Ramadan 2012 – Day 1

I woke up around 3:10am, had the food and drinks that I kept on my nightstand, then went back to sleep until around 8.

In some ways weekends are the toughest when fasting. During the week I’m at work so that can keep me distracted but on the weekend I have to come up with things that keep me busy yet keep me away from food and drink yet not be outside (way too hot out there and I can't drink water while fasting).

So after surfing the net at home I went to work to get a bit done there and got back home around 2:30, which meant it was time for a nap. I felt hungry around 12 but the feeling passed after a while. I slept for about an hour and a half and did some chores around the house to pass the time.

A Qatari friend of mine mentioned something that locals like to do just before iftar is called -- drive around the Corniche. He says loads of Qataris do that. So around five o'clock I got in the car and headed to the Corniche. Here's what I saw:

My friend wasn't kidding, parts of the Corniche were gridlocked! There were even cops at some of the roundabouts directing the traffic. I drove around for a while but since I was on my own doing laps of the Corniche wasn't all that exciting. That was okay because it was time to go home to prepare food.

I chopped up some vegetables and got a soup ready and laid out three dates with a glass of water (traditionally you should break the fast with three dates). I had the television on Qatar TV to catch the time when you could break the fast but it wasn't necessary as the nearby mosque started a prayer at the same time. I couldn't finish the soup because I got full pretty quickly, this kind of surprised me as I've never had this issue before -- maybe my stomach shrunk a little from the fasting or it was full with the glass of water I had.

So all in all it wasn't too bad. No caffeine withdrawl, no desparate hunger.

Anyway it's 9:30pm, time to hit the town.


_______________________________________________

Hadiths of the Day:


What if you accidentally eat or drink something?

Abu Hurairah narrated that the Messenger of Allah said: "He who eats and drinks forgetting that he is fasting, let him continue observing fasting, for it is Allah Who gave him to eat and drink." (Sahih Muslim, Book of Fasting)


I’ll leave you to look up "Junub" . . .


Aishah narrated that a man came to the Prophet asking for a fatwa. While she was listening from the behind the door, he said: "O Messenger of Allah, (the time) of prayer overtakes me while I am Junub; should I observe fast?" The Messenger of Allah said: "This too happens to me, and I still observe fast." . . . . (Sahih Muslim, Book of Fasting)

Ramadan 2012 Has Begun!

Here I thought it would be called tomorrow night but as I was sitting with a friend at a café having mocktails (I'm off the caffeine, remember) when he got a message on his Blackberry and said, “Ramadan has been called!”

Apparently Ramadan has been called in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Kuwait as well.

So after we finished at the café it was off to a grocery store for supplies. I picked up some cheese and laban for my pre-dawn meal, I have the rest of the food so I'm set.

My friend is going to have a cranky weekend; he is not off the caffeine and he smokes (which you can’t do during the day either) so tomorrow he's going to be fasting, going through caffeine withdrawal, and nicotine withdrawal. Yow.

According to my Ramadan prayer guide fasting starts tomorrow at 3:28am and finishes at 6:27pm. 15 hours of fasting!

Let's see how it goes this year. Ramadan Kareem everyone!


________________________________________________________-

(The first hadith I want to share is small so I'll give you two hadiths)


On women in mosques:

Zainab Ath-Thaqafiyah narrated: the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said to us: “When one of you comes to the mosque, let her not wear perfume.” (Sahih Muslim, Book of As-Salat)


On eating garlic:

Ibn ‘Umar narrated that during the battle of Khaibar the Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said: "He who eats from this plant (i.e., garlic), let him not go to mosques.” (Sahih Muslim, Book of As-Salat)

[There's actually three different hadiths about eating onions and garlic and not going to mosques. It appears that smelling of onions and garlic is a no-no.]

Dates

Need to stock up on some dates for Ramadan. Last year I bought a variety from the supermarket but there are other options:

There's a few shops in Souq Waqif that sell dates. They are behind some of the restaurants like Le Gourmet, facing the parking lot. I have picked up dates there a few times; or

a Qatari friend of mine recommended a place that he goes to for dates, a place near Burger King roundabout

They carry a wide selection of dates as well as decorative platters and other things you can use for them, much like a chocolate shop.

One of the advantages of date stores like Al Qaseem or the ones in Souq Waqif is that you can sample all the varieties and then buy the ones you like. There are many different varieties of dates – Al Qaseem had over a dozen.

Ultimately I picked up some Khudri dates, a variety I never tried before called Sultani, and of course some Ajwa dates. Ajwas are the most expensive, in part because they are specifically mentioned in hadiths as providing health benefits, but I like their flavor. I didn't order a lot of them though – at QAR 180 a kilo they are up to three times as expensive as some other varieties.


___________________________________________________________________________________

Hadith of the day:

Abu Harairah narrated that the Prophet said: “When any one of you wake up, let him not put his hands in the food plate until he washes it three times, for he does not know where his hand was [while he was asleep].” Sahih Muslim, Book of Wudu.

Ramadan Approaches

Ramadan is about a week away so it's time to start getting ready. Like previous years I too will be fasting (for previous years see the Ramadan category on the right-hand side for more information, or click on “Ramadan” at the bottom of this post). So that means a few preparations.

1) Get off the caffeine

During the fast you are not allowed to eat or drink anything during the day, even water. For someone who likes coffee that's a surefire way to have a splitting headache if you don't wean yourself off the caffeine in advance. At work I used to drink 4 cups a day (cups, not mugs, not grande lattes from a coffee shop, cups), now I'm down to two and on Sunday the plan is to move to one coffee in the morning and a decaf in the afternoon.

Caffeine withdrawal can be nasty if you go cold turkey but thankfully you can get off caffeine without headaches or illness by slowly reducing your intake over a couple of weeks. I've done this the last couple of years without any problems.

2) Get some Islamic reading material

It is customary for a Muslim to read the entire Qur’an during Ramadan, which can be done at any time though some do it as part of Tarawih prayers.

Now I have read the Qur'an a couple of times, and have occasionally referred to it over the years but I also like reading hadiths. I own a copy of the Bukhari Hadiths that I purchased a few years ago.

I found many of the hadiths in the book really interesting. You see, many of the traditions we associate with Muslims (such as men can't wear gold) aren't actually mentioned in the Qur’an -- they come from the hadiths. I was surprised when I first read the Qur’an at how few rules there were actually in it.

So this Ramadan I decided to expand my reading and picked up:

A summary of the Al-Muslim Hadiths (2 volumes), another significant Islamic work. Like the Bukhari Hadiths the Al-Muslim Hadiths are generally accepted by all Sunni Muslims so I’m hoping to find yet more interesting rules and etiquettes. I'll post some of the more interesting findings as I read through them.

3) Get a paper that outlines the prayer times.

I'm not Muslim (nor do I play one on TV :p ) so I'm not praying five times a day, but you need to have an idea of when the fasting starts and when you can break the fast. Cards outlining the prayer times are handy for that. It is likely I'll be waking up around 3am to have my final meal then fasting until about 6:20pm but because the timings are based around sunrise and sunset the exact timing slowly changes over the course of the month.

4) Stock up on essential food

There are a number of items that I need for the Ramadan meals. Dates are important, traditionally you break your fast with three dates, and my 3am meal always consists of cereal, nuts, dates, cheese, and laban.

Thankfully the Government subsidizes the pricing on a number of key items during Ramadan and mandates the prices that they can be sold in the stores, to prevent price gouging.

Not sure yet what I'm going to be doing for Iftar meals but I will plan something small. If I can do this Ramadan thing properly it should also be a good way to lose weight.



So I have about a week ago, like previous year is almost frequently about how it's going.

City Center Mall has Reopened!

As reported by both a coworker of mine who went over there, me seeing that the security stopping cars is now gone, and a report on dohanews, the mall is open now, though on such short notice many of the stores will not be open tonight. The Mall should be open as normal tomorrow.

Spread the news!

Caps

One of my favorite things to wear is baseball caps. Not sure why, maybe it's a Canadian thing, but I started wearing them as a teenager and never looked back. I recall years ago I was with a bunch of people, playing some card games in a game store where I been hanging out for a year or so, and I had removed my cap to scratch my head when a girl there suddenly said, "Hey! You're not bald!” . . . . No, I’m not (see picture - - - ->), but it turns out I wore a baseball cap every time she saw me so she assumed I was bald and trying to hide it.

So of course here in Doha I wear caps in the evenings and weekends. I was out with some friends a little while ago and one asked if I was wearing a new cap. I said no and he was a bit surprised. “I haven't seen that one before -- how many baseball caps do you have?”. Good question.

It turns out, 11.

I was a bit surprised myself that I had that many. Granted, there are some I don't wear that often (for example I try not to wear the Corona one in Qatar) but I had more than I thought.

More surprising was just how many were distinctly Canadian:

Have you ever heard that old stereotype that Canadians sew little Canadian flags onto their backpacks and jackets so that people won't think they're American? I didn't think much of the stereotype, though in truth my father did do that when traveling, but I was surprised at just how many caps I had that either screamed "Canadian!" or would have been recognized by a Canadian because they were Canadian sports teams.

Not that wearing the caps is a bad thing. Occasionally people will recognize whatever logo is on the cap and say hi. I remember when I was at a gelato stand in Bergamo, Italy and the store owner recognized my Vancouver Canucks cap! Turns out he was a big fan and was telling me how lots of people in northern Italy follow the NHL. Who knew?

City Center Mall Update -- July 8

I checked this afternoon (the office is near there). Still closed.

City Centre Update - July 6th

It's 3:15pm on Friday, July 6th and City Centre is still closed. Security is still turning cars away.

City Centre Mall update

It's Thursday at 1:30pm and City Centre Mall is still closed. We might be looking at another weekend without City Centre.

With the dust storm today and City Centre closed I think I'll just stay home tonight instead of braving the crowds at the other malls.

Air Ticket Prices

The Gulf Times has an article about the sudden rise in airfare prices now that it is peak season. This is timely as I've just had a similar experience with airfares myself.

But first just to give you an idea of how much the airfares have gone up, the article mentions that Doha-London return is QR 5,300 (~$1,450). My winter trips to Canada, typically Doha-London, London-Vancouver, are around QR 5,600-6,000 for the entire trip. . . and London-Vancouver is the longer leg of the two.

Doha-Paris now at QR 5,600 (~$1,525)? Typically it would be around QR 4,000 (~$1,100).

Now for my story, a few weeks ago my friend Murat wanted to take his wife to London for Eid and since he's never been there before, but I have, we were all going to go together and I would show them around. Well the prices for the air tickets were outrageous and we figured out that the trip would be over his budget so we cancelled those plans. Instead he invited me to travel with them to Turkey where he could show me around. Sounds like a plan to me!

So earlier this week I went online to look at tickets to Istanbul and found that the day I wanted to travel (and the following day) was already sold out -- nearly two months in advance. And tickets on the days around when I wanted to travel were going to cost QR 4,600 (~$1,225). WTH, it's not even a four-hour flight!

So I told my friend Murat and he suggested we look at flights to Ankara. It'll be a bit farther drive to get to his hometown (extra four hours) but maybe flights are available on the day we want and he has some relatives in Ankara as well.

Sure enough, there were flights available on any of the days. And the price? QR 2,800! (~$750) For a flight of nearly the same distance.

Okay I realize that supply and demand might create a price increase but what some of these airlines try to get away with is outrageous. $500 difference in price for going to a different city nearby? Why!?

Anyway, if you're planning to go to Turkey on vacation this summer think about flying to Ankara instead of Istanbul.

Revenge of the Secret Ministry

It looks like the Ministry is monitoring this blog, I tried to drive out this morning only to find construction had blocked all the roads from the apartment building! Well, one 1-lane road was open, but a massive truck decided that would be a great place to stop and slowly offload construction equipment.

It took me going the wrong way down a one-way street and going over two sidewalks to get out of the neighborhood. Better luck next time Ministry! :P


By the way I just got back from West Bay, City Center mall is still closed. No word on when it will reopen but dohanews is reporting that many workers are there trying to get the fire saftey enchancements completed.

The Secret Ministry Strikes Again

They came in the night, without warning, while the city slept.

I awoke to a different world, of red and white barriers and upturned pavement.

The Secret Ministry had struck again.

How long the repairs will take is anyone's guess. Thankfully it is not causing major disruptions and it is still easy to drive around the neighborhood. Friends of mine have not been so fortunate in the past. One time a friend of mine was almost trapped in his compound as road construction work pretty much surrounded the whole complex. It's not that bad here.

. . . so far.

:)

Gold Souq

As of today at five o'clock City Centre was still closed.

I just got back from Souq Waqif and the new Gold Souq is open. I took a quick wander around, it's air-conditioned, has a nice courtyard area with a small pool, and also had a café with a few tables. Not all the stores were open yet but the ones that were appeared to be very high-end -- some of the jewelry on display had really large stones (I'm talking “Holy &%^#!” stones). The jewelry was clearly for people with lots of money to spend.

Pictures:

City Centre Update and Summer Is Here

Summer is fully upon us and the temperatures are reaching well into the 40s. I can handle that as the evenings are hot, but manageable IF there is no humidity. On those evenings where the humidity kicks in it’s unbearable, sweat is pouring off you within five minutes of walking around.

Now I like to walk around, which gets impractical in the summer. My main way of beating the summer heat and getting some exercise was to go to a big mall and walk around there. Unfortunately, there's not a lot of options now.

Villaggio is still closed (of course) and it likely will not reopen for months, with some rumours saying that it might be shut down for good. We’ll have to wait and see for an official announcement but I certainly think it won't open for the rest of summer at least.

Despite the original optimism that it would only be closed for a few days City Centre Mall remains closed -- two weeks later. There's lots of speculation about when it will reopen, ranging from tomorrow to weeks. Have to wait and see on that one.

That leaves Landmark as the only large mall left and it is insanely busy. It always was busy but with the closure of the other two malls it's now the main shopping centre for 1.5 million people. If you're dripping with sweat after a five-minute walk, well, you'll probably be walking longer than that just to get from your parking space to that mall.

There's not much else that can be done. In the Middle East the summers are incredibly hot so you tend to stay indoors. Malls provide a large air-conditioned area with which you can wander around, meet friends, have a coffee or a meal, and generally have a pleasant time. There's little else in Doha that can provide that so that means coming up with alternative things to do. I'm thinking of going to the gym more, meeting friends at coffee shops or at various homes (I had some friends over at my place this weekend), and I might have to splurge on a getaway weekend somewhere just to change things up a little. I'm thinking Oman but we’ll see.

Is It a Sport or a Game?

Occasionally there is a debate about whether a certain thing is a game or a sport. This tends to come up around Olympic time when people criticize certain events as not being a "real sport". Given that the Olympics are right around the corner and figured I'd offer my views on the debate as I've always had a rule of thumb to differentiate between a game and a sport:


If you can be over 45 years old, and/or overweight, and/or drink beer while playing, yet still be one of the best at it -- it's a game, not a sport.


To me sports are athletic, you have to be in peak physical condition to be the best, whereas that is not necessarily the case with a game. That doesn't mean that certain skills are not necessary to be the best again, in fact they have to be extremely skilled to be the best, but not athletic. For the Olympics, that means games probably shouldn't be there.

So what does that mean for various events?


Chess – game. I know occasionally there is a push to include it in the Olympics (it is in the Asian Games) but I disagree with that.

Synchronized swimming -- this one always gets flak from people but under my definition it's definitely a sport.

Bowling – game.

Golf – hmmmmm, I will have to leave that one open for debate. Golfers seem to peak in their 20s and 30s so there appears to be a level of athleticism involved. I don't follow golf much so I couldn't really say how likely it would be for someone in their 40s to be a top-20 golfer. Are you allowed to drink beer between holes of a major golf tournament?

Curling -- I'm going to get in trouble for this one from my fellow Canadians – game.

Baseball -- maybe in the olden days you could have been overweight and out of shape but I don't think that's true anymore (so forget about bringing up those late-career pictures of Babe Ruth everyone) – sport.

Darts -- I think in Britain it's mandatory to drink beer while playing it ;-) Game.

Archery and Shooting – hmmmmm, don’t know. Can't think of why you can't be 45 or overweight and not be an excellent shot -- game unless someone can argue otherwise.

Equestrian -- you probably won't do well if you're overweight, and you can’t drink beer on the horse, but I think you can be over 45 and still win – game.

Table tennis -- occasionally maligned by Westerners but if you've ever seen it played at an Olympic level there is no way someone who is out of shape is going to be at the top – sport.

Wrestling – sport (hopefully it is not common for there to be top wrestlers over the age of 45, otherwise this will have to be the exception that proves the rule). Sumo wrestling is definately the exception that proves the rule on the overweight criteria.

Ice Dancing – sport. While not as physically grueling as, say, pairs figure skating you still need to be really fit.


Try the definition out with other events, if you can find some exceptions let me know.

Oman

Okay, here are the promised pictures.

First, my friend Serdar, his family, and I drove up to the mountains.




And wandered around an abandoned village on a trail above a wadi.








We were planning to go further along the trail but it was just too hot so we went back down and hung out in the town of Bahla, which has a massive fort and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Unfortunately the fort was still being renovated so we couldn't tour it but my understanding is it will reopen later this year.







Later we went to the nearby town of Jibreen because we saw a sign that said “Jibreen Castle, 4km”. We decided to check it out thinking it would be some small ruin and instead saw this:



It was massive! With dozens of rooms in something like five levels. It was a fantastic Castle, and we were the only tourists there.







Afterwards we continued on to the city of Nizwa, once the capital of Oman, today it contains a nice fort and large souq area.






We wandered around the souq for a while before I headed back to Muscat to catch a flight home.

It was a great trip but it was a bit hot. Because we were up in the mountains it was a dry heat rather than humid butwalking around was like walking next to a giant hairdryer! That said, Oman is a great country to visit and it's a shame more tourists don't go there. When the weather is cooler I plan on renting a 4x4 and explore the countryside for a couple weeks.

Car Inspection 2012

I had to get my car inspected this morning as part of renewing the registration. The process was pretty much the same as last year only this time, because I had a couple of scratches on the door (from some fool in the parking lot opening their car door too hard), the inspectors deemed it a “fault” and said my car didn't pass. Seriously, the two scratches were about an inch long! Apparently the inspectors are instructed to be conservative and write up any problem.

So what do you do in that situation? At the side of the building is another line up with a Ministry Officer who you go to for a second opinion. Drive up, hand him the report, he takes a quick look, and if he thinks it's minor signs off that you can renew your registration. Which of course he did in my case.

Other than that it was a pretty smooth process. Driving in the Industrial Area is a bit of a pain though but c’est la vie.

Villaggio Tragedy and City Centre Update

Apparently the first report is out and it points to an electrical fire at the Nike store as the source. No evidence of arson or other wrongdoing. I haven't gone through the full report but I believe there is a link to it at dohanews.co. A criminal investigation is still ongoing.

So imagine my surprise when I stopped by City Centre mall this morning only to find it completely closed. The guard wasn't sure why but I later found out through websites and texts from friends that the Ministry of Interior had closed it for inspections. Later word was that the mall would be closed for at least two days because something didn't conform to safety regulations. Looks like the ministries are starting to crack down. Closing the largest mall in Qatar for two days over the weekend is pretty tough.

I was out at lunch with a couple of friends when I heard the news. With both Villaggio and City Centre closed that left only one main mall open on the weekend – Landmark. We decided to go just to see how crazy it would be. (I know, I know, let's chalk it up to morbid curiosity.)

Yep, it was pretty crazy. It was difficult to even get a table in a café and this was mid-afternoon. We left by six before it got too insane.

While I'm glad to see that the Government is stepping up inspections I sure hope City Centre isn’t closed for long. There's no way all of Doha can go to Landmark.

Away on Business

I was out of the country last week for work. It coincided with a weekend trip I had already planned with a friend of mine so it was a bit annoying as I had to change my plane tickets but c'est la vie.

The weekend saw me in my favorite GCC-vacation country. No, not Dubai, I was in Oman. I visited sites near Jebel Shams, had a great time.

I will post pictures this week.

City Centre Update

Happened to be in City Centre Mall on Friday afternoon. By about 4:30 in the afternoon it definitely seemed to be busier than usual and by the time I left around six o'clock it was pretty crazy. Busier than Thursday night.

Again the police were there. A Traffic Policeman was out in front of the mall trying to stop people double (and triple) parking in the area near the taxis. Yes, technically it’s not parking because there was always someone in the car but the police were moving them on anyway. I think it's still okay to drop off and pick up people, you just can't wait around.

There are lots of illegally-parked cars across the road and again there were Traffic Police ticketing the cars. I'm not sure if they use stickers anymore, they simply take a picture of the car. I guess that way if you protest the ticket they will just show you the photo. The people who received tickets may not even have known it until they go online to check.

The ticketing officer was behind the skyscrapers, by that vacant lot near Bio-Bil and the W, and there were a lot of cars on the sidewalks for him to ticket.

It looks like if you are going to City Centre Mall on the weekends you're pretty much guaranteed to get a ticket if you park illegally anywhere in the area.