With the first day of Fall having passed this week it brought back a series of memories from back home. The crisp morning air, the changing colors of leaves, pumpkins, weekends filled with Football, Homecoming, and the incredible tailgates. With all that being said, we brought in the Fall season with a cool 100 degree Saturday afternoon here in Doha. To be honest with you, it has begun to cool down here as Doha approaches its "winter" season which will have temperatures in the 70s and 80s as opposed to the summer with temperatures in the 90s and 100s. Since my arrival the temperatures have been bearable and I missed the worst heat of the summer in July and August.
As I mentioned, Fall for me is synonymous with Football for me (American football that is). Saturdays are spent catching the best of College Games and following the JMU Dukes, while Sundays involve an NFL marathon from 1pm until Midnight. Due to the 7 hour time difference, football season has been mostly absent from my weekly routine. This week was a bit difference as I woke up at 3am (after going to sleep at 1am) on Friday morning to catch the Giants v. Carolina game live with the NFL Game Game Pass with a fellow Giants fan, Kevin from New Jersey. I met Kevin through work and plan on catching as many Giants games as we can this year. We watched the game, which kicked off at 3:20am, which we chowed on McDonald's, had a few beers, and drank coffee to keep awake. I have never watched a live NFL game while catching a sunrise...only in Doha!
This past week was the first time that I really felt comfortable at work and have started to share my insights and opinions more. It took me a while to navigate the systems that are in place at HBKU and I have at least a general understanding of how it operates. The branch campus model here is really interesting as each of the campuses operate some ways in complete isolation and very collaboratively in others. At the Student Center we are constantly looking for ways to collaborate and serve students from across all the campuses. This weekend we held a training for our student staff in the building and this upcoming weekend we will be holding a student leadership workshop. Looking forward to working on developing some new programs in the upcoming weeks and I have had some great conversations with students and colleagues about future directions. We also hired two student employees who I will be supervising to round out the Campus Life Team.
Earlier this week my supervisor Melissa and I were driving to work and she asked me if I felt comfortable so far in Doha or if I felt out of place. This is something I have thought a lot about since arriving here. In no way do I feel like I "fit in" here in Doha, but I am also not out of place. Doha is an incredibly diverse city and there is no real such thing as "normal" here. In fact, Qataris are a minority in their own country. I came across this interesting breakdown:
As you can see, Americans would fall into the 7% of "others" that live in Qatar. With this diversity of population, no one really seems out of place. Regardless of what you wear (with the exception of short shorts or tank tops) no one looks twice. People are incredibly accepting and non-judgmental. Nearly everyone in the country has an incredible story and family all over the world. It really is an incredible place to live and work.
One of the few times I did feel uncomfortable occurred this week during a work lunch. I was a table of ten during this lunch. It was myself, eight Qatari men, and one Lebanese man. Naturally, everyone at the table spoke Arabic except for me (unfortunately knowing how to say Good Morning and Do you want to get coffee? were not helping me follow the conversation). Upon noticing the conversation in Arabic, my Lebanese friend kindly asked everyone at the table to speak in English since not everyone spoke Arabic. The reality was, only I didn't speak Arabic. This made me feel uncomfortable to make everyone speak in a language that is less natural for them, even though most of them speak flawless English. It is moments like these that I feel very privileged to have English as a common language of communication, while simultaneously feeling very guilty for not being fluent in any other languages. In the US most Americans only know one language, here people will know at least two, usually more languages. My neighbor across the hall is fluent in 5 languages!
This post is already getting long so here's some other entirely random thoughts:
As I mentioned, Fall for me is synonymous with Football for me (American football that is). Saturdays are spent catching the best of College Games and following the JMU Dukes, while Sundays involve an NFL marathon from 1pm until Midnight. Due to the 7 hour time difference, football season has been mostly absent from my weekly routine. This week was a bit difference as I woke up at 3am (after going to sleep at 1am) on Friday morning to catch the Giants v. Carolina game live with the NFL Game Game Pass with a fellow Giants fan, Kevin from New Jersey. I met Kevin through work and plan on catching as many Giants games as we can this year. We watched the game, which kicked off at 3:20am, which we chowed on McDonald's, had a few beers, and drank coffee to keep awake. I have never watched a live NFL game while catching a sunrise...only in Doha!
This past week was the first time that I really felt comfortable at work and have started to share my insights and opinions more. It took me a while to navigate the systems that are in place at HBKU and I have at least a general understanding of how it operates. The branch campus model here is really interesting as each of the campuses operate some ways in complete isolation and very collaboratively in others. At the Student Center we are constantly looking for ways to collaborate and serve students from across all the campuses. This weekend we held a training for our student staff in the building and this upcoming weekend we will be holding a student leadership workshop. Looking forward to working on developing some new programs in the upcoming weeks and I have had some great conversations with students and colleagues about future directions. We also hired two student employees who I will be supervising to round out the Campus Life Team.
Earlier this week my supervisor Melissa and I were driving to work and she asked me if I felt comfortable so far in Doha or if I felt out of place. This is something I have thought a lot about since arriving here. In no way do I feel like I "fit in" here in Doha, but I am also not out of place. Doha is an incredibly diverse city and there is no real such thing as "normal" here. In fact, Qataris are a minority in their own country. I came across this interesting breakdown:
As you can see, Americans would fall into the 7% of "others" that live in Qatar. With this diversity of population, no one really seems out of place. Regardless of what you wear (with the exception of short shorts or tank tops) no one looks twice. People are incredibly accepting and non-judgmental. Nearly everyone in the country has an incredible story and family all over the world. It really is an incredible place to live and work.
One of the few times I did feel uncomfortable occurred this week during a work lunch. I was a table of ten during this lunch. It was myself, eight Qatari men, and one Lebanese man. Naturally, everyone at the table spoke Arabic except for me (unfortunately knowing how to say Good Morning and Do you want to get coffee? were not helping me follow the conversation). Upon noticing the conversation in Arabic, my Lebanese friend kindly asked everyone at the table to speak in English since not everyone spoke Arabic. The reality was, only I didn't speak Arabic. This made me feel uncomfortable to make everyone speak in a language that is less natural for them, even though most of them speak flawless English. It is moments like these that I feel very privileged to have English as a common language of communication, while simultaneously feeling very guilty for not being fluent in any other languages. In the US most Americans only know one language, here people will know at least two, usually more languages. My neighbor across the hall is fluent in 5 languages!
This post is already getting long so here's some other entirely random thoughts:
- Cost of living here is cheap in some ways (food shopping) and wildly expensive in others (drinking at restaurants/bars)
- Still no car but I do have a QF ID!
- Wil (from across the hall) has a copy of You, Me, and Dupree in his movie collection. Did we just become best friends?!
- Skype: This is a life saver. Thank you to everyone who keeps checking in on it. I have spent literally 3 hours tonight Skyping with a list of people. I say this as Brennan calls me now. Tonight I was able to talk to my parents, Zach and Kristina, and the triple crown crew (Travis, Rielly, and Brennan) all in one sitting!
- Whatsapp: So there's an app you can download that allows you to text anyone with a smartphone for free. So all of you need to download the app and let me know when you get it. My cell here is 974 5563 5119.
The Whatsapp is a great way to stay connected. Glad you found out about it.
ReplyDelete