to him just before the lecture and squirmed whilst he asked me what buildings I was working on - I don't think a curtain-walled high-rise tower cuts it when compared to ancient mosques.  The man is a legend.  Since I went to a lecture last week about Islamic Textiles this place is culture crazy right now.  It can't last.

Off I now go to consider my wrinkles and read The Times, which Mr A gets through his work but is not immune from the censors.......

P.S.  I got the cats castrated.  I felt kind of bad, but they aren't letting a lack of balls affect their ability to whine, be cuddled and break things so don't feel too sorry for them.