New Year’s Eve 2013 – Dateline Doha, Qatar

New Year’s Eve 2013 – Dateline Doha, Qatar

Although Qatar follows the Saudi lead in not declaring New Year’s Day a national holiday, that does not stop all the local hotels from offering ex-pats and locals the opportunity to ring in the new year with lavish food, drink and loud music. Two blocks from my apartment is the La Cigale Hotel, consistently voted as the best hotel in Doha. While billing themselves as a 5-star hotel they do not offer an early-bird special. Our reservation for the fixed price five course dinner was set for 7:30.

We were fashionably 5 minutes late and walked into a nearly empty restaurant. We were seated and immediately Gary, our favorite waiter, came to our table. Exchanging Happy New Year wishes turned into catching up on each other’s lives since our last visit. My health report was trumped by Gary’s tale of returning with his wife to his typhoon ravaged home in Tacloban, Philippines. “Thanks God” was repeated constantly as he revealed that although wet and soggy, their two children, both sets of parents, homes, three dogs and the pig were all safe and sound. Thanks God.

But as usual, I ramble. This post is about the 5 course dinner. Gary left to take care of the smoking section and Karen started us with a palate cleansing Black truffle ice cream. It tasted a bit like an earthy mushroom ice cream. Wow, a fungus amongus. Don’t look for the BEN & JERRY’S version. It will not supplant Salty Caramel anytime soon.

The first course was a very nice creamy chestnut soup with mini raviolis and avocado oil.  Not a lot of depth but still very tasty. This turned out to be my second favorite course.

We paused to enjoy our complimentary proseco and a review of the wild and crazy year 2013 had been for the Schoenes.

Soup settled, we signaled Karen to proceed with the second course. A beautiful piece of roasted red tuna encrusted with artichokes on a bed of sautéed mango. Patty eyed this with great anticipation, but I like my sushi fried. Apparently, encrusted artichokes and sautéed mango really need semi-raw tuna to complete this gastronomic experience. Patty found the tuna tough and somewhat unappealing, even though she usually loves raw fish.

I was in bad need of another palate cleanser. The Chef had anticipated this and provided a Granny Smith Apple Sorbet topped with pineapple meringue and finished with a sprinkle of basil and Szechwan pepper. Holy smokes. I was reminded of Dolly Parton’s response to the talk show host about her over-the-top stage appearance. Dolly said lots of women wear wigs, makeup, false eye lashes and flashy jewelry. They just don’t wear it all at the same time like I do. This menu has a lot going on at the same time.

With a touch of my glass and a nod of the head, our glasses were refreshed with Hildon “gently sparking” water. The service at La Cigale is wonderful. A well trained staff quietly attending to our every  need. 

With my palate cleansed and thirst slaked, I was ready for the main course. Seared veal medallion on pomme frite cake flavored with lawn grass clippings. A small oven-hot serving of blended carrots and tomatoes completed the main course. We gazed at each other across the table completely under-whelmed. At least, I ate my veal and baked carrots. Patty hardly touched anything. As she cleared the plates, a concerned Karen was soothed by Patty’s words of just being too full.

But not too full for fifth course. Laid out where the salad bar normally is found was an all-you-can-eat smorgasbord of desserts. A sampling of these and a cup of tea - Jasmine for Patty camomile for me - finished our meal.

But wait, there’s more. My sixth and favorite course: the tooth picks, individually wrapped with a tiny drop of green Retsyn (like Certs) on one end to help freshen your breath while you clean your teeth. Incredible.

Dusty

 

Magnetic Resonance Imaging

My first MRI was some years ago at Winter Park Memorial Hospital. It was a fairly new tecnology at the time and what I remember most was the sound, a repititious BAAHNNG BAAHNNG BAAHNNG. There were other sounds as well but not as memorable. As a result of my recent biopsy pathology report I had a MRI scan today at the Al Ahli Hospital in Doha. The equipment is a very shiny, new looking Siemens MAGONET scanner. As a general rule I love German technology but the baby is LOUD and noisy. Of course the staff knows this and I was provided with a pair of headphones and music to make the experience tolerable. Now my only question is, "what is worse, a loud, noisy scanner or listening to ABBA on headphones for 50 minutes?"

Dusty   14 September 2013

Dust Bunnies are your friends...........

Dust bunnies are your friends………. 

Has been one of the guiding principles of my life, along with floss daily, don’t pick flowers in your neighbor’s yard and never, ever, refer to your Mother, wife or girlfriend as “the old lady”. I have always believed that a house that was spotlessly clean becomes an overly attractive host to germs. A house that is semi-clean and tidy is less appealing to germlife and therefore much healthier for human habitation. When faced with the choice to go play golf or clean house, there is really no choice at all, hitting the links wins every time.

This life philosophy, “The World According to Steve Schoene” has been seriously challenged living in Doha. I live on the fifth floor, in a one bdrm flat with bathroom, powder room, kitchen and living/dining room combined. There is no exterior balcony suitable for growing drought resistant plants. It has polished marble floors throughout with double glazed, reflective glass windows that are never opened.

My normal pattern is to run around the rooms with dust mop every two days, three days max. But this picture shows what happens from a busy week with unplanned doctor visits and decisions to go to the gym rather than dust mop the floors. 7 days, just 7 days, where does it all come from? No one can say, but all who live here experience the same thing. Inescapable dust. Everywhere.      I remain……..

Dusty in Doha

 

 

 

Fresh Air?

Hot, dusty and now humid. Not sure why it took so long but yesterday it hit me like a ton of bricks. Fresh air or the lack thereof is one of the features of living in Doha.  Friday was the first day in my life when not confined by a medical condition, that I did not go outside to breathe deeply of fresh air. But lest you should think I'm totally bummed, remember the picture posted by my friends at Full Circle Yoga in Winter Park, Florida and think of me, dryly asking all I meet, "have you been outside today for a bit of fresh air"?   Dusty

 

Camel Helper

Before leaving Doha for the states to reunion with the family and my new grandson, I visited the MIA with a friend to take in the new exhibit.  STEEL AND GOLD is a collection of swords dating from the 9^th century to the present.  It is a fantastic voyage tracing the technological developments dictated by foot soldiers giving way to mounted cavalry to the ceremonial swords of today that are indicative of military rank and political power. Cold, hardened killing steel has become engraved, gold-filled and jewel encrusted. I have mentioned the Museum of Islamic Art in previous notes to friends. It is one of the most beautiful buildings I have ever seen. It was designed by I.M. Pei with the interior gallery spaces developed by JM Wilmotte. The galleries occupy three sides on four floors of a large cube with the forth side a 5-story glass wall looking across the bay to the skyscrapers dotting the shoreline of the City Center. Standing in the open central atrium you look up through the chandelier's delicate geometric arabesque pattern to the dome above. (Recommend Wikapedia for more info) On the fifth floor you will find IDAM the 4-star restaurant where Chef Alain Ducasse enhances traditional Arabic food with elements of French cuisine. The restaurant is closed during the summer months but the museum café on the ground floor is open year round and provides a sampling of what IDAM has to offer.  We decided to have a light bite at the café and seated ourselves next to the soothing sounds of the black onyx water fountain. The wait staffer appeared almost immediately asking if we were dining or just having a refreshing drink. She left us with menus and took our drink order to the kitchen. She soon returned with our water and mint tea. She asked if we had any questions about the menu.
I nodded yes and pointed at the item; Pastini avec Capsicum et Camel. Every once in a while those 3 years of French with Madame Louselle at Oak Ridge High School are put to good use. I had everything covered except the camel. I asked, “is it really camel”? To which this really cute, tiny South Asian girl replied, “oh yes sir, but not an old camel, a young camel”.

Wow, that was a relief, nothing worse than tough old boiled  camel. Me being the guy who always recommends gator tail to our out town visitors when dining at JB’s Fishcamp in NSB, how could I not try this local delicacy. When it arrived it was beautifully centered in a white plate but looked as though it had been prepared in advance in a shallow bowl and finished off (microwaved) my dining pleasure. It was hot. It was tasty but lacked any complexity of flavors. Then I thought, this is what I always imagined hamburger helper would taste like. Which, BTW, is available at local grocery stores.

Dusty

 






 

Not all dust is the same.......

 Walking down the street about a block from my apartment one finds a store front window that hasn’t been washed in ages. But when you pause and look into the darkened showroom space you see there are four Bentley automobiles. Four brand new Bentley automobiles. I recognize them but have never longed for one. My wild guess is around 120K per vehicle making it close to a half a million, their once shiny skin dulled under a thick coating of Qatari dust. Have I mentioned it’s dusty in Doha?
 

Dusty    25 June 2013

the opposite of even?

With as many as twelve thousand workers on-site, the Sidra Medical Research Center is a multicultural stew. English is the official language of the jobsite but for roughly 90% of the workforce their English language skills would not qualify as a second language.

We all know effective communication is essential to the success of any project. So one of the really fun but challenging aspects of working in Doha is understanding the English spoken with the many different accents.  Arabic, Farsi, Hindi plus two other Indian dialects, two Pakistani dialects, Nepalese, Tagalong, Indonesian, Italian, French, German, Irish, Canadian, Brits, Australian and the Scotch is a good start to the list.

We work directly with a delightful group of youngsters in their late twenties to early thirties.  They are three Lebanese, two Egyptians plus an Indian and a Philipino. And what we have found is that all these young folks have the basic, “see Dick and Jane play” language skills but it's the nuances, the double meanings of some words that leave them mystified.

Anyway during one of our seemingly endless meetings a really strange bit of conflicting information was noted by my co-worker, Leah Bauer who said, “oh, that’s odd”. As I looked around the table all I saw was blank, confused faces. Finally Ibrahim said, “what you mean odd?” You mean opposite of even?

Dusty