Camping in the Desert

I've been camping my whole life in Germany, Switzerland, France, Monaco, and of course in Canada. Most of this was done when I was a boy where we went camping almost every weekend, so I consider myself somewhat of an expert on such activities.

This time was a whole different story ... camping Arabian style in the desert.
In all my previous experience, we camped at a campground with specific campsites. Desert camping in Qatar has no campgrounds nor campsites, and for that matter, no roads to get to where you want to camp. Instead you take a 4-wheel SUV out into the desert, find a sand dune to your liking, and voila ... instant campsite.






Obviously, you also need to go with Arabian friends or you may never find your way back.The area we went to is called the Inland Seas and is about a one-hour SUV drive into the desert. (the blue area at the bottom of the map)

You'd expect that driving into the open desert, at night, with no roads, there would be no one else around.  Surprisingly there were literally hundreds of other SUV's scurrying through the desert in all directions heading for their campsites.


At last we found an empty sand dune right on the sea that we chose as our campsite. Now this camping trip was of the minimalist type ... no tents (other than the one two-man tent you see) ... sleeping under the stars. Like in the Old West we circled our wagons (Cadillac Espalade, Range Rover, and two other SUV's) to define our spot and cut down any wind, or any prying eyes.
After laying down a large carpet and setting up the barbecue, we all had drinks and delicious beef and lamb kabobs.


We did have a night visitor ... a desert fox who liked the smell of our kabobs. He was quite bold and came very close to us. In fact, after some of us had crawled into our sleeping bags, he came right up to sniff each one of us. I named him Rommel ... the desert fox.









As usual, I was up at literally the crack of dawn and took a few pictures of the site and neighbouring areas.

As you can see the sand dunes are large and spaced conveniently apart making for excellent private camp areas.

It was actually quite cold at night (first time I've said that since I've been here). There was a constant cool breeze off the water that made you hunker down into your sleeping bag. Apparently Rhonda wanted more warmth as she was sleeping on the fire pit.

As I said, we were doing a minimalist camping trip, but there were some campsites that were permanently set up for the season which had large tents, trailers, generators, air conditioners ... an apparently large flat screen TV's!

The day was perfect for being on the beach. It was around 30 degrees C and the water was warm and clean. we did discover that there were a lot of small stingrays sharing the water with us but they were skittish and kept out of our way. They bought a few air mattresses on the way to the desert and they turned out to be very popular ... mostly as an improvised swim-up bar. In the picture are Rhonda (who you have heard me mention before), Lizzy (a very bright Canadian girl who can talk the ears off a cornstalk), in the water Muhammed (a Palestinian friend), and standing on the beach (a Qatari) and (Escalade driver).

We stayed at the beach until late afternoon and it was time to go. How did we know that? The drinks had run out ... what else? My first desert camping trip was a lot of fun and sure to be not my last.

Thailand II - A Second Look at the Land of Smiles

 As Ramadan ended, I was glad to get out of Qatar for a week's holiday and away from the restrictions of Ramadan and the intense heat. Now, if you've been reading this blog all along, you might remember me saying that one of the greatest perks in living and working in Qatar was the generous holidays we are given. My plan is to visit much of Asia while I'm here. I actually have made up a list of places I want to visit ... my bucket list, if you like. So why consecutive trips to Thailand?

Well, my thinking went like this ... every place I have on the list is intriguing, and they are places I definitely want to travel to, but would I enjoy myself as much as I did on my first trip to Thailand? I actually couldn't imagine how any place could compete ... there are over 3,000 bars in Pattaya. How can one week be enough? I still plan on making those other journeys ... just not this time.

My destination once again was Pattaya, only this time I booked a much nicer place. Last time I stayed in a three-star hotel, which was conveniently located, clean, had good service and was very inexpensive ... OK, it was cheap ($30 /night). This time I splurged and spent $70/night ... still very cheap by western standards, but a giant step up from my previous accommodation.

 It is called the Rabbit Resort, and don't read anything into the name. First off, it is located in Jomtien Beach, not in downtown Pattaya where the night action is. It is like paradise on the beach, with two beautiful pools, a great restaurant, a large room complete with kitchen and flat screen TV, and it had orchids on the pillows every day when I returned to it. The surroundings make one think that you are in a rain forest with narrow brick pathways winding throughout the resort (rabbit runs?). And still, the nightlife is only a ten minute baht bus ride away.

Probably the main reason I returned to Thailand was not because of the tropical paradise that it is, but because of the wonderful Thai people. They constantly smile and will strike up a conversation with you if you only make eye contact. On one baht bus trip into Pattaya, this very beautiful girl was telling me how she wanted to buy a pair of cowboy boots that were in the window of a shop we passed ... not your usual start-up conversation. This led to some drinks in a couple of bars in Pattaya and a fun time with lots of chatting and laughing as we got to know each other more. Things didn't turn out as I thought they would though, because this very pretty and entertaining girl turned out not to be a girl at all ... OK, you tell the difference.

Pattaya's Walking Street is world famous, and although I mentioned it in my previous blog about my first visit to Thailand, it bears (bares?) another look.

It is worth the walk to just go and see it at night when it is packed with people from many countries taking it all in, and there is a lot to take in. It is filled with exotic go-go bars, beer bars, show bars, German bars, Irish bars, yada, yada ... with the odd restaurant thrown in, in case you work up an appetite ... for food.

It is difficult not to be drawn into the bars because every one of them have girls beckoning you to enter and enjoy yourself.  You will have no problem finding friendly company to go with your Singha beer.

After a night out on the town, what better way to relax than by the Rabbit Resort pool sipping a cool drink. It's either that or on the beach, but that's at least another 20 metres to have to walk.

This is a Buddhist shrine, and you'll literally find them everywhere in Thailand. There are large ornate public shrines, small yard shrines like this one, and small interior house shrines. Every morning when I walked by this shrine in the resort, it had fresh food and water lined up in bowls with flowers and burning incense beside them.

I found a new food that I enjoyed very much ... it's called a pomelo ... the Thais call it 'some oh', and I call it 'awe some'. It tastes like a sweet, mild grapefruit - it has very little or none of the common grapefruit's bitterness, and it's huge ... about 20 cm in diameter. They sell them on the beach prepared like you see in the picture, so all you have to do is pick up a section and munch away ... it's probably even good for you.

The week went by too fast, as is often the case with holidays, but I feel that I made the right decision to return to Thailand for my second holiday. The thing is ... what the heck am I going to do for my next holiday?

Ramadan - A New Experience

After a great holiday in Canada for the month of July, and an escape from the heat in Doha, I returned to Qatar on August 1. If I thought it was hot before I left, I now had a whole new understanding of hot weather. Although the 'average' temperature in July and August is 45 degrees C, you don't expect it to be 45 every day ... but it is! Those readings are in the shade ... only there isn't any shade here to speak of.

Not only did I make it back for the hottest days of the year, I made it back in time to experience the full month of Ramadan. The beginning of Ramadan is based upon the Islamic calendar and observing the first waxing crescent moon.

 It is the Islamic month of fasting , in which participating Muslims refrain from eating, drinking, smoking, and indulging in anything that is in excess or ill-natured; from dawn until sunset. No, I am not a participating Muslim, but in Qatar, all residents must recognize Ramadan. Although, non Muslims do not have to go to the prayers five times a day, they are expected to fast in respect for the customs here. Fasting means no food, no smoking, no chewing gum and no water during the daylight hours.

For we Canadians at the college, we have a lunch room where we  can go and eat and drink so it wasn't so bad, but don't get caught in your car doing that or you could get arrested. Smoking is another matter ... the only place we could sneak out for a smoke was on the roof. Now if you think it's hot on the ground when the temperatures are 45+, try going on the roof where all the air conditioner vents blow out hot air. You almost don't need a lighter because I'm sure if you stayed on the roof for more than ten minutes, the cigarette would light spontaneously ... probably your hair too.

I really admire the Muslims doing the fasting but it tends to make their bad driving habits even worse ... work all day with no food, no water, and no smokes (and most of them smoke). So after a day like this, they get behind the wheel and try to get home as fast as possible ... well, they do that every day, but imagine now doing it with an edge, in a souped-up Land Cruiser.

 One good thing about Ramadan is that the work day is shortened. The Qataris go visiting relatives at night as it is a family festive time ... so they fast all day and kind of pig out at night till all hours. The drive into work in the mornings is easy during Ramadan as the roads have less than half the traffic due to people going in late because they've been up most of the night ... add to that the horde who have left the country during this time, and the roads seem almost empty.

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar and goes on for a full lunar month. It comes approximately ten days earlier each year. The Islamic holiday of Eid ul-Fitr marks the end of the fasting period of Ramadan and the first day of the following month, after another new moon has been sighted. This is definitely one of the perks of Ramadan since it's a week-long holiday.

So it's back to Thailand because one visit just isn't enough.

It's Freakin' Hot!

Qatar is in the northern hemisphere almost directly on the Tropic of Cancer, and is a fairly small peninsula sticking out 160 km into the Gulf of Arabia, so it is mostly surrounded by the warm waters of the Gulf.

Qatar is a desert ... every bit of it. Were it not for man's intervention, I don't think there would be a single green plant here. Come to think of it, were it not for man's intervention, I don't think there would be a single white man here either.

Being a desert, it can get hot in the summer ... notice that the graph peaks at 45 degrees C during July and August. Now that's the average temperature, and to give you a comparison, Toronto's highest months are the same months when the temperature is 26 degrees C. I know in Ontario, when it gets to 30 degrees, we whine and complain about the heat and generally hide in air conditioned spaces. Just imagine that you are here where the temperature is 20 degrees hotter. Some smart asses will say stuff like ... 'yeah well it's humid here in Toronto unlike over there where it is a desert climate'. Wrong! Because the country is surrounded by very warm water, it gets very humid here as well.

Some days I have gone out to my car, which has a gauge to show the outside temperature, and it has surpassed 53 degrees C, and that doesn't include the effect of the humidity. It makes it difficult to drive when it's that hot because, despite using a reflective windscreen, the leather steering wheel and shifter are almost too hot to touch ... and be careful not to touch the seatbelt's metal parts to any exposed skin! There is a law here that should the temperature reach 50, then workers have to be sent home for the day ... never happens because the temperature never 'officially' gets to 50.

I've been here for 5 months now and have yet to see a single drop of rain. It has rained (twice) at night, and I know that because there were puddles on the ground the following morning.

What we do have here are dust storms. They usually happen just before a weather change like in the spring before it starts to get real hot. I was at lunch in the cafeteria with Rhonda one sunny, clear day, and when we came out from our 20 min break, the sky was brown, the humidity was very high and the finest dust you can imagine was heavy in the air. It gets into every pore of your body. Apparently, when these dust storms hit, the clinics and hospitals get very busy with people getting sick because of them.

Because of the extreme summer heat, most people get the hell out of Dodge for as much of it as possible, especially the westerners. Another reason they leave is to miss the month of Ramadan, but more on that in a separate post.

There is a winter here where the weather is cooler, but it's fairly short ... usually falling on a Tuesday.

To sum up the weather here ... it is freakin' HOT!

Thobes and Abayas

Take a close look at the picture above and notice the range of dress depicted. You might want to click on the picture to see it in full size. In the left half of the picture you will see, from left to right, a Qatari boy, two Qatari women wearing abayas, and two arab men, one wearing a traditional thobe and one not. The abaya is a loose fitting cloak that covers the whole body, and you will see some women cover their face entirely and some don't, although they all wear coverings over their head called a hijab. You might think that wearing a black cloak would be hot in this climate, and you are right, especially since they are fully clothed underneath the cloak.

 The man on the left is a Qatari wearing a thobe, a long white robe similar to a white dress shirt that extends to the feet, and a ghutra which, can be either white or red and white checkered.On top of the ghutra the men wear an igal, or black rope-like coil to hold it in place. Men also wear undergarments including a t-shirt and pants that cover from navel to knees.

Boys may also be seen wearing the traditional thobe exactly like the men, and mothers don't have to worry about grass stains since there isn't any.

Since the Qataris all wear thobes and abayas, you may think clothing is not a status thing, and that follows the Quran's teaching of being modest. What they do, however, is spend big money on bling such as 18 carat gold cufflinks with precious stones, expensive watches, and yes, the ultimate status symbol, expensive cell phones.

On a side note, notice the two other women in the first picture walking away from the camera. The one next to that tall drink of water wearing the skull cap is Rhonda, my friend and my boss, and lagging behind her is Connie, her mother. For non-arabs, it is ok to wear what you want, so long as you don't expose too much between the shoulders and knees.

Doha people come out in droves at night making the driving a bit of a nightmare. Because of the traditional dress being worn, women in particular are very hard to see in the dark, so you have to be careful not to hit them. We kid around that '... the ghosts and ninjas' are out, which is slanderously referring to the thobes and abayas, but reminds us to watch we don't hit one. I think the rule of thumb here is don't hit anyone at or above your status class, the others ... well, as I said before, they are just potential road kill anyways.

A Course? In Singapore? Of Course!

Following right on the heels of my trip to Pattaya, Thailand, I flew to Singapore. Now the last Peoplesoft course I took was paid for by me ($5,000) and it was in Mississauga where I also paid for my own hotel. Now, if you're from Heathcote, Ontario, that may seem like a big deal. But I'm not from any where near Heathcote, not any more anyway. So when my boss (did I tell you she was also my friend?) asked me to take another course that was offered in Singapore, paid for by the college including a five star hotel and a generous per diem allowance ... well you can guess it didn't matter where I was from, never mind Heathcote.

The only down side of this trip was that I'd just spent 9 days in Pattaya and was running a bit low on energy and probably dangerously low on protein. Anyways, a week in Singapore after a week in Pattaya is like going from total disarray to absolute organization. Singapore is beautiful and so clean and organized ... eat your heart out Toronto.

My hotel was the Pan Pacific in the heart of Marina Bay, Singapore. Very nice ... had a room on the 31st floor with the outer wall made of glass ... no peeping Toms at that elevation. The view was spectacular overlooking the harbour and the world's biggest ferris wheel called the Singapore Flyer.

To give you an idea of the scale of this marvel, the Flyer is 536 feet high, takes 30 minutes to take a one revolution 'flight' ($30), has capsules that hold 28 people, and is capable of holding up to 784 passengers! And no, I didn't partake of this wonderful opportunity ... if I didn't ride a 7 foot camel, I'm not riding a 536 foot high ferris wheel that calls rides 'flights', never mind that it doesn't have a nasty disposition or bites the clients.


As for the course I took, it was delivered by a local Singapore resident originally from Hong Kong. We had a great time as I was the only student and he loved to chat. I learned more about Singapore from him in four days that from anything else.

You might wonder how I got along with language while in Thailand and Singapore. In Thailand, I couldn't speak a word other than to point to myself and say 'Singha', which is the local beer ... very good by the way. Eye contact and a big smile pretty much gets you anything else you want, if you know what I mean. For everything else, enough Thais speak enough English to get you by. In Singapore they primarily speak a form of English, known there as Singlish which isn't too hard to understand. When I get around to going to Malaysia, they apparently speak Manglish, which by the sound of the name, might be a tad hard to understand ... much like my fellow workers from Newfoundland 'mangle' their English.

Overall, the trip to Singapore was terrific. I learned some useful stuff on my course, had some great meals (hopefully restoring my lack of protein), and took in the sights of one the world's premiere cities. I'm pretty sure I need to take a couple of more courses in the near future.

Off to Thailand - yeS_I_AM

Near the end of April I had my first days off work ... holiday time for a week. One of the things I decided when I took the contract in Qatar was to take advantage of the generous holidays and travel, primarily in Asia. My first such travel was to Thailand, formerly known as Siam. After a 7-hour flight from Doha on Qatar Airways (great airline), I arrived in Bangkok. Finding transportation to Pattaya where I was booked to stay was easy ... lots of independent taxis to take you there ... only 1000 baht (about $30 CAD) for the one hour and forty-five minute ride on the motorway.

Pattaya is a popular beach resort area close to Bangkok, but better known for its nightlife. Pattaya has more bars than any other place on earth, and Walking Street is the most obvious example where the fare is more than just beer ... girls, boys, even girls that are really boys ... only you really can't tell.

But Pattaya is not all nightlife, only the most exciting part.

 During the day, whenever you can drag your butt out of bed after a night on Walking Street, it is a tropical paradise with beautiful beaches to relax on and regain your strength for the coming night. At the south end of Pattaya over a hill, is Jomtien Beach which is far nicer than Pattaya Beach because there are not many motorized vehicles in the water. Umbrella's line the beach where you can sit and relax all day on a beach chair for 50 baht ($1.60) and be served drinks, have a manicure, a Thai massage and eat some great food. My favourites were fresh steamed jumbo shrimp and barbecued squid cooked right on the beach

Getting around in Pattaya is easy. It has one of the most efficient transportation systems I've ever encountered. They are small blue pickup trucks with two facing benches in the back and buttons to push when you want them to stop ... which they will about 6 feet after you press it. They are everywhere and come along about every 3rd vehicle on the road. The are called baht buses because they cost 20 baht (about 65 cents).

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Sand dunes and camels - back to the desert

A couple of the great things at Sealine beach area are the camel rides and the dune buggy rentals. So far, I've ridden neither, but I will in the future. The camels are very cool as seen in the picture above. You don't get to take one out for a ride by yourself, and given their generally nasty disposition, it's probably a good thing ... nasty buggers. Notice that they are all wearing colourful muzzles so they don't take a chunk out of the patrons. Now there's a new thing to knit in your spare time ... not much different than a tea cozy.

Here a mother and daughter show they are more adventuresome than I am. I believe they were just out in the sun a tad too long. You know, mad dogs and Englishmen ... in this case Englishmomandkid.

On my way back to Doha, I actually saw a herd? of seven wild camels by the roadside ... no saddles or muzzles either.

To the Desert in my Z4

On my first venture out of Doha and into the desert ... Qatar is entirely desert even though it doesn't always look like it in Doha where there are palm trees and grass ... throw enough money at it and you can even conquer Mother Nature. On the drive out there, I passed road signs that were like our deer crossing signs, only they are camel and ostrich crossing signs. In Doha, instead of pedestrian crossing signs, they depict a person wearing a thobe ... so we call them thobe crossings. Attempting to cross any road without these signs is taking your life in your hands, because pedestrians are really just potential road-kill here.

On a fine Saturday morning, myself, Satish (a co-worker from India) and his 13-year old son drove out to Sealine Beach. Once out of Doha, you appreciate exactly what a desert really is ... totally barren. It's not all sand like I thought, but more like hard-packed clay-like dirt the colour of sand. Once you get to Sealine, however, you see massive sand dunes that the locals love to challenge with their Land Cruisers (the most popular vehicle by far in Qatar). Just to show you that my comments about what the Qataris drive like in my previous post are carried over to desert driving, catch this video of them in the sand dunes ... insane! And if that doesn't convince you check this one out ... That'll leave a mark!

This is a view of the Sealine beach area from atop a large sand dune ... damn near killed me climbing it. As you can tell it was near the end of a kind of a hazy and overcast day.

Oddly enough, Satish's son doesn't swim (neither does Satish) and they come from Kerala, India, which is by the ocean. Eventually, though he went in the water after climbing the sand dunes ... after all it was 40 degrees C, and I think the sand was more like 140 degrees.

Roundabout problem solved - my new wheels

One of the very worst things about Doha is driving in Doha. I've found the people here to be very refined, dignified and respectful ... at least until they get behind the wheel. They do have well-defined driving laws here such as, no cell phone use when driving, only park in designated areas, speed cameras everywhere, and well marked lanes on the roads. The only problem is that nobody either knows of the laws or doesn't give a rat's ass ... probably the latter.

The first month I was here, Rhonda drove me to work and to shop, etc., which was great. But I knew I needed to get my own vehicle and learn to drive here. After seeing what driving was like as a passenger and driving Rhonda's car a few times, I realized I had a choice ... get a tank or a very fast car to survive. I chose the latter because I couldn't find a tank complete with ammunition for the canon.

 My rule-of-thumb for driving here is as follows: If another vehicle looks like he might be able to cut into your lane, he definitely will, and if it looks like there's no way he could squeeze in, he definitely will. The only way to drive here is what I would call the defensive-aggressive style of driving. That means don't trust any other driver not to do something stupid (because they will), and if you are going to go ... GO!

 The majority of roads are multi-lane divided highways with the average city speed limit of between 80 - 100 km/hr, and for the most part, they have roundabouts instead of intersections. The rule of roundabouts is that the inside lane has the right of way ... only no one knows that here. It wouldn't be so bad if the drivers here knew what that thing is sticking out of the left side of the steering column (the turn signal), but they apparently do not as no one uses them except some Canadian drivers. My new car even has fairly large side flashers so other drivers can see your signal even if they are beside you ... not that it matters to them.

I love my new car ... a BMW Z4 ... the ultimate roundabout tool. Not many other vehicles can do a roundabout like I can ... except for the Lamborghinis, Ferraris, Maseratis, Porsches, etc., of which there are more than a few. I now look forward to my trips to and from work ... I refer to them as rally races, because that's pretty much what they are.

This is the view of my car that I like to give other drivers as often as possible because, only then do I feel they won't hit me ... at least until the next roundabout.

The term 'woman driver' here takes on a whole new meaning. One really disconcerting thing is that they wear black head coverings ... some completely covering their face. Seeing them anywhere near me makes me nervous especially when they are using their cell phone ... which is all the time.

Not so modern - The Old Souqs

Souqs are actually shops, and in Qatar, shops tend to be located in groups. For instance there are the gold souqs, the furniture souqs, the computer souqs, ... well you get the picture. I'm still looking for the automotive souqs and the ever popular soup souqs.

Doha used to have an old souq. However, times move on, and it was decided that progress required knocking it down and replacing it with a new souq that looks like an old souq. This area is call Souq Waqif, but more commonly known as ... you guessed it ... the Old Souqs. It is huge and contains a maze of shops that sell everything you can imagine. It is particularly famous for spices. 

One of the nice features of the Old Souqs is the range of restaurants featuring foods of many different cultures. They all have outside areas where you can sit and eat, smoke shisha, and watch the people go by.

Here I am doing just that but particularly concentrating on my shisha. Now don't be confusing this with smoking anything illegal ... that's what I would call hashisha.

The Pearl

The Pearl is a man-made island that is 10 minutes from the college. While it is still under construction, I went there to see this amazing place. It is truly The Pearl of the Gulf.

Talk about high-end shops! As you enter The Pearl, you pass Rolls Royce, Maserati and Ferrari dealerships.

Once inside you can visit shops like Giorgio Armani and many I have never heard of because they are way out of my league, but it doesn't cost anything to look. I saw a golf shirt for just over 1,000 riyals (about $350). The marina is spectacular, and while not finished there were a few boats moored there ... some over 100 feet.