A Business Proposition

I thought I was prepared for almost any Doha dating scenario.  But this was a new one.
So, let me introduce you to: "I-don't want-to-date-but-I-need-a-woman-to-accompany-me-to-business-related-social-events" guy.

After 2 months of phone calls, texts, and a few lunches (he lives in Dubai, but works in Doha most weeks), this person invites me for dinner. We went to a lovely restaurant where he dropped an unexpected business proposal: He told me he needed an arm-charm for social business dinners. He would hire someone, but he wanted someone from a country that is not associated with paid escorts.  Further, he wanted someone professional, age-appropriate (not a 20 yr. old), and intelligent enough to have conversation with his American/European business associates and their wives (this person is from the Middle East but educated in the U.S.). In other words, he wanted a woman that others would view as his stable, respectable dating interest.   Because he was so direct about what he wanted, I didn't feel angry or offended. After a bit of discussion, I learned that he was not offering money.  Rather he was offering, to use his words: "A night out with a good looking guy at some very nice restaurants.  And you'll meet interesting people. And you won't have to pay for taxis."

Honestly, if he was already a trusted friend, I would go to some of his dinners. But I couldn't agree to go to these events with someone who would have been just as fine with a local hire IF the local hire wasn't clearly viewed as a local hire.

As a side note, he answered his phone twice during the meal without acknowledging the disruption.  And he seemed relieved when I opted to take a taxi home.  He didn't offer the slightest protest which told me I was already kicked off the island.

So, single women of Doha, this guy is still out there.  And I far as I know, he still needs an arm-charm.  If this appeals to you, then you're in for some very nice dinners.  By the way, he dresses beautifully and smells amazing.  Sigh...

Qatar has skewed my perspective.

This is the dirtiest thing I've seen in months.

Online dating in Doha: Or, "Hello, sweaty!"

I've been doing online dating since before there was a world wide web.  I was on usenet, for heaven's sake.  If you don't know what that is, ask your parents.  If your parents are geeks.

In my work life I'm surrounded by other women, married men, gay men (though they're mostly closeted here in Qatar), and 19 year olds.  I'm not meeting dateable men at work, so online dating it is.  And mostly it's paid off for me.  In the last ten years I've only met one prospective swain offline, and he turned out to be a registered sex offender.  So I'm a big fan of online dating.  (For one thing, you're already on a computer, so it's easy to google the local sex offender registry.)

When I came to Qatar I thought that online dating would be a productive way to meet single men.  There should be a lot of single, male, expat engineers floating around here, right?  Or military officers?  Wild adventurers? 

Apparently, instead, if you're a heterosexual woman, the online dating market in Doha is filled with very young men, average age of 25.  And...

(... I'm about to describe their ethnicity.  Which requires a side note.)

As much as I'm loathe to admit it, people's ethnicity and cultural background matters in the middle east in a way that would be wildly offensive to suggest in the US.  It's rare that you'll tell a story about a funny thing that happened in a store, or that person at work who's annoying you, or someone who cut you off in traffic, without the listener asking the person's nationality.  Nationality is a symbolic label here, for how society treats you, where you're positioned in the strata, and what cultural assumptions you're operating from.  I don't think it's a good thing.  I wish I could opt out of it.  But unfortunately, nationality/ethnicity/call-it-what-you-will, plays a role in every interpersonal interaction in the Middle East.  ESPECIALLY interactions that involve gender.

(Now... where was I?  Oh yes...) 

The online dating market if you're a heterosexual woman of a certain age, is filled with very young, Middle Eastern or South Asian men.

Who think that western women are easy.

And who can't spell.

Normally I would feel cruel for making fun of somebody's grammar or spelling, but these guys are asking for it.

So what I get are floods of poorly written, highly sexual, come ons.  I supposed it's fortunate that they're usually quite brief.  That saves me time yelling at the screen, "Would you write that to a woman wearing an abaya????"  But they're crude, gross... and often pretty funny.

My favorite examples:

"Wud u like to have casual sex ?"

(If you can't bother to type three letters to spell "you", your attention to detail probably isn't up to my standards.)

"Would you like an arab hotdog?"

 (Is it halal?)

"Hello sweaty!"

(this one gets points for being literally accurate.)

"I love making sex and I have a big .............and alot of Genital "

(It's not the size that matters, it's the quantity.)

"I love you from the first Fresca"

(I... I got nothin'. )

There are also regular messages from Nigerian scammers.  I won't go into all of the grammatical quirks that flag a message as a scam, because I don't want to call their attention to just how consistent they are in their writing style.  But I'll say that two red flags are the inability to start a sentence with "I", and the overuse of the word "dear" by profiles that are supposed to be American men.

"Am Thomas by name.  Dear, your beauty is taking my breathe away!  You are angel dropped from the sky!"

So... yeah... the local online dating scene hasn't exactly been paying off for me, except in entertaining stories.

But I stick with it.  I keep trying.  I don't want to give up on the possibility of making a connection.  Lately that has led to a number of long distance penpals, but that's better than nothing.  They provide a little excitement in my day, when I see a message in my inbox.  And working here has let me earn enough money that I could, imaginably, travel to see these people someday, if something real seems to be developing.

But I do really wish that one correspondent understood:  "Sweetie" is spelled with a double "e". 

Janie's Fun Facts About Dating in Doha

A single woman arriving in Doha is presented with conflicting information: 

What you are told: "The ratio of single men to single women is in your favor.  It's something like 3-1."

The facts: 

1.) The demographic statistics include laborers, lots and lots of laborers, that you will never interact with because of class divisions in Qatar.  

2.) A number of men claiming to be single have wives living outside the country.  Their wives may be absent because they could not be sponsored or because the husband is in Qatar on a short-term contract. 

3.) Many of the single men are passport-chasers (sorry if the term offends, but these men do exist) and under the impression that marrying an American/Canadian/Australian/UK citizen gives them instant access to the Land of Plenty.  Not the case.  

4.) Many of the single men living in Qatar operate under the impression that women from Western countries will give them a guaranteed good time.  And they pursue you with this goal in mind.  Some of these men are quite willing to wait and put in the effort with dinners, talking, and romantic words.  At the moment you are beginning to wonder if this person is the exception --BAM! -- bad behavior and inappropriate advances.

5.) Many of the single men living in Qatar are very nice.  But they only want to date you.  They will never marry you because they are required to marry someone from their own country or someone with a shared religious background. They will never share this fact with you.  At the very moment you are sharing a candlelight dinner, their Auntie Jamila is networking the local village for a suitable wife.  Having said this, I am aware that not every woman is interested in getting married.  So dating one of these men may be ideal. 

6.) The Middle East attracts a lot of strange Western men.  Their strangeness would be called out back home, but they fly under the radar when living in the Middle East.  And to be fair, the Middle East attracts a lot of strange women, too.  

7.) I do believe there are a lot of interesting and intelligent men living in Qatar.  But finding them among the others is no easy task.  You have to put yourself out there and maintain a positive outlook.


I suppose this information presents a very negative view of dating in Qatar.   Sorry. Not my intention. I use this information as a framework of understanding so I can stay grounded in reality and manage my expectations. I should also say that dating in Qatar can be a lot of fun. Regardless of the outcome, you meet people from all over the world which provides you with insight into someone else's life and experience.  That is always worthwhile. In the end, I stay hopeful because I believe in Fate and the random ways of life.  

An introduction

A friend sent me a job listing.  A professional position in Doha, Qatar.  I was intrigued.  The job was good.  Very good.  I applied.  I got it.  I was moving to Qatar.

I talked to friends who know about the Middle East.  Qatar's more liberal than most countries in the region, they said.  It's trying to become "The Paris of the Middle East", a cultural and intellectual center.  Women can drive.  They don't have to cover their hair, or wear the abaya.  All of that sounded good to me.

But what would it be like to live there as a single woman?  I did some hardcore googling.

"Come to Qatar!  It's a great place for families!"
"Come to Qatar!  We have a wonderful mothers' club!"
"Come to Qatar!  The schools are great!"
"Amusement parks in the malls for your children!"
"Inexpensive nannies!"

Not one thing on living as a single in Qatar.  The silence was deafening.  And ominous.  But I came anyway.  And haven't regretted it.  Mostly.

At first my group of friends seemed to be couples, and other singles who weren't interested in dating.  But now I have more friends who are trying to put ourselves out there, and date, to whatever degree that's possible, while we're here.  This blog will share the interesting and sometimes ridiculous stories of our dating lives.

And I hope that when the next single woman considers moving here, and googles "What's it like to be a single woman in Qatar?" she'll at least have a little more information to go on than I did.

Not that I regret my decision.

Mostly.