Okay I’ll just say it; I have been so self involved that I forgot it was about to be Mother’s Day in the States. Well, fortunately I have a wonderful friend that reminds me of things like this and I had already been shopping in the Bombay Silk Market and was having an outfit tailor made in my Grandmother’s signature purple – made specifically to match the hat she bought while visiting me in Lima and the fabulous purple Peter Kent bag I gave her a few years back for Mother’s Day when I was living in Argentina (when said friend had once again called to give me a warning of the impending holiday).
As the always-absent member of the family these well thought out gifts are extremely important, to my Grandmother. My family is Catholic and she is very active in her church. I’ve been told she loves to say pointing to something I picked up somewhere, “Oh my granddaughter thought this would be perfect for me. She sent it last week from (insert country here).”
I rushed to the silk market that Wednesday morning and thank the goodness her outfit was ready so it was off to the post office. As I mentioned I’d been living in some let’s say red tape nightmare locations so walking in to the main post office in Doha was an awe inspiring experience. Seriously people, I had never seen anything like this before (did I mention I was a long-term contract designer for the United States Postal Service so I know my post offices.)
I was directed to the EMS counter wrote in her address paid and next thing I knew it was Friday and the outfit had already arrived in DC!!!! This gave her enough time wash it and wear it, not to Sunday Mother’s Day mass but my cousin’s wedding, complete with aforementioned purple accouterments collected in South America.
Meanwhile the items I mailed to my mother using the South African equivalent of EMS, 2 weeks prior had yet turn up, but I was covered because Grandma was happy.
Did I mention I love this place!

I want to introduce myself and give you a bit of my background but I think the first thing to be said is this: the following are my personal opinions and personal experiences. As with most blogs and online accounts, I am sure they will be scrutinized and commented upon by those who take a counter position to my thoughts or have completely different encounters, but hey that’s life and I will not engage in commentary arguments.
I arrived in Doha for the second time (not counting layovers) in the beginning of May. My first trip here, in 2006, was brief and I fell in love with the small city. It reminded me in a strange way of home, the ever-present sight of construction cranes, a small physical area but extraordinarily international population. However, I did not move here instead I found myself back in South America, Buenos Aires to be precise.
Nevertheless, this time I plan to stay! Qatar’s overall stability, functioning services and the feeling of personal safety are just too much of an attraction for a woman who spent the first 4 months of the year living in Colombia, South Africa and India—not exactly the safest, most efficient or stablest places on planet. And no, I would never consider returning to America, it’s just not an option. I’ve never really liked it there; except for quick vacations to visit friends and family or take advantage of opposite season cothing sales.
Some other random but non-the-less essential facts to understanding my stories are:

• I speak French, Spanish, Portuguese and Cape Verdean Creole – so I’m prone to meeting and engaging with people who speak limited to no English;
• I have lived in 7 or 8 countries and visited over 40 – so I have become very aware of the fact that I am American but moreover completely enjoy yet respect the fact that I am a guest in someone else’s country;
• I work as a freelance designer, copy-editor and grant writer – so long as there is an internet connection I can work;
• I grew up in Washington, DC – more on that later;
• I’ve been mistaken for just about every non-European nationality – this only happens outside of the US unless I open my mouth and start speaking American English;
• And perhaps most important, I began traveling the world with my parents at 6 months old – so I have a deep wanderlust that does not allow me to be happy working a 9-5 in the States only taking a brief 7 day jaunt once a year to the Caribbean.

I hope that you will enjoy my little tales of life in Doha.

Well, I am a movie buff. I love everything about going to the movies: big screen, opportunity to see the film in company of other people, even the popcorn.

Unfortunately, I’ve had it with cinemas in Doha, and I won’t be going to see the films ever again in this town.

First - it is the mobiles, of course. Attendants in cinemas are usually low-level employees, simply too frightened to ask young Qataris not to talk on the phone. Result is the constant buzz of SMSes and phone rings.

Even if you choose to ignore that problem, or if you go to see the film that will not be interesting for young boys population, there’s the issue of complete, total and absurd incompetence of all operators in all multiplexes in Qatar. And believe me, I’ve tried them all as I simply couldn’t believe this myself.

Cinemas themselves are nice: comfy sitting, new equipment, fine projectors. It is a shear inadequacy of the operators that is mind-boggling. 9 times out of 10, sound will be overcrancked to the point of painful distorsion, surround sound speakers obviously there but the sound still coming only from one (mono most likely) source. Picture quality varies, but is almost never without a problem, too.

Recently, I had a guest here from the US, spending 5 days with me and in this short period I tried to give him a full and accurate picture of what life in Qatar is all about, both good sides and bad. We’ve been invited to the Museum of Islamic Arts for some movie event that was broadcast simultaneously across the world. Couldn’t ask for the better example to give to my friend. Here it was, multi-gazzillion-dollar building, brand new auditorium, fancy visual film. Projection started, from the start it had horrible sound (to be expected), obvious HUGE smudge either on the projector or on the screen itself, blurry picture as if it was aired from VHS tape, to culminate in total blackout about 1 hour into the film. My friend and I had enough, and left before they could’ve restored the pictures, and we managed to get the glance of “operator”, a poor guy staring at the projector, obviously not trained or knowledgeable desperately trying to figure out what went wrong.

Then I realized: watching the movie at home, especially if you have a nice PLASMA / surround setup, is much better film experience than what you will ever get in any cinema in Qatar. I’ll simply wait for new movie Torrents to become available, or, in cases of great movies, get a BlueRay version. This is my advice to you, too, if you care about the movies.

For the last one year, since my family arrived here in Doha, I had to take my daughter to Hamad hospital for her checkups. She was diagnosed with cataract when she was only 1 year old, which was removed while she was back in Pakistan and for the last one year she was wearing those thick glasses.. .. +15 & + 16 number… (Tough & Difficult). Anyhow… when she turned 2, the Ophthalmologist at Hamad asked us whether we want to get her operated again (both of her eyes) to put in the Intraocular Cataract Lens (IOLs) or not … we decided to get her operated so that she gets rid of the thick glasses for the rest of her life.

The operations were scheduled on 17th and 31st May, 2008 in Rumailah. On the 17th of May, we went to the day care center of Rumailah for her Right Eye’s surgery and there in the room, my daughter and 2 more kids were the only patients. We got a bed reserved for her. The nurse asked me to go to the cashier and pay.. They took her at around 9.00 am to the operation theater and she came back after 4 hour… the doctor then told us that the operation took much extra time because he had to properly fix the lens.. but Alhamdo lillah everything went perfect…

On the bed, next to us, there was some Arab kid, who was operated and there came a family to meet him, my Goodness, those people were laughing so loud without caring that they were in the hospital’s operation theater’s area. My daughter was under anesthesia so they were not able to wake her up. I thought I should go to them and ask them to talk in a low tone… but it’s really difficult to ask the locals to do something…

On the 31st of May when we went there at 7.00 for her Left Eye’s surgery, I was shocked to see.. the number of patients waiting there in the small day care center with a few number of chairs and in a room of only 5 beds.. The patients were very small kids to aged people. Some people were standing carrying their kids because there were no more chairs available. The old people somehow managed to get the seats but rest of all were standing. Even the doctors didn’t have any place where they could check the patients

Luckily we went at a time when we easily got a bed for her… so when she was taken for the operation, the other doctors were using the same bed for other patients. There was no arrangement for changing the bed sheets even… And for the next 2 hours we didn’t have any place to sit & wait for her because other patients needed the bed… my God, those 2 hours, we spent moving around… couldn’t sit anywhere…

The nurses there in the day care… were discharging some elderly patients after 10 minutes of their operation to get the bed for the next patient… I couldn’t believe that this is a day care of on Operation Theater… where there was no place for people to wait for their turn, they were moving from one chair to another, with the arrow marks on the eyes - they mark the eye that requires surgery.

Actually what I think happens is, the doctors keep on giving operation dates to the patients on their convenience but don’t check with the hospital whether the hospital can accommodate that number of patients or not. Or at least they should keep a gap of 2/3 hours between two appointments.

Although the health facilities here are better than in some other countries still authorities should look into things like this… where they can increase the level of communication between the hospitals and the doctors to facilitate the patients instead things become difficult.