2022 World Tour – Doha, Qatar
Hello from Doha, my fourth stop on the trip and country #48. Below is the standard summary with a few new items:
– Cool Ranch Doritos: No
– Thai ATM Card Works: Didn’t try
– Thai Debit Card Works: Yes
– Thai Internet Purchase Works: Didn’t try
– USA Credit Card Works: Yes
– Worldwide Telephone/Data/SMS eSIM Works: No
– Magic Jack Works: Yes
– VPN Works: Yes
– COVID Compliance Chronicles: Absolute Fucking Nightmare
– Internet Works: Yes
– Drone Flights: Only citizens
– Ramadan Restrictions: Hardcore
– Cost of Living: $$$
– Currency: 1 Rial = Fixed at USD $0.27
– Language Issues: Easy
– City-Wide Wifi: No
I’m currently a week into my stay in Barcelona, and absolutely loving it. I’ve delayed writing this because I’m at a loss as to how to properly frame my time in Doha. Tremendous disappointment? Intergalactic Shithole? Invent time machine and go back to skip visiting here? A few interesting things? All of the above? Curious? Read on!
To summarize: Don’t come here until 1) Construction is 100% complete, 2) COVID restrictions are 100% removed, 3) it is not Ramadan.
I took the short flight from Muscat to Doha on Qatar Airways. We landed with a hard bump on the runway, flashing back to my bird strike but we all survived. Now the endless stream of my problems are about to start.
Another bored agent at immigration. Along a hallway stands a guy in a uniform, randomly stopping people. I got stopped and finally worked out that he wanted the paper printout from the COVID registration web site I had to fill in before entering, requiring the usual passport picture page and details of all vaccinations. The second part of the COVID requirements is the mandatory registration and use of the “Ehteraz” app. I had installed it on my phone in Muscat but it wouldn’t register me, complaining about random errors. Since I had this guy’s attention, I showed him my app and asked how to fix it. He shrugged and pointed me towards the exit. Cue the inevitable foreshadowing.
Google Maps says I can get to my hotel via the Metro and then a 1km walk. Now, it’s 8 pm so I’m not looking forward to the walk in the dark. I find the airport Metro station, buy a 1 week ticket and attempt to go through the turnstile. Here begins my problem – you cannot enter the Metro, shopping mall, restaurant or any other indoor space without showing the green barcode from the Ehteraz app saying you’re good to go on your vaccinations and you haven’t been in physical proximity to someone who tested positive. Well I can’t even get to that step because it won’t register me. I was rejected at the turnstile and pointed towards a customer service desk. Two very helpful ladies tried everything to get the app to work, including entering their own local phone numbers. Nada. They finally said OK we’ll let you through but you have to fix this. I asked if this was a common problem and they said yes, many people, call the tech support phone number when you get to your hotel. Ugh. I get out at my destination station to find complete chaos. It turns out the ENTIRE CITY IS UNDER CONSTRUCTION. Sidewalks and roads are torn up, heavy equipment everywhere, barricades, dirt, rocks, broken concrete, deep holes where you least expect. I made my way to the hotel eventually by rolling down the center of the street as traffic was light and I didn’t give a fuck anymore. When I got to the hotel, they want to see my green bar code. I was raging inside but explained the problem and they let me in after reviewing my vaccination cards. They told me it’s possible to use taxis to get around, at 10X the price of the Metro, as they don’t look at the app, so that’s my saving grace.
The hotel itself was good and I had a large room with a great bathroom. Wifi is strong and fast. Only one of the 3 elevators was working for my floor because they were also hosting people in the government’s quarantine program – whoa. My view was a massive construction site next door, accompanied by the random noises of 100 pieces of heavy equipment working day and night.
I called Ehteraz tech support and talked with a bored woman who said “The problem is known and we are working on it. Try again in 30 minutes.” I couldn’t get anything else out of her and 30 minutes came and went without success. I did a Google search and found that this has been going on for MONTHS, mostly with tourists having their holidays ruined due to the restrictions. This is not good, folks. You cannot run an entire country on an app that isn’t 100% bulletproof. And any failure should invoke an emergency bug fix process.
In the nearby market I got a local SIM card as a desperate attempt to get the app to work, no luck. Wasted $15. Ugh.
I walked two blocks to the harbourfront, through more construction. I had to zig-zag as I discovered in real time which ways were passable and which were completely blocked. I hadn’t intended to, but I walked for about 4 hours all the way around the harbourfront to the downtown part of the city. As I sat in the shade by a Costa Coffee shop, closed for Ramadan of course, a guy walked up and said he was a reporter with Sky News doing a story on Doha compared to Dubai. I gave him a short interview which probably tanked the entire Doha tourist industry for a generation.
After baking in the heat and dust and construction I found blessed aircon in the City Center mall. I bluffed my way in with a sympathetic guard, showing my vaccination cards – my lucky day. I found a restaurant deep inside the attached Marriott hotel that was serving food during Ramadan. I walked to the Carrefour grocery store in the basement and stocked up on daytime Ramadan snacks and got a heavenly taxi back to the hotel. That was a 15,456 step day, all of them torture of the soul due to heat and the construction. Did I mention the construction was terrible? Just check out the pictures.
Elon announces he’s buying Twitter. I trust his judgement but I wonder why, and how it will all function.
About 2km away from the hotel is the big city souk. I’ll save a lot of time and say I went here nearly every night for different restaurants and walking through the shops. I got the feeling that it was new construction that’s meant to look like an ole-tyme souk but it’s just not-quite-authentic. Turns out I was right, the locals call it the Disneyland Souk. Since it’s Ramadan, the shops open about 4pm and food starts serving after the literal cannon-shot at Ramadan-ending sunset. The most unique thing was the falconry shops – birds and all of the associated equipment. It was sad seeing these awesome birds locked inside on perches with hoods on their heads. There was also a pet section with dogs, cats, birds, turtles, rabbits and fish.
In other adventures, I tried to go to the National Museum, but it was closed. Then I walked to Box Park at the harbour and sat down to rest on a bench and watch the boats go by. A security guard walked up and told me I had to leave because the park was closed. WTF is wrong with this place?
In desperation for something to do outside my hotel room I took a taxi to the Mall of Qatar, hoping to get lucky. Nope, rejected. Two security guys try all of the things again, can’t get the app to register. Then the guy enters exactly the same information into the app on his phone AND IT WORKED. So there was some difference between my 1-year-old flagship Samsung Android phone and his 4-year-old Android phone that’s the source of the problem. Jeez, you would have to work hard to engineer in this kind of failure in an app.
Got screwed over at a restaurant in the souk on my order and the price. It looked shady, I should have known. I am so beaten down by this place.
I went to the west coast of the island and then to the north shore. There’s a fort from the 1930s and two abandoned fishing villages, as a royal decree at the time said everybody needs to move to the big city. Found four frisky puppies living amongst the ruins, played with them until they started biting and scratching, no rabies for me!
On my last evening, I got a taxi to the Lusail race track about 30 miles north of the city. It was built for MotoGP motorcycle racing but Formula 1 raced there for the first time last fall. I didn’t think much of it while watching the race and being here just reinforced my opinion that it’s a flat, soulless twisty track with nothing interesting going for it. Hosting the race here is purely Formula 1 following the big money and abandoning the classic European circuits. On certain evenings the track is open to the public for walking, running, rollerblading and cycling. I registered and crossed my fingers that they would let me in, and they did, they weren’t checking the app for anyone because it’s all outside. I rented a bicycle and did two laps of the track until my knees said no more. I was following the racing line that the F1 drivers take, hitting the apexes like Lewis Hamilton (last year, not this year). Now, my rental was a heavy steel mountain bike and I got passed by absolutely everyone except a mother and two toddlers on training wheels. Hundreds of riders had carbon fiber racing bikes and those skin-tight racing suits so I didn’t feel too bad.
I got a taxi back to the hotel, picked up my suitcase and headed to the airport, holding my breath for my last app check. The security guy wasn’t happy but he let me in because I’m just trying to get the fuck out of this country. The Pegasus airline, based in Turkey, had only two agents checking in an entire plane and both were in training and extremely slow. Ugh. We took off 45 minutes late because people kept dribbling on board due to the terrible customer service.
You’ve likely already read about my flight stopover in Istanbul and the bird strike in the engine on takeoff. Luckily I’m still alive to write this up. Remember my theory about “The Final Insult?” Well there’s another example of Doha kicking me in the balls on the way out.
I landed in Barcelona, showed my SUCCESSFUL COVID registration paper and jumped on the bus into the city. And boy-o-boy, does this city make up for all of the previous pain. I absolutely love it here. This is where I belong. More joyous details later. Don’t be surprised if I move here after I wrap up my trip. Hugs & kisses from Barcelona!
