Let's Predict the Disaster!

All right, so it’s time for another fun-filled round of Let’s Predict the Disaster! Without further ado, here’s today’s scenario:

My financial institution in the country beginning with the letter Q, an International bank, is implementing a change from ATM cards to debit cards. These debit cards have a chip in them, and are usable with a PIN for extra security. This is fine in itself, given that financial transactions seem to have a greater risk these days. In Western countries, a change in cards means that the new cards are sent by post to customers, who then destroy their old cards by cutting them up. No problem.

In the country that begins with Q, however, the banking system is supposedly built based on the Indian banking system, which is comparable to tellers sitting at desks with ledgers, writing each transaction by hand. Thus, the disaster begins:

There is a 1-month window in which existing ATM cards can be changed for the new debit cards, and after September the 30^th the old ATM cards will no longer be valid. 3 types of customers can go to their branch of account to change their cards; however, everyone else has to pitch up to a tiny card center located in the center of town, where there is no parking to be had because 4 or 5 banks decided to establish their main branches right next to one another in a single building but forgot to think about where people would park.

So, here are the disaster choices:

A. The exchange is occurring over Ramadan, a time of the year when not much gets done courtesy of reduced hours and the interchange of day and night, and the exchange timeframe is inclusive of a week-long Eid holiday.

B. The cards are undoubtedly not pre-printed, so this is when you pitch up to apply for your new debit card, NOT collect your card, meaning another trip downtown to collect them if and when they are prepared because they won’t post them and frankly who trusts the award-winning postal system anyway?

C. The cards have been pre-printed, but are sitting at Customs and cannot be cleared because the manager is not a customer of this financial institution so therefore has no personal gain or concern regarding this matter. He's tired from being up all night, every night, and is probably sleeping in his chair anyway.

D. Extra documentation is required to collect the cards, which was not reported in the advertisement so people could pre-plan before leaving work during their work hours, meaning another trip downtown.

E. The cards will not be prepared in time for the September 30^th cutoff, meaning there will be people without access to cash for at least a month while the problem is sorted.

F. The clerk in charge of deactivating ATM cards, who has been up all night every night for the last month gorging himself on food to make it through the day of fasting, misunderstood September 30^th to be September 1^st, shutting off access to cash for thousands of people. It will take 2 weeks to figure out the problem and sort it because the technicians, too, are napping before Iftar.

G. Any of these, or a combination of these, are highly, highly possible.

So which option do you choose? Did you choose G? G is the RIGHT ANSWER!!!

So how does one plan to make it around these disasters? Well, I'm thinking I had best go get some cash before pitching up to the Debit card center. I will also have a photocopy of my local ID in addition to the original, a photocopy of my passport page, and the original, and I will go as soon as possible.

Just another day in the life of an Expat.

Ramadan from a non-Muslim perspective

We're 1 week into Ramadan, and 3 weeks to go. This is my 3rd Ramadan (well, 2.5th I suppose, as I moved to Qatar about 1 week into Ramadan), so I've had a bit of time to observe and learn. So what's it really like for a non-Muslim living in a Muslim country-- more specifically, a Gulf State-- during Ramadan?

I was careful to say a Gulf State because it seems that Ramadan is observed in ways which differ greatly from other parts of the world. Ramadan, from my understanding, is a month where complete fasting during the day means a general reduction of food and water intake over the month-- not a long period of non-eating and drinking to be followed by a gluttonous orgy of overeating at Iftar (sunset) and Suhoor (sunrise) and all in between. My colleague, who is Muslim and grew up in the US, told me that the eating pattern here at Iftar is distinctly different, and she has a hard time following it because she ends up sick. Her usual custom, which is the way recommended by health professionals, is to break the fast slowly, with dates and water, to be followed by a bit of soup and then a meal a bit later. However, the custom here is to break the fast with dates and water, followed almost immediately by a huge meal.

In Qatar, eating and drinking in public during daylight hours is forbidden during Ramadan. Restaurants and coffee shops are closed, with the exception of a few restaurants in hotels who serve food behind closed doors, and open around Iftar (this year's Iftar is approximately 6pm). Those who are not fasting become, yes, closet drinkers-- crowding elbow-to-elbow in pantries with newspapered windows to sip cups of tea and drink water. In my particular workplace building, food is still served, but the food locations are well publicized prior to the start of Ramadan, and signs are posted in the hallways leading to the food place advertising that food is being served in the area. Technically, we're not supposed to have drinks at our desks, but many of us stretch the rule and keep our bottles of water in the drawer or at our feet, turning away towards the wall and drinking discretely.

One nice thing about Qatar is that the mandated workday is only 6 hours. I am conscientious about eating lunch as my big meal, but during Ramadan I adjust and make breakfast my biggest meal. This way if I am working in the morning I eat lunch when I get home, which is around 2 or 2.30. If I am working from 9.30 until 3.30 I may take a piece of fruit to work, but otherwise I eat enough breakfast and then an early tea. During the 3-9pm, though, I take my tea and eat after sunset.

When it isn't Ramadan, I usually have 2-3 cups of tea a day-- one at breakfast, one at 7.30 when it is brought to me, and then a 3rd at 10.00. However, as we aren't being served tea, I have 2 cups of tea at breakfast and there has only been one day where I engaged in closet drinking at work.

Shop timings, naturally, change during Ramadan. This year is tough with Iftar being around 6pm, as shops will have evening hours starting from 7.30 or 8pm. I am a morning person, so by 8pm I am getting tired as I get up by 5.30 am to go to work. It's hard to want to go back out after I've gotten home and been there for a while. Some shops have morning hours and then evening hours, and some shops are only open at night. The hypermarts, though, have virtually the same hours-- perhaps opening 1 hour later in the morning, closing for about 1 hour or 1.5 hours for Iftar, and then opening back up until 1am. (They usually shut at midnight) So food shopping activities aren't affected terribly. Remember, people still have to prepare their lavish table-groaning Iftar feasts.

Driving is a challenge here under usual circumstances, but during Ramadan it becomes even more interesting to dodge the other traffic. What I find here is that many people essentially flip their day and night-- moving through the day lethargic, or even sleeping through the afternoon, and then staying up all hours of the night. So when people are driving around during the day, they have a harder time concentrating on what they are doing, and there are some horrendus accidents as a result. It gets worse as the month goes on too. The issue, though, is not fasting-- the issue is that people are tired from staying up all night. There was a study done somewhere which showed that driving while tired is worse than drink driving. So imagine a road chockers with drink drivers, and you'll get the general idea. I suspect that as Ramadan moves into the summer months, and people go on holiday, it will be marginally safer to drive here.

Although Ramadan is the Muslim holy month, don't imagine a solemn, silent funeral environment-- think more of the Christmas season in the West, with the carnival-like atmosphere in shopping malls and shops, family entertainment, special foods, and emphasis on charity and giving. Zakat, the obligatory alms tax calculated on income given by Muslims each year, is often paid at this time, although some people choose to spread Zakat over the year. (There is even a Zakat payment option on Hukoomi, Qatar's e-government website)

Overall, Ramadan is really quite a fun time of the year, and a good occasion to see cultural performances. As life slows down during Ramadan because shop timings and work hours change, so not as much can get done, it's only natural to also slow down individual lifestyles and take a bit of time out to enjoy the day. In some ways, then, Ramadan is also a healthy break.

Ramadan Mubarak

Wishing everyone a joyous Ramadan with family and friends. Ramadan Mubarak!

Deira building crash

http://www.gulfnews.com/nation/General/10340812.html

Most of the time, buildings fall down after they're completed, not during. This is not the first time this has happened in Dubai. The Atlantis Palm Hotel, christened last December by the likes of Robert DeNiro and so forth, supposedly already has water leakage.

This reminds me of the Delhi metro station incidents. Interestingly enough, the labor that builds the empires in Dubai, Doha, and other Gulf cities comes from the same corner of the world. Dare I say I detect a pattern here?

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One arrested in Deira building crash

By Wafa Issa, Staff Reporter
Last updated: August 16, 2009, 18:27

Dubai: One person has been taken into custody after part of a six-storey building collapsed in Deira on Sunday, officials said.

No one was injured in the incident, Yousuf Foulath, Chief Prosecutor, Deira Public Prosecution, told Gulf News. This was confirmed by Khalil Al Mansouri, Head of the Criminal Investigation Department, Dubai Police.

Click here to see more pictures

The building near the Ramada Continental Hotel in Abu Hail was in its final stages of completion, Foulath said there were 23 workers and an engineer in the building when they heard strange noises from the three-storey basement. The men grew suspicious and ran out of the building.

They informed the police, who reached the site immediately. "After about 35 minutes a few chunks from the building started crumbling," Foulath said.

Watch video: Six-storey building collapses in Deira
The Public Prosecution has started investigations into the collapse.

The incident occurred around 3.30pm when half the portion of the building gave way. "It was around 3.30pm when I saw the building collapse. I've never seen anything like this. There was glass everywhere. It seemed like half the building just fell to the floor," recounted Shahid Bashir Ahmad, a Gulf News reader.

"I don't know how it happened - it happened really fast. I was standing at a traffic signal nearby and within a few minutes, police cars and ambulance vehicles sped to the location," he added.

Construction workers were present, working at the nearby bridge. No one could believe it.

"I was walking near the Ramada Hotel when I saw the building collapse. It was a glass building and half of it was on the ground within minutes. Shattered glass was everywhere. Some of the debris fell on other buildings nearby too. It was so out of the blue! At least 15 police vehicles came to the area and stopped traffic from all directions. People got out of their homes and cars and were clicking pictures," said Waqas, another reader.

Traffic came to a standstill for a few hours as police put up roadblocks as a safety precaution. Gulf News counted at least seven vehicles parked near the building damaged, but no official statistics were available.

One of the contractors has been arrested, according to Brigadier Anas Al Matroushi, Deputy Head of Operations for Rescue and Transportation Affairs at Dubai Police.

Eisa Al Maidour, Assistant Director General at the Planning and Engineering Department at Dubai Municipality, told Gulf News that a technical committee has been formed to investigate the cause of the collapse.

"Preliminary findings have revealed that there was a fault in the structure, which put extra pressure on one half of the building. The structure was made of steel and hence it took a long time to collapse. This gave workers time to leave the site safely," he said.

Sniffer dogs were deployed to ensure no one was trapped in the debris.

A funny thing happened whilst sitting n the Family Food carpark...

My colleague Amani and I were sent out yesterday morning into the wilds of Doha to gather up the most important pieces for our upcoming Orientation-- the prizes. Whilst waiting to leave the Family Food carpark, we observed the usual urban landscape found in Doha-- construction barriers, tape, and piles of sand--, along with 2 construction workers digging in a hole near the nonexistent curb. The construction workers had set their tool box on the outside of the nonexistent curb, thinking it would undoubtedly be safe since, you know, people will give them a wide berth upon entering the carpark. Well, in front of our very eyes, a Qatari in a little pickup comes barreling into the carpark and proceeds to run over their toolbox, leaving a huge wheel-sized dent in the top of the toolbox lid. This, of course, made a hideously loud popping sound no doubt audible to everyone within a 3 meter radius-- that is, everyone but Buddy in his pickup truck, who continued to drive on, completely unaware of what he had just done. One of the construction workers, with a combined look of shock, amusement, and sheer disbelief on his face, went to inspect his toolbox. I didn't get to see if the box still opened or not, but it's quite a story to share back at the worker's dormitory.

Rhythms and Rituals of Ramadan

This is a pretty good description of what happens in Qatar during Ramadan, even though this story was written whilst the author was in Banda Aceh, Indonesia.


Rhythms and rituals of Ramadan

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THE INCIDENTAL TOURIST: Virginia Jealous | August 08, 2009
Article from: The Australian

DURING Ramadan in Banda Aceh, on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, life is very different.

Working hours are shorter, projects come to a standstill for the duration, my colleagues who fast are tired and short-tempered. By early afternoon, lassitude descends. Buildings are sealed against the heat, and people snooze if they can or sit quietly at computers. No one talks much; mouths dry out, breath is stale.

Those of us who eat lunch do so surreptitiously, behind closed office doors and curtained windows, food delivered in anonymous brown cardboard boxes. The few eating places that remain open during the day have blacked-out windows, or are screened from the outside, with notices stipulating "non-Muslims only" on the doors and Sharia police on lookout duty in the streets.

A friend, unthinking, unwraps and eats a sweet outside a shop and is loudly castigated by an old woman who pulls it from her hand and throws it on the ground. Most local people forgive such small insensitivities, though. Twice I taste the leaves of market vegetables for freshness, as usual, and am instantly apologetic. The stallholder knows me and grins, saying, "No problem, we know it's too hard for you non-Muslims to fast."

Around 4pm, street vendors come out in force. Roadside stalls appear, selling crushed sugar cane and fruit juices, or fried snacks -- such as savoury pancakes, stuffed tofu, crepes made of bright-green pandanus and filled with palm sugar and grated coconut -- to be packaged up and taken away to eat later, before the evening meal. The streets become a frenzied mass of horn-honking cars and motorbikes and cyclists double-parked alongside the markets, with stern policemen at intersections and pedestrians venturing out at their peril.

At dusk, the breaking of the fast is marked by a loud, lengthy blast on a siren. A few last, stray motorbikes rev up and zip past, riders keen to get home and eat with family and friends. Then absolutely nothing moves for a half hour or so as people rehydrate and renourish.

For a non-Muslim living with a mosque in the immediate vicinity -- and almost everyone lives with a mosque in the immediate vicinity in Banda Aceh -- the balmy nights of Ramadan signal a storm of amplified noise. Evenings on the open-microphone at the mosque go from about 8pm to midnight; the "wake up and eat before dawn" announcement is about 3am; regular prayers start at 4.30am. The few (very few) hours of quiet are fraught with a mix of anxiety about having to sleep now, at once, before the loudspeakers start again and an urge to lie awake and enjoy the silence.

On early morning walks I've become more familiar than I'd choose with the work of the local goat-killer, whose backyard abattoir has been very busy slaughtering animals for evening feasts. Schools are on holiday so this time of day is crazy, with over-excited kids and adolescents roaming around on a pre-dawn breakfast high.

Gangs sweep yahooing through the streets riding motorbikes and piled three or four to each, while younger groups do wheelies on bicycles and rampage loudly through the village lanes. They're all boys, of course, and all of them without fail shout something at me. Mostly they're not hostile. The girls roam in great packs too, but more demurely. They've been to religious classes and are swathed in white prayer cloaks and headcovers, billowing clouds of fabric.

Then as it heats up, it quiets down. The Ramadan routine has started again.

Ramadan will be observed by Muslim countries and communities from August 21 to September 19 this year.