It was bound to happen one day

Not involved in any accidents

This week I returned to Qatar after my holidays and 2 weeks spent in the USA where I pretty much ate my weight in Dunkin’ Donuts chocolate munchkins.  On my second day back, the inevitable happened; I had a car accident….or rather, another driver drove into my car.  The situation involved slow moving traffic, a driver who admitted the entire thing was his fault (which it was) and damage to my car which looks like a really big scratch.  I always thought that it was just a matter of ‘when’ and not ‘if’ I had a car accident and if this is the worst road incident that I’ll ever be involved in here, then I’ll take it.

This whole fiasco is nothing but a major hassle as I now have to go to the Traffic Department, pick up the incident report (no garage in Qatar will do any sort of body work unless there is a police report to accompany it), drop my car off at the garage and be without transportation for a few days until it is fixed.  And don’t worry, if there’s any sort of major debacle that happens along the way (and this is Qatar after all so there very well may be!!!), I’ll be sure to tell you all about it.

But how’s this for a major debacle….

Since the beginning of December, all restaurants at the Pearl have had their liquor licenses revoked.  This means no glass of wine with your risotto at Carluccio’s, no happy hour at Pampano, no sparkling wine with brunch at Tse Yang and definitely no more Sundowner Sessions at Mango Tree.  There was speculation that the sale of alcohol was simply suspended due to the Arab Games, but these games have now been and gone and still no questions have been answered.

Now, I am quite partial to my drink and I do love to indulge here and there but if others don’t agree with the sale and consumption of alcohol, then that’s fine with me.  The problem that I have in this instance is the complete lack of information; during a meal out on Christmas Eve, one of my dining companions asked our server about this ban and they replied that they had no idea what was going, nor did their managers.  No one really knows who has banned the sale of alcohol, but they know that their liquor licenses have been revoked.  If whoever is responsible is so against the sale of alcohol at the Pearl, then why give licenses in the first place?  Plus, is this a ban or simply a suspension?  If it’s a ban, then give a reason and if it’s a suspension, then give an end date to it.

Many restaurants at the Pearl have reported at least a 50% drop in patronage and I really do feel for them as this news came at a time when many people would have booked festive Christmas lunches and dinners.

Kind of makes you sigh and scratch your head, doesn’t it?  It actually reminds me of a situation that’s just arisen at work; after nearly 3 years of our cleaners washing, drying and putting away our dishes in the kitchen, their supervisor has told us that they are no longer allowed to do this because of ‘hygiene reasons’ and that now we’ll have do this ourselves.  Ok, so the cleaners are still able to mop the floors in the lab and clean the chemical cabinets but they can’t wash our coffee mugs?

Is this for real?  Yes.  Where on earth would something like this happen?  Qatar.

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