Qatar...

So, I am sort of up to date with everyone now..., so here I am in Qatar (about to leave).

Qatar, where is that? That was my first question too! - It is in the Middle East, a Gulf country, that is next to Saudi Arabia:

Funny old place it is too! Basically, it is the Milton Keynes of the ME - they have just fabricated a city out of the wasteland and put a load of roundabouts and funny buildings on it. They are counted as the mini-Dubai and are building some amazing buildings.

I have a pic that I took that is similar to this, but Google's one is better, so here it is!

I was asked to come here to be involved in an International Deaf conference, which was a real eye-opener for me, for several reasons. Due to the State's love of monitoring emails and internet activity, I can't really go into a lot of what I was doing, thinking or such, but hopefully I will see each of you at some point to tell you all in full. Suffices to say, that this place is a challenge to live in, but can be very worthwhile.

One of the upsides was that I was being hosted by the government, so I was housed in the country's swankiest hotel - the St. Regis:

The plush surroundings helped to take the edge off of the 30 hour trip from Guyana to Doha! The downside was that due to the amount of work we had to do, we got to enjoy very little of the amenities. I did manage to employ my personal butler (yes, seriously) with silly tasks that made me feel all self-important. Not really! He was a really nice dude from India who was so gracious and friendly, I felt bad asking him to do anything for me.

Once we had finished working like dogs and been paid very little, lol, it was across to another challenging environment. I had been asked to remain by an English deaf guy who is doing some work in Qatar. He had meetings planned and was not getting very far on his own with lip reading and such, so asked me to stay and do some work. So, that is what I have been doing for the last two weeks. Annoyingly, as in America, I have not been able to see that much of the country due to the work on my plate. The working week here is different too (Sunday to Thursday, with Friday and Saturday off), which has thrown my internal clock immensely. Oh, I did manage to attend an Arabic Sign Language course (for two of seven classes but they said I passed the exam anyway), so I now have Level 1 in Arabic Sign Language too! Looks good on my CV doesn't it!

Regardless, I have managed to take a few pics:

The MIA - Museum of Islamic Art (I think) beautiful place

Really bad picture but was a funny thing - having a tour at the museum, given in Arabic and rendered into French Sign, Arabic Sign, American Sign and British Sign all at the same time!

Some arty stuff from a long time ago...

A rare picture of ME!

This is a chess piece from the 18th century 

A souq, or market. Reminded me of Guyana in ways, but smelled nicer and was less rubbish on the floors

Not chocolate, but an Arabic version of chess

A really cool lady from the conference. The hat is mine, someone bought it for me!

Cool building but asking around, no one knows what it houses. Thats quite common here, as many of these ultra-chic buildings are empty

Our guide to the desert one night - Abdullah a lovely deaf man

Bedouin tent in the desert that took hours to reach as we kept getting stranded in the sea of sand - arrived at about mid-night

These guys are deaf from around the Gulf

A Venetian shopping centre complete with gondolas and a canal!

A pearl fishing festival - Dhow festival

The old and the new

Captain goes down with the ship

This summed up Qatar for me - old and the new slapped together.  Obviously, the facia is supposed to look old. Passed this most days and was tres impressive.

So, that is about it... Some of the sights have been amazing and as usual, everywhere I travel I met some amazing people with amazing hearts. I am flying back home to Guyana on Saturday, for another 30 hour trip. That said, my client is asking me to stay another week to finish some meetings, so watch this space.

Sorry about the lack of coherent sentences, just trying to get this done whilst I have ten mins to 'chat'. 

Will try to do better.xxx

A bit of a throwback post...

So, life has been a bit hectic and, as I said in my last post, I am in Qatar right now doing some work.

Before I can tell you about Qatar though, I have to finish off the America trip! Sorry for anyone that is not interested, I shall keep it brief and just throw loads of pics up!

The last time we spoke I was in Washington and was bemoaning the fact that I did not really get to see much. Well, that was the tone for most of the trip really, it being a work trip and all. Thankfully, in each of the places I did manage to escape either on my own or with others and see some of the tourist sites that would have been criminal to miss. Read on!

I loved this building - did you know there is not 'front' to the Capitol? So as not to offend any of the other states, they made four fronts, so no-one was shown the back!

The Shakespeare Museum - these were some frescos that run around the outside of the building. Awesome - sadly as I was walking around on a Sunday evening, it was shut. I was really gutted

White House - so not impressive! The building next door (can't remember the name) was so much more stately. 

Awesome to see this, shame about the thousands of tourists that were there too! How rude of them.

I don't think the 'Dream' was to be trampled on by so many feet. It was a shame actually as no-one really acknowledged this was here as they ran towards Lincoln.

My Final Nights in NYC - we stayed in the Trump Towers in UWS with the remaining pennies! lol. So over-rated, but nice for the scrapbook. This was the view from the living room window!

For the third time in my life I got to ride the Maid of the Mist! Awesome sight

Miss these guys - Ryan and his wife are quite well known in the ASL community and were so welcoming and lovely to me. Matt and Rachel are stars and will one day move to Guyana to join me (I know you are reading this!)

I got a little bonus and so decided to treat these lovely two to a bottle of fizz - they just got extended to the Tuxedo project for a year! How exciting...

Heading home!

This is who greeted me on my return!!!

Its Official... Im Rubbish!!!

Okay everyone, I come to you with tail between my legs and my hat in my hand... Sorry for the complete absence from the bloggersphere. I like to think that people read my blog, but perhaps no one does and the hiatus in postings is inconsequential to everyone but me... But in case anyone is out there - SORRY!!!

I am back in Guyana (obviously, as couldn't still be in the States!) and things have been up and down. Up because I love being here and some amazing things have happened (Annual Meeting, Assembly, Silver Sword, catching up with my boys), but down as I have also had to move house, have been manic catching up on studies and responsibilities in the hall, and also because... I am leaving again!

That's right, I am off on another trip - once again it is not for fun, but for work. The back-to-back nature of these opportunities was not by design but I guess it is better to get it all out of the way. The cong are a bit confused as most need treaters go away for 3-5 months to work and then come back. I went for one, back for one, gone for one.

I will be in Qatar, Middle East, for three weeks (or one, depending on something going on with my flights) helping out a client from the UK who has a set of meetings over there. I will also be interpreting at an international deaf conference which should be interesting indeed.

Ill try to post the rest of the America trip before I post the Middle East one, using the internet over there. I leave Friday morning for a 28 hour journey across the world! The internet here is driving me nuts as to how slow it is: I was spoiled in America.

Okay, right, its Diwali today for the Hindus so market is open for just a few hours and I need to buy for for the group coming for family study tonight.

Tarra

Things Got Better...

Hey everyone...

I left things on a bit of a sour note last time didnt I - sorry about that: I just wasn't feeling it at all!

Well, as the subject line says - things did get better. We FINALLY made it to Washington DC after a total of ten hours for a journey that should have taken three. It looks like disaster was following us as the next day, the skies were dark and there were huge lightening storms in the evening which resulted in the control tower at the airport being struck and massive delays for flights. At least we were not flying, eh.

Well, Washington - my favourite part so far is definitely... urm... okay well actually havent seen anything of Washington yet! I know! Lame! Three days in and we have been working so much we havent seen anything of import.

Okay, well, not ALL the time! This was at a cool German bar that we ended up going to with about 20 deaf people from all over Europe. Allow me to start at the beginning - Ill be brief Jo, dont worry ;)

Wednesday - arrived. Apartment is glorious - hilariously my client went into both bedrooms and declared the one with all the windows overlooking the city was his. What he didnt realise was that he chose the second bedroom and left me with the master: King bed, big bathroom and a tv! Early bird does not always catch that worm. Honestly, this place is a polar opposite of the last place. Have separate bathrooms, lovely building, good views... just awesome and what I needed to be honest.

Thursday - had a meeting with the National Deaf Association. Was a successful meeting and I managed to continue my ASL/BSL hat-wearing. Thankfully my client is learning a bit of ASL and the people we were meeting signed International Sign Language which my client also knows a bit. So, I was able to sit back and just be there to fix any misunderstandings or convey more complex items. Being here for work really spoils the vibe, as we had so much work to do when the meeting was over that we ended up in the apartment on our laptops for the rest of the day pretty much.

Friday - this was a monumental day for the both of us. We had a day scheduled at Gallaudet University. Now, for most of you, that is meaningless. But for those of us in the sign language world it is a mecca of sorts: the world's first and only deaf university. Everyone signs and most people are deaf. You learn in sign language, order coffee in sign language, the painters are deaf - its weird! We had a tour from a student around the campus and that was fascinating about the history of the place and dispelled many of the myths that we have been told around the world (wont bore you). We ended up meeting a whole bunch of people who invited us to a party the next night and to a bar that night. We spent the whole day hanging out with students and it was great for my client (who attended UCL) to imagine being a student at a place like that. I was horribly worn out by the time we headed home to change for the bar, as every person my client met required ASL/BSL interpreting. This was compounded by the fact that many of them were from the Middle East and mixed their signing with Arabic sign language. Fun. I was rewarded tho with a lovely beer (seen above) and sat back as my client decided to try and communicate alone - brilliant. The day was so interesting but raised a lot of questions for me about having a full-deaf environment. Again, I wont bore you with my musings.

Saturday - we planned Saturday to be a tourist day but Abdi got a text from a deaf man with whom he has been in contact through Facebook for the last 6 years or something. He lives in Virginia, about 20 mins away and is coming to get us. Great! :( ... I actually tried to go to an ASL meeting up the road but it seems that ASL and Russian were mixed up on the website and so that was dashed from the start. I ended up going to a big gathering of deaf muslims (!) all from different countries. It was lovely for my client to meet with loads of deaf people, many of whom were from Somalia like himself. They all thought I was deaf and were very complimentary about my ASL. In fact, one of them is a guy who is organising the deaf conference I am booked for in November in Qatar and was so impressed asked me to be part of the ASL team as well as the BSL! It was weird to be amongst so many Muslims at a gathering like that, but they were all lovely and it was so nice to see their community spirit and the way they welcomed Abdi as one of their own - like when we go to assemblies abroad.

Today - today is a slow day of 'paper-work' and catching up on accounting, booking travel and hotels and forming the final reports. I had to leave to go and get coffee as was getting cabin fever whilst my client went to the gym. Hoping to get some White House time in later...

Here are a couple of pics:

The Pentagon!

Awesome bruschetta - my first in years!

Gallaudet - meaningless to most of you

Green tea in China town

The Smithsonian