Doha Diaries

What happens in Bangalore... ...stays in Bangalore, it seems! It’s been almost a month since I flew off to India for a weekend to attend the Bangalore Literature Festival. And much water has flowed under the bridge (both before and after—both literally and figuratively) without being captured in this blog and sent out to its forgiving and patient readers (that’s you, if you’re still paying attention). I’ve prepared for writing this blog by putting on my salwar kameez and settling in with a cup of coffee that has a wee bit of “flavouring.” Well deserved rest after getting up at 4 AM for dragon boating and then jumping on my bike for a 27 k ride with Glenn. Just another beautiful November day in Doha. Temperatures in the low to mid-20s, and, fingers crossed, no rain in sight. So let me start with the literal deluge that took Qatar (and Glenn and me) by surprise in mid and late October this year. On one weekend day (I believe it was October 18) Qatar received a year’s wo...

Home, indeed! I returned to Doha from Canada just over a month ago, and I've been asking myself that question ever since. Was I visiting home when I went back to Canada? Was I coming "home" when I came back to Doha? When I was living out of a suitcase in Red Deer and Cochrane, was I home? Or did I get “home” when I came back to our villa in Al Jazeera 1 Compound (see picture of our block) and put my clothes away in the drawer and the closet? Well, to go back to the definition, I came back without Glenn, who took his mom (hi, Norma!) “home” to Newfoundland for a visit and “wee toar of the rock”). And my kids are back in Canada. But only one of my grandchildren is living there; the other is in Denmark! So, when I came back, I was not with my family—not even close. And don't they say, home is where the heart is? So, was I home or away while I was in Canada? (Snowbirds like my friend Anne Price face a similar dilemma, although their migratory patterns (signalled i...

With the tour of the Mosque in Education City? The Sunday Brunch at W Hotel? Our first visit to Souq Waqif? The ongoing saga of Glenn Against the Dust (coming to a theatre near you soon!)? How about our upcoming trip to Canada for a visit? Okay, let's start there and work backward. A week from today, Glenn and I are heading back to Canada for a short visit. Shorter for me (August 11-30) and a bit longer for Glenn (August 11-September 30) as he is taking his mom to Newfoundland in September (hi, Norma, we'll be there soon!). We are so looking forward to spending time with friends and family and getting out and walking and biking on the trails. A special thank you to Terry and Darrel, who are picking us up at the airport when we arrive and hosting us for a day (or maybe two?) while we recover from the jet lag. Another shout out to Carlen, who is allowing us to stay at her house while she's in Ottawa. Thank you guys, and thanks to others, like Trish and Sheila, who also off...

Greetings everyone. I hope you are keeping well and enjoying life. It’s always good to hear from you, so please keep sending your news as well. Shout out to brother Neil Fordham today. It’s his birthday this weekend and he tells me that he’s making his own birthday cake. Now that’s taking control of one’s own destiny! Glenn and I are doing well: we’ve just passed the three month mark in Doha and feel that we’ve been here much longer. We can’t quite figure that out; perhaps it’s because we’ve settled into a routine and everything feels pretty normal for us now. But let’s talk about “normal,” shall we? I’ve already mentioned that the new normal means that Friday is the new Saturday and Sunday is the new Monday. Tuesday, not Wednesday here is “hump” day (the day at work when you feel as though you’re half-way through the week). But there are many more things that seem, well, a bit different here, even to the point of seeming upside down. For example, the “cold” water that com...

When you started reading this blog, I'll bet you expected a little more from me than pictures of food, descriptions of malls, and complaints about not being able to walk across the street to get to the mall to buy food. (Okay, there's also been a little bit of dragon boating and kite boarding thrown in there for good measure.) But this is probably what you've all been thinking: Nancy seems to be kind of stuck on the bottom rung of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and needs to climb that ladder and get to something more interesting, a bit more … cultural? Here we go, then! Yes, of course, the culture here is quite different than it is at home. I tend to be wary of the term "culture shock," however, and neither Glenn nor I has found it really difficult or disconcerting to adjust to life in Qatar. Of course, we live in a compound with other expats, and we're not too restricted in our "behavior" within the compound: for example, we wear our bathing...

Today, in fact. Let me remind you (Blog #1) that Glenn and I live within 3 kilometres of, not just 3 as I reported in that first blog, but 7 large shopping malls! Well, maybe a couple of them are outside that 3 k radius, but they’re all a walkable distance away, except for one thing. Skill testing question to see if you’re keeping up. Glenn and I cannot walk to the malls because: A) It is 101 degrees Fahrenheit outside right now, and it was not much cooler at 10 AM today; B) We are both old and decrepit C) All of the malls (except North Gate Mall, which may open in the next milennium at this rate) are located across a major 6 to 8 lane highway and there are no crosswalks or overpasses and no traffic lights (just a crazy traffic circle) and so much fast-moving traffic that you are taking your life in your hands if you even contemplate crossing the highway, 100 degrees or not! If you guessed C), then you really have been paying attention!  Glenn has, in f...

So, you all thought I was the ambitious one. Not so. Glenn had one burning ambition when we decided to come to Doha: he wanted to become a beach bum and learn how to kite board. Well, it’s taken a while for Glenn to find his groove, but it all came together this past week when he received an invitation to do some dry land kite-board training with a colleague of mine. When Mike came to pick Glenn up on Friday morning (remember, Friday is now the new Saturday, in our reality—I will blog about that some day), he asked us if we wanted to come to the beach with him and his wife later on in the day. That was a no-brainer! You see, Qatar is essentially a peninsula—we’re literally surrounded by water, except for a strip of land where we’re connected to Saudi Arabia. But getting to a really nice swimming beach is a bit tricky—most of them are about 45 minutes away, and that typically requires a car (or hiring one), and we haven’t done that yet. Yes, there’s Katara beach, where I go dragon bo...