Doha Day Three contd

Today we are taken to two other shopping centres- my 14 year old son still needs convincing. The first one is, from the outside, rather old and tatty looking, yet it has been newly constructed and purposefully built to look like this. As we enter I am greeted with a painted cloudy sky, a curving avenue of 'old' buildings with new shops on the lower level, standing lamps to light our way and a gondola floating past along the canal that seems to run through the centre of this carefully created 'other' world. As we wander on we come across a large skating rink where Canadian children are hurtling around doing what they have always done, except they are not in cold Canada at all. Here are the usual mixture of expats, Qatari families in robes and modern young people. Because the weather is unseasonably cold I buy a modern track suit top for 100 QR- only $32 or thereabouts.  We drive on to our second shopping centre to find a Marks and Spencer store within- so now I am convinced that Qatar is going to be an easy stay for us. Not that we are shopping centre people but compared to our stay in Africa where we had to shop at the local 'duka' made from shipping crates, this seems all too easy. (even our son seems impressed!)