Once again, my apologies. It's been a long time. Our lives are absolutely crazy right now. I can't even begin to explain everything. However, I have indeed been thinking about things I'd like to write about. Most likely I'll go backwards for the next few blogs which I promise to write this week.
Visitors...we just had visitors from Germany. For much of their visit I wasn't even here. I was off on a strenuous tour in Europe (next blog topic). Erik was here most of the time, but on the same day I arrived back in Doha last week, he had to go to London. By the last day of their visit, all five of us were finally in house.
The theme that kept going through our heads was, "Yeah, but we actually have to live here." Of course when one is on vacation, one wants to have a great time - a good memory. Totally understandable. On the surface it looks great. Big apartment with no expenses (don't forget, we still have the expense of renting an apartment in Cologne), nice car, good pay with no taxes (which is going straight to the bank to pay off debts), warm weather (but seldom blue sky because the air is so full of pollution) and low work hours (but no way of planning the future because the schedules aren't known more than a few weeks in advance). Six months of living here gives one a very different impression from that of ten days of visiting.
As Western Europeans, it's simply a fact that we can't live the way we are accustomed. We knew that going into it. However, we see plenty of Arabs in Europe who, for instance, cover themselves. I am not being racist here. Rather, I am simply pointing out a double standard. Either we all accept each other or we all don't. This is even affecting our love life. Although once in a while we just throw up our hands and do it anyway if we are pretty sure nobody is looking on, we technically aren't allowed to hold hands or kiss in public. We tend to take our chances in the arrivals and departure areas at the airport.
The lack of basic human rights here is a real struggle for us. One of the hardest things is the lack of mobility. For me (Karen), it is in some respects easier. Since I'm not formally employed, I can leave by plane anytime. However, should I wish to drive out, the only way is through Saudi Arabia. I would not only need a visa, but must also be in the company of my husband, father or brother. Plus, I must cover myself from head to toe and I can't be the one driving the car. Since Erik is employed here, anytime he wants to leave, even if it's just for the day, he must have an exit permit which takes four days to process. We often ask ourselves what would happen if there were to be sickness or a death in the family and we need to leave immediately. For the first two months, Erik was completely without a passport. Thankfully, mine was only gone a few weeks. In a place like this, that feels like being naked.
This is a country in which you are lucky to accomplish one important thing a day. That is due to any number of reasons from bureaucracy to traffic to general attitude. The stock phrase here is "insha'Allah" (literally, "if God wills it"). That basically means anything from "it will happen" to "forget it". When you have to live with that everyday, it's not so "geil" after all (our German guests' favorite expression literally meaning "cool").
Our guests were waxing poetically about how nice they found the Qataris they've met here. It seemed to be based on just two things. Once, while crazily trying to walk in the heat along a road with no pedestrian pathway (mostly the case here), a Qatari picked them up and drove them home. That's because locals can't imagine going anywhere by foot. The other event was a ride through the dunes in the desert. Well, the guy was getting paid to do one of the few things they actually seem to like to do here - drive like a crazy person at a 45-degree angle. Of course he was nice. They paid him. Wracking our brains, it seems we have only really met one nice Qatari, and still, he is actually half Indian.
Yes, they look exotic and very graceful in their abayas and thawbs, but we just don't have a chance to get to know them. I'm sure there are many nice people somewhere in there but we have very little contact. When we came here we had such high hopes of becoming a part of their community, but it has proven to be impossible.
Our guests seemed to be surprised that we don't listen to local music in the car. First of all, there pretty much isn't any. Secondly, do we listen to schlager music in Germany just because it's German? No. We don't like it, so we listen to what we do like. Aside from Al Jazeera (the local and very good, internationally known news station), we listen to Alison Krauss and Handel in our car - no matter where we are.
Right now, we are just at the end of probably the best time of year weather-wise and I'm certainly glad our guests chose this particular time to visit. There is some green left from the cooler winter days and flowers are still blooming. It's warm enough to go to the beach to swim, but not so warm that stepping on the sand and being under the sun's rays is intolerable. But, when Erik arrived back in September, it was 45 degrees at night and if there was any vegetation to be seen, it was dry as a bone. Very soon, it will be back to that kind of weather and everything will dry up. That is what it is like 8-9 months of the year.
I don't want to go into detail on this blog about the professional nightmare we are experiencing here, but we are suffering immensely. Even if one knows one is right and is far above the level of the people who are doing the judging, it is #$*^ hard to keep one's integrity intact. Nobody here is being helped by pity, but we had hoped that we would receive some empathy from our guests - Erik's friends for some three decades. That was hardly the case. How could we possibly be so unhappy when everything here is so geil?
Suffice it to say, that in any real orchestra what is taking place right now simply could not happen. The very small, insecure people who have taken upon themselves to hold our future in the palms of their hands would simply be fired. The rest of the orchestra would stand up and say that the whole thing is completely unethical and there would be a strike. The administration would actually do something about it. Instead they are sticking their heads in the sand (and there's certainly lots of sand here). I repeat here my status on Facebook from last week:
Ethics, people! Think about the impact of your actions or even inaction! Other peoples' lives are not toys for you to play with.
I leave you with something fun - a few pics from my gig last week playing for the opening of a Lotus showroom:
Two Loti in the Intercontinental Hotel parking lot.
Awfully small to compete with the Land Cruisers...
The make-up job they did on me
