Qrossing to Qatar

I am intrigued by borders, boundaries, particularly those of states or nations. What does the border crossing tell of a country's character. or its attitude toward its neighbor? At the key Saudi-Qatari road crossing, the Saudi border post appears to be about 30 years old, with little maintenance. The guard perfunctorily stamped our passport and waved us through. At the true boundary, the highway suddenly became a 4-lane new blacktop perfectly surfaced roadway. The customs building is bright and new, with bilingual directional signs. Another pleasant surprise: the passport clerk was female! After inspecting passports, driver's license, registration, she diverted us to the office where we had to pay visa-fees of QAR100 ($27.50) each. Again, pristine, modern surroundings. Later, another fee: QAR100 for a week of car insurance -- curiously, he first quoted a price of QAR160, then said "oh, just 100" without explanation. Border lesson: Qatar is new, modern, and more expensive. Driving on another hour of new smooth swift 4-lane highway, past a long line of sewage tanker trucks returning from a landfill near the border. We saw the same long queue when driving out of Qatar a few days later, so it is a major effort that makes one wonder about their waste-handling capabilities in the future. My earlier google-maps investigation of the location of our hotel, the Retaj Residence Al-Sadd assured me of simple directions -- just follow the main road from the Saudi border into town. Big construction works detoured us onto a service road, then rush-hour traffic, then a mysterious 15-minute stoppage, then I attempted a detour into more construction and one-way streets and road-closings... one hour later we finally drove past the google-map-indicated point: nothing there. Phone number from my Expedia reservation? not in service! Coleman called his classmate now living in Doha, who claimed to know our hotel and gave us directions. Coleman also compared various numbers, deduced that Doha recently added an extra number 4 to all phones, and retried with success...the desk clerk pointed us in a different direction, finally arriving exhausted at 6:30. Lesson1: Doha is under construction; Lesson2: you will get lost--few streets are straight for long, streetnames change, and signs typically point to neighborhoods, not streetnames; Lesson3: always call ahead to the hotel to confirm location.

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Where we are working now

ISG Jubail School is the Anglo-American school for this area: Jubail is one of two planned industrial cities in Saudi Arabia, given a special royal commission for development and planning. Our district, the seven schools of International Schools Group, runs the school in the other industrial city -- Yanbu -- as well. Jubail is on the east coast, between Dhahran and Kuwait. Our nearby "big city" is the tri-city metropolis of Dhahran-Khobar-Dammam, where all the big shopping malls and quaint old markets are, along with the central 3 schools of our district, where Coleman attends high school. ISG Jubail has 410 students -- an average of 2 homerooms for each grade, K-10. Class size varies, up to 22. I have 12 in my required course "Computers & Information Management"; Barb has 12 students in her first-grade class. Most of the teaching staff come from the U.S., some from the Commonwealth. Several teachers are wives of engineers an...

Riding the Bus often

From 201010 Saudi scenes It is ironic that this land of cheap gasoline has so much group transport -- buses. From 201010 Saudi scenes Our housing compound has a Toyota-Coaster bus that takes some to/from school (we usually go earlier and return later, on a similar bus that the school provides). Driver Yahya takes residents on the 90-minute trip down to the Big City shopping every Thursday morning. The above picture shows our group one Thursday, usually going to Ikea or the new Lulu's Hypermarket , or the Dhahran Mall. Coleman rides a different bus every day to and from school -- usually 100 minutes there, 80 minutes back. His bus is evidently an old tourist bus, usually comfortable but a bit dusty. The air-conditioning usually works too well. I've ridden it with him several times, to attend business meetings at the district office. From 201010 Saudi scenes There he is, at 5:45am every morning, at the start of the bus run. Fortunately only about 20 stu...

Reservoir of European Youth, Parliament

A few days ago I walked to the nearby Pasteleira Park, planning to visit the city museum at the Reservoir. Walking through the park I noticed a large group of young people gathered in a circle, engaged in team-building activities. My days in education attuned me to the spectacle and piqued my interest, so I sat on a nearby bench and watched as a succession of enthusiastic students ran to the center and started an activity, which all the others joined enthusiastically. What sort of group would this be? A typical high school class would include a portion of disinterested teens, and others only half-heartedly participating. This crowd was unanimous in their excitement. I also noted that the leaders were speaking in English, though the breeze muffled the words. I walked around, found a couple of older participants on the side, with official-looking lanyards, and asked: this was an activity of European Youth Parliament , simil...

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