Settling In (next step)

Late last night our shipment from Canada arrived at our door.  Tim spent five hours at the airport, working his way through a series of steps, levels of bureaucracy, and utter chaos, to retrieve our boxes which were packed and sent on August 5. 

We are still not sure of the full story, but our shipment left Bridgewater on August 5 and was scheduled to go to Montreal to get on a container ship.  After six weeks at sea it should have arrived in Doha, cleared customs, and been delivered to us by mid-October.  Early in October we contacted the company in Nova Scotia looking for a shipment tracking number so that we could complete the paperwotrk on this end.  After many emails and phone calls we discovered the reason that a shipment tracking number could not be found was because the shipment was never shipped!  On October 13 our shipment was located in Nova Scotia, just 100km from its origin two months prior.  Then things started moving quickly.  Within 24 hours the shipment was on a plane and on its way to London, Dubai, and Doha.

Many people have told us that the arrival of a shipment is like Christmas.  We were very skeptical of this considering that we had packed all the items -- no surprises!  But the shipment arrived after Max and Simon were asleep, so in the morning they were excited to see all the boxes and begin to unpack their favourite possessions.  While it may not be Christmas, there is certainly a sense of comfort in being surrounded by your own familiar things.

Settling In

When moving to a new country there are certain events that happen to mark your stages of 'settling in".  Here in Qatar the process has been much faster than in Kenya.  But still, there are challenges...

The first step in Qatar is to secure a Residence Permit.  This is like a work permit in other countries but requires several more steps than we were familiar with.  First is a Medical exam -- blood work and chest x-ray to test for HIV, TB, Hepatitis B and C.  Men and women are separated during this process. Tim and the men flew through these tests but Lisa and the women were delayed at every step.  The stamp that Lisa is holding above took 3.5 hours to get and that was before any testing was done.  In the end Lisa made four trips to the Medical Commission, received six chest x-rays, and totaled more than 10 hours for the process.  (Tim was finished in 1.5 hours on one visit.)

After passing the medical, fingerprinting, and Identification card, Tim received his Residence Permit last week.  Lisa's RP is, of course, delayed.  There are three significant implications of having a Residence Permit: 1.You may live and work in the country of Qatar; 2.You may leave the country for travel purposes; 3.You may purchase a vehicle.

This is our new 2008 Toyota Prado VX.  It has 60,000km on it and handles like a dream.  With a 4.0L V6 engine, it has nice pick up in the round-a-bouts.  It has two fuel tanks which hold 150 litres of gas.  In Canada that would cost $201 to fill.  Here it is just $37. 

It seats seven because it has a third row of seats that fold up and down as needed.  The air conditioning works really well (the #1 item on our wish list) and there is a cooler between the front seats to keep our water cold.

Lisa has been joy riding around the compound (she doesn't have her Qatar driver's license yet).  Sigh.

Eating Turkey!

This weekend we enjoyed a turkey dinner with some other Canadians.  It was delicious and we are so pleased to know how accessible turkey is in Qatar (unlike Kenya).  The Kanabars are a family that we met even before we arrived in Doha.  Simon and Taran were penpals before we left Nova Scotia.  We have enjoyed their friendship, their advice, and their hospitality.  These other Canadians work at Qatar Academy and come from Newfoundland, Ontario, and Winnipeg.

The newest Kanabar is this little boy, Jahan, who is just 10 days old.  Being the fifth child, he gets lots of cuddles from older siblings so Lisa usually has to wait her turn to hold him.

Happy Thanksgiving

While Canadians enjoy a Thanksgiving dinner this weekend, we want to share some of our food stories.  This week Simon was excited to see pumpkins show up at LuLu's.  The cost of one of the small pumpkins is 200 riyals (about $50)!! These pumpkins are imported from U.S.A. It was a treat to be reminded that it is Autumn in Canada.  It is also autumn here, but seems like summer to us.

LuLu is the name of the local grocery store.   We have LuLu Express next door to our compound and there is a LuLu Hypermarket downtown (something lost in the translation). We can buy almost anything here.  Tomatoes from Syria.  Carrots from Australia.  Cucumbers from Saudi Arabia.  Lettuce from Lebanon.  Green chillies from Jordan.  Pomegranate from Egypt.  Peaches from Turkey.  Grapes from Italy.  Our fridge is an international cornucopia.  And because shipping costs are not a big expense (gasoline is 25 cents a litre) these items are very reasonably priced.  Despite the miles these fruit and vegetables travel, we actually find that most items are less expensive than in Nova Scotia.

There are also some fun things that we have discovered about food.  Max and his pen pal, Matthew, are holding very large pita called Arabian bread.  They make wonderful thin-crust pizza.  The great thing is that they cost just 1 riyal (about 25 cents) for a package of FIVE big ones!  The same price will buy us a package of 10 smaller ones.  Needless to say, pita is on the menu for breakfast, lunch, and supper. The deli-made hummous is also delicious and very inexpensive so Lisa doesn't make her own here.   We hope to get to a Lebanese bakery to see how they make the bread.

Obviously we eat lots of fruit and vegetables every day.  Lettuce is one of the things that is more expensive so we have a salad just once a week.  This one was so good with feta cheese and lupini beans (yellow beans).  Lupini beans are a new food for us.  They are grown in the Mediterranean and require huge amount of preparation to take the bitterness out.  And if they are not prepared properly then they will kill you.  Really!  Toxic legumes!

Just for fun, here is a can of Coke.  The Coca-Cola logo is written in Arabic of course!  Read from right to left.

Beach

 

We drove north of Doha to the shores of the Persian Gulf.  There were sand shores and rocky shores.  We sat under the outcroppings of rock in order to be in a bit of shade.  It was a hot day but the water, early in the morning, was actually not as hot as we expected. 
The name of this body of water is sometimes controversial.  Our North American maps label it Persian Gulf but locals may call it the Arabian Gulf or just "The Gulf".  Persia is the former name for Iran.

There were small 'salt bowls' on the shore.  The tide comes in over the rocks and when it recedes, it leaves pools of salt water, similar to what happens on Nova Scotia shores.  The difference here is that the water evaporates very quickly and leaves puddles of salt.

Designs on Buildings

One of the first things Max noticed here was that the colour of the buildings is all very similar.  Every house and building is made of cinder block construction and the outside is a sand-coloured limestone finish.  This gives all the buildings a neutral sand look -- very much like the colour of the ground.  We speculated that from the sky you could probably miss whole villages because of the way they blend into the landscape.  We also supposed that the local people like these neutral colours of the earth.

But then we began to notice how the outside walls and gates are highly decorated.  The intricate carvings are mostly near door frames and above windows.  If there is a large wall then the area may have large carvings to take the plain look away. 

We have seen men working on the carvings using a sander and drill.  This is a very skilled craft.

Yard sale!

Just like a Saturday morning tradition, I went to a yard sale this morning.  There are constantly expatriots coming and going from Qatar.  We have heard that there are 1000 new people moving to Doha every week.  Fewer numbers are leaving but there is still movement.

Today I visited a family that is leaving in November to return to Canada.  They have just started to pack and are clearing items from the house that they do not wish to move.  I was able to purchase a number of household items:  measuring spoons, tools, placemats, picture frames, clothes drying rack, clothes hangers.  But by far the most exciting purchase was a large rug for our living room.  This is not a silk Persian rug but it will work in our living room (which has blue drapery and fabric) until we decide on something with a local flavour.