Trip Report: Qatar
Visited in May 2023
Qatar was my 149th country on my journey to every country in the world. The fact that it took so long for me to visit this small Gulf state has always puzzled people over the last years. After all, Qatar is a country that many combine as a stopover with a trip to Southeast Asia.
In fact, I even had the chance for a stopover in Qatar once. In 2015, I flew with Qatar Airways to Vietnam, my 29th country. Back then, however, I didn’t care about counting countries, and Qatar wasn’t a country I was particularly interested in anyway. “You can always visit Qatar on your way to Southeast Asia” was what other travelers said over the time. But on every trip that was going eastward in the last years, the airfares of Qatar Airways were so steep that a Qatar stopover was out of the question. I had to postpone the stopover again and again.
The more time passed, the more often I wondered if a Qatar stopover would happen at all. Ultimately, the countries in Asia and Oceania that I had not visited yet were decreasing more and more. Consequently, I sometimes even wondered if I should just fly to Qatar and back home. In other words, without combining the country with another one. But since flights with Qatar Airways from Switzerland to Doha are often practically as expensive as say from Switzerland to Thailand, that would not have been a great option.
Finally, in May 2023, the time had come. A trip that took me to the Philippines, among other places, made the Qatar stopover possible. This time, the flights with Qatar Airways were cheaper than those of other airlines. However, I had to make a compromise with the duration of the stay. I had to choose a connection with which I would arrive in Qatar at 23:00 and fly on to Manila at 18:00 the next day. In total, that meant 19 hours, but with the airport transfers realistically more like 15-16 hours.
I had to accept two more compromises. First, my stay fell on a Friday, the Sunday of the Muslim world, so to speak. In Doha, that means the city is practically dead on Friday morning. Locals attend mosques and stores and restaurants are closed until early afternoon. Even attractions like the Museum of Islamic Art don’t open until 1:30 p.m. So based on my flight times, most of my stay would fall on the phase when Doha is a ghost town.
Second, my visit was in early May. This means that in the worst case, temperatures would already be above 40°C. On the 5th of May 2022, exactly one year before my visit, the temperature in Doha was 45°C. It’s hard to imagine that there was serious thought of having the 2022 World Cup in Qatar take place in June. Regarding the temperature, however, I got relief a few days before my trip. According to the forecast, it should actually only be a mild 35°C.
Due to the short duration of my visit, I knew that I had to optimize my time. This meant that I had to find a hotel with a strategic location and also decide which places to visit and in which order. All with the goal of doing as much as possible in the shortest amount of time. Even with the additional challenge that many places are not open on Friday morning.
I booked my hotel directly in the Souq Waqif, so to speak the nightlife area of Doha. I benefited from Qatar Airways stopover program, where you have the opportunity to book a luxury hotel for almost free. In the end, I chose a 5-star hotel for the equivalent of 30 euros. The temptation was great to book an even more luxorious hotel for maybe 75 euros. However, I did not want to waste my already short time unnecessarily in the hotel, so I resisted.
For my stopover in Qatar, I had picked out three parts of Doha that I wanted to explore. The first few hours after my arrival I wanted to stay near the souq and visit the places there that are suitable for night photography. Besides the Souq Waqif, these were the Corniche, i.e. the promenade overlooking the skyline, Msheireb Downtown (impressed me the most) and the Abdullah Bin Zaid Islamic Cultural Center, another Doha landmark.
The fact that Doha would be dead on Friday morning meant, conversely, that Thursday night would be very busy. Many people were enjoying their free evening before the weekend. The cafes and restaurants in the souq were still full even at 3 am when I went back to the hotel.
Funnily enough, I also noticed that Qatar is not as conservative as I would have expected. I saw many men in shorts and women dressed up and wearing a lot of make-up. This is something you rarely see in Kuwait, for example. Qatar may still be a conservative state where religion and traditional values play a big role in the everyday life of the people, but in the end I guess it’s a question of which other countries it compares to.
Not surprisingly, I met in Doha a very large population of people whose origin is the Indian Subcontinent. After all, this has also been the case in Kuwait, Bahrain or the Emirates. These people often work in jobs that tourists typically come into contact with, i.e. cab drivers, in restaurants or hotels. Sometimes I have the feeling that more people from the Indian Subcontinent than Arabs are actually living in these small oil-reach countries on the Arabian Peninsula.
Of course, there are all the Bangladeshi construction workers, as most of you know. After all, a large number of guest workers died during the preparations for the World Cup due to massive safety deficiencies. This issue has brought Qatar the never-ending discussion in recent years about whether a World Cup can take place in a country where human rights mean little to nothing.
There is no question that the World Cup should never have taken place in a country like Qatar. Although the World Cup was a good one, Qatar is a country with neither football history nor football culture. But the whole human rights discussion could not have been more hypocritical, since on the one hand the World Cup has already taken place in many countries where human rights are no more important than in Qatar. On the other hand, it was equally ridiculous to see political elites from Europe chiding Qatar on human rights and at the same time traveling to the country to beg for gas.
Since most of Doha is closed on Friday morning (even many restaurants don’t open until late afternoon), I visited the Katara Cultural Village before noon, because this place is open 24/7. By the way, at the entrance I noticed once again how green Doha is. In fact, you’ll find a lot of green spaces in the city. This is even more amazing when you consider that it only rains a few days a year in Doha. Imagine all the effort that goes into maintaining these green spaces.
I also saw green hills (see picture above), which are man-made and built in the middle of the desert. This is not a big surprise, though. Because in the end, Doha is just like Dubai kind of an artificial place that was created from nothing in the last decades. Funnily enough, I have to say that I still perceived Doha as more “Arab” than Dubai.
I spent the last few hours of my stopover visiting three other places, all relatively close to each other. I took an Uber cab from Souq Waqif to Box Park, where several colorful containers adorn the harbor. Speaking of Uber, cab rides are pretty cheap in Qatar. For a ride within the city, I usually paid between two and four euros. No wonder, after all, a liter of gasoline in Qatar costs just 50 cents and is cheaper than a liter of water.
I walked from Box Park to the Flag Plaza, where – if I saw it correctly – you can find the flags of all 193 UN countries. For me as a country counter of course a great thing and probably my favorite place in Doha.
Last on my agenda was the Museum of Islamic Arts. However, this museum turned out to be a disappointment. The entrance fee of 99 riyal (about 25 euros) is not exactly cheap. In the museum, you can then examine various art and collectibles from Islamic history, which I found rather boring. Maybe it’s just me, because I am not interested in arts in general.
Shortly after, I drove back to the airport, where I continued my journey to my 150th country, the Philippines. My Qatar stopover was thus over and it is time for a conclusion.
I actually liked Qatar during this short stay. I found Doha to be a pleasant city that has some nice things to offer for visitors. Even though Doha is not a city I would personally want to spend a week in, if I had a second day, I could have done some other things that I missed. For example, I left out all the mosques and there are one or two of them in Qatar with spectacular architecture. I also didn’t visit the National Museum, because I didn’t have time for a second one besides the Museum of Islamic Arts. Additionally, I would have liked to visit one or the other World Cup stadium.
What I also liked about Qatar was that despite its wealth, the country is not overly expensive. Especially not when you get a cheap hotel with the Qatar Stopover program. Food prices were somewhere in the European average and transportation was pretty cheap as mentioned earlier. Except for the museum, I never felt that I really paid much for anything.
Last but not least, Doha is not as pedestrian-unfriendly as Dubai or Kuwait (or the worst: Saudi Arabia). There are many sidewalks and I could easily walk from the souq to the corniche or the Museum of Islamic Arts. Not being able to move without a car is always something that annoys me. Good for Qatar that you don´t need to order a Uber just to get across the street (like in Jeddah).
Compared to the other two small GCC countries, Bahrain and Kuwait, I would give Qatar second place behind Bahrain, but just barely. I found Bahrain a bit more interesting, although I must also admit that the circumstances there were different. After all, I spent two nights there and I wasn’t there on a Friday either. However, Qatar clearly beats Kuwait, and there should be no two opinions about that.
I can recommend the stopover in Doha to all who fly with Qatar Airways. Even if the layover is only eight hours, you can book a city tour at the airport, which shows you the highlights of the city in three hours. Since the airport is not far from the city center, you can do this easily and without stress.
Will I ever return to Qatar? I would not rule it out. If another stopover comes up, then why not. For now, Qatar remains in my memory as a solid country no. 149, my last stop, so to speak, before the big number 150.
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