In da Desert

Hi guys,

settling into the New Year here in Doha, although as we didn't have Christmas holidays it still feels like the same year!

Matija has settled back to kindy and has made plenty of friends, she's also been to one of the kids birthday parties so we're getting to know the team - there's Emma, currently best friend who is about the same age, family from Prague (dad is a theatre writer who is doing copywriting for Vodafone), William is an out-there American ginga whose mum works at the kindy, Tomaso (called Tomato) is from somewhere in the Middle East we suspect, Jayden has American and English parents, Sara had the birthday, her Dad is an English lawyer and they live in a compound, Paige has South African parents who live at the Pearl (flash new development) and Ares has a Greek mum and has the odd ear problem (same as Matija).

We went to one of the Friday brunches a couple of weeks ago, just to try it out. There was everything from Thai to Mexican and Indian food as well as a huge seafood buffet, beef, heaps of desserts. I was on the dry menu (driving) while Ande had bubbles with hers. There was face painting and videos for the kids as well as more food for them. Interesting day out, it wasn't cheap, but good for a oncer.

Ande has a few weeks off from presenting at the moment and is planning more programmes. There has been restructuring here and the guy she works with has taken on some more leadership work so it could mean more work for her. They're looking at getting someone else, but Ande needs that NOW rather than later. Still loving the work though and is doing more work with 4 Qatari co-presenters as part of their development, which has been great.

Had a great trip out in the desert on a peninsular to the north yesterday. It is a kind of national park. Three of Ande's colleagues had 4WD vehicles and we went touring and stopped for a picnic at a lovely beach up there. It started a little cool so we didn't take togs, although Matija stripped off and had a great time swimming. In most of the best spots the local Qataris set up camp over winter and head out for the weekends. They put a deposit in and GPS co-ordinates and are allowed to leave the camp there for 3 months. They have portable toilets, generators, spotlights, fridges, boats etc. Some have tv's and satellite dishes. When they pack up they have to take everything, if there is rubbish left behind they lose their deposit, about $3000. Pretty cool I thought.

Anyway the driving was mostly over rocky or hard-packed terrain, you didn't really need 4WD but good ground clearance was essential. In many places there were 3 or 4 options of tracks across open ground so you just went with the one that was least bumpy. The landscape was amazing and it was great to get out of Doha. The circular buildings you see could have been ancient fortifications but they were actually made for a film set, Transformers or something. There was also a fort made in the old style for a film. We pulled up and I leaped over the wall to have a look, someone who had been there before was trying to warn me, but when I walked around I spied a caretaker making a cup of tea. I silently sneaked back over the wall and went in through the gate like everyone else. It was kind of cool, way out in the desert, we would have taken more pics but the battery of the camera ran out.

Anyway we went to a nice gentle sandy beach at the top of the peninsular and had a lovely picnic and a swim for Matija between two local campsites. We also saw some pink flamingos which Matija managed to frighten off by yelling excitedly.

On the way back we passed quite a few salt flats. You have to stick to the tracks here because there is a crust of o.5 to 1 metre over the salty water and if you break through you may never get your vehicle out again!

The peninsular starts about 50mins north of us and there is a town there (around a gas plant) where you can get a coffee and some groceries. There's also a beach which would make a nice day trip. After that trip we're quite keen to upgrade the car to a 4wd so we can get out of town. It would also give us the chance to get to the Inland Sea over the sand dunes, something I'm very keen to do on the weekends.

In other news (sounds like a newsreader here) Matija has started doing gymnastics. They do stretches and running and forward and backward rolls, handstands, bar work and even start learning flickflacks at 3years old. All the other kids seem to be Middle Eastern (Egypt, Lebanon etc) and the instruction is in English and Arabic. A couple of young guys take it, they're quite strict but that won't do Matija any harm and she was really enjoying it and improving every time (although they keep having to tell her to keep her legs together!). It's also just down the road from our gym, so on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday Matija can go to gymnastics for an hour while Ande and I go to the gym and do our workouts.

We've also been up for a rooftop barbecue at one of the other apartments. There were prawns, beers, snarlers etc. It was also the coldest night yet so we were rugged up against the elements. Amazing to hear the call to prayer from the mosque towers at the same level as us!

All the best to everyone - hope you're all well and happy.

ps. Making good progress on the next book and the last one (Jonty and Choc) is due for release any time now. I'm waiting for a copy but delivery takes forever over here.

Food - very important

Hey everyone

Food in Doha

the good thing about Doha is that there are people here from all over the place and they've brought their food with them. The other good/bad thing is that there is a lot of cheap labour meaning they want cheap food, and it is cheap to prepare. A quick summary of some foods around here:

Cheap

- Shwarma - little wraps of chicken, tomato, onion, lettuce and garlic dressing in flatbread. Available at small Lebanese restaurants, Turkish places and occasionally on the street. Anywhere from about $2 to$5. The meat is done on those upright Turkish spits and is very tasty. NZ needs more of these!

- Chicken - (pretty common) there's an Indian place on the corner from us called Badriya Chicken. The chickens are smaller and less fatty than you get at home and they seem to be a bit healthier to eat. They have whole rotisserie chicken for $5 or spicy barbecue chicken (done over charcoal) for about $7. That covers the chicken, rice or bread and a little bag of salad (the salad is a little dodgy looking). There is a man in the front of the shop that shapes and bakes flatbreads in an oven, very skilled, tasty bread and neat to watch. You can buy the bread straight off him through a little window onto the street.

- Indian vegetarian - these places do a variety of things:

- marsala dhosa - a bread wrap with vege curry inside.

- pilau - rice and veges,

- spicy falafel with cumin etc on the outside

- chapatti

If you get any of these they are served on a plate with three sauces, a coconut one, a green curry type one and vege curry. They come around with pans of these sauces and if you've finished yours they top them up again. These are around $3- $4 for a main. Heaps of single Indian workers go to these places and families, particularly Western ones, are unusual. We get plenty of interest when we go there with Matija. A lot of the guys want to touch her cheek or shake her hand. These places generally don't have utensils, you eat with your right hand (left one is for hygiene).

All of these things are good and cheap and we haven't had any crook tummies yet.

Middle range

This covers a whole lot of food in Doha.

Middle Eastern restaurants generally start with meze. These are dishes like hummus (chick pea paste), tabouleh (parsley, mint, bulgar wheat and lemon), baba ganoush (egg plant dip), green salad (speaks for itself really) they come with fresh breads, either loaves or flatbreads and you can easily make a meal of these. Mains are a variety of things - whole split and roasted chickens, fish, kofta (lamb sausages), shwarmas (see above). A lot of places do tagines - stoneware pots with casseroles - usually they have the meat (chicken or lamb) with a little spice and a sweeter fruit, prunes, apricots, figs etc. They also do a desert called Umm Ali or Mother of Ali. Legend has it that a sultan was travelling, he stopped in a village and the best cook was asked to prepare a desert. She cooked up flatbread in milk with spices, cinnamon etc. She was the mother of Ali and the desert was named in her honour. Another theory has it that an Irish woman called Bridget O'Malley introduced bread and butter pudding over here and it was named after her.

There are plenty of great Indian eateries here that are a bit more upmarket. Andrea has been to one in a hotel and we went to one about 10mins walk from our apartment - a place I went past taking Matija to the bus stop. Matt Ford would think he had died and gone to heaven. We started with naan breads, then got into some fantastic curries from Kerala. I had one with prawns and coconut and awesome spices, Ande had a chicken curry in an amazing gravy. We got kofta (minced lamb sausage) for Matija, but it was hot and we had to eat it ourselves. It came with rice and more breads, yoghurt and raita (yoghurt and cucumber). We were the only ones in the place because we were there at 5:30 with Matija. We were next to a frosted glass wall into the kitchen and there were patches of clear glass. We could see about 6 cooks working in a large stainless kitchen, all with hair nets, white clothes etc. It was all very sanitary and they were cooking everything from scratch. Amazing food and it came to $30 NZ for all of us.

There are a few good Thai places around and plenty of Lebanese and Turkish restaurants as well. There are Phillipine places too, but haven't tried these out yet. There is a very good Chinese place just down the road too, but still have to get there.

The hotel restaurants are pricier, but you can go for flash or very, very flash. Our Christmas lunch was fantastic - anything from cold seafood dishes, to turkey, roast beef and 20 or 30 deserts.

Friday lunch is a big thing here in the hotels too. Huge smorgasboards that people go along to from 10am to 3pm, kicking back and chatting eating etc. Many places cater very much to families with entertainment for the kids too. These are more expensive - some of the flash ones charge a little over $100 per head, but kids are free and they include free drinks for the adults. We may go along to one of these things just to check them out - haven't been yet.

On another tangent - Ande is really enjoying work and Matija has just got back to pre-school. We've all had some colds and flus and things but it looks like we're OK now. Ande met a committee last week to decide if I could stay. If I was a woman and Ande was a working guy it would have been no problem, but as I'm a non-working guy they look a little harder at us. We were advised to say that I was just looking after Matija and the house, not writing. They couldn't understand why I would want to hang around to do that, but Ande must have been convincing so I will be allowed to stay. Unfortunately it meant we didn't get a company paid trip to Dubai or somewhere so that I could renew my visa.

I haven't got very much writing done at all, but I've done a hell of a lot of thinking. The outline for my next series (Scrap) is firmly in place and I'm very excited about it. I've thought a lot about what I really want to say and why I want to write these books. That's really underpinned the whole series and I'm looking forward to getting my teeth into the writing in the next few weeks. I guess I could have been really frustrated about not being able to get into writing yet, but I'm learning to wind back and really enjoy the things I'm doing, whether it's looking after Matija or even cleaning the house. I am making time to get to the gym - taking some time out for me and keeping fit and healthy. I suppose I'm living in the moment and making the most of each one. The writing will come when it is time and I'm sure it will be a lot stronger when I'm ready to focus on it (which is very soon). I'm also there for Matija, loving the time with her and Ande and generally a very happy camper.

love and hugs

V, Ande and Matija

photos are just some random ones from the park, the zoo etc.