Hello from Doha, Qatar

Hello from Qatar! No, I'm not from here, I'm originally from the USA working here on Al Udeid Air Base supporting the U.S. military as a civilian. Been working in telecommunications for many years now so that makes me an old fart. My primary hobby interest in the last ten years has been lasers and I've learned a lot, so with that statement you might wonder why I'm showing up here. Truth is, I'm not all too interested in flashlights with the exception of the new LEP flashlights, now those have caught my interest!

My prior hobbies have been general aviation as a pilot and aircraft owner and an interest in ham radio in high school, first licensed in 1973 as WN8***, my extra class license is still valid but I'm not active now. I'm an electronics technician by trade most of my life, now a telecom engineer in my job over here..

73's

Cheers!

Have a nice time here, Laser Project!

I know little about Qatar.

What's it like over there?

Do people in Qatar have many freedoms?

How hot does it get in the summer?

Where I live, it gets over 120° F a couple of times per year.

Qatar is mostly filled with people from other countries, this is the richest country in the world per capita, but that is in regard to the real Qatari's, not the workers here from other third world countries who are severely underpaid to our standards in the USA, but better pay than they can earn in their own countries. Freedoms here are like in the USA, except for alcohol and pornography, those are strictly controlled for Alcohol and pornography prohibited as this is a Muslim country (as a non-Muslim I can buy Alcohol from one company, but forget pornography which isn't a big deal for me anyway). No one here can openly be gay either which from my standpoint is not a restriction. The country is pretty much owned by what we might think of as a king, but from what I've seen there is far less corruption here than in the US government, HUGELY less. There isn't a political party to fight one another either, not so bad, in some ways superior to our government. I don't feel restricted in any freedom I care about here. Violent crime is uber rare here, another improvement over what we experience in the USA. From what I see in the USA now, we are not free, we are controlled by an uber corrupt government which gained power through fraud, so I am quite happy over here not having that around me.

Summer can be hot, 43-45 C. with high humidity.

Enjoy the World Cup later this year!

Heh, I would need to be paid well to attend any of that, I'm a techno geek, don't care at all about sports.

Yeah, the world cup that ended in thousands of people dying to get the stuff built.

I was not aware that thousands died. That is not good no matter how special the event.

Yeah, it’s absolutely disgusting.

We knew Fifa was corrupt, but this was far too bad.

I’ve gotten a decent amount of people to just stop supporting Qatar stuff in general, since they do a lot of things regarding this, and still doing it today.

I will not talk more about this however.

BTW @Laser Project, how can you ship lights to Qatar?

There’s another member from Qatar who’s tried to get his Mateminco lights shipped, but apparently, it is quite problematic at times.

The more I hear about Fifa, the more I dislike it.

I care about soccer much, but the people in charge of Fifa are just terrible.

One thing to take note of regarding all of the construction deaths here, the work supervisors of these projects are not Qatari, they are from all over the world and I see them as just as responsible for the deaths because they are the people who should make sure the job is safe. That said, why are the Qatari's not making sure that happens too? Industrial work safety is not well regulated in these countries, they have a long way to go.

Strange the worlds richest country per capita pays their construction workers so little and treats some of them so poorly, but at the same time I understand why the low pay, no one pays more than the market requires and there are plenty of people from India, Pakistan and the Philippines who are worse off at home than here. While I enjoy low crime Qatar, as you are aware this country has its own problems and darker side, it's not just Qatar, all of these rich Arab countries take advantage of the poor but these poor people come here because they can do better for their families than working at home, so they feed off each other.

Some of the good things about Qatar is the workers have employer provided living quarters (although for construction workers packed in buildings too tightly) and have high tech medical services provided to them, so not everything is so bad for them here, just that they are treated like property while under employment here, that I don't like. What I do like is the Muslim culture is far more family oriented than ours is in the USA today, that is something they have going for them.

The Muslim people here can be very honorable socially, I just don't want to work directly for a Qatari myself, I'm not used to being treated like personal property and as employers, I've seen how cut throat some of them can be to their workers if they feel crossed by them and they can cause huge problems for workers because no one has a right to be here, if you aren't Qatari, you cannot retire here, if you are over 60 years don't try to find work here because work visa's are rarely issued to senior individuals, you can come younger and stay in a job, but not come and get a work visa if too senior. Also, if you are a foreigner here you must have a job or you cannot stay for very long, only visit for two to three months, six months maximum a year total. Due to these restrictions I believe this is one of the reasons crime is so low here, if you cause a problem you are gone, not like in the USA where people can be career criminals and we can't get rid of them, here if you do anything bad you are out of here so fast your head will spin.

All of that said, this is a very peaceful country and I don't see any of their government or police out of control here, if you don't cause problems they won't be difficult with you. I'm amazed how on the highway drivers will speed past police cars going 20 over the speed limit and not be pulled over, the police just aren't out to slap everyone down here, unlike many places. However, watch out for Qatari drivers, they too often are terrors on the highway, a few of them are the most aggressive arse hole drivers I've seen in my life, most driving huge expensive Toyota Land Cruisers but the worst drivers of them all have huge American pickup trucks.

Regarding the sports, all I can say is bah humbug, I would rather waste my time in other ways than watching sports, world cup or not.

Regarding Mateminco: I cannot get Mateminco flashlights in Qatar because they won't ship to me here, Nealsgadgits won't ship to me here either, not via air and not via post mail through my APO, AE address which is a USA address. The Qatar customs has no issue with them, but these companies do with shipping here and I don't know why, FedEx, DHL, UPS and more all operate here and Doha is a very modern city, more modern than many cities around the globe but that is not hard to do when you have lots of money and plenty of uber cheap labor.