Doha, Qatar and the Demon

Ah yes…Doha.  Land of desert.  This place was flat, flat, flat.  It was however, close to the ocean…the Persian Gulf to be exact.

Once again, dad was there first for some reason and I came next.  Where to begin…I packed, I flew; I landed…no problem.  I walked in the terminal doors and up to the “Work Visa” counter…problem.

After looking at my visa certificates and documents, the nice Arabic guy behind the counter said…”You no old enough to do job”.  Got that?  “You no big”.  OK, I’m game, what did he say?  Long story short, My visa said that I was to be the Purchase Administrator for the Emir.  My age listed was 24 (hey, this must have been in 1984).  In his mind I guess a 24-year-old can’t do this job.  Sure, that makes perfect sense.

I was then shuffled into a small room with a military guard.  Third world countries like military guards by the way.  For 4 hours, I sat in this room.  While sitting there I noticed a door with a small window on the opposite wall.  This door looked out into the parking lot of the airport.  While I was looking out of it, lo and behold, my dad walks by on the sidewalk.  He’s been walking around looking for me.  After saying our howdy do’s, he talks to the project manager who in turn talks to the main guys assistant who in turns calls someone on his phone.  10 minutes later, the guard picks up the phone, sweats a little, gets the sergeant who picks up the phone, sweats a lot, says a lot, whines a lot, and then yells at me and tells me to get out.

I guess this Emir guy carries a lot of weight in his country.  He was the one on the other end of the phone.  His full name by the way was Sheik Nassar Bin-Ackmed Bin-Ali Al-Thani.

Well, I finally get out and into the real world and into the heat.  The average temperature in this area is 120 degrees and the horizon and sky had that familiar gray line dividing them.  Although Israel had its flat spots, it was nothing like this place.  There were no mountains, hills, valleys, or color.

The trip to the compound was a short 20-minute drive.  It was located approximately 10 miles outside the town of Doha on the South side.  During the drive, it seemed as though every car we passed including taxis, were Mercedes, with gold trim.  The intersections were made from “round-a-bouts” instead of standard square intersections with lights.  People here drove crazy.  On a two-lane road, you have a center solid stripe that is supposed to denote two different lanes…two sides of the road.  In Doha, the center stripe was used to drive the car directly down the center of the road.  It was like a yellow magnet that sucked the vehicle directly over it when you drove.  When on-coming traffic cam, you veered over to your side again to avoid hitting head on.  Don’t get me started on the round-abouts.

           After 20 minutes of “Death Race”, we arrived.  The compound sat off the main road about 50 yards.  It was made up of five small trailers.  Each trailer had two 10’ x 10’ rooms at each end and a bathroom in between.  When you opened the door, you could go left, right, or straight to the bathroom.  These converted job site trailers were again called “Hooches”.  The trailers were put into a horseshoe configuration and vehicles were parked in the middle. 

Here's five of us laying out in the 125 degree heat getting tan???

This picture shows us sitting out in the heat doing what we usually did…nothing.  The window on the left is my room, and the one on the right is dads.  That’s me on the table.

We were part of a larger compound as well.  The entire compound was as large as a football field.  The rest of the compound was designated for Philippine contractor and employees…Eresca was the contractor’s name.  We were the only 10 Americans on the compound and on the site out of over 300 Philippine workers.  We were the brains; they were the brawn…we were out numbered.  I settled in and made myself at home.  The room came with a twin bed, dresser, small refrigerator, and an air conditioner.  There were several small holes in the floor that looked like someone had taken a hammer to it with the claw portion and hacked away.  I would have to plug those sometime I guessed.  Dad introduced me to the rest of the guys including Dave who threw me a beer.  I was pretty sure this was a “dry” country and alcohol was not permitted.  It was explained that since there was British companies here, you could go to the cable and wireless and spend up to $400 dollars a month on booze.  Dave spent every dime obviously.  It was getting late and tomorrow was Friday so I hit the sack early.   Work started at 4:00am.
            The project consisted of 300 villas that Al-Thani’s Air force families would live in.  They spared no expense.  You would be hard pressed to find as nice of a home stateside.  There were 4 different models and each one had the best of everything including gold plated faucets, marble floors, Jacuzzi tubes, and sound systems.

The project.  The warehouse is shown in the lower left with the yard around it.  The well and pumping station are in the upper right.

Dad was the engineer on the project over plumbing / pipefitting.  Eresca had started early on the project before dad arrived and had screwed things up.  When dad asked to see the test results of the underground main water lines, they didn't’ have any results.  That’s because they didn’t do any tests before they covered up and paved the streets on phase 1.  Wait…It gets better.

There was no water on site.  All water for construction purposes had been coming in on water trucks.  Here is the deal.  The plans called for a well to be dug and a pumping station to be installed…pretty elaborate stuff.  You see there was no such thing as pressurized water systems in this country.  Even the projects that the British companies were working on, all used gravity feed systems.  All water was on shipped on trucks and in turn was poured into big holding tanks, which were mounted on rooftops.  When you turned a faucet handle, it came out through gravity flow only.  Unfortunately, Eresca’s project engineer didn’t know any better either and so he proceeded to build per his known standard and not per print.  Gravity feed doesn’t have too much pressure so the piping can be substandard.  Clamps?  We don’t need no stinking clamps.

When dad showed them the plans for the new well and fire protection (fire hydrants in the street), disbelief abounded and rumors of Voodoo circulated.  This was unheard of.  I suppose this would be a rather big step for the locals and a little unbelievable…who knew.  3 months later, The well, pumping station, and other equipment were finally completed.  Dad had run the station through its tests and it held a nice 300 pounds per square inch just like it should.  Phase 2 paving had also been completed.  After much discussion, yelling, and finger pointing, dad christened the station and put the water to the project.  Our little group was happy when the water started pumping and the pressure started building and filling the main lines.  Things were starting to look up and it looked like we were going to have water on site and in a few homes.

We got water all right.  When the pressure filled the main to ¾ capacity, we had lots of water.  It wasn’t controlled but it was water all the same.  You should have seen the looks on Eresca’s faces when the streets in phase 1 and phase 2 blew up.  Dad warned them and showed them how to install and test but to no avail…OOPS.  It worked out ok because to tell the truth, the streets were not all that good to begin with.  They looked more like roller coaster trails than flat streets…but that’s another story.  My guys loved the geysers of water shooting skyward and were running around like kids in a sprinkler.

  

Did I mention my guys?  My guys consisted of  (from left to right) 1 Philippine labor (Talin) 1 Philippine foreman (Armando), 1 Pakistani labor (Mannan), 1 India labor (Pog),

1 India labor (Luntz), 1 India labor (Zubair), 1 Philippine labor (Roger).  Badsha is not shown

We all worked over in the warehouse and yard, which was off to the West of the project.  This is where I spent 2 years working away in 120-degree weather, 6 days a week, 16 hours a day.  Fortunately, being close to the gulf, it was more of a humid heat than dry heat, and the ground was covered with a fine white silt that clung to you after 5 minutes in the heat so you always looked albino.  I call it “Poof dirt” because it went “poof” and sent up a cloud of smoke when you walk in it. 

We American white boys always wore shorts and muscle shirts to help keep cool so we were against the norm once again.  Everyone else wore pants, work shirts, or traditional garb and headdress.  I don’t understand how they lived like that. 

My best employee was Mannan, a 17-year-old Pakistani kid.  Mannan lived in the lower part of town with 15 other guys.  No, they weren’t “hinkey” or anything…they just had to share a place in order to afford the rent.  When Mannan told me about the place, I naturally thought that it would be of a good size and kind of look like an apartment back home.  It’s natural…come on.  One day he mentioned that his place had no “Condition” and it was pretty hot inside.  I figured out the “condition” word as being an air conditioner.  The warehouse happened to have several small window a/c units that had been bent or damaged in route and I could not put them in a new house like that.  I told Mannan that a friend and I would bring a unit over to his place and plug it in for him.  You would have thought I was a God.  Man was he happy.

Upon arriving at the building complex / slum / shanty Ville / dump, Mannan led us through several narrow alleys about 3 foot wide and entirely covered with bright cloths, scarves, sheets, and turban wraps.  On each side were hand made room like adobe structures with openings cut in the walls for doors.  There were no doors but carpets and rugs hung in their place. 

We finally came to a small opening, which Mannan said was his place.  Inside, we found a 10ft x 10ft dirt room complete with corrugated metal roof and dirt floor, and 15 men crammed inside.  Ah, home at last.  Needless to say, it was very hot (what with the roof and all) and it smelled.

We were shuffled inside with our “condition” while several other men shuffled outside to make room.  A new hole had been carved out of the alley sidewall and an extension cord hung inside.  The other end lead down an alley, around a corner, down another alley, and into oblivion.  We had attracted quite the crowd now, which was gathering and growing outside the room.  Someone had even pulled back a section of the roof covering to get a good look at what was going on inside.

My friend and I cut a bit more from the hole and eased the a/c into its place.  A sturdy 2 x 4 was propped underneath to secure it from falling…I’m being sarcastic here.  I instructed Mannan on how to operate the unit.  He was now the controller of the “condition”.

I asked if the cord was plugged in…it was.  I turned it on and it sprang to live.  It made its familiar sound of the compressor kicking on and the fan turning.  Familiar to me anyway. When it kicked on, so many people gasped all at once that I swear it sucked all the air out of the room and two more rooms next to it.  The kid on the roof fell off because he lurched back so quickly.  The men that took up so much space in the small room stood back in such amazement that they all fit into the opposite corner with lots of room to spare.  All we could see was white eyes and open mouths.  After the initial surprise wore off though, people started filing in one at a time to feel the cold air.  You would have thought we were God’s.  Alpha Shukran means “One thousand thank you’s” in Arabic.  How do I know?…We heard it over and over and over for the next half-hour.

We were then asked to stay and celebrate the victory and cold air by staying for dinner and a party in honor of the ”condition”.  We agreed.  The details of that party and festivities remain a secret.  I will say that the whole “Shanty Ville” turned out in full garb.

Mannan taught me a lesson on customs while I was in Doha too.  He had gone to the dentist to have a tooth pulled.  The next day, he came to work as usual ready to work.  I met everyone else at the door but Mannan would not come in.  In fact he wouldn’t even look at me when I called him.  I kind of blew it off and got everyone else lined out for the day.  I told Badsha to get with Mannan and show him what to do.

This worked out pretty good and things were moving along.  At lunch, I came over to eat with the guys and Mannan literally ran off into the warehouse.  Ok…enough is enough.  I ask Badsha what was going on.  He informed me that Mannan’s tooth had been pulled and was not hurting until he came to work and saw me.  Supposedly, Because I was in charge of him during work, and I was wearing some gold jewelry showing wealth and power over him…this was bad.  I guess I had made his poor demon mad.

So what was I supposed to do?  Badsha called Mannan over.  This took most of the lunch hour to do so and the guys had to physically drag Mannan over to me kicking and screaming and holding his mouth…kinda funny actually.

Badsha told me that I had to then take off my gold ring, hide it in my pocket, and then work up a good saliva, and spit on him.  Say What?!!!  No way I said.  “It’s the only thing that will drive off the demon away” Badsha tells me.  Well this was stupid but Mannan was rolling around like a dog who just got hit by a truck, so I spit a good one on him…right on the head.  Instantly, Mannan gets up, says his “Alpha Shukran”, smiles, and sits down and eats lunch…pain gone…hello.  Wouldn’t an Aspirin done just as good?