Gail moves on

I doubt that anyone is reading our blog for our voluminous posts and frequent updates.  Because, well, we haven't got those.  But it seems like folks find us every now and then, and that's fine.  Our reasoning behind starting this blog was that we, as single women contemplating moving from the U.S. to Qatar, couldn't find any information on what it was like to date and attempt to lead a social life there, as single women.  We hoped that this blog would fill that gap, and that maybe other women like us might find it, and have access to a little more information than we did.

As I moved through my time in Qatar, I was pretty satisfied.  I progressed professionally.  I made some very good friends.  I traveled to places I never would have otherwise.  But still, it felt like my personal life was on hold.  Though I'd dated some while I was in Qatar, it was never a particularly satisfying experience.  But the other positives balanced that out.

There were some changes in my professional situation that caused me to reevaluate things, ultimately leading to a new job back in the U.S.

So, I am no longer "Dating in Doha".  I moved to a neighborhood of Brooklyn.  And in my short time here I've already experienced more than a few situations that I wanted to blog about here.  But they were outside of this blog's scope.  So I've opened Dating in Ditmas, where I'll share those stories, though probably as sporadically as I had here! 

Janie and Lynn remain in Doha, reasonably happy on the whole.  I doubt that any of us would recommend moving to the middle east specifically for its dating potential.  But I think we were all glad to have had the experience of living there for other reasons.  Single ladies of the world, if you're considering moving to Qatar, we say you should give it a shot.  An informed, well considered, optimistic but realistic shot.  I hope that this blog helps you to make that decision in a way that's right for you.

Further adventures in online dating

We haven't posted in awhile.  Part of it was probably that the burst of excitement that came from starting the blog had dissipated.  Then something came up that kept me out of the dating pool for awhile.  Janie and Lynn were dating, but nothing much was happening that would be blog-worthy.
We've talked about how we wish that fewer of our posts so far were kind of negative.  But then, it's the horror stories that are the funniest!  Until all of us meet and marry our Sheikh Charmings and live Happily Ever After we're pretty much guaranteed to have more weird experiences. 

But now I am trying to get back into dating, whatever that really means for me.  Recall that I do most of my dating via the internet.  That hasn't yielded any local matches for me in quite awhile.  So "dating" in my world generally means writing to men who are thousands of miles away.

Even if we don't ever meet, it's nice to have some friendly, flirtatious email with good men, to remind me that they're out there... somewhere.  To remind me that, yeah, just like everyone, I have my issues, but for the most part my lack of local dating partners is a problem with the population here, not with me.

If I'm wrong, don't correct me.  Rationalizations let me sleep at night.

Anyway, I've gotten Janie into online dating too, at least the very beginnings of it.  I'll let her update you on her experience if she decides to.  But it's been nice, and sometimes side-splitting, to have someone to talk to about the pitfalls and pratfalls of online dating.

A pitfall:  Though it's nice to meet good men from around the world, no matter how good they are, they remain ... around the world.

As an example, a few months ago I'd been looking for nice men in the city I was about to visit on a vacation.  One started writing to me, and we arranged to meet up for lunch and a museum visit.  We ended up talking for almost 12 hours straight!  I haven't had such a good conversation in a long, long time.  It was fun, flattering, and affirming.  But in the end, he's still on another continent, and I'm still here.  And though it's nice to know that there are good men out there, who enjoy being with me, meeting one so far away highlighted for me how frustrating it can be not to have found them in Qatar.

But luckily the pratfalls have come fast and furious, and been an excellent distraction.

The site I used decided to start labeling responses by quality.  "Our computer says that this is one of the best messages you've received!"  Here, verbatim, is the message the site decided was one of my best, from a 44 year old local man:

"Long team setting us fore everlasting lobe"

Um... WHAT?

I feel guilty for picking on people's English grammar... but "Everlasting lobe" is pretty awesome. So, yeah, I guess that IS one of my best messages.


And so it goes, here in our weird little corner of the desert.

13 Arab Men Not to Date

I ran across this article on Facebook the other day.  I am friends with or have dated many of these guys on this list and this list made me laugh. While not all of them are 100% accurate, it does give you some insight into their behavior.  Oh and never say never ladies!  He might be your Arab prince.

http://www.kabobfest.com/2009/03/13-arab-men-you-should-never-date.html

It's a Small Big City

Yesterday, I went to IKEA and saw a group of four people I all know.  Before that, I had been to Ric's Kountry Kitchen for breakfast and saw a coworker.  This morning I ran into someone else while running an errand.  Rarely does it happen when I go out and don't see someone I know.  I am actually shocked when I don't.  What this also means is that when you meet new people here you usually know a mutual person or a friend of a friend.  Try dating in this small sea.

There are several expat groups here in Qatar and I am active in a few.  The idea was to make new friends and do activities in Doha.  As you can imagine these groups are popular with the single crowd.  Not long after I arrived, I met someone through one of these expat groups.  We went out a few times and then he just disappeared.  Well you would normally assume, no big deal and move on.  Not so!  I kept running into him at other activities.  As I grew my group of friends, they all seemed to be friends with him. While other issues have arisen from this the main point of this is that Doha is small and you have to be careful who you go out with and how you handle that relationship when it ends.  My friends are all now aware that this guy is not a guy to date.  My friends have warned me about men they have gone out with.  They aren't all bad guys of course, but we all talk.  This is also a two way street and women need to keep this in mind as well.  My advice would be to not date your friends or within your group of friends here.  Also, if it doesn't go the way you want, be a grown up and end it on a positive note.

Freaks in the City

Do you recall the scene from Friends when Rachel dates a guy with a bad temper (played by Ben Stiller, I think)?  This guy seems perfect but, at the slighest provocation, loses his temper and goes absolutely ballistic?  This sums up yet another Doha date.
I accepted a date with a man who I found to be very intelligent, outgoing and, best of all, genuinely single (reference: previous posts about married men in Doha). Anyway,  we met at a group event and had a nice time talking. We attended two other group events before deciding to go out on our own. We opted for a casual lunch in West Bay and things went well. The next weekend he invited me out again. Our plan was to drive to one of the forts in the desert and then come back to Doha for an early dinner. Before heading to the desert, he needed to stop at a friend's apartment building to pick up an ice chest that he had lended. So we pull up to the building and he calls his friend to let her know that we are waiting downstairs. While we are waiting, a couple of cars come up behind us and honk to indicate that our car is in their way. As it turns out, we are parked in the only lane that gives tenants access to their underground parking garage. Rather than move, my date waves them around and begins to curse under his breath as more cars approach and honk. After 10 minutes, we are still waiting for the friend to come down with the ice chest and, by now, our poor choice of parking has caught the attention of a building security guard. So the guard comes over and asks us to drive to the end of the lane, indicating that we can park in the fire truck zone (don't ask...this is an entirely different problem about living in Doha).  Sure. No problem, I think. The new parking spot is less than 30 feet from where we're currently parked and the friend will clearly see the car when she exits the front door. But what happens next shocked the hell out of me. My date goes absolutely ballistic! He screams at the guard, insulting him with racial remarks, a slew of expletives, and a threat of physical violence! I'll spare the gory details of all that he said, but the basic theme was that we would wait "wherever the f*#$ we want" and the guard couldn't do anything about it because he had no real authority and, if he tried, he would get the $h*# kicked out of him. Charming, right?!? So, in addition to a short fuse, my date demonstrated that he is a racist jerk with a foul mouth and a willingness to engage in physical violence. I couldn't pretend to understand or to act normally after that blow up. I told the guy that I was bothered by his outburst, hoping to hear a reasonable explanation. Nope. He spent five more minutes defending his "right" to park in the only lane leading to the parking garage. Even when his friend came out, he still carried on, telling her she should report the guard to building management because he felt harassed.  wth?!?!?!?
 In the end, I got out of the car and walked to the Intercon to catch a taxi home.
This bad date was topped off when a mutual acquaintance texted me and told me that Mr. Racist Jerk was telling others that I am a b*t@h and trying to salvage his pride by telling them that he only took me out because he wanted to see if I was willing to put out.
Oh, what a lovely ending.  "Dear Diary, Today I met my Prince Charming..."

Hot, Hot, Mixed-Gender Hugging

Some friends and I went out for dinner last night.  A female friend and I were standing in front of the restaurant when our male friend walked up. 

"Hello!  Hi!  How are you doing?  It's so good to see you!"

We stood stiffly, and he commented that he'd like to give each of us a friendly hug, but that of course we can't do that in public in Qatar, even though the gesture would be only friendly and platonic.  I said I'd read about a male expat hugging his mother in the arrivals hall of the airport, and being suddenly surrounded by angry security guards peeling them apart.

After dinner our group came out of the restaurant and onto a relatively deserted street.  "Oh, we can get away with it", I said, "nobody's looking", and we all gave each other a friendly hug goodnight and went our separate ways.

I don't know if it's a formal law that tells us not to hug each other, or just a very strong cultural prohibition.  I'm pretty sure that there is a law against "obscene" contact between the sexes in public.  And yet I do see heterosexual couples in local dress walking hand in hand, or arm in arm, pretty regularly.  I don't see expat couples doing this very often.  It happens rarely enough that I will do a double take when I see a white, Asian, or south Asian hetero couple walking hand in hand on the street or in a mall.

This illustrates one of the challenges of dating in Doha.  The prohibition against touching the other sex in public changes the rhythm of the initial dates.  There's no friendly hug goodnight to show that you'd enjoyed that first date and would like to do it again, but also don't want to promise too much right out of the gate.  There's no flirtatious hand falling onto a forearm as you laugh at the other's joke, "Oh, you're so funny!"  Showing gentle, flirtatious interest is much harder, when you're standing or sitting stiffly, several feet apart. 

You can't get close enough to tell if you like the other person's scent.  Is that one of the reasons that perfume is such a big deal here?

And the press of upper arms against each other as you're sitting in a movie theater becomes a moment laden with meaning.  Is he meaning to touch me?  Am I meaning to touch him?  Is it just that the seats are too small?

If casual touching can only happen in private, that first time you meet a date in private becomes a much bigger deal.  It can feel like a promise of much more.  Maybe you want that.  Maybe you don't.  But how are you going to communicate your intentions?  To verbally set a limit before you meet at someone's place for pizza and a movie seems presumptuous to me, and off-putting.  But to not set a limit risks misunderstanding, at best.

I don't have an answer.  It's just a tricky tightrope to walk.  And very strange to have all of this run through my mind, when I'm just giving a good friend a hug after dinner.

I'm Keeping the Tent

And the sleeping bag, and the carpets too! In other words, how not to date a Saudi guy!  Most women here (and many other places) would balk at dating a guy from Saudi Arabia.  Not me! Oh no, I jumped right in and only after the first weekend together, did I begin to wonder. 

First, how does one meet a guy from a country you aren't allowed to visit, drive in or show your hair?  Why in Qatar of course!  Many Saudi Arabian men go to Bahrain to go out as the opportunities in Saudi are what we would call limited.  Apparently, Qatar is also on the list of places to go as well.  I met this one at an off-roading event. I didn't think much about it because he was from Saudi Arabia and in a thobe.  Although, I did think he was good looking, but figured he was married (as most Arabs are by a certain age).  I should of listened to my initial instinct.

I met him again a few weeks later at another event.  This time it was at a bar.  And no, he wasn't drinking.  We started talking and that surreal thing happened where the whole world fades into the background and it is just the two of you talking.  Wait no, that might have been the two mojitos...  Anyway, I say I am hungry and he suggests we go eat.  In the elevator at the restaurant he gives me a brief kiss.  Later he holds my hand. Both of which are not allowed here and definitely not allowed between a Muslim man and a Christian woman.  I end up inviting him to two other things that weekend.  We spend most of the weekend together.  He promises to return the next weekend.

But I begin to wonder, should I be doing this?  Could I get into trouble?  Is he married (he says he is divorced)?  What would happen if this got serious?  I did some research and learned some important questions to ask besides the obvious one. I got nervous as the hour of his arrival came that next weekend.  After we met and had dinner I brought up my concerns.  I asked if he would ever tell his family about me?  Would they be okay with me?  I know very serious questions for a second meeting, but I knew I had to ask before anything went further.  He said he couldn't tell his family.  They were too conservative for that.  That told me all I needed to know.  This was never going anywhere.  I also asked several times about him being married.  I got the long version of why he wasn't married. 

Everything was telling me to end it.  But I didn't.  I spent the whole weekend with him again. I was given a tent, a sleeping bag and two carpets. We had talked about camping, but I didn't expect to receive my own kit of Saudi camping gear! Saturday night after he left, I met a friend of his. Cause Doha is tiny!  Our mutual friend mentioned to him I was seeing his friend and he says, but he's married!  After pulling some teeth, I get it out of him that he is technically still married.  He may not consider himself married, because him and his two(!) wives don't live together.  Lesson learned!

So my advice to any woman dating in Doha, ask, ask and ask his friends! And keep the tent!