The Month That Was March 23, 2008

Pejam celik pejam celik, dah masuk 8 weeks kitorg jadi warga Qatar. We’ve had our shares of ups and downs. Ye lah, if everything went smoothly, tak challenging lah pulak kan.

My work has been keeping me busy for the past couple of weeks. Mana tak nye, everything has suddenly been dumped on me. Deadlines memanjang. My boss I have learned, is not such an easy person after all. Typical of his kaum – malas la nak cakap from where (alah.. negara yang i keje sebelum ni kat south asia tuh, yang selalu ada bom meletup and rusuhan tak abis2 tuh…) Kadang2 tension dibuat nye. Macam semua yang kita buat tak kena and tak meet his expectation. Dia ni macam trying to prove himself kat sini and pantang di criticize. Especially kalau kita cuba argue benda yang kita confirm lagi terror dari dia, takkan mengaku kalah punye lah.. Dugaan..dugaan..

At the home front, my kids are enjoying their spring term break right now. Two whole weeks. Ikhwan has been accepted at DMBS and will start his pre school in the summer term next week. He did me proud during the ‘interview’ with the principal last two weeks by giving all the right answers! (budak 3 tahun pun ada interview, don’t play2..).

And last but not least, the best news of all- the wait has finally ended for my significant other, who took the biggest risk in his career by moving to Doha with me!! Syukur alhamdulillah, our patience has been rewarded.. He’s now waiting for his work visa to be ready, as well as my kids’. Lepas ni tak yah lah pegi chop passport every month lagi..

Trip to desert safari March 16, 2008

 

Last weekend, my business unit organized an outing – desert safari. Kalau menetap di mid east ni, memang tak sah kalau tak pegi sand bashing kat desert. Objective of this outing konon nye, untuk berkenal-kenalan dan mengeratkan silaturrahim. Almost 200 of us went in the 4WD provided by the tour operator.

 The trip took us down south of Qatar, from Doha we passed 2 towns – Al Wakra and Mesaaid. After that, it was off-road up and down the beautiful rolling dunes till we reached our camp by the beach. This is not our first sand bashing experience, we had gone once last year with our good friends in Oman to Wahiba Sands, so we basically knew what to expect. Unlike Wahiba where the sand is orange, here the sand is more pale, macam warna pasir laut biasa. Nevertheless, the slopes were challenging enuff, especially the drive to the inland sea. Also known as Khor Al Udeid, the inland sea is a huge water inlet surrounded by dunes. It is also the border between Qatar and UAE.

Apart from the beautiful scenery and adrenaline rush from the bashing, there was lots of good food (read – briyani kambing and mix bbq grill), games for kids and volleyball for the guys. My kids tried to fly kites for the first time and they enjoyed it very much. We’ll have to bring the kites to the corniche one of these weekends. 

It was a generally good trip, everyone had fun, apatah lagi semua nya free! But errr, objective achieved ke tak?!

Penantian Satu Penyiksaan March 12, 2008

One fine day some time last week, on the way home from work, my shuttle-mate burst out crying. She had arrived in good ole Doha a month before me, with 2 kids in tow. Her hubby had to say g’bye to Qatar after sending them over, as his Italian passport didn’t enjoy the luxury of further extensions of visit visa without leaving the country, which is offered to selected nationalities like Malaysians & British. 

Qatar has a “unique” law of not allowing a woman to sponsor her family. This country defines men as the breadwinner of the family, hence this ridiculous immigration ruling. Unlike my Brit friend who found out about this ruling after arriving in Qatar (imagine her shock!), yours truly found out about this issue soon before leaving for Qatar. By then, it was of course too late to turn back as I had already tendered my resignation from my old company. It’s probably the company’s conniving strategy to not inform the new lady recruits of this scenario as it is definitely a deal breaker! I mean, how could they conveniently forget to mention such an important point?! I was nevertheless assured by my company that there are discretions to this law. One thing that I have learned since living in Oman, is that undang2 kat mid-east ni tak pernah yang straight forward. Kadang2, terpulang pada budi bicara orang yang handle tu. Kejap macam ni, kejap macam tu. Yang hitam bole jadi putih, and vice versa. Proof of this – after writing a nasty complaint to the top management, my friend’s kids’ residence visas / sponsorship miraculously got settled within 48 hours!

In 2 weeks’ time, my family will be due for their second visit visa extension. I have not applied for them to be under my sponsorship as we are waiting for something else. An agonizing wait which we can’t afford to give up…  

Power to the rakyat March 10, 2008

The election 2008 is finally over. I missed the poster war this time around and my only source of election pitch was the world wide web. My Hubby loved browsing thru the campaign ceramahs and in doing so I realized how sucessfully the oppositions had embraced technology to reach out to their target audience. Perhaps the lack of media freedom had led to this.

I’ve only voted once in my lifetime, back in 2004. Agak kecewa jugak tak dapat mengundi kali ni. Kena lah tunggu lagi 4-5 tahun nampaknya. Ingatkan bole undi pos tapi rupa2 nya tu untuk tentera and gomen jer. I have never been one to follow the political scene closely. Sekadar baca dalam paper sikit2 dan apa2 yang di forward oleh kengkawan thru emails. Nevertheless, it would be exciting to see the dawn of this new era. Bravo to the people who voted for a change! 

Click goes the camera March 4, 2008

Sejak dok kat overseas ni, I’ve become a camera freak. Ke mana pegi mesti bawak camera. From signages to food, everything nak kene snap. Bukan nye terer ambik gambar pun. Camera pun tak lah canggih mana. Just a mini handy one which can conveniently fit into my handbag. My kids have also learned how to ‘posing maut’ – their favourite pose is making funny faces. Yup, they actually learned that in school masa ambik class picture last year.

I noticed that my other frenz who live overseas also have this same hobby. Maklum lah, zaman digital ni u can never over-snap. Kalau tak ok, delete jer. Yang penting, biar terlebih, jangan terkurang. Oh well, kalau ada camera digital SLR best gak, mana la tau kot2 ada bakat photography terpendam ke..