I am really annoyed today.

Not even two months ago I went and bought a karaoke game in one named shop here in Qatar as a gift for my daughter. Either to give her for Christmas or for her birthday. Christmas turned out to be quite successful and rich for her (especially in presents) so we kept the present until last week.
Last week we then gave her. She was so excited when opening, but as we tried to get it running, it did not work. Luckily I still had the receipt and went back to the shop. But what to hear?

"Sorry, Sir, but you bought this item in December. And we cannot exchange or refund it. It says that we have a 7 days (!) refund garantee." Although they tested it and could reproduce the fault easily, there was neither an offer to repair the kit, nor any offer of price reduction or exchange.

At least I know that I will never again buy something at SAQR, Doha, as their way to keep customers happy exceeds after one week.

So if you buy something there and it turns out to be broken after 8 days - bin it. Regardless how much money you spent and what the normal warranty time (usually 6 months minimum) is.

Even most of the car manufacturers put the name of the vehicle on the back, some of the owners disagree with the spelling and put it right. Like this one not only on the front, but as well on all 4 doors.

Maybe also "E" was not available at the time.

Over here everyday there are new and interesting ways of spelling to detect. I will have to use my camera more often, as this is not only a matter of one-day-newspaper spelling, but something that should be done correctly.

This time it was a strange kind of service.

Sometimes it happens over here that you are waiting in your car in a queue in front of a traffic light for it to turn green. And you can see the oncoming traffic flowing, the cars from your left and your right as well are crossing the junction. Only your own queue does not move.

Well this is a typical problem (not only over here, but I noticed it here quite often) of missing technical knowledge. People over here stop at traffic lights not where the line is (well, some don't stop even when the red light is showing, but this is a different issue), but quite with some distance apart.



As you can see, there are inductive circles built into the street, trying to register a change of the electro-magnetical field when a car stops on it. Just to trigger the traffic light to turn green much earlier. But somehow, maybe by law, it seems inappropriate to stop on this area. Which leads to non-triggering and long waiting times.

Hopefully one day these drivers will learn. After stopping at the traffic light for maybe 3 hours.

Not only that I purchased undies sized XL (normally I wear size L) and they don't fit due to "Made in China", I also face some problems with shrinking clothes.

So when you come over here, one thing is that clothes are tailored to fit small people. Even if it looks odd for you, take 2 sizes bigger than you are used to back in Europe. Otherwise you will be facing a nice, tight fit. And this is not really comfortable when it comes to undies.

The next thing is that most clothes are made to be washed at 30 degrees centigrade. Now over here, as stated before, the water supply is stored in a tank on top of the house. Washing machines also take their supply from there. Now even that you put the selector to 30 degrees for washing cotton shirts, trousers or undies, the water delivered to the machine will arrive at some 40 plus degrees. And I haven't found one machine over here to cool down the water first. With the knowledge of this you can expect all your sensitive clothes to start shrinking. Maybe an additional fact is that you gain weight as well. But besides that, the only choice you have is to wash by hand then. With bucket water that you gave the opportunity to cool down throughout the day.

So don't be surprised if during summer time you seem to be growing out of your clothes. It is not always calories.

Now that summer hits the country I will be off for 3 weeks. Back to cold, rainy Germany, just after the nice summer days they had.

Ok, I admit, we already had some days with temperatures at 52 mid day. But still real summer hasn't come yet. The humidity is still bearable, at night one can still sleep with an open window. 30 almost feels like a cool breeze.

There is a change in weather conditions though. Unless previous years, this year there are more heavy winds carrying loads of dust and sand from the desert and dumping them here. Working outside, especially at remote sites, becomes quite difficult. Work had to be stopped already due to lack of visibility.

And now companies start as well to stop work in between 11am and 3pm due to the temperatures.

Temperatures are rising above 40 now. Time to switch on the AC during the time out of the flat and switching it off during night time. To be able to sleep without the noise.


Even the cats are now looking for shadow places, a few I saw hidden under cars in the underground parking of the Virginia Commonwealth University in Education City. Outside strong, hot winds blew from the north, carrying a lot of dust and sand into town. Waves of sand flowed over the road, tickling the body of the car. Inside the parking lot, although exposed to the outside, the winds seized, the heat came down. This made those cats have a rest under the cars.


Once you enter the university campus, there is a canteen to go for food at reasonable prices. Normally it does not exceed 15 Riyals for a proper and nicely prepared meal. There are several menus to chose from, even the pasta can be ordered with ingredients of your choice. And it will be freshly prepared while you are watching. Sometimes it is a bit crowded, but adapting your times of appearance will give you a chance to grab a seat.

Even more than one month there was no update here. Sorry for that. But nothing happened over here which I could blog about. Everydays life as usual, work, week-end.

Only the weather conditions change. During daytime the temperatures now start reaching the high thirties, at night, even with open windows in the bedroom, temperature does not drop below 26 any more. Even tonight it kept staying above 28. Centigrades.

Tonight I will have to leave for a short period to sort out things in Germany, but I will be back in about two weeks time. Hopefully with more time for blogging about Qatar.

It has been a while that I posted something regarding water tankers. Now I had the possibility to take a picture of the incredible way to write like to speak. As long as people are able to understand, it is obvious what the content shall be. But it somehow looks a bit odd.



Then the other day I approached one roundabout and was confronted with one of my big fears. Landcruisers, driven in a way of disrespect of others. Big chunks of heavy metal piloted without the usage of brain sometimes. And using small cars just as bumpers. I felt lucky not to have driven in the way of one of those guys so far. Otherwise my car would have looked like this.



Keeping my fingers crossed.