Day 71, Saturday - Doha

So do you remember those camels I mentioned seeing at the market last night? Well, I think we saw them again today. Mary Anne and I were meeting Trish and Betsy at the souq for breakfast and on our way there we got stopped in traffic and saw this:

So, we aren’t really sure why this was going on, but it is the only time I have seen camels being ridden on the road. They look like they are dressed up for something but I’m not sure what.

Me & Mary Anne

We had a nice long breakfast at a French-style restaurant and then we walked around the souq for a bit. Mary Anne and I ended up going to one of the shops where she has gotten to know the guy and had insisted we sit and have tea. He brought it to us from a place next to his and said that this tea is really good because it is heated over coals not direct flame. I don’t know much about the method, but I can tell you that it was good tea.

Mary Anne, Trish, & Betsy

We did a bit of shopping and I got to bargain a bit. By the way, I am not very comfortable with bargaining. It is probably a mix of being Western where we don’t bargain much and my personality, but I feel like I don’t really know what I should start the bargaining at, how hard to push, etc. I have gotten better at it on this trip though. I even did one of my bargains completely in Arabic. It is definitely a skill though, one I am working on.

After that, we walked to the gold souq to look around. It is different than the others that I have been to as most of the storefronts face the street, as oppose to facing each other across a walkway.

We didn’t have a car (Trish had picked us up to go to breakfast) so we took a taxi home.

Later on we went to City Center mall where I practiced my now near-perfected art of acting disinterested. We went into a back part of the mall where there are lots of souvenir type things which were largely run by men and being that both Mary Anne and I are Western I am sure they start with a higher price for us. Also, remember how things went with me at the sheep/goat market? Well, there are certain cases you learn to recognize where showing interest, not even in the person but just in whatever they are selling, just causes trouble.

Oh, and in case you wanted to know what a typical party dress looks like in the Middle East, I took a picture of some in a window (since I can't take pictures of women in them at the parties):