Happy Holidays!

Is anyone out there? After relying primarily on Facebook status updates to keep in touch with friends and family over the last few months, we've neglected our blog again but aren't sure who is reading it anyway. (If you read this, please say hello!)

We just celebrated our first Christmas in the Middle East, which was different from past Christmases in many respects. For one thing, few of the stores are decorated and even fewer play Christmas music--the closest we came to music while shopping was the call to prayer blasting out of the mosque next door to the electronics shop where I picked up Guitar Hero - World Tour Edition "for Ella." :) The weather is also a lot different, since our high temperatures over the past few days have been in the mid to upper 70s. Perhaps the biggest change is that this was the first Christmas we've spent as a family in our own home since we were always the ones to travel to Missouri from the East Coast.

So how was our Christmas, other than the above differences? In a word, relaxing. After attending Christmas Eve services, we opened our family gifts on Christmas Eve as we had done in the past, and then stayed up until 1 a.m. playing Guitar Hero and Rock Band: The Beatles on the wii. Christmas morning got off to a relatively late start, and Morgan was delighted to find that Santa Claus had brought her an American Girl doll with some accessories and clothes. Since it was just the three of us, we opted against cooking and went to Market by Jean-Georges, located at the W hotel, for their Christmas jazz brunch. After stuffing ourselves on traditional Christmas foods like turkey and less traditional ones like sushi and hummus, and taking advantage of the unlimited champagne refills, we had a very lazy afternoon at home before making evening calls to our respective parents.

We also stayed in Doha for Thanksgiving, but cooked a traditional dinner for a houseful of guests; the menu included a honey-brined turkey, corn bread stuffing with pecans and (turkey) bacon, sweet potatoes, homemade cranberry sauce, garlic mashed potatoes with pan gravy, green bean casserole, beer bread, pumpkin pie, all combined with some very nice French wine.

Another highlight of our fall was a week-long trip to the Seychelles in September for the Eid al Adha holiday. The place was absolutely beautiful, and we kept activities to a minimum other than some snorkeling. Mostly, we lounged by the beach or pool and caught up on reading, frequently with a strong drink in hand.

Here is a recap of what else we've been up to since our last post:

Morgan started a new school year as soon as she got back from Paris in September, and school is going great so far. She has a wonderful South African teacher with 30+ years of experience, who cannot find enough good things to say about Morgan. Morgan continues to make lots of friends, to the point that her music teacher expressed concern at our parent-teacher conference that "Morgan may be too popular." (Apparently other girls fight over who can be in Morgan's group whenever they divide up for class projects.) She is still keeping busy with gymnastics and ballet, both at a fairly serious level (twice a week), and has resumed piano lessons after a lengthy break.

Ella is starting to settle in quite a bit better, due largely to two things. First, she got her Qatari driver's license soon after returning from the summer and now takes the car out on her own a couple days a week. Also, she started an Arabic class that met twice a week through the fall. I've lost count, but I think this is at least the 11th language she has studied, and starting to learn the language has at least made Ella feel like she has some reason for being here.

I have had a busy fall with work. Since the last post, I've had business trips to Turkey, Oman, and Algeria, in addition to trips to Kuwait and Iraq over the summer. The job is going pretty well overall, and while I'm still working hard I enjoy the fact that my hours are much better than at the law firm.

Finally, Serafina (our very large brown tabby) and Lucy (our 7-month-old Boston Terrier) are settling into their new home after arriving in November.

P.S. For anyone who saw the title of my post and thinks I've suddenly become "politically correct"--anyone who knows me well should know there's no danger of that--the title seemed a little catchier than my other choice: "Merry (Belated) Christmas and Happy New Year, in Case I Don't Post in the Next Five Days." :)

Goodbye, Summer

I'm pleased to report that the Rich family is back in Doha after a busy but enjoyable summer, and that we're now getting back into our normal work and school routines so we should be able to post our updates more regularly. Since our last post, we all traveled together to the States for much of July--I returned on the 19th and Ella & Morgan followed on the 29th--where we split our time between the DC area and Missouri. Ella and Morgan came back to Doha for about 24 hours, just enough time to unpack their bags and repack, and then left for Paris. I joined them for the last week of August, which happily coincided with Ella's birthday. After five days or so together in Paris, we took the train to London and spent 2 1/2 days there.

Highlights of the trip to the U.S. included getting Morgan a new puppy, which should be joining us soon in Doha, and spending time with friends in the DC area and family in Missouri. I especially enjoyed going to a minor league baseball game in Springfield, MO, where Ella and I attended college and met each other, and having dinner at one of DC's best restaurants with my friend and former boss Tara, her husband, and Ella. My time in Doha was mostly occupied by work, including business trips that took me to Jordan, Iraq, and Kuwait, but was otherwise uneventful.

Here are a few pictures that sum up the past couple of months.

Morgan Takes a Star Turn

This week was the culmination of a month-long preparation by Morgan and her classmates for their end-of-the-year musical, Three of a Kind. Year 1 through Year 3 students performed their show five times over the course of the last week for parents and administrators as well as the preschoolers and high school students. In the musical, a variety of fairy tale characters in groups of three search the woods for Baby Bear, who has gone missing. Morgan performed beautifully as Wise Woman number 2. As "the big kids," several of Morgan's best friends also had speaking roles: Alicia was Maid number 2 and Sean was Caballero number 2. Ella volunteered behind the scenes on set decoration and makeup with Sean's mom Denise and Riyah's mom Su'ad. The kids celebrated the musical's wrap with a party -- lots of chips, sugary soda and sweets -- I pity their poor teacher that afternoon!

Fun and Games in Doha

Since these posts usually come from an adult point of view, we thought it would be fun to give a little glimpse into the life of an eight-year-old American girl in Doha.  Not surprisingly, Morgan was excited to get all of her toys from home when our container arrived at the beginning of May, but she also has enjoyed finding a few new toys that are unique to the region.  Since a picture is worth a thousand words, here's a little clip that shows two of Morgan's favorite things that we have found so far in Qatar.

The first part of the clip is Morgan's Fulla doll, complete with abaya, saying her prayers.  To a Westerner, the idea of a mass-market toy with overt religious overtones is still a bit jarring, but not necessarily in a bad way--frankly, it seems a whole lot healthier than the body-obsessed toys marketed to young girls back in the States.  The second part, which we found absolutely hilarious, requires a couple of words of explanation since the video quality isn't great.  As noted in the titles, the music playing is a somewhat strange interpretation of the song Axel F (the theme from Beverly Hills Cop).  Also, the little Arab guy riding on the camel is carrying an electric guitar. Only in the Middle East!

Nesting - His & Hers

Our exciting news for the weekend--exciting to us, anyway--is that we finally finished putting together the furniture that we had delivered from the Dubai IKEA a few weeks ago and unpacked the last few boxes.  A few pictures of the fruits of our labor are below.

I've also included a shot of my new power drill, which was indispensable in putting everything together; somehow just having my first power tool for the new place made me feel a little more at home.  The experience of getting the drill was a little bit surreal--we went to a Carrefour hypermarket, which is a lot like a Wal-Mart Supercenter.  The strange part was going from the grocery aisles, where I was walking past locals in thobes and abayas, Indian and Filipino foods, Arabic sweets, and fresh-baked French breads, to the hardware section.  As I headed down the aisle with the power tools, I realized that Randy Travis was playing over the sound system (well, I noticed the fact that country music was playing and the DJ said it was Randy Travis).  Standing there looking at Black & Decker cordless drills, saws, etc., and listening to country music, when I ignored the handful of dual-language English-Arabic labels and the price tags in Qatari Riyals, it seemed like I was back in the Ozarks.

Morgan's Big Night

Last night, Morgan's gymnastics club had the opportunity to participate in a meet with three other Doha-based gyms. This was her first experience in getting scored by judges, and also the first event she had been in where it took more than showing up to get a medal. The gymnasts had to demonstrate 10 skills for the judges, and received a maximum of 2 points for each skill, scored in half-point increments; it took a score of 14 out of 20 to receive a medal. The judging was not easy--perhaps half of the kids from the other gyms received medals. However, thanks to the fine coaching of Shelagh Innes and the talent and hard work of Morgan and her teammates, Morgan and all of the other kids from Gymnastics Academy received medals.

Morgan thought it was cool that the presenter was supposedly a member of the royal family.  She also liked the outfits of the kids who helped with the medal presentation, ornate red and gold brocaded robes, which reminded me of something the Three Wise Men would wear.

A few pictures are below.

Are You Ready for Some Football?

No, we're not talking about American football, although I was momentarily confused last week when Saji, one of the administrative assistants on my floor at work, asked me if I was interested in football.  After a half-second of wondering whether the Redskins were making a world tour, I realized that he was talking about soccer, which is simply football to the 95 percent of the world's population that lives outside the US.  We managed to get five free tickets to the Qatar vs. Australia World Cup qualifier courtesy of Qtel, and went with our neighbors and new friends Sybil and David, who kindly drove us all to the match.  

While the match wasn't a great evening for offense--it ended in a 0-0 draw--we did see several amazing saves.  The people-watching aspect was by far the most entertaining, though.  From our rowdy Australian section-mates (is there any other kind?) to the sea of thobes across the pitch to the Middle Eastern version of a marching band/pep band, it wasn't an experience we'll soon forget.

Below are a few pictures.   Be sure to check out Sybil's blog (http://qatariadventures.blogspot.com/2009/06/qatar-vs-australia.html) for some photos that are a lot better than what we could get with our little point-and-shoot.

 

Watching history

While we don't have any intention of making this a blog about politics, we wanted to write a few lines about our unique perspective on President Obama's speech in Cairo yesterday.  I was fortunate to have the chance last night to hear excerpts from the speech, followed by remarks from the US ambassador to Qatar and then a town hall-style Q&A session at the Brookings Doha Center.

Whatever your political views, the speech was well-written and extremely well-delivered, so much so that a number of people in the crowd last night were already making comparisons to JFK's famous "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech (which I understand was actually "I am a jelly doughnut," but that's another story).  Our ambassador to Qatar is a very impressive man, and he delivered his remarks in Arabic, which was excellent according to the Arab next to me.  However, the highlight of the evening (other than getting to watch portions of the above-described speech) was the Q&A session.

In general, the comments from the audience (which included a large number of Arabs of various nationalities, as well as many Americans and other English-speaking expats) were favorable. Obama's speech especially resonated with the younger members of the audience; at least a couple of college students (one Arab-American and one Arab who had studied in the US) were particularly effusive in their praise for the President.

Some older members of the audience, however, offered some tough and pointed questions even as they also praised the evenhanded and eloquent speech given by President Obama.  For example, a Syrian engineer in the audience took issue with the fact that Obama had mentioned the Holocaust in the speech, as if to link it to the Arab world.  The gentleman acknowledged that the Holocaust had happened, said that he (and most Muslims) considered it a terrible, evil occurrence, but also said that prior to World War II Jews were treated far better in the Middle East than in Europe.  (I'm unfortunately not as well-versed in the region's history as I should be, but I believe that this is generally true.)  His question was essentially why Arabs, and Palestinians in particular, should have to pay such a steep price for the Holocaust by giving up their lands when they had nothing to do with it.  Another Arab in the audience asked why the US--which ostensibly supports democracy and free speech--supports some of the most repressive regimes in the Arab world.  (I didn't hear a response to that one.)

All in all, it was a fascinating and informative exchange, and I feel fortunate to have had such a unique vantage point from which to experience this historical moment. 

Real City!

Last weekend we made our first trip to Dubai. Primarily we went to stock up on armoires so we can actually put our clothes away in our new house, as Dubai is the closest location with an Ikea. Another mom asked me, so did you do anything in Dubai other than shop? Well no, not really, but here's why: as far as we can tell, life on the peninsula revolves around shopping malls. Some are trendy nightspots, like the Madinat Jumeirah, with an array of restaurants. Others are family destinations, such as Dubai Mall, with its indoor aquarium and Mall of the Emirates, home of Ski Dubai. Others are practical, like the one that houses Ikea, a supermarket, an electronics store and an Ace Hardware. What more could you need?

In the tunnel at the aquarium, Dubai Mall

The indoor waterfall at Dubai Mall

Burj Dubai

Souk Madinat Jumeirah

Burj al-Arab

Morgan as Fulla (think Muslim Barbie)

suited up to ski at Ski Dubai, Mall of the Emirates

Settling in and catching up

We have fallen behind in our updates again, but it's not just due to a lack of motivation--rather, we spent the past two weekends moving.  Since the last post, we have moved out of our temporary apartment into a house.  The weekend of May 1-2 we brought a few boxes over to the new house from the temporary apartment, and we spent much of Saturday painting Morgan's room for her Harry Potter/wizarding theme.  (We also had breakfast of biscuits and gravy--minus the pork sausage, of course--with our new friends Sybil & David at Ric's Kountry Kitchen.  Yes, that's a real place in Doha!)

The container arrived on May 3, so I took the day off from work to help get a few basics situated. Ella spent most of that week unpacking, and that weekend we finally brought the last of our things over from the Somerset.  Below are a few pictures of the compound; now that we've gotten ourselves somewhat settled, we will do our best to be a little more diligent in our updates.

 

Two months and counting . . .

It's late in the evening here, but I just wanted to post a quick note because today marks exactly two months since we arrived in Doha.  We now have residence permits for Ella & Morgan, which means that we can start exploring other nearby countries.  (You can't leave while the immigration process is in the works, or you have to start over.)  We will be sure to post updates as we finalize our plans, but I expect that we will travel both to Dubai (UAE) and Oman over the next month or two.

We've also received confirmation on the delivery date of our container, which will be May 3; we are supposed to finalize the paperwork on our lease in the next day or two and take possession on May 1 (inshallah).  Since we'll no longer be walking distance from work, that means that we'll finally need to break down and get a car, so we hope to rent one this weekend.

Here is a picture of the compound where we are planning to live. 

Catching up

It's been a busy week or so due to tax deadlines, our house hunt, etc., so we've gotten a bit behind in our updates. Last weekend we made a day trip to the desert, which was the first time Ella & I had left Doha since our arrival on February 23. Our driver picked us up at 9:00 sharp and drove us south of Doha to Sealine Resort, where we left the paved road and went dune bashing. To the uninitiated, dune bashing involves taking a capable 4 x 4 (the Toyota Land Cruiser is the vehicle of choice) with the tires partially deflated into the desert and driving at high speeds up and down the sand dunes. For anyone who enjoys a good roller coaster ride (I do), it's great fun, but it is not for the faint of heart or anyone with a weak stomach. The video clip at the bottom will give you an idea of what it's like, although it certainly won't convey the full effect. (Disclaimer: it's best to watch the video with the sound at a high volume to hear the revving engine, but I accept no responsibility for the choice of music that is playing in the background. Our driver was very skilled at off-road driving, but I can't say we share his taste in music.)

After a couple of hours of dune bashing, we took a break to swim in the Inland Sea, which separates Qatar from Saudi Arabia, and then went to the tour company's camp site for a leisurely lunch in their tents. Here are a few photos:



























This weekend also has been a busy one. I took Morgan to a movie Friday afternoon to give Ella a break from mommy duties, which was nice for Morgan and me, too. While we were at the mall, we ran into Morgan's new friend Yasmine, an eight-year-old who just moved into our building and attends Morgan's school. Yasmine's mom offered to take Morgan to the movies with them last night, so Ella & I had an impromptu date night and had our first dinner alone in at least three or four months. We went to The Spice Market, a new pan-Asian restaurant in the W Hotel across the street from the Somerset. The food was very good, and more than anything, we enjoyed being able to sit down with a bottle of wine and have a nice leisurely meal without that little person (as lovable as she is) constantly asking if we were ready to go.

Today we went back to the InterContinental for their Friday brunch again, this time with Morgan's new friend Yasmine, my colleague Bertrand (with whom I'd worked years ago in another job), and his wife and kids, who are visiting from Paris for the next three weeks. We took full advantage of the buffet (none of us left hungry), which had a nice mix of cuisines, from French to Italian to Lebanese to Chinese to Japanese, to name a few. After lunch we spent a couple of hours hanging out beside and in the pool, and enjoyed watching Morgan have a good time with her new friends.

Our biggest news for the week is that we've found a house. It's in a complex called Riviera Gardens that is close to Morgan's school and shouldn't be more than a 20-25 minute drive to my office at rush hour, which means it may wind up being a 15-minute drive by the time I come home most evenings. We are scheduled to take possession on May 1, and will be posting more details in the near future.

Where exactly are we, anyway?

Cowboys ain't easy to love and they're harder to hold
And they'd rather give you a song than diamonds or gold
Lonestar belt buckles and old faded Levi's each night begins a new day
And if you don't understand him and he don't die young
He'll probably just ride away

OK, if I had more advanced blogging skills like our new friend and fellow expat blogger Sybil (http://qatariadventures.blogspot.com/), I would have figured out a way to play some Willie for this post. Since that's not the case, I'll just ask you to imagine “Mommas Don't Let Your Babies Grow up to Be Cowboys” playing in the background--for reasons you'll soon understand, I couldn't shake the above verse after my experience last weekend.

For those of you stateside, LuLu is a chain of supermarkets, hypermarkets, department stores, and shopping centers in the Middle East. We made it last weekend to the LuLu hypermarket in Doha, which consists of a sprawling supermarket on the main floor, a beauty salon (ladies only, with fully covered windows to make the point), an abaya shop, an arcade, a travel agency, a post office branch, a coffee shop, and other stores, and a department store upstairs with everything from flat-screen TVs to washing machines to underwear to shoes. To cater to the Indian population, there is a whole room devoted to saris.

Just out of curiosity, I walked through the men's clothing department while Ella & Morgan looked at kids' clothes. It's not someplace I'll do a lot of shopping—the quality appeared to be somewhere between that of Wal-Mart and the dollar store—but I couldn't resist breaking the rules and taking the following photo:













Yes, you're seeing what you think you're seeing: a whole section of “American” belts. I laughed out loud when I came across this, because this isn't the kind of thing I'm used to seeing even in DC, much less Doha. (Back home in the Ozarks, that's another story!) Anyway, I'm still trying to figure out exactly whom the store is trying to cater to, but now we know where to shop for any good ole boys on our Christmas list.

Your response, Aaron

A couple of weeks ago, I was chatting on the phone with one of my oldest and dearest friends--as hard as it is to believe, we've known each other for over 30 years. Having known each other for so long, it's unusual for either of us to ask a question that stumps the other, but this time it happened in the form of a pretty innocuous question: "What has surprised you the most about living in Qatar"? I stammered for a few seconds and gave a response that was clearly not satisfactory to me or Aaron; I don't even remember what I said, but I think it was a banal observation about the availability of Western goods, which hadn't actually been surprising at all since I had seen the variety of shopping here when I came in October for my job interview.

In fairness to myself, we'd been so engrossed in all of the details of daily life here--everything from finding out where to get our blood typed in order to get our residence permits to shopping for PE uniforms for Morgan to looking for decent pizza--that I hadn't been able to step back and reflect on it all. The question started me thinking, and I finally have an answer: the thing that has surprised me the most about living here has been the extent to which religion permeates every aspect of daily life.

By way of example, the annual report of my employer, Qtel, starts off with the following: "In the name of Allah, most gracious, most merciful." It's hard to imagine seeing that in the annual report of a publicly-traded American company. It's even harder to imagine a company back home (apart from one with a clearly religious focus) that devotes several hundred feet of floor space to a prayer room, but Qtel does and I understand that this is pretty commonplace. Each shopping mall has prayer rooms, segregated by gender, and public restrooms contain basins for ritual foot-washing (they look a lot like bidets). And of course, you can't spend much time here without hearing the call to prayer, which happens six times per day. Not long ago, you would only hear it over the loudspeakers on the minaret of your local neighborhood mosque. Since it's impossible to hear the muezzin perform the call to prayer at a nearby mosque from inside a large, air-conditioned shopping mall, and shopping is the unofficial national pastime, the malls all pipe the call to prayer in through their sound systems as shown in the video below.

The things above are a few of the most visible reflections of the role that Islam plays here, but there are more subtle indicators, too. For example, when a Muslim talks about a future event, such as "let's have lunch tomorrow," the statement is typically accompanied by "inshallah" (God willing). I also wonder to what extent the view that everything is in God's hands may explain other things such as the "carefree" attitude (to put it nicely) that the locals take toward road safety. (At least they are consistent--they show the same lack of concern for their own children riding unbuckled on their laps in the front seats of their Land Cruisers as for the passengers in other cars that they cut off and tailgate.) It may be a stretch to tie the two together, but I'm not sure it's totally unreasonable.

I hope this answers your question, Aaron, albeit belatedly, and I hope it gives anyone else who reads this some food for thought.

Milestones

Steve here. As the title suggests, we've passed a few milestones over the past week or so that I thought I'd share.

A week ago Monday, I became the first one of us to celebrate a birthday here in Doha. At the suggestion of a colleague, we went to the Four Seasons, which happens to be next door to Qtel, and ate at their casual outdoor restaurant. It was a perfect evening to be outside--temperatures in the low 70s, comfortable humidity, and a slight breeze coming off the bay that was perhaps 50 yards from our table. We could just make out the the Museum of Islamic Art in the distance, across the calm waters. It was a good meal, and I enjoyed being in one of the few restaurants in the country that is allowed to serve alcohol. To top off the evening, Morgan and Ella surprised me with a nice birthday cake.

Yesterday marked the end of our first month in Doha, which has flown by. Today we reached a couple more milestones; I completed yet another immigration formality by getting my Qatari driver's license, and Ella & Morgan received their family visas so that they can now begin the process of getting their residency permits.

Our most exciting news--to us, anyway--is that we officially kicked off our house hunt this past weekend even though it's about a month until the ship with our belongings is scheduled to arrive. It looks like we've found the neighborhood where we will live--it's a brand-new development north of central Doha that will be an easy drive both to Qtel and to Morgan's school. The development has nicer amenities than many others, and the grounds are beautiful. (I can't describe how refreshing it was to be surrounded by lush green grass and tropical plants after living in the dust of central Doha for the past month!) We will probably check out a few more places, but this neighborhood will be hard to beat.

I'll close with a few photos from our budding junior photographer. Yesterday Morgan's class took her second field trip to the desert within a week, this time to a Bedouin camp. One of the pictures (taken by a classmate, I think) is of Morgan and her new friend Alicia, who is from Australia. (A short anecdote about Alicia: The day that Morgan visited the school during our first week here, the teacher assigned Alicia to be Morgan's "buddy" when the class went out in the courtyard to plant some flowers as part of their unit on the environment. When Alicia spotted Morgan on Morgan's first day of school the following week, Alicia ran to Morgan, hugged her, and said "Hiya, Buddy!" They have apparently been inseparable at school ever since.) Another photo is of the traditional coffee pot the Bedouins use, and yes, that is a working TV set in the background. The last one is pretty self-explanatory.

Anybody else out there needing the A/C?

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Time for our weekly update. From my perspective, after three weeks now, life is becoming more routine: work for me, school and gymnastics for Morgan, work for Steve. Steve's getting all the immigration minutiae settled, now has a local bank account and is working on getting his Qatari driver's license and liquor permit. Now that his visa is through, I'll have to start mine soon, beginning with a visit to a lab to have my blood typed. Morgan was one of six Year 3 students selected to accompany the principal to a local beach for trash pickup. It ties into the school's focus on community service and their current unit of inquiry, which is the environment and concerns about it. Last week's trip to the desert for the whole class was canceled because of a sandstorm; they'll try again on Thursday or next week.

Over the weekend, we went to the Intercontinental for brunch on Saturday. If you've ever been to the Willard in DC for a holiday brunch, the spread is pretty similar, but also included a variety of Middle Eastern mezze and desserts. For the kids there was a cooking lesson with the pastry chef where they made fruit tarts and later a face painter who turned Morgan into a cheetah.

After brunch we checked out the Museum of Islamic Art, which just opened in late November. It stands alone in the bay on a man-made island -- architect I.M. Pei didn't want his creation to become lost in Doha's ever-spreading skyline. Steve pointed out that this is fourth place we have lived with an I.M. Pei-designed art museum, after Bloomington's IU Art Museum, Paris's Louvre addition and the National Gallery of Art's East Wing. Just call us Pei groupies. There are overlapping elements across his body of work, such as the use of glass and angularity, but Pei made sure to add touches to this one that make it part of its surrounding environment. The museum's collections are well-curated. I appreciated the early manuscripts, dating back to the 7th century. Morgan was fascinated by a small jeweled box with diamond and pearl sides and an emerald top. Steve liked the carpets.

Museum of Islamic Art

Two Weeks Down, How Many More to Go?

Morgan reminded us this morning that today marks two weeks here, so it's time for an update. I think everyone's getting more and more settled. Morgan's having a hard time adjusting her bedtime, though. School here starts at 7, and she's riding the bus, which means being downstairs at 6:15. That means getting up with the sun at 5:45, and bedtime should be around 8. We'll get there, though.

Friday night after gymnastics we went to check out one of the other big shopping malls in Doha, the Villaggio. It is patterned after Venice, complete with stucco storefronts, frescoed ceilings and a canal running down the middle with gondolas and gondoliers. That's where more of the American and London High Street stores are: Gap, Banana Republic, Topshop, etc. Morgan was excited to see a Claire's. Limited Too sells Webkinz (some things can't be escaped!). Of course it has the requisite ice rink as well. We tried TGI Friday's, which was a bit of a letdown (sorry, their beef bacon was not good) and Krispy Kreme doughnuts (not bad). Steve was excited to see a Virgin Megastore. He got some more Qatar guidebooks. Morgan got a movie and Harry Potter and The PHILOSOPHER's Stone (Bloomsbury/UK printing) since we accidentally put her Sorceror's Stone in the shipping container. She said at first spellings like "neighbour" confused her, and that she knows she'll come back speaking British English (that's what's taught at school, despite the fact that her teacher is also American ...).

Hall near Villaggio's food court

Morgan at the Villaggio canal

We joined the Bay Club at the Intercontinental on Friday. The weather was great, but Morgan totally freaked out about the flies. In just the past few days, it has started warming up. Today it's around 80, warm enough to break a sweat on my walk back from the grocery store.

The Intercontinental

The Doha skyline from the Intercontinental's beach

The beach at the Intercontinental

This brings me to my favorite topic, food. Overall, I'm impressed with what's available. We've come up with a short list of things we haven't found: Hershey bars (though French and Swiss milk chocolate bars are available), plain graham crackers (there's Nabisco cinnamon or McVities digestives), and almond butter. Some things are ridiculously expensive, but we'll suck it up: plain Cheerios are $10 a box. But most other American foods are readily available, particularly junk foods, I'm not proud to say: Pepsi, Coke, Kraft cheeses, Lays chips, Baskin Robbins ice cream, deli meats. What I really like is that Europe's a lot closer, so foods imported from there are more readily available and cheaper. Morgan can get three Kinder Surprise chocolate eggs for about $2; I think I paid $3 for one at Tysons Mall when we finally found them. One of our favorite drink mixes, sirop, is carried in five flavors and two brands. I can get limonade (the French fizzy drink kind of like lemon-lime soda but not as sweet). Twinings teas are about $2 a box. With all the workers from Asia, there's lots and lots of ethnic foods: one side of one row at Carrefour (the French supermarket in the mall) is just rice, another is Indian spices and curries, another is Filipino and Thai. There's even a small Mexican section. For meat you can choose local, Indian or Australia/New Zealand, and produce is imported from everywhere -- China (avoiding that one), Lebanon, Spain, France, US.

Morgan had her first playdate on Saturday with a friend from school. I think school's going well. She says the homework is hard; I think she is having to think more critically again after not using that skill much for the last year and a half. We're working on getting her a private tutor for French during the school day. The rest of her class who are taking French are beginners. Morgan said she reviewed articles of clothing for the fourth time yesterday. In PE, she's learning to play cricket.

I've noticed that the news coverage is broader over here, albeit with a different slant (see the ICC/Bashir story). I'm reading one of the local papers, The Peninsula, which offers more coverage of the Arab world, India and Asia than US papers do. It also reprints Financial Times business news. The building keeps a copy of the International Herald Tribune in the lobby that I flip through in the afternoon while I wait for Morgan's school bus. Every now and then we catch a few minutes of Al Jazeera, but don't really go out of our way for it. We also get BBC World News and CNN, and I supplement these with web browsing the online editions of NYT, CNN and the Post.

I'll close with one observation: from my perspective, it seems like women who choose abayas and veils could have a free pass on bad hair days. And why spend tens of thousands of dollars on designer gowns (Dior was among the busier shops in the Villaggio) when almost no one will see them? At least that's how I see it as an outsider looking in ...