The Fingerprint Factory
Drama Drama Drama. It used to be the last dreaded event before getting your residence. You had to have fingerprints taken and it was in this big mob-scene, huge mobs of people and hot hot hot, no air, and the ink was HORRIBLE, and even if you brought your own soap and washed right away, you still had ink under your fingernails for days. It was a hellish experience.
Today was the day. It started with drama – when I got to where I was supposed to be at 10:10, the receptionist told me I was supposed to be there at 9:30, I had missed my appointment. I was really sure my husband had told me my appointment was at 10:30, so I waited while she called, and it was one of those experiences where she was NOT happy being wrong, and I got to sit out in the not-air-conditioned hall to wait for my group to go.
When my group got to the fingerprint place, there was no mob. There WAS more drama. There was only a very nice be-thobed gentleman who said that the fingerprint computer was broken. It was broken yesterday, and they got it working again this morning until 9 o’clock, but now it is broken. I asked “how long until it is fixed?” but it was one of those insh’allah things, no one knows how long it will take to get the system up again. We would have to come back tomorrow.
And then, just as we were walking out the gate back to the van, he called to us “Come back! Come back!” The fingerprint machine was working again.
Inside, it was orderly and air conditioned. Take a number, take a seat. Wait your turn. Very cool, watching people’s fingerprints, handprints, etc show up in huge prints. If there was any blur, the machine showed red – like a red thumb – and it had to be done over again.
For some reason, I had to have several done over again. I don’t know if it was me, or if the machine was just finicky. All I know is that the system was up long enough for me to get my fingerprints taken, and there was NO mess. None. Wooo HOOOO.
I still have my old Qateri driving licence. I am praying – please keep me in your prayers – that they will just renew it and I won’t have to take a road test on the roads of Qatar. Although – after driving in Kuwait – I can drive anywhere. 😀
Happy Birthday, Mom
“You make me sound so OLD!” my Mother scolded me, when I wrote about how she was 85 years old and still living on her own. Mom keeps active. She can’t do all the things she really wants to do – travel, mostly – because she can’t manage a heavy bag or standing too long – but she keeps up her own place, fixes her own meals, goes out with friends, exercises, makes and keeps her own appointments. We should all be so fortunate, when we hit our 80’s.
(This is not my Mother’s birthday cake, but when I looked up cakes I found this on Kay’s Cakes.com and knew it was a cake my Mom would love, if she loved cake. Actually, she loves Lemon Meringue Pie, and that is what she really had at her birthday party.)
My younger sister has shown her a couple really nice places where she could have more assistance on a daily basis, beautiful places with activities and transportation for elders.
(I can already hear her wincing at using the word ‘elder’)
She doesn’t want to be surrounded by old people. She stays young by being as active as she wants to be.
She has signed up for a three-day mini university course at a nearby university, where they use the college facilities during the summer months to offer interesting mini classes. One of the four classes that she has signed up for is Early Islamic Spain. I’m impressed, Mom.
She keeps up with the news, sends me clippings, reads books we tell her are worth reading, and keeps up with her friends. She is good at managing her money, and researching her investments. She does better than most women half her age.
Happy Happy Birthday, Mom, and many more to come.
Sharing Your Faith in Qatar Gets Leader Deported
I heard a very strange tale and while there is nothing in the paper about it, I wonder where the truth lies. This week, the leader of the local Phillipine evangelical church (I don’t know the exact name) and his wife and three daughters and grandson were visited by the CID one morning and told that they had to be out of the country by night, that they needed to go back to the Phillipines. The person who told me could not imagine what might have caused this.
These are good people, she told me, and we are just about to do a performance about Joseph and his dreams, and his wife was making the costumes.
I thought about it, and said that well, it is an evangelical church, meaning you seek actively to bring souls to Jesus, and it is forbidden by law, in Qatar, to share our faith with Moslems. Is there any chance he was trying to convert Moslems?
She told me that people attending the church were expected to bring visitors, and that when visitors came, they were welcomed to the front of the church, where they were baptized.
I was horrorified. “Do they have any understanding of what is happening?” I asked her, and she replied no, and that most of the baptized visitors never come back. But, she added, the director still gets credit for all those baptisms, and his statistics look pretty good when he reports back to the church in the Phillipines.
In addition to her tithe (Christians are supposed to give 10% of their income to the church and charities) she said members of the congretation were tasked extra monies to pay the rent on the villa, to pay for food and travel of visitors who stayed there, etc, and she said it put a great burden on those who didn’t have sufficient income to contribute the extra. She said it wasn’t a voluntary contribution; if you didn’t contribute the extra, it was like you weren’t really a part of the church.
Last weekend, among those baptized, was a new Nigerian Moslem family who had been invited to visit. I can only imagine how I would feel, visiting a church, invited to the front to be welcomed, and then receiving a baptism I neither asked for nor wanted. I would never come back, but if I were Moslem, I might be horrified enough – and angry enough – to report it to the authorities. To me, at the very least, it is disrespectful.
There may be more to this story than the few details I was given. I expect the entire story is fascinating.
Residence
We all know the drill, the expat drill we all go through to become residents. Residency is not something to be sniffed at, if you don’t have it, really bad things can happen.
So today was the day I needed to get my medical exam. What a difference from the last time, six years ago.
Six years ago, we went to an old, dilapidated hospital in the center of town with terrible parking. There were long lines in the hot sun everywhere. I don’t remember there being any air conditioning. What I do remember is walking down a hallway littered with the used cotton balls people had discarded after having their blood taken for the blood tests. I was nearly ill – blood carries diseases, and here were these bloody balls all over the floor.
When it was my turn to have my blood taken, the women who took my blood – six years ago – was eating salted pumpkin seeds. I saw the thought cross her mind that she ought to put on the gloves, right there in the box on her desk, but if she did, she couldn’t continue munching, so she decided not to. I watched her take a fresh needle – I was saving my protest to insist on a fresh needle had she decided she could re-use an old one. I choose my battles.
I closed my eyes and prayed. She did OK, she got the blood she needed and was still munching on the pumpkin seeds as I left to go get my X-ray.
In the X-ray room there were all these women in USED hospital gowns, one would take one off and the next woman would put it on. I had been warned to bring a white T-shirt, and that would be acceptable, which it was. There was no dressing room, just one big changing room.
I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.
Fast forward six years – new, modern air conditioned medical facility outside the city with lots of parking. I’m already feeling more positive, although I do have my clean T-shirt. The phlebotomist is in a white jacket, clean and neat, and is supplied with all kinds of sterile supplies. The blood work takes maybe 30 seconds, thanks be to God, because I am a little squeamish about people taking my blood, and one time, I even fainted, but just for a few seconds. Not this time – it was over before I could even get too worried about it.
The X-ray was orderly, and there were stacks and stacks and stacks and bags of clean gowns, and even three fairly clean changing rooms. I still wore my own T-shirt, since I had it. The only thing that bothered me was that there were bins to put the used gowns when the X-ray was finished, but the women tossed them on the floor! There is a part of me that almost picked them all up and put them in the bin, but they called my name just as I was about to do it.
The process was so orderly, so painless this time! And, God willing, soon I will be a legal Qatar resident and even, soon, insh’allah, a legal driver. I still have my old Qateri driving license, it will just need to be renewed. (I also have my 10-year Kuwait license, because in expat world, you just never know. I also have my lifetime German driving license because in expat world, you just never know. And I have my stateside driver’s license to take care of me there. 🙂 )
Parents Don’t Want Raped 8-Year-Old, Says She Shamed Them
This very sad, very strange story is from today’s BBC News. Parents of the girl, living in Phoenix, say she brought shame on them (eight years old) and they don’t want her back. People all over the US are sending money and offers to adopt her. Eight years old – all she wanted was a stick of gum.
Offers of help are pouring in for an eight-year-old Liberian girl disowned by her own family in Phoenix, Arizona, after being raped by four boys.
The girl is under the care of the Arizona Child Protective Service (CPS) because her parents said she had shamed them, and they did not want her back.
Phoenix police said calls had come in from all over the US offering money, or even to adopt the young girl.
The boys, Liberian immigrants aged nine to 14, have been charged with rape.
The case has sparked outrage across the US and even drawn condemnation from Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, an outspoken anti-rape campaigner.
“I think that family is wrong. They should help that child who has been traumatised,” Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf told CNN.
“They too need serious counselling because clearly they are doing something, something that is no longer acceptable in our society here,” she added.
Brutal attack
Media reports said the girl was lured into a shed on 16 July with promises of chewing gum by the four young boys. There, they held her down and took turns assaulting her for 10 to 15 minutes, before her screams alerted officers nearby.
The oldest suspect, a 14-year-old boy, will be tried as an adult on charges of kidnapping and sexual assault, police said on Friday. He is being held in police custody until trial.
The other three – aged 9, 10, and 13 – are charged as juveniles with sexual assault and kidnapping.
But the police said no charges will be filed against the parents.
“They didn’t abandon the child,” Phoenix police sergeant Andy Hill told AFP news agency. “They committed no crime. They just didn’t support the child, which led to CPS coming over there.”
Sgt Hill said people from eight or nine US states had called wanting to adopt the girl or donate money.
“It has been unbelievably fantastic in terms of support for the child,” he said.
I’m hoping that this traumatized little girl gets a new family who treasures her, helps her overcome this attack, sends her to school through university and helps her to prevail.
“Lord, Please Don’t Let Me Grow Up to Be a Dirty Old Man”
“So,” said AdventureMan, sitting down with me to eat a pizza after an unusually disrupted Friday, our day off, “tell me more about King David. Like wasn’t he the one who killed Goliath?”
He is asking, because the sermon at our church this morning was like eight sermons in one sermon. While the priest stuck close to the gospel and readings, he made so many good points that we had already discussed with our friend over breakfast, but there were still so many to discuss.
“Yeh, King David is problematic, once you get to be a grown-up,” I started. We have to start with the Israelis arrival in the promised land.”
“Israelites.” He corrected me.
“Yes. Them. They wanted a king. God said ‘no’ that they didn’t need a king, but they kept whining that all the other peoples had a king and they wanted one, too.”
(Please keep in mind, I am not a theologian, and this is my summary, as best as I can figure it out, so you can argue with me, I am no expert, but I DO read scripture.)
“They kept begging for a king, and I am guessing it annoyed God so much that he gave them one. (Who knows what God is thinking?) The prophet Samuel annointed Saul, and Saul became king over all the tribes of Israelites, but he got in major trouble because he didn’t do what God told him to do.”
“What did he do?” AdventureMan is fascinated.
“He was supposed to kill ALL the males of the tribe he had conquered, but he didn’t. When Samuel confronted him, he argued, then he said he would go back and kill the ones he had promised God he would kill and he had promised these guys he would not kill them, but he went back and killed them anyway. He thought going back and doing what he was supposed to do would make it all right with God, but it didn’t.”
“Where does David come in?” AdventureMan asks.
“Samuel anoints David king, at God’s instruction, so for a while there are two kings of Israel.” I explain.
“Isn’t that the one where Samuel looks at all the sons and doesn’t see the one who is supposed to be king?” AdventureMan asks. (Good! He was listening in Sunday school!)
“Yep. God told him none of the sons he saw was the one, so he asked the father if he didn’t have any other sons and he sent for David, who was out taking care of the sheep in the fields, and God said ‘that’s the one.
So David kills Goliath, and Saul invites him to come live with him in the castle, and Saul’s son Jonathan loves David and David loves him, and Saul’s daughter Michal also loves David, and David marries her. Saul knows God’s spirit isn’t with him anymore, and he has these fits when he tries to kill David because David is very successful in battle and the people love him and Saul has a sneaking suspicion that God’s spirit is with David, so he is really jealous, even though a part of him loves David. There are a lot of times he throws his spear at David, trying to kill him, and finally Michal and Jonathan help David escape totally.
Eventually Saul dies, David becomes king, but David has some odd behaviors.”
“I remember last week, or the week before, when the arc of the covenant was being moved and David told one man to stop and it ended up killing that man,” AdventureMan said, “it was supposed to be about moving God’s home on earth, but it turned into being all about David.”
“Yeh, during that same procession, he took off all his clothes and danced wildly. It may have been exultation, but there is this strange verse about Michal watching from her window and despising him in her heart. Really an odd event.”
“OK, so what happened with Bathsheba?” he asks.
“Pretty much what we heard today in the gospel reading.” I respond. “After Uriah is killed in battle, she marries the king and bears him a son who becomes Solomon, who turns out to be really wise.”
“So what is your problem with David?” AdventureMan asks.
“We all grow up thinking he is a great guy, but the bible tells us he was also greatly flawed,” I respond. “After Michal helped David get away, Saul married her to another guy, and they really loved each other, but once David became king, he sent his men to take her away from the other guy, even though he already had two other wives. He did that naked dancing thing. God made him really sick for disobeying, and being more focused on his kingliness than this responsibilities, but David repents heartily, and tells God if God will heal him, he will serve God with all his heart. I guess it is a mystery to me why God loves David so much. But it might have more to do with Solomon than with David.”
It’s not often that AdventureMan and I are so engrossed in a bible reading that we discuss it over dinner, and the discussion went on and on, because it was such a human story, and also sort of a mystery.
During the sermon, the priest made us vote as to who was wrong, Bathsheba, for bathing on her roof, or David. We all voted, every single person, for David being in the wrong.
At the end of the service, when the priest sends us forth to love and serve God, he added this prayer, which I am certain referred to King David, but it caused a collective gasp nonetheless:
“Lord, please keep us far away from pornography. Please don’t let me grow up to be a dirty old man.”
We love this priest. He is direct. Very straightforward. At the same time, he is very practical about people and their fallibilities. I suspect we will be thinking about this sermon the whole week. That’s a really good sermon!
(I found a fascinating discussion of the passage about King David dancing naked in a writing on Passionate Spirituality and Worship written by a Mennonite theologian which presents another interpretation / explanation of what is going on)
Doha Cat Television
“Cat channels?” asked Little Diamond, mystified, listening to a conversation at the dinner table.
Oh yes. He’s got the Gardener channel, two or three pigeon channels, the songbird channels, the cleaning lady channel – life is very interesting for the Qatteri Cat. Today, I set up the Quilt Room Cat Sleeping Station – he likes to be in the same room I am working in, and it is a help to me if he has his own place so he is not on top of my work. (My friend who organized my quilt room thinks the Qattari Cat is spoiled, LLLOOOLL. OF COURSE he is spoiled! He is an only cat!)
Here is the cat sleeping station:
Here is how the Cat Sleeping Station is utilized:
But then – the one remaining sort-of-non-flying-baby-pigeon has begun spreading his wings, little by little. Yesterday morning he was on top of my car – this is a giant step for a pigeon who walks everywhere. Last night, he was on the garage room – an even bigger step.
No sooner had I set up the Cat Sleeping Station then the little walking pigeon figured out how to make it to my windowsill:
Never a dull moment for the Qatteri Cat:
Baked Stuffed Pumpkin
My visiting niece, Little Diamond, is vegetarian. AdventureMan and I are not vegetarian, we laughingly say we are meatatarian or meatavore, but the truth is, we don’t eat a lot of meat, either. Last I tried a new recipe, not entirely original, but a lot of fun, and it turned out really really good. It is also surprisingly easy. 🙂
(This is not my photo, but it looks a lot like my pumpkin. It is from visual recipes, another great recipe site)
I got the idea from a quilting friend in Kuwait who baked a pumpkin full of a meat stuffing. It sounded yummy. I filled it with a channa dal / burgul mixture (recipe follows) and I added:
1 chopped apple
seeds from 1/2 pomegranate
1/2 cup slightly chopped walnuts
Here is the original recipe for the stuffing:
• 3/4 cup chana dal
• One large onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic (or more, to taste), minced or pressed
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 cup bulgur wheat
• 2 cups hot water
• 1 teaspoon salt (or less, to taste)
• 1/4 cup finely chopped parsley or cilantro
• freshly ground black pepper
Preparation:
Soak chana dal for 10-12 hours. Drain and rinse.
Sauté onion and garlic in olive oil until soft (5-8 minutes). Add drained chana dal and bulgur wheat. Sauté for about 3 more minutes, until bulgur wheat is browned (it will begin to smell heavenly). Add all remaining ingredients except pepper, bring to a boil, and lower heat.
Simmer, covered, for about 35 minutes. At this point, check to see if the chana dal is tender enough for you. If not add a quarter cup more water and simmer another few minutes or until you are satisfied. Turn off heat and let sit, covered, for at least 10 minutes. Fluff with a fork and mix in pepper.
Makes about 6 cups.
The only hard part is remembering to soak the chana dal. 😉
Pumpkin
Cut a lid off the top of the pumpkin. I usually put a notch, so I know how the lid fits back on.
You have to clean out the pumpkin, throwing out the innards (you can toast the seeds if you want). I also cut some of the pumpkin flesh into small pieces and added it to the stuffing, but that is optional.
Stuff the pumpkin tightly with the stuffing mixture, then line a baking bowl or pan with the remaining stuffing, set the pumpkin in the center, pour 1/2 cup of water – or wine, now that we are in Qatar – or broth – over the stuffing, and cover loosely with foil.
Bake at 350°F / 175°C for one hour, or more, until the pumpkin flesh is soft all the way through. Cut the pumpkin into slices to serve, and heap extra stuffing on top.
Delicious!
Additional hint – I use a Misto, a bottle you can fill with the best olive oil, pump, and spray. I spray the bowl before I put the stuffing in, to make cleaning easier, and I also spray the pumpkin to give it that glisten. It is very sparing with the olive oil, but you still get the taste.
Little Diamond asked if it were a potiron or a citrouille, two words the French use for pumpkins, but none of us could say definitely. I thought it was a potiron, because it is more squat and I thought citrouille were taller and oranger, but Little Diamond actually looked it up online after dinner.
AdventureMan reminded me of the time in Tunisia when Halloween was coming and I went to the market and bought a whole pumpkin to carve. I don’t think it was really a pumpkin at all, it was a huge pumpkin-like squash, and it was sold in slices, by the kilo. I bought the smallest one I could find, but it still caused quite a commotion, buying the whole squash, not just a slice.
And I was thinking, too, of my French friend who shared her recipe with me for the very best pumpkin pie I have eaten in my life, ever.
Doha Parking Nightmare
You could think of it as an adventure, as adventure can cause the same heart-slamming rush of adrenalin. Little Diamond and I were late to the fabric souks area, looking for a match to some pants she has loved and needs copied, as they have irrevocably split in a critical area. We circled the Souk al Diraa multiple times, hoping a spot would open up, one of a couple hundred cars circling, hoping for a spot.
Sharp-eyed Little Diamond spotted a sign for public parking. I’ve never noticed it before – it led us to a building in front of which I often park, it is now totally empty of stores. There is a sign as you enter the parking, which is all above ground, that “only Ministry personnel” can park on the first level.
We had started up the winding ramp when after two curves, we were in total dark. I have my sunglasses on, and I am desperately trying to get them off, but even when I get them off, I can’t see, we are in total darkness on an upward twisting ramp and all I can think of is what if someone is coming up in a hurry behind me and hits me???
“The light! Turn on the car lights” shouts Little Diamond, who is allowed to shout at me when she gives me good ideas. Oh yeh! Car lights . . . since I have never driven this car at night, I don’t exactly know where they are, but I make a guess and thanks be to God, the lights come on and we crawl up two more levels until we begin to see some light appear.
We check out every level – every level is full. On level three, we finally find a spot, and hurry down the filthy stairs to check out fabrics so we can get back to the tailor before he closes. As the tailor had said – we cannot find the exact fabric, but we find a fabric which is about a 90% match and that will have to be good enough.
As we head back to parking lot – the surrounding sidewalk is crumbling and one entry is chained off – we find the elevators to take us up. “Not working!” says a man standing nearby, so we head for the nearest stairwell, and almost gag on the way up. I think people maybe sleep in there at night – there are some terrible sights and smells.
There are footprints, even high on the walls:
As we exit the stairwell on our floor, we are met with the sight of a totally burned out car:
Fortunately, on the drive out, there is no area where the lights are burned out, and we drive comfortably the four levels down to the exit.
I normally get the these souks before nine in the morning and I can always find a parking spot, do my shopping and be out in a couple hours, max. I will NEVER, NEVER again, park in this parking lot. I would forego a visit to the souks rather than park in this parking lot again. It is a danger to your health!
The Low Tech Solution
Two days ago, a cleaning crew came and cleared out the pigeon nest entirely and cleaned up the area. The parent pigeons are gone – I think they found a more congenial dwelling elsewhere. The adolescent pigeons still like to spend the night in our entry.
My husband thinks we need a board with longer nails. The maintenance crew suggested taking out the center light in the entry, the one they perch on, sleep on, and from which they poop-bomb our entry. It is a brilliant idea – the low tech solution. They said they have tried it in other houses in the compound and it works.
We don’t want to be mean to the pigeons, but we sure hate pigeon poop in our entry! I have a shower curtain rod that I bang against the center light, and I bought a squirt bottle (there doesn’t seem to be a water pistol in town; where is Toys R Us when you need them??) and squirted the persistent adolescent who wants to nest here, but . . . he LIKED it! Curses, foiled again! I am guessing taking out the central entry light will do the trick; that seems to be their favorite perch.
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