Yes, today is the day of the fishing trip on a Dhow. But first...
Do you recall how excited I was about getting to bed at a reasonable time last night? Part of that excitement was because I have felt tired since I got here. I assumed it was just jet lag and I was taking unusually long to get over it. Well...about that...
I woke up at 1:00 AM to the curious sound of dance music coming from my pillow. I was pretty damn certain that I had explicitly ordered the non-musical pillows, so I got up to investigate.
Room to the right...quiet.
Room to the left...quiet.
Trade the robe for jeans and a shirt. [Apparently, I am OK with wandering *my* floor in a robe, but getting in an elevator in a robe, well, that's just going too far.]
Upper floor...quiet.
Lower floor...quiet.
WTH?
Back to the room. Pillow is still musical. Bed is musical. Maybe something outside...hmm...that balcony...is that part of the bar downstairs? In the esteemed word of Lana, from Archer, "Yup!"
I head down to the front desk and let them know that I am having trouble sleeping and need to relocate my room when I wake up. The night manager apologizes profusely and even comically offers to have the bar turn the music down a bit, which I laugh off and tell them I'll just wait until they close (by then, it was around 1:30, only 30 minutes more). We agree to get me moved in the morning.
Morning comes...I am drowsy and stiff. To the gym!
So, two quick points about the gym today. One, their benches are awesome and they have nifty degree markings on the heights so you don't have to guess which setting is 30 degrees.
Two, their dumbbells have this interesting feature, a spinning handle. I shot a quickie video to show you what I mean.
This is a double-edged sword. I left my weightlifting gloves at home, so this is nice because it is a bit easier on my hands and thus should result in callouses growing less quickly. HOWEVER, when you try to do a stability exercise that requires supporting yourself on a single dumbbell...well, let's just say the exercise gets a LOT more effective with rolling grips. For example, the T-Pushup from the Spartacus workout, specifically, this part of it:
A tad wobbly, it is. Super core workout go!
OK, enough fitness talk. I'll close the fitness interlude by saying today's workout music was the Blade II soundtrack, which has a number of collaborative works between a hip hop or rap artist and an "electronic" (e.g., dance, trance, trip-hop) artist. For example, Mos Def and Massive Attack's collaborative work, I Against I, which is an anthem for the tragedy of vampire-on-vampire violence. We all gots fangs yo; stop hating, daywalker.
Changed hotel rooms, off to lunch!
So, I know I am going on a boat later with my co-workers, but I don't know how small or cramped it will be. In a fit of foolhardiness, I decide to go to Nando's again for some peri-peri chicken, fully aware that if I am not careful, I may end up conducting chemical warfare against my colleagues. I decide to get the more fancy pants dish today:
Tasty. And the cole slaw (with Nando's "special" mayonnaise...I don't want to know) was good. When I get back to my room, I am greeted by a make up gift from the manager. Fruit!
Tasty. Now, on to the Dhow!
After a bit of mucking about, we finally all converge onto the Dhow.
There are only about a dozen of us, including the crew, so it should be relatively roomy. The plan is to head out to "Banana Island" and fish nearby (we won't actually land at the island, just float around it). We set out for a 6 hour tour, so we could get twice as lost as Gilligan, but given that Banana Island is a small lifeless patch of sand, I am sizing up which of my colleagues to cannibalize first...
About Alcohol in Qatar: Drinking in public and public display of alcohol (as in, outside of bars and such) is forbidden; public drunkenness is also illegal. I have been told that even carrying alcohol is illegal unless you are non-muslim and have a special permit, which you can only get after getting Qatari residency; however, I suspect that as long as you were truly transporting to a legitimate location for alcohol consumption, it would be OK. Even a house party with alcohol is illegal, unless the home owner has an alcohol permit.
The first leg of the trip was cruising out to international waters, or leaving Qatar's territorial waters, or whatever. The important point is that once you get there, if you happen to come across alcohol, it would be legal to drink it. Until then, though, the alcohol needs to be out of sight. I can neither confirm nor deny that any alcohol was on our Dhow...
Here is some footage of the outbound cruise. I did my best to avoid the wind noise, but it was choppy and windy, so whatcha gonna do?
And another video off the port side, showing the downtown skyline.
OK, so we cruised up to the Qatar Coast Guard ship, which I initially mistook for someone's party boat. It is permanently moored at the imaginary boundary of Qatar's territorial waters (or whatever you call them). We were told that close up pictures of the ship might upset them, so here is a very distant picture to give you a sense of why I thought it was just some party boat (but the gun emplacements on it suggest otherwise...):
All righty, the ship is checked out and cleared to proceed, so we do. After a while we arrived at Banana Island and got busy fishing. The fishing was a bit comical - a dozen people with a BEvERage in one hand, a fishing pole with two hooks on it in the other, stumbling about a boat that is rocking so hard side to side that the side of the boat is going up and down a meter or so...miraculously no humans were caught on the hooks.
Our fishing was not stellar. We caught a total of four fish. What was remarkable is those four fish were caught by two people from a single cast each. That's right, twice someone cast their line and pulled out two fish at one time. That whole two hooks approach is pretty slick.
To be honest, though, the fishing was not as major of an event as I had expected. The Dhow was more suited to chilling out, sitting on the benches, eating, drinking, and chatting; over time we started to put up our poles and do just that.
At some point in the late afternoon, we had some grub, which did not include the fish we caught, somewhat to our surprise. The food was OK, but I didn't each much, because it was pretty much meat and starch.
As the sun set, the air got REALLY cold. Remember how I was wearing essentially running shorts and a sleeveless work out shirt? Well, as that cold win kicked up, it started feeling like bits might fall off before we got back to port. One of my colleagues made a makeshift hobo windbreaker from a garbage bag...and after a while I sat downwind of her and used her as a windbreaker. :-D
We headed back home, checked in with the Coast Guard, and got back on dry land.
I got back to the hotel and had a quick meal and relaxed a bit before bed. I did not choose wisely with my meal. I picked a salad with bitter lettuce and failed to notice that my Veal Milanese also came with bitter lettuce on top. The Veal was good, but I was pretty bittered out by the end of the meal.
[Day 11] November 9, A Day Without A Picture...
This is the first day for which I don't have a picture. Uh oh...I need to find my inner tourist and get that camera fired back up. In my defense, today was a work day that ran a little long, so I pretty much just worked out ate, worked, and slept.
Today's workout music was Offspring's Smash. Instead of linking one of their most popular songs off this album, I will link one of my favorites, an ode to road rage.
Yummy lamb chops and herbed spinach for dinner.
[Day 12] November 10, Real Arabic Food!
Today's workout music is Pantera's Vulgar Display of Power. I was torn on which song to link, but I'll go with Mouth for War.
The morning was educational. As my cab driver started heading off into the desert, I once again learned the important lesson to not even mention the word "medical" when I tell them where I want to go. You see, I work in the Sidra Medical Tower, but when they hear "Sidra" and "Medical" they generally stop listening and decide I want to go to the Sidra Medical Center construction site. So, today's valuable lesson is - just say "Sidra Tower".
The big news today is that I went out to dinner with my coworkers for a company-sponsored "team dinner" at a local Arabic restaurant, Nobles. The food was great. Here is a picture of the group:
We had all of the usual goodies - hummus, baba ghanouj, kafta kebab, shish kebab, tabbouleh, pita, falafel, and some stuff I am probably forgetting. Some new stuff (for me) - a strong raspberry drink, an excellent seafood soup that was red and reminded me of borscht, some vinegared vegetables, a tray of jams and jellies with crispy bread, and turkish coffee (I passed on that and the tea). All in all, a great meal. It was the best baba ghanouj I have ever had.
Administrative note: I am going to post a little more frequently to reduce the epic duration of these posts, at least until there is less to say, and I am going to go by the numbers of the days since my trip started as opposed to the weeks.
[Day 7] November 5 (continued), No Tongue!
After I posted yesterday, I saw a movie with a colleague. We ended up seeing In Time. I had been forewarned that I should expect cuts during romantic bits and there were a few. What's interesting is that there was one gratuitous kiss that was not cut and one shorter one that was. Of course, no part of the sex scene survived. So, I think I have their censoring algorithm worked out.
If naughty bits, then censor
If tongue, then censor
Move along, nothing to see
And we all know how racy Puss in Boots is. I give you...Cat in Boots!
After the movie, we grabbed some dinner...another exotic meal at Chili's. :-D
I settled on a New York Strip with steamed veggies and sauteed mushrooms. I *was* going to get broccoli as my second side, but the server was emphatic that it was unacceptably redundant, since the steamed vegetables also contained broccoli. Unwilling to start an international incident, I laughed and acquiesced.
Apparently, the workout earlier and/or the last vestiges of recovering from food poisoning left me too tired for a second workout today. Ah well, if I skip my day of rest for a couple of weeks, I'll catch up anyway.
Speaking of the food poisoning, I opted to use the Dompy sparingly, and within 24 hours I had stopped. My stomach is not 100% queasy free, but it's calm enough to stop the med. The decision to not take the other two meds seems to have worked out fine.
[Day 8] November 6, Peri-Peri Good
The morning workout was interesting today. I decided to take my iPhone 4S and my Bose SoundLink down to the gym and take full advantage of 1) being able to fit all of my music on my phone now, and 2) the wireless portability of my SoundLink; the goal was to play my own music instead of the loud but strangely sedate clubby...jazzy...music-like sound that played in the hotel gym.
Well, it turns out that there is a plug where I can directly hook my iPhone into the gym's sound systems. MUAHAHA!
I fired up Audioslave and started rocking the weights. Much to my amusement, the hotel attendant / fitness trainer there kept cranking up the volume to near ear-splitting levels. The other guest and I didn't mind, and for a while it was full on rockin' gym mode. Feet were tapping and weights were lifted with zeal.
And now, a musical interlude
The band Audioslave was formed by the singer from Soundgarden and all but the singer from Rage Against the Machine. If you have watched Iron Man or Aliens vs. Cowboys, you have heard their music. Here is a video on their genesis and them performing two of their more popular songs - Set It Off and Gasoline. It's live, so it's not as polished, cut them some slack. :-)
[If you want the polished version, try this link for Set It Off and this link for Gasoline.]
Both songs do a fantastic job of showcasing the distinct but well-matched sounds. What Tom Morello can do with a guitar is just amazing, Chris Cornell's vocals are incredible, Tim Commerford's bass riffs are awesome, and Brad Wilk's drums bring the beat. Good stuff.
OK, musical interlude over.
So there we were rocking out to Gasoline when another guest, a lean British woman, came in and ruined our man party by turning it down so she could listen to her headphones. Ah well, I can understand; it was crazy loud. And she's in great shape, so at least the scenery improved.
She had really overdone it on turning down the music, but the attendant snuck over and turned it back up a little. :-D
I had chatted a bit with the attendant during some of my workouts, but today was a whole new level. I gave a lecture on physics, nanotechnology, communications technology, the genesis of Audioslave, and a lot more.
But then I did something silly...I decided to show him the Spartacus workout while my muscles were still worn out from the workout I had just finished. I only did one circuit, but holy crap did it kick my ass. On the plus side though, it was kicking his ass just as hard and he was a fitness trainer ten years my younger. Hooray for fitness!
Breakfast brunch at the W Doha amazing as usual. I wonder when I will get tired of their fresh mango. It's hard to imagine right now...but I know the day will come.
Today is a national holiday, so I was told I could work from the hotel. This is a good thing because there are so many little administrative and compliance things I need to knock out.
I headed over to the mall for lunch and settled on Nando's Peri-Peri.
Now, you may be thinking, "Hey, Michael, Mister I-wanna-eat-exotic; that sounds like some Tex-Mex joint." Ah, but it is not. You can read about them on their site. It turns out they started in South Africa. Their name comes from a bastardization of a Swahili name for an indigenous pepper called the African Bird's Eye Chilli. So, there, naysayers, it's more exotic than you think.. We'll just ignore the fact that I could buy the same stuff in Washington or Maryland...
What closed the deal for me was seeing that they had a heat scale.
Now it was a matter of pride. I had to conquer their heat scale. I shall be the King of the "Perio-meter".
I ordered the quarter chicken with grilled vegetables and smoked corn on the cob. And this is what they served me.
That is unlike any chicken I have ever seen. I chalked it up to different breeds and soldiered on. The chicken tasted great. Not very spicy, but really tasty. I'll ignore the fact that the sauce probably has sugar in it and is likely not the best for me, but it's tasty and spicy, so screw healthy; I mean it's grilled chicken, so that's gotta count for something. The Grilled vegetables were somewhat exotic (for me); the chief ingredient was eggplant. They were somewhere between OK and good.
The corn was not so good, I think it was mummy corn stolen from Egypt, because it would take some special process and thousands of years to make corn that dessicated and tough. But...they gave me another ear that was more moist and tasty, somewhere between OK and good.
Overall, probably a place I will visit again. I really liked the taste of the "extra hot" chicken.
Work, work, work.
Hmm...it seems that the Extra Hot peri-peri chicken from lunch is striking back with chemical warfare. Luckily there are currently no innocent bystanders in my room, so no collateral damage. Definitely not a good lunch choice if I have a date planned that night.
I hit one of the in-house hotel restaurants, Spice Market. I had actually had my first meal in Doha here the night arrived - lamb chops. Tonight I had some funky salad with green papaya and for my entree I had red curry chicken. It was all very tasty.
The restaurant is nice, but a tiny bit pretentious. The ambiance is really nice - dark, sections are segregated somewhat so that everywhere still feels a little cozy/intimate. Beautiful furnishings, etc. Portions are small, so trying to get by on an entree alone is challenging (I learned this during my first visit).
The jazz piano was fired up tonight and I swear I couldn't recognize a single song. They were English songs and the person was an English-speaking person, American or European. I am not sure if the songs were simply obscure (to me) or just so brutally re-imagined that they no longer recognized themselves. Out of kindness, I will assume the former.
The piano area in the bar was strangely crowded. The cocktail tables were right next to the piano. The singer had a very passionate audience of two. A couple of guys sitting at a table practically in arms' reach, clearly enjoying the alcoholic beverages available, as witnessed by that glossy sheen of that says, "I am f'd up!" After each song, the two of them did their best to cheer and whoop enough to make up for the rest of us who were just there to eat. Gotta give them credit for trying, but it came off more comical than I think they intended.
My body is still sore and worn out from my folly in the gym, so no second workout tonight. It looks like I'll just have to skip my day of rest each week and slowly get back on schedule over the next two weeks.
[Day 9] November 7, It's Raining?
I had the gym to myself this morning, so I hooked up the iPod (I need the iPhone for the timer) and fired up Rage Against the Machine's first, eponymous album.
Sidenote:When I went to insert a link to Killing in the Name Of, one of the better-known songs off of the above album, I stumbled across a video of a live BBC Radio performance. Apparently, in 2009, there was a campaign to break a cycle in which a song from the winner of the show X Factor would be the #1 song for Christmas. This had been true for a few years. Well apparently, there was a campaign to break this by pushing Killing in the Name Of to the top. And it worked. [This performance is a bit raw, if you want the polished version, try this link.]
/end sidenote
I have been told that we get only a few centimeters of rain in Doha each year. Wikepedia reports 7.5 cm per year. Egads. I thought Dallas was bad, but we are practically drowning in rain compared to Doha with our roughly 36" (91 cm) average per year. So, I was understandably surprised when it rained while I was working out this morning.
I thought it would take me at least two weeks to make it rain here.
Since it was such a special thing, I thought I'd take a video, but this was smack in the middle of the second circuit of a Spartacus workout, so my movies looked like they were taken by Hammy, the hyperkinetic squirrel from Over The Hedge. I finally had the brilliant idea to brace my iPhone up against the window of the gym and I got a nice steady sequence. Time to upload it...and we're uploading...and we're uploading...and we're uploading...
Wow, you really feel that low bandwidth when trying to upload a video. It's only 30 megabytes, but it keeps going and going and going...I wish Blogger would give me a progress bar; the suspense is killing me! Ah, to heck with it, it's time I created a YouTube channel anyway.
All right, let's see if uploading via YouTube works better. Ooh, that IS better. A description, a name, no interference with injecting other video content into my blog post, and a progress bar! Yay! Anyway, here is the short (10 second) video.
The rain interlude was nice, since the Spartacus workout was really kicking my ass today. After the first circuit, I figured out why...virtually no breaks between exercises. At home, I use the Powerblock "Intellbells" (they ain't dumb, I tells ya!).
They are wonderful for a home gym because you get 0 to 90 lbs in a very small footprint. However, changing weights is not instantaneous. You have to slot the weights back in, change the pin, then pull them back out. If you want to make smaller changes, you have to slide inserts out of the handgrip. So...that 15 seconds between exercises happened pretty naturally, no matter how motivated I was.
Well...in the hotel gym, I pulled the weights I planned to use and placed them all in easy reach. My first circuit damn near killed me because I wasn't taking any breaks at all between exercises. But boy was it a good cardiovascular workout.
The gym was also a bit warmer today, so I was making some salty rain of my own inside as well; it was like one of those Gatorade commercials, except my sweat did not have a cool fluorescent color to it. At home I have the AC cranked and a Vornado room fan blowing on me the whole time to keep the sweat under control. Anyway, workout done.
Breakfast is still interesting, as I made a new discovery - menemen. Now, did you just think of the muppets and the "mahna mahna" song when you read that word? I did. And if you do not know what that means, then welcome to the brain worm:
However, like most of my brunch food, menemen has nothing to do with muppets. It's a Turkish egg dish with onions, pepper, eggs, etc. Read Wikipedia for more detail. It wasn't bad, but a little wet for my tastes.
Work, work, work.
Lunch time. Off to the mall. I came across this ad for KFC featuring what I can only describe as a conservative, middle eastern version of Captain Jack Sparrow; I found it amusing but I can't really articulate why. I might make up an amusing name for him, but I will err on the side of diplomacy.
Today, I tried another of the trio of what I am calling kabob places in the mall's food court.
As with the others, no matter how hard I try, getting just meat and some green vegetables in a single meal seems impossible. Green veggies are always an "extra" side. So, when I ordered "barbecued chicken" (their description, not mine) and tabbouleh, and told them to hold the rice, bread, and chips (they use the UK term for French fries here, given the history of the region and the heavy UK population among the ex-pats) this is what I got:
Notice the pepper. Score!
The chicken was surprisingly good, but again its shape was unfamiliar to me; I really need to lay eyes on what chickens these folks are slaughtering for this food. It reminded me a lot of Caribbean jerk chicken. The tabbouleh was decent, but had a tad too much olive oil. I caved in and ate that little piece of bread on top because it was slathered in hot spices, but I left the rest of the bread for whomever, and avoided most of the chips/fries.
By sheer serendipity, Ed (the academic fellow that welcomed me into his family's home last week) was at the mall and he took me for a quick tour of Education City before dropping me off at the hotel.
It was a fascinating trip. Such long stretches of sparse, low level buildings outside of the city center. It feels so strangely open. Education City, which is being renamed to something I can't remember at the moment, is primarily an amalgamation of satellite locations of Western schools. For example, Ed works at the Texas A&M at Qatar facility here. There are others, including a Weill Cornell Medical School in Qatar that will be collaborating with the Sidra medical center for which I am working. In fact the same person, Sheika Moza bint Nasser Al Missned, that is the driving force behind Sidra was/is a primary driving force for Education City. She seems like a remarkable person.
I even got a direct glimpse of the Sidra Medical Center itself, which is still being built. It has a certain beauty to the lines and it is definitely a large facility. It's hard to describe. I forgot to take pictures, but they have a webcam trained on it.
Work, work, work.
I tried a different restaurant in the hotel tonight. There are like a million or five. I can't remember which.
Anyway, tonight I tried the place that serves brunch in the morning, Market. This is not to be confused with the place I had tried the previous nights, Spice Market. Got it? Good.
It's been feeling increasingly more difficult to eat a healthy meal, so I opted for simple and ordered the "roasted organic chicken with farm vegetables" and a side of "herbed spinach". I was expecting a somewhat unexciting, but nutrient-licious meal. I was grossly mistaken. It was incredible. It is the tastiest meal I have had since I arrived. Everything was awesome. The chicken had been deboned, which was a plus.
I tried to find a way to rate it, but Yelp doesn't recognize the area...Google Spaces only lets me rate the entire hotel...bah, whatever. I know it was good and now you do too, that will have to suffice.
Ooh, actually getting to bed at a good time. Maybe I will wake up a little less tired tomorrow...
All righty, so I guess it's time to blog about my adventures in Qatar.
October 30, My God, It's Full of Stewardesses
My abundant time to pack and prepare rapidly evaporated and I found myself a little stressed as I piled my gigantic new bags, along with the usual carry-on and brief, into my friend's car. The advice online was to arrive three hours in advance, but I showed up with two hours to spare.
Worried that two hours might not be enough, we pulled up to the curbside baggage check. There were two guys there, one was practically lounging on a chair, listening to his iPod. The other one was sitting near a computer. The latter sluggishly responded to our presence. After a painfully slow, confused exchange of "information", I was referred to the IPod guy, who had to be seriously goaded to stand up, turn off his iPod, and actually do stuff. More painfully slow, confused inquiries...and nothing.
So, I bid my friend adieu and headed up to the ticket agent. In sharp contrast to the curbside experience, the American Airlines agent was incredibly friendly, efficient, and helpful. Working with him washed away the grime of the curbside check-in snafu.
It turns out that there is a weight limit for carry-ons...40 pounds. This was problematic because my grand plan for travel included packing every piece of electronics into my carry-on or brief. My carry-on ended up being about 8 pounds over, so the PS3 and Bose SoundLink went into the "suiter" case.
I offered my prayers to the gods of baggage handling and asked them to watch over my electronics.
Speaking of electronics, the agent mentioned an interesting electronics alternative plan from his and his friends' experience with long stays abroad - buy them locally and then sell them when you leave. Not a bad idea. Oh well, I was committed to my crazy plan to take lots of electronics with me.
I touched down in Houston, hopped on the interterminal train, and arrived at the gate for my Qatar Airways flight. I wasn't in Kansas anymore. The gate waiting area was noticeably warmer than the other terminal. The Indian and Middle Eastern folks in the area vastly outnumbered everyone else. It was already starting to feel like I had left the country.
I was unable to get a seat assignment or boarding pass ahead of time, even at DFW, so I headed up to the desk and was greeted by an affable woman attendant. I think I filled out some paperwork. She took my bag check tags and confirmed that my bags were being put on the plane, which was a welcome reassurance. Then it was back into the line for me.
You know how they have the folks in wheelchairs at the front of the line? Oh...my...God, so many wheelchairs. There were dozens of folks in wheelchairs. Oh well, it's a big plane.
Boarding started late, but I was not worried. My bags were accounted for and I had a 14.5-hour flight ahead of me, so small delays were irrelevant. We ended up leaving more or less on time (7:55 PM).
When I did get aboard the plane, I was taken aback by two remarkable things. One, the seats in economy were actually reasonably spacious. Two, an army of stewardesses in formal uniforms.
It was like I had time-traveled back to when I was a kid, flying to England for the first time. Outside of the TV show Pan Am, I had not seen this since I was a child. It was cool. It really takes the edge off of a long grueling flight to not only have nice people tending to you, but to have plenty of them. I mean wow, so much service. There were 3-5 stewardesses within a 40 ft. radius at any given time.
As if that was not enough to blow my mind, they offered me a free drink...no not just a soft drink. That's right, they were pouring cocktails in economy class. Sweet. One gin and tonic please! And some water...gotta stay hydrated. :-)
Interestingly, they fed us appropriately for the time zone we left (UTC-6) as opposed to our destination (UTC+3). So, we had dinner first. Dinner was actually good, but I can't remember exactly what I had. It was a complete meal though, including dessert. Each portion was smallish, but collectively, it was satisfying. And the complimentary wine was nice too.
Clearly, Qatar Airways realizes that mildly inebriated customers enjoy their 14.5-hour flight more. :-)
Then it was time to settle in for the long haul. Many hours of fidgeting, shifting, and repositioning to avoid leaving a permanent flat spot on your ass.
Entertainment was plentiful, as each seat had its own monitor with music, movies, TV, and more. You could even pull up a screen with flight information. I watched Cars 2, which taught me the valuable moral lesson to not befriend a moronic tow truck.
Then there was much fitful sleeping, with an occasional water break.
Somewhere over the vast black expanse of the Atlantic, October 31st arrived.
October 31, No Tricks Nor Treats
After a few more fits of sleep, breakfast arrived. Again, it was surprisingly good, but you have to weigh that against a healthy pessimism about airplane food quality built up by life experiences and hackneyed routines of comedians that lack creativity.
I tried to watch The Tree of Life, but the background noise of the airplane was just too much, when combined with the frequent whispered commentary. So, I switched over to Too Big To Fail. It was an interesting film that gave me more insight into the machinations of the financial industry in the USA. I hope someday to learn more about it and explore the arguments made in the film.
We landed a few minutes early, just before 7:00 PM local time. We were ushered onto a terminal bus to take us to our appropriate terminals. As we rolled along, I was pleasantly surprised to actually recognize a word I understood from my Pimsleur Eastern Arabic CDs. Apparently, the word for "station" was also used for "terminal". Understanding stuff is fun!
The processes here were clearly refined for satisfying the needs of a broad swath of cultures and languages. Your boarding pass sleeve and bag tags were all uniformly color-coded to match your destination terminal. In my case, blue.
The bus pulled up to the Blue terminal and I stepped into a large, brightly-lit room with a large network of stanchions. I saw two signs...both read "all other countries". As I stood there, baffled as to whether I was "all other countries" or the mysterious unnamed country or countries not included in "all other", a gentleman flagged me over to him. He pulled back the stanchion rope and guided me to a distinctly different area.
Most of the people being served were being served by men in open booths. I was guided to an obscured booth with acid-etched glass. When I entered, it made more sense; the women inside were covered completely in black. I tensed a little bit. I had been told that women in such garb I should avoid, avert my eyes, and generally not interact with in any way. However, I was told that if I "had" to interact with them it was OK.
So I sort of stood there, befuddled until the woman called me to her, impatience clear in her voice. It was all very confusing but, somehow, I left with a visa stamp and a credit card receipt. Then it was time for customs.
Which is apparently, just another area of the airport, as virtually all of us just walked right through.
As I reached the exit, I had another cultural encounter. Because it had been so easy, I was concerned that I had not done everything needed for my immigration process. So, I went over to the information booth and proceeded to wait for a good ten minutes while the woman there shot the breeze with a fellow Qatari, occasionally glancing at me every few minutes. I had been warned about this, but it was weird to be standing in arms' reach of someone, clearly needing them to do their job, and just have them blow me off while they chatted with someone. Well, I am a guest, so I did my best to grin and bear it. She confirmed that I was good to go, and I headed out to the taxi.
I had heard horror stories about the traffic, but it was far better than I expected. People were a little aggressive at times and way too comfortable riding right on top of each other. By all rights, we should have been in an accident at least six times during my taxi ride.
Regardless, I arrived at the W Doha Hotel and Residences in one piece.
There was a bit of confusion checking in. My corporate American Express would not run the authorization. Now, he was trying to authorize a month, so that was not a surprise. Then he tried a week. Still no luck. Thankfully, since I was with a large corporation, they waved me up and resigned to settle the issue later.
This is when I started to feel the pain of not having a phone. It got worse, though.
You see, American Express provides an international collect call number, but apparently there is no way to make international collect calls in Doha. So, I hopped onto the American Express website to check out my options and the "fastest" one was using their messaging system. Hours later and we had the problem identified. The hotel was trying to run the charge as retail and that is the one thing that is explicitly capped on our corporate cards. In fact, it was a $1000 cap and one week at the W is $1440 (with our corporate rate). Mystery solved. Cap extended, just in case.
I opened my suiter to see how my electronics fared. Um...what is wrong with my suit? Holy crap...
Yeah, that was a brand new hanger, shattered by the compressive force placed on my bag. Yay! Well, here's hoping the PS3 works when I get around to using it.
On that topic, the room safe is big enough for my Xbox, PS3, Bose SoundLink, and more. Nice.
Clothes unpacked, suits and shirts hung. T-shirts and jeans...sorta flopped over furniture...bedtime!
November 1, I Came All This Way for a Mushroom Burger?
My first day of work got off to a slow start. There was some confusion on timing. Suffice to say I got up very early for no reason. Ah well, better than being late. The hotel breakfast was freaking awesome! I discovered a tasty new food - Sujuk, which appears to be sausage-like meat with tomatoes. I also got to try dragon fruit, which sounds way cooler than it tastes.
I showed up to work, hopped into an empty desk, and got to work.
I had lunch at the tiny cafeteria in the tower where I work. The food was not bad. Cash only.
That evening, I met the team lead for dinner. He is from the USA and is not exactly the adventurous type when it comes to food. We went to Chili's. So, there I was, on the other side of the world, eating a Chili's Mushroom Swiss burger. Exotic!
Then it was time to get a phone. The company was already going to pay for the SIMs and phone minutes, and they were willing to buy a phone too. But I took this as that final push/excuse to get an iPhone 4S (buying it myself, of course). We headed over to the obvious place, the iSpot, an "official reseller" for Apple products. But, to my dismay, they were all out of iPhones.
I trudged out of the store, forlorn...for about 20 feet. Then I spotted what appeared to be iPhones in the adjacent store. Yay! "I can't run your card" Boo! "There's an ATM" Yay! "This transaction cannot be completed" Boo! So, the team lead graciously bought the phone on his card (and I will reimburse him). Yay!
We headed over to Qtel and picked up a SIM, popped it in the phone, added some minutes, and I was ready to go!
Now, I had the presence of mind to contact my credit card company and my bank and tell them of my travel plans. So, I was a bit peeved that my cards were not working for me. I spent the rest of the evening trying to determine why my card didn't work and why the ATM withdrawal did not work. My answers were:
The card was not refused, it was referred. In such cases, the merchant is supposed to call the card company and answer some quick questions. Merchant fail.
My ATM card is set up with a daily limit to minimize losses if it gets stolen. Oh yeah, I forgot I set that up. Michael fail. Can we get this increased for a day or two? Um, we can't get into the system, please try again later. Bank fail.
November 2, Pancake Breakfast With Colleagues, Dinner With New Friends
The morning started off with breakfast at Ric's Kountry Kitchen, a favorite of the team lead's because of the familiar food. A member of the team picked us up and the three of us headed to Ric's for our "American" breakfasts.
On the way there, I noticed my UK colleague had a small red and green lapel pin and, being who I am, I asked about it. It turns out it is a Poppy. Apparently, in the UK, they wear poppies around Remembrance Day (similar to what we in the USA celebrate as Memorial Day) in honor of their fellow countrymen that have died in battle. It comes from fields of poppies growing up around the fallen dead, especially in Flanders field, in World War I.
Hearing that, I remarked that it explained Sting's lyrics, "poppies for young men, death's bitter trade" in his song Children's Crusade (off Dream of the Blue Turtles). Learning is cool. By the way, the whole song is filled with beautiful, sad lyrics, I recommend listening to it...and here's a YouTube video with the lyrics. Enjoy!
All right from somber to cheesy! Here is a picture of Ric's.
I had the pancake breakfast. It was pretty good, on par with Denny's or IHOP. I discovered once again that no one can escape Coca Cola products.
Or, if you want to see that in Arabic, just spin the bottle around...
The ham actually tasted like ham. This observation spurred a discussion about the legality of pork products. My colleagues explained that selling pork is not illegal, but importing it is, or something like that. I bet that makes the pork on the US Air Force base quite valuable for an enterprising soldier...
Off to work. Work was done. Lunch in the Cantina again.
That evening I enjoyed the gracious hospitality of Ed Brothers, his wife Nicole, and his friend Mike, as Ed and Nicole welcomed me into their home for dinner. We had salad, lasagne, and strawberry shortcake. Many nerdy jokes were made. Fun was had by all. Well, maybe not the large cat-like lump that they claim is a living cat; I am not sure it had fun. Further, I am still not sure I believe that it is 1) a cat or 2) alive; however, out of courtesy, I will take their word for it.
Ed, Nicole, and Mike are all involved in local academia at Doha, and have been here a while. It was an interesting to hear their take on life in Doha. I look forward to more visits.
November 3, Work Before You Crawl
Brunch was awesome again. Today, they had fresh mango. Holy crap was it good. I was inspired to post to Facebook about it:
So *this* is how mango should taste. I am officially spoiled now. When I go home the mango will seem like an imposter. Sigh. Well, we'll always have Doha, mango, we'll always have Doha.
Seriously, it was wonderful.
And off to work. You may have noticed that I am not talking about my work. That's intentional. This is a personal blog. However, I will say that I managed to get on board for a fishing trip with some colleagues during the holidays next week. We will be renting out a Dhow. I am not sure what to expect, as a Dhow can be pretty swanky or pretty basic. Either way, it should be another unique experience and I look forward to it. They have speakers that work with the "I-pot", which I can only guess is a Rastafarian MP3 player.
That evening, after pounding out a lot of work for a deadline some colleagues took me on a mini pub crawl. We started at an Irish pub located in the bottom of the Sheraton. They had smoking, pub food, and beer, all in a dark wooden milieu. It was quite pubesque.
While trying to find the pub I came across a bizarrely incongruous sight. A woman covered head to toe in the "do not talk to this woman" black garb. The only things visible were 1) her eyes and 2) bright red 5" stiletto heels; you know, the kind of shoes you would usually expect to see on a woman that was the opposite of covered.
So, back to the pub. I had hoped to experience the duo of shrill Asian women singers that my colleagues had described so emphatically but, alas, we had to settle for a guy and girl doing covers of popular songs. The vocals all sounded like Cher, so when she did Amy Winehouse it was painful; if alcoholic toxicity hadn't gotten her, hearing this surely would have. I kid. It was fun and the pub had a good vibe to it.
That said, I would prefer not to hear someone trying to mimic Amy. She had a style all her own, she is gone, and I am sad for that.
Excited by the prospect of "real" British pub food, I ordered Bangers and Mash. Of course, with the taboo of pork, it was made with veal sausages which, technically, still makes it bangers and mash. It wasn't bad going down... (subtle foreshadowing)
Anywho...moving on.
Most of us headed on to the Bavarian Cafe. I was almost sad to leave the Irish pub, as the place was really jumping when we left. But so was the Bavarian Cafe.
The cafe, however, had a different vibe. No dance floor or live music, but a lot more beer and many of them with high alcohol contents.
Then it was back home for the night. Shortly after I got back to the room, my bangers and mash decided to leave my body the same way they arrived, via my mouth. Yep, food poisoning.
November 4, When I Said I Wanted to Crawl, I Did Not Mean It Literally
The vomiting continued throughout the night and morning. Some time after the sun came up, I realized I had unfortunately passed the point where my body would no longer accept water. Not even sips. So, I needed to get some intravenous fluids. If I didn't act now, I would be riding to the hospital unconscious and incoherent later. Time for Michael's Doha Hospital Adventure!
Apparently, because I am not a resident, yet, I can only go to one of two private hospitals, according to the concierge. With no other data, I chose the one with "American" in the name - American Hospital. So, I asked the concierge for a couple of plastic bags...just in case my body managed to find something else to expel during the trip.
It was a much longer taxi ride than I had experienced thus far, and there were a lot of half-demolished buildings...uncertainty was rising. Of course, time sort of stretches out when you are constantly focused on keeping your stomach calm. When I arrived, I was not greeted by the sprawling, shiny Mecca of medicine that I might have hoped. Here is the outside of the building and, to be clear, this was the building, that is not a close up on just the front. I clipped the left edge slightly, but otherwise that is the entirety of the hospital.
I headed in and stopped short of the reception desk. There was an Indian gentleman and a woman completely covered in (do not approach or look at this woman unless you HAVE to do so) black garb. She was staring right at me, so I hazarded a glance and she beckoned me over, explaining that she was the only one there (and thus it was OK for me to approach her and talk to her). I guess the Indian fellow was not real person and, I have to admit, I never did reach out to touch him and confirm, so perhaps he was a figment of my imagination. No wait, I have picture of him, so he at least must be a sophisticated hologram. The woman hidden by the desk on the right; you can just see part of her head dress sticking out of from behind the left of the nameplate on the right; I didn't make an effort to get a more direct picture of her, as I am unclear of the social acceptability of taking pictures of a covered woman. Better safe than deported.
And to jazz up the flavor a bit, a close up of the price list in back:
It's hard to read, because I was too much of a slacker to take a close up picture of it, but the board on the right lists their medical specialties in English and the price list on the left is as follows:
Consultant 140 QR (Qatari Riyals)
Specialist 120 QR
GP [General Practice] Doctor 100 QR
For reference, there are about 3.5 QR to a dollar.
I got another taste of the need to be patient and lower my expectations for promptness, as they called for a nurse three times over the span of 20 minutes before I saw one. Then suddenly there were two. I got lucky and ended up with the cute one. :-)
They took me back to the hallway, took my vitals, and led me to the doctor. I gave a concise description of my signs and symptoms and suggested that I needed IV fluids. The doctor concurred, but ordered a battery of tests to be certain. I can't blame him, I certainly could have had something else going on. My parting statement was, "As long as I get IV fluids until I start peeing, I am happy."
Now it gets fun. You see, back in the day when I was a nurse, I was "da man" when it came to giving IVs. That meant I got to cringe as other nurses desperately tried to get needles into peoples' veins before they would give up and I would painlessly one-shot it, much to the relief of the patient. In all of my time as a nurse, there was one patient that I did not save from IV hell and that was because he was a Down's Syndrome patient with very thick, chubby arms which made his veins completely impossible to see and I knew that he needed a cutdown from a doctor, not a nurse blindly sticking him and praying. Suffice to say, I have seen every possible bad technique for IVs.
But I needed fluids, so I bit my tongue and told myself that unless I felt like they were going to do serious harm I would stay calm and take it like a man. One stick...ah ah ah. Two stick...ah ah ah. Three stick...ah ah ah. I LOVE to count needle sticks! No wait, let's not take it out yet, let's just keep trying in that third spot. Oh cool, let's let the other nurse try. Why not? We're all here and we have nothing else to do, needle party!
I was this close to going Special Forces medic on them and doing it myself, when they finally got a blood flash. Yes, eventually, they managed to get a pediatric needle (read, very tiny) into a tiny vein in my hand. Yay!
The blood samples were collected by letting blood drip ever so slowly out of the catheter, as opposed to drawing out the blood and injecting it into the container. Probably not a bad idea, given my dehydration, the size of the needle, and tiny vein, which would likely collapse if they tried to pull out the blood. However, I knew that small needles could also mean greater hemolysis (broken blood cells), which could generate erroneous potassium levels. Mentally noted for the future in case they say that is a problem. I am not here to teach and I certainly don't want to offend.
Fast forward 4 hours. My tummy is calm, I have gone pee pee, and all is right in the world. Well, righter at least.
Prescriptions, check. Payment, check. Taxi!
Hmm, what is this anti-nausea medication? I assumed it was Phenergan, because that was what I used back in the day, but it is not. It is Domperidone. Huh, let's look that up...not approved by the FDA...used for enhanced lactation...individual incidents of problems in patients receiving an intravenous form of domperidone include cardiac arrest and arrhythmia (wait, they put some of that in my IV)...sonnuva. Oh wait, apparently "the FDA's division of gastrointestinal drugs had approved domperidone." Well, the risk of sinking back into dehydration versus a few days of taking a pill that is probably not as safe as I like...I'll take the damn pill. Note to self: pick up a prescription for an anti-nausea pill before I go overseas again.
More drugs - an antibiotic and an anti-acid. While I see the reasoning, I don't like taking antibiotics or antacids, let alone any medicine, unless I need them, so I decide to hold off on those and play it by ear. For now, I'll just take the "Dompy" and hope it does not enhance my lactation.
All righty, back to the hotel for water and to pass out...time passes.
I am awake and hungry. So I do the usual drill and head to Carrefour (the French Wal-Mart) for crackers, a couple of bananas, and what the heck, some chicken shawarma and fattoush for later; experience has taught me that, for me, food poisoning resolves fast and I am usually eating pretty regular within 24 hours.
So, here's another cultural quirk. Today, the mall had signs outside declaring "family day". The team lead has mentioned that was a day when admittance to the mall was restricted, but I could not remember the details. I was sporting jeans and my t-shirt declaring, "Video games ruined my life. Good thing I have two extra lives." I hoped it was acceptable. No one stopped me or gave me a second glance. However, on the way out, I saw guys dressed as casually or better being stopped. The difference? The only visible one was that they were dark-skinned Indian men. Yeah, that felt a little weird. I have never really witnessed overt discrimination like that. Well, aside from Ladies Night at a bar. :-D
Crackers...water...steady...more sleep
Banana...water...steady...more sleep
Crackers and bananas...steady...more sleep
Chicken shawarma...steady...a lot more sleep
November 5, Recovery and Shopping!
So now it's freaking past midnight and I am wide awake and hungry. I hop in the shower and get dressed, but nothing good is open this late (exacerbated by the holidays), so I break out the fattoush and have some more of the shawarma.
I think I may have slept somewhere in there. And I worked on wrapping up some work stuff; there were administrative deadlines from the mother ship.
Hmm, what can I do? Oh, I guess it's time to blog. Type, type, type.
Yay! Another yummy brunch. Mmm, more delicious fresh mango. More yummy sujuk.
Time for an early workout. I need to cram two in today to make up for being sick all day yesterday, but it should not be a problem
More catching up on administrata for work. More blogging. Time to get some swimming trunks and maybe weightlifting gloves. Back to the mall! I guess I could show you a picture of it. Here is the entrance. It's bloody huge and you can only see the map for the current floor, so it can be challenging. In spite of the fact that there were a half dozen stores for sports equipment, I had to directly identify them by walking around because of communication barriers.
Shopping done. Food time. I decided I wanted to eat something decidedly local, so I hit the food court and found three places that were basically kabob places plus. I finally settled on Safeer Express because they had fish and spinach. :-D
See, it even says "Middle-Eastern Flavors" right on the sign, so it's GOT to be legit. Here is what I ended up getting:
The fish was spicy, which was awesome. I am curious what was in it, because it made me sweat a little, but it was not super hot. The spinach was tasty but definitely not as good for me as my usual fare at Rockfish back in Plano. There were bits of meat and oils or fats in there; it was like someone decided to make "greens" with spinach. The yellow stuff is a lentil soup. It was all great, but I could not finish it.
Back to the hotel.
And since this is already a novella, I'll stop here and post this monster. Hopefully you were amused and/or educated.
I have not been on a long-term trip since I visited England as a kid. Well, I guess those couple of years at Fessenden boarding school count too. Even my field exercises in the Army were no more than a few weeks, and you were generally kept busy during that time. So, suffice to say, the logistics of long-term travel were invisible to me.
So, when I first heard that I might be living in another country for 3-12 months, it dawned on me that I might want to ponder those realities. For example, I use my desktop for a lot of things:
Banking
Bills
Gaming
Taxes
E-mail
Web development (99% of which is OwlCon)
Pictures
Music (45 gigs!)
My desktop is a custom built tower, so travel is not a good idea for that, especially since it would need a monitor, keyboard, etc. So, I started moving everything to my gaming laptop and the interwebs, aka the "cloud". Here's what I learned...
Laptops Are Not as Roomy Nor Powerful as Desktops
Yeah, I know, it's these fantastic gems of wisdom that keep you reading my posts. But I am only half-facetious here. You see, my laptop's capabilities were excessive for the way I used it - for gaming and short trips. When you start moving your electronic life over, things get complicated. Having 45 gigabytes of music certainly does not help, but computer games nowadays consume a lot of space, so having a dozen games installed is problematic on a laptop.
So, I picked up a Western Digital My Passport drive. I chose it for a few reasons:
I know Western Digital
It provides a place to which I can backup my laptop data
The drive is very small and portable, about the size of three passports stacked together
With a 500 gigabyte capacity it holds more than enough data to account for my music and pictures
Powered via the USB cable so I don't have to carry another power supply
This last one was a "must have" requirement for me. Here is a picture of my snazzy drive. Note my passport underneath...and my Alienware laptop under that.
So, that solves the raw storage issue. For the most part. I need to back off on the number of games installed at any given time, but that is manageable. I just need to dabble less and wrap up more. :-D
Goodbye Office, Hello Gmail and OpenOffice
Outlook is a great program. It is very useful at work. However, when you start living a multi-device life at home, buying expensive licenses left and right gets old. It is also a bit "heavy" as an application because I buy it as part of Office. That's a lot of apps and resources.
So, I made the final leap and adopted my Gmail account as my full on private e-mail. Of course, that's just part of the Office suite, so I installed OpenOffice; if nothing else, it will be a chance to seriously test out OpenOffice.
Books Are Heavy! eBooks Are Not
After months of wringing my hands over whether or not to stick with paper books or go electronic, the very idea of long-term travel rapidly resolved that conflict. So, I picked up an iPad, installed Kindle on it, and starting snagging ebooks. I also put all of my music on my iPad. I will post more on my eBook adventures someday...
Setting Up Full Synching With Gmail
So, with these changes and my new plethora of devices, I decided I wanted to fully synchronize with Gmail - mail, contacts, and calendar. If you pick he seemingly obvious Google e-mail account choice on your iPad or iPhone, it won't set up all of that. In fact, to get the most, you need to set up both a Gmail account and an Exchange account. The exchange account sync's mail, contacts, and calendar, but the Gmail one does mail, contacts, and notes. Toggle them however you like.
This page explains how to set up a Gmail account via the Exchange option on iOS devices.
Getting More Friendly With Evernote
I had dabbled with Evernote for taking notes, but with my new high mobility plan, I set it up on every device and it is awesome and convenient.
Closing Thoughts
So, all of my contacts, mail, notes, and calendars are in the cloud now, my laptop has been set up as my main computer, and I have made the switch to eBooks. I am a high mobility machine, bring on the travel!
All righty, time to roll up my sleeves and get busy blogging about my travel adventures!
Setting the Stage
What you see above are pictures of my poor abused arms, fresh from the immunization wars, bravely displaying their medals of honor - Looney Tunes band-aids. Damn, I should have flexed hard for those pictures; oh well, onward.
So, about two months ago, I got an offer from within my company to go to Doha, Qatar for a period of 12 months. At the time, it was problematic due to family obligations.
About a month ago, I was asked to help a colleague, located in Brazil. She needed advice and guidance on process and methodology, which I was able to provide remotely (i.e., no travel needed).
Well, a few weeks ago, both of those turned into viable opportunities as a key family matter was wrapped up and I felt I could leave the country without doing familial harm.
For a variety of reasons, ultimately, the winner was Doha, Qatar. Now, it wasn't that simple, of course, there were many entertaining twists and turns, most of which it would not be appropriate to discuss because they are internal to my company and this is a personal blog.
What I can tell you is that I did not know where I was going, for certain, until a few days in advance. It certainly made things...more interesting.
Passport
Hopefully, this is the most obvious thing. You will want to insure your passport is not only current, but be sure that you have plenty of time left on it to cover your travels. In my case, I was told that I needed to have at least six months left to travel. Regardless, you don't want your passport to expire when you are in a foreign country.
NEEDLES IN MY ARMS!
Another obvious task to resolve, but what shots do you need? Well, the interwebs are your friend here. You can head on over to the Centers for Disease Control's Destinations page to get the information you need.
But where do you go for all of these lovely shots, especially the more unusual ones, like Yellow Fever? First, you can check with your company's wellness program / nurse, if they have one; for simple shots, they may have what you need. In my case, they did not so I called my doctor and was referred to Passport Health, a business that specializes in just this thing.
In less than 24 hours, I was being briefed on what I needed for Brazil and Qatar, as well as the usual stuff that was simply smart for travel. In total, I received one TB test and NINE vaccinations, four in each arm and one via nasal spray. I was pleased to find out that exercise was not limited; on the contrary they encouraged it.
Random comment - because of my time in the army and as a nurse, my vaccinations were a lot more caught up than normal, e.g., I only needed a Hepatitis B booster. Yay!
Did my arms hurt? Eh, not really. My shoulders got a bit stiff that night and were a little sore, but nothing incapacitating.
Did I get sick? Nope, and I shouldn't have. I was told the Yellow Fever might make me feel a bit cruddy for up to five days, which was less fun to hear with a full day of travel coming up in three days, but for the most part it was not an issue.
Vaccinations are not cheap. They gave me close to $1000 in vaccinations and one of my co-workers over here reports that he had around $2000 in vaccinations.
Storing Your Shot Record In Your Passport
This was a nifty idea from the Passport Health folks. Staple your shot record into the back of your passport and then you have the two key documents for immigration bound together. The bonus is that you are a LOT less likely to lose your shot records and have to get extra shots.
Prescriptions
Fortunately, I don't have any routine medications, so this was not a concern for me. Hooray for healthy living! But, I like you, so I am going to chat a bit about it.
If you have regular prescriptions, consider getting a full supply for your trip, just to be safe. Be sure to bring your documentation with you, as you will generally be required to show it (assuming they actually bother to ask/check).
Even if you don't have regular medications, you might need to get some. For example, if you plan to visit a country known for Malaria, you should consider getting your prophylactic antibiotics in advance. Pick up the prescription at your travel health visit.
Condoms
Yes, that's right, people all over the world have cooties. Regardless of your gender, there's the whole family planning aspect too. Nothing new here, but you might want to consider picking up your favorite brand before you head out to insure you have a supply. You may find it surprisingly difficult to locate what you want when you get there, and being prepared is far better than hoping you will have enough willpower to interrupt your exotic romantic encounter in a far away land to pick up protection.
Adapter vs Converter
This was interesting. Figuring out what you need is relatively easy, thanks to the interwebs. I say relatively, because you might get weak or misleading information. For example, my search turned up the adaptelec site which suggested that I needed two different adapters for Qatar. Luckily, my briefing at Passport Health also included the socket type, so I knew which of the two made sense.
That said, fair warning, there are multiple three-pronged sockets and the visible differences between, say the Israeli one and the British one are not incredibly stark, especially if you only had a grainy picture in a travel guide as your reference.
If you head to your local electronics store, you will see a LOT of choices and, like me, you may find that the store clerks have little to no idea what you should get or 80% of the adapters are for Israel and the ones you need are buried behind them. Also, when you get there, you will find that there are adapters and converters.
Adapters simply change your ability to plug into a socket. If you simply throw on an adapter and plug it in, you may fry (literally) your adapter or device. They are cheap.
Converters allow voltage conversion between 115 V and 220 V. Frequency can also change 50 Hz vs. 60 Hz, which can be an issue if your device relies on that for timing (the only example I saw was a turntable, so no danger there).
Do you need a converter or an adapter? Well, does your device perform at the voltage and frequency where you are going? If so, then an adapter is fine.
Laptops are interesting. In recent history, the standard appears to be that laptops generally support everything. For example, here is a picture of my Alienware adapter's specifications.
Should you get an adapter? Because they are inexpensive, I picked up a couple to be safe. I wanted to be able to use my computer immediately. If you can wait, then you can play it safe and wait until you arrive, see what you actually need, then go pick it up.
Should you get a converter? These are a lot more expensive and, in many cases, still require adapters to use. So, for example, a converter and adapter for a hair dryer can be more expensive than simply buying anther hair dryer where you are going (of course, if you are staying in a hotel, they may provide one).
Lead time
Depending upon how ready you are, for the trip, you may need more or less lead time. I found that the last 2-3 days before my trip vanished in preparatory errands and activities.
Mothballing - PO Box and Mail
Do you have a PO Box? Is it paid up past the time you will be gone? Do you need to stop your mail delivery or arrange for someone to pick it up? Large PO boxes give you more latitude in this. Plan accordingly.
Mothballing - Car Insurance Storage Discount
It occurred to me that an unused car might not require so much insurance. I called my provider, USAA, and was pleased to find out that indeed I could get my rate reduced to 10% of normal while it was collecting dust. There is a downside, if someone were to decide to use it without reactivating, then it would not cover medical, which makes sense. Either way, I saved hundreds of dollars with a single phone call! Yay!
Mothballing - Phone
Unfortunately, my iPhone is one of the locked variety. This makes it a sleek, expensive paper weight while I am in Qatar. Even though it has the proper technology, the absurd rates from AT&T are unacceptable. Given that it was going to basically be off or in airplane mode while I was gone, I called AT&T and explore my options. It turns out that they have a "suspend" option that dramatically reduces the plan cost to something trivial, like $10 a month. Yay!
Bank and Credit Card
It's not a bad idea to call your bank and 1) let them know where you are going and what dates you will be there; 2) discuss if there are any limitations with using your debit and credit cards while traveling, and 3) record international customer service numbers that you can use to contact them while away.
Packing
I had some surprises here. The sheer magnitude of what I was taking caught me by surprise. I expected my gigantic cases to be perhaps 2/3 full...they were stuffed.
Shoes: For me, shoes were part of the surprise. I have work out shoes, two pairs of dress shoes, and a few pairs of casual shoes. They ate up a fair bit of space. I feel for someone that needs to take a lot with them.
Electronics: This is a personal decision. Whatever you do decide, I recommend putting all of your electronics in your carry on luggage. It may be heavy. It may be awkward at security. But at least they should arrive intact, unbroken and not stolen. Another option, which I learned about later, is to buy the electronics locally and then sell them before you leave; clever, but more complicated than I wanted.
Shopping
For me, this also entailed a complete refresh of my high end business clothes, suits, dress shoes, etc. So, I spent a lot more time shopping in the two weeks leading up to my trip than I had in probably ten years. I tried on so...many...suits.
Closing Thoughts
There are easily a dozen more things I haven't mentioned, but the gist of this is that a trip abroad, especially an extended one, can get complicated fast. Think ahead and give yourself a week or two to work out the details.
