When you consider that Qatar have a native population of only c. 250,000 people it’s easy to fall into a state of awe at just how successful a little nation, Qatar really is. Possibly the richest country in the world, home to over a hundred different nationalities, none of whom will even gain citizenship, unless…
Friends come and go all the time in Doha, but not a lot come back! So this week when a buddy that left the sandy dunes of Doha for the lush fields of Cork made her way back to Doha, for a holiday I was super excited. Not many people come to Doha on a…
It’s probably ingrained in us Irish and maybe even more-so that any other nationality, that we are prone to suffering from a small bit of negativity. We lean towards the down side. We highlight the pitfalls, point out the inefficiencies and harp on about the negative in like, any situation. We loved to go on about Christmas starting…
When you live abroad for a while, the newness wears off the new surroundings and regardless of how strange it seemed at first, it will feel familiar and ‘normal’ in time. When I first arrived in Qatar I was awed by just about everything, over time, the awe has waned and is replaced by acceptance.…
By the time it comes to the last week of school term, a morning without an argument about how many spoons of Rice Krispies qualifies as a breakfast, seems like heaven. The kids are tired, the monotony of school lunches is like Chinese torture, for you making them, and for the kids having to eat…
There’s a common misconception out there about women in Qatar and that we are poorly treated. Many think we are not allowed leave the house or work here alone without a man, drive, socialise in bars with friends, in fact we are allowed to do all that, and aren’t we grateful for it, see that’s…
We all want different things for our kids, me for example I want my kids to grow up with a real sense of Ireland and what it means to be Irish, my friend (also Irish) on the other hand, wants her kids to grow to have style and be stylish. I understand that, I get…
Having escaped back to Ireland for the most part of Ramadan back in July, I thought by not returning to Qatar until September that the heat of significant Muslim religious festivals would have cooled down. I was wrong, this week the display on the car still reads fifty degrees Celsius and the calendar tells us…
Last week I complained about the weather, my biggest issue was the rain, it was too wet to be outdoors and I my only options to entertain kids were indoor play areas and McDonalds. Sure, I waxed lyrical the first few weeks about the smell of the rain and the fresh air, but the novelty…
The term ‘expat wife’ is bandied around a lot, the illusion being that the wife of the expat is nothing other than a trinket that bobs along happily behind the her husband, happy with her new found finery and year round suntan and most importantly the envy of all her friends at home. I…
thereluctantemigrant 