Weekends defined, Learning to drive, and Traveling outside of Doha

Weekends

In the last post, I mentioned that it was the weekend, but what I neglected to mention was that in Qatar, the weekend is different than it is in most Western countries by one day. Since Friday is the Muslim day of prayer, the weekend here falls on Friday and Saturday, and thus by extension, the normal workweek runs from Sunday through Thursday. So the phrase, "this past weekend," henceforth, can be legitimately used in this blog starting the Sunday of any given week.

Driving practice

Anyway, this past weekend, most of us took the time to get accustomed to our cars and did a pretty fair bit of exploring. Friday morning was the test run for our new cars -- I share a car with my apartment-mates Jeff and Adam -- and so we all got some practice navigating the city and its many roundabouts. Actually, I was hugely anxious at first about getting behind the wheel, but I've been getting the hang of it a lot more quickly than I expected. Driving around Doha could well be a subject for another post entirely, but for now, suffice to say that every pass through a roundabout is accompanied by much honking and a rush of pure adrenaline. This is one of those cities where lanes and turn signals are apparently vastly overrated. Think NYC traffic but with circular intersections. That's approximately how it is here.

Venturing out of Doha

Come Saturday, we all took our cars and headed out to explore some more of the country, driving north from Doha toward the town of Al Khor. In hindsight, we probably should've come a different day, and we probably will later in the year. As it is, we're currently in the middle of the hottest week of the year: the highs are about 105-110 F and it's humid enough to fog my glasses when I step out of an A/C-ed car. At this latitude and at this time of year, the sunlight is powerful enough to force most people to stay indoors during the midday hours. Including us. When we got to Al Khor, it was pretty empty outside, so we quickly took shelter and got lunch at a self-described Indian/Arabian/Chinese/BBQ restaurant. As hungry as I was, there was a definitely lot more food than I could finish, but altogether I don't think we spent more than 15 riyals each (less than 5 USD). That's one of the best things I'm discovering about living here: it's fairly easy to eat well without burning a hole in your pocket. Which is nice, because other things I'm on the hunt for, like books, tend to be somewhat on the pricey side.

From Al Khor, we drove northwest toward Al Zubarah, an old fortress, the last stop of the day. The fort itself was a bit underwhelming, but it was a worthwhile trip just to be able to explore some more of the country. I leave you with these pictures in lieu of the thousands more words I could type.

Looking out at the beach in Al Khor:

Peter, one of the TAs in our group, picked up a huge cardboard box to shield himself from the blistering sun. I caved and joined him, as did a couple others, not too much later:

Enjoying a tasty biryani lunch:

Driving through miles of mostly empty desert to reach Al Zubara:

Al Zubarah fort -- the flag on top of the rectangular tower is the flag of Qatar:

The Qatari flag, up close:

Yep, it's pretty lonely out there:

Climbing down the tower:

The inside of the fort: