sandbox hopping (in continuing the easter theme)

almost as soon as we arrived back in the uae, we left for qatar. jeff is supposed to be on a project there and hopes to spend the next 6 months lounging about at the doha intercontinental beach club. currently we're staying at the oryx rotana hotel right by the airport. not a bad place to stay (the gym is pretty modern), but there's not really anything close by to walk to, so i'm bored.

the whole taxi situation here is a bit different too. in abu dhabi, they're all metered and regulated, so you know what you're going to get. here, the drivers all pretend their meters are broken and they just make up prices on how much it costs to go from point a to point b. i've attempted to haggle with them, but then they just pretend they don't understand what you're saying.

i've been to the one museum here (where i took all the pictures of the quran); been to the souk, etc. thought about going to the zoo, but its far away from the city and the taxi drivers say between 100-200 qatari riyals for the fare.

each hotel here is very big on buffets and last thursday, we were up to our elbows in all you can eat seafood night at the 'al fanourah'. we were joined by jeff's co-workers bruce, jaime, chris and chris' lovely wife joanna.

it was jeff's birthday weekend, so we strolled around the museum park, took in a movie ('cabin in the woods' - it sucked), and had a celebratory italian dinner.

birthday boy:

view of the west bay:

lonely boat:

jeff gets embarrased at 'cucina' the italian kitchen at the renaissance, while being sung to in a languange we couldn't understand:

back to abu dhabi today, just until saturday when jeff has to come right back here for a meeting. i may just go home to dallas a bit early as the visitation is not so much a visit as an endless wait.

ttfn,

tricia