And Just For the Record

Not everyone in Qatar drives a Land Cruiser...

Yamaha

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Aroma

Mini food review...

I visited Aroma at Kempinski Residences and Suites with a friend yesterday. Since I hadn't been before, I was a little extra excited being the multitasker that I am. "Double whammy, an overdue visit with a gal pal and a blog post to top it off!" Yeah well, not so much, as I was too engrossed in our rapid fire conversation to really soak in the nuances of the food before me. Mindless eating. We have been warned of such atrocities. I do however, remember liking the mozzarella smothered chicken. It was very tame with no Arabic spices screaming at me. Four years later and some of those flavors still don't jive with my buds. The carrot caraway soup was pretty good, I guess, if you like that sort bland flavor. Tomato basil would have been my ultimate choice, but it didn't happen to be an offering on the lunch set menu. For dessert, I got some kind of mascarpone cheese tart thingamabob and subbed good old standard vanilla in lieu of the Turkish coffee ice cream mentioned in the description. I was in play it safe mode. I'll give you my dad's canned answer when asked to judge the dessert. "It had sugar in it, didn't it?" Bottom line: I'll be back.


The set menu was 90QR ($25) which included a starter, entree, dessert, breads, and a coffee/tea. There were several options in each category to surely please everyone.

Food: Good
Atmosphere: Modern, quiet, cozy, not crowded
Service: Excellent
Location: Across from The W, Next to Somerset ~ Google Map
Phone: 4405 3333 () ‏

I forgot to include this starter that my friend got. I'm not so sure what it is...

but, it sort of creeped me out.

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Rogers Diner ~ Doha

Three times is a charm. That's how our third run to the newly opened Rogers Diner in Doha worked out for us. We tried to squeeze in Thursday night and then on Friday afternoon, but business was booming. One last attempt on Saturday and we sashayed on in. We were seated at a table for two, or make that one and a half. If we had been plus sized, we would have been SOL. We were understandably "bumped" a few times while awaiting our food with the tables being too crowded in the area we were seated. The noise level was pretty loud with the espresso machine running every few minutes and the ever screaming baby in the corner didn't help matters. Other than that, the decor was bright, open and airy, with the chrome 50's diner feel. Oh and there was a pretty cool vintage aviation theme going on. The moment I saw a booth vacate, I requested to be moved. The staff did so most obligingly not making me feel at all guilty for my request...almost like, "what took you so long to ask?". Seated at our new table it was an instant transformation. Much more relaxing, so much so that I forgot about the noise level and the big lunged baby. Bring on the food. The menu was a fair sampling of appetizers, burgers, pastas, fajitas, and steaks. The Tex Mex burger and Texas Chili that we decided on (do you spot a theme here?) arrived looking mighty delish, but the taste is in the test. They both passed with flying colors, but I do have to note that when scooping the chili with my chips, there seemed to be an abundance of grease. That sounds pretty disgusting, but the chili had great flavor and I didn't note the grease while actually eating it. So, if appearance bothers you, just close your eyes and savor the flavor. They had some good looking desserts, but we had to opt out in case we get stuck at the one and a half persons table next time. Ciao!









Location: C-Ring, across from BMW Showroom (Ramada area)
Phone: 974 4455 23333
Atmosphere: Fun, bright, casual, bit noisy
Food: Good
Service: Good
Price: Reasonable~similar or slightly higher than Chili's & Applebees

Tex~Mex Burger/fries: 44QR ($12)
Texas Chili and chips: 36QR ($10)
Fountain Drinks w/refills 10QR ($2.75)

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The Secret is Out...of Bras?

Victoria's Secret has made it to a mall near you, well at least near me, anyway. Before I actually moved to Doha, I never thought of it as a target audience for sexy lingerie shops, but au contraire. Just in my local small mall, Landmark, I can think of four right off the bat. The odd thing about this particular Victoria's Secret is that it's missing all the famous lacy bras and negligees for which it is known. What's up with that? The whole storefront is perfumes and cosmetic displays. One would have to slither into the back room (and I did) to even get a glance of the frilly boy panties and a few t~shirts . If you are waiting on the real deal, folks, you're out of luck. My advice: Walk a few aisles over and visit the store with the revolving scantily clad "nipping" (can I say that?) mannequins in the window. Maybe they can hook you up.

Let us in on the secret, Vicki...
Where are the bras?

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Name and Shame

Ask any expat in Qatar what their biggest complaint is and I'll wager that "the traffic" will come foremost to mind. I'm not so sure it's the amount that's the biggest problem as much as the style of the drivers. The words manic creative come to mind. Let's just say it's a rat race out there and it can bring any sane flighty calm hyper person to their melting point. "I'll have a McDonald's double grease, er I mean cheese burger to calm my nerves, please." Valium at its best. Yep, that was me yesterday while running the Doha roads. The character below didn't seem to want to wait his turn. He came whizzing by all the stopped traffic waiting their turn and proceeded to go over the curb and jumped out in front of the lead car as soon as the light turned green.

After tweeting the incident, there was talk on twitter about starting a "name and shame" blog to out all the traffic perpetrators. I'm not so sure we could keep up with the incessant infractions, though. It would definitely be a full time job. Oops, I accidentally got jerkface's license plate number. Maybe this can be the first in the installment. Gee, I hope no one harasses the poor guy *wink*wink*.

....Be safe peeps. It's a war zone out there.

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"The Day"

What would the term be? "Happy Anniversary"? Hardly so. I honestly had zero intention of bringing up "the day" ten years later. There was not a bone in my body that wanted to discuss any emotions brought forward from the past. I was happy with it being just that, the past. It's hard to ignore, though, when it is all television, Internet news, facebook, and twitter have to offer is remembrances of that dreadful day. One would have to be a complete social misfit to avoid it, but that's exactly what I had intentionally done until this morning when I dare clicked on a local expat's link to her blog titled, Ten Years On. My curiosity overcame my need to stay in my bubble as I knew the author wasn't an American. What could she have possibly felt from a far off land to put the crumbling chaos of my country in perspective? Surprisingly (or actually comfortingly), feelings that weren't so far off from my own. She experienced the same need to cry, same need to be held, and that same need to feel for those that were beyond help. Reading her words, tears streaming, I was sucked back into that surreal day that I so wanted to leave behind. Hindsight, maybe it's not meant to be forgotten. Maybe I need a reminder of no matter what bubble I may live in, someone out there is experiencing their own 9/11.

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Qatari's Raising the Roof

As reported in The Gulf Times~September 7, 2011

And we're ecstatic if we get 4% ...how you like them apples?

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Berlin, Prague, Dresden ~ In Pics

The dust has settled from our Berlin/Prague/Dresden visit, so I've taken a moment to put some pictures together. Prague is by far our favorite of the three. The city is beautiful, festive, and buzzing with old world charm. It is a place definitely worth a do over, but if ever we get another chance we would try their off season (if there is such a thing). Apparently we aren't the only tourists to have discovered Prague's appeal, as it was crawling with the likes of us.

Thanks for coming along on our holiday.
We enjoyed the company!

Click on the slide show to go directly to

Photobucket to speedup, slowdown, or pause the pics.

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