Audi Yudasmara

Spring in Doha

2009-04-04T18:16:00.004+08:00

Our Little Chocolate Tea Party

2009-04-04T17:56:00.001+08:00

My Parents @ 5, Yudasmara Walk, Gharaffa Doha

2009-01-03T16:14:00.005+08:00

Our trip to Abu Dhabi

2008-12-30T05:25:00.005+08:00

Backyard Fun

2008-12-30T05:18:00.001+08:00

Our little garden

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At the playground

2008-12-30T04:50:00.003+08:00

Park Visits @ Aspire Zone

2008-12-30T04:34:00.001+08:00

Dahl Al-Hamam Park: Athirah's Birthday

2008-12-29T23:22:00.005+08:00

At the Mesaied Beach

2008-12-29T23:07:00.002+08:00

Catching Up

2008-12-09T03:00:00.002+08:00

Only 2 months have passed since the last blog entry yet many, many things have happened.

Within that short period, we've had the experience of being stranded in the desert, leave the country at a moment's notice, face the very real possibility of having to find another job because of contractual issues and many, many instances that made us seriously consider returning home.

Pictures will follow to better illustrate our predicament but very briefly, we got stranded in the desert because the car I was driving was simply not meant to drive on sand. We were on our way to the beach. I took the same route that my friend had previously taken when he first brought me and some Singaporean friends there - through the sand. It never occurred to me that MY car was not up to the task. Anyway, we got stuck. Alhamdulillah, by God's grace, a kind Arab man in his SUV came along and helped us out of that sandy affair.

Next sticky situation was, in my opinion, extremely avoidable. I had been bugging the HR guy who was handling my visa problems for months but, for whatever reason, he did not work on my family's visas till the day just before they expired. Only to find out he couldn't do what he thought he could because of some change in immigration procedures.

That put us in a fix. He told me the problem at about 2 p.m. that we had to leave the country. Reached home at 3.30 p.m. Tried to book tickets on-line. Found tickets to be extremely expensive. Couldn't book on-line for God knows why. Rushed to the ticketing office at 5. Got tickets for the 2 a.m. flight to Abu Dhabi. Rushed family home to start packing while I dashed to the airport to meet HR guy to get my passport. HR guy had needed passport to clear some immigration leaving procedures. Rushed home at 9.30. Got children ready and rushed to airport at 11p.m. Finally reached Abu Dhabi at 4 a.m.

Fortunately for us, a cousin is in Abu Dhabi so we saved on accomodation. Otherwise, it would have been a much, much bigger hole in our pocket.

In between, other little incidents of insanity pop up. So, it's been a crazy 2 months. Somehow, I can't say for sure that the worse is behind us.

Night out @ Souk Waqif 5 October 2008

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Ammar's first ride on a donkey !!!

Athirah is too excited to even care to look at Mummy.

Inarah says the ride was definitely a bumpy one.

Datuk is waiting for his favourite juice;
pineapple, coconut and orange.
A refreshing combination indeed !

We love the alfresco ambience.

Back to the past...all things quaint and mystical.

Mummy can we buy this cute house for Ginger and Tim Tam ?

Athirah loves this herb, eaten best with lemon juice.

Grilled lamb never tasted so so good.

Welcome to Souk Waqif

Raya in Doha 30 September 2008

2008-10-09T01:16:00.014+08:00

Eid gathering at Uncle Adnan's place.
Athirah could not resist this beauty's curls...
Ammar & Grandma @ Aunty Liza's place
Kafa (enough) cookies Ammar

Inarah with one of the Pakistani princesses...

Playing with congkak with little Aqil from UK.

Ammar is smitten by this American beauty queen.

Great male-bonding

The kids with kakak-kakak from Malaysia!

This Malaysian residence has a private beach.
We love the view !

Grandma & Datuk with the kids

My family on first day of Eid.

Eid holidays

2008-09-27T04:55:00.002+08:00

Today is actually the start of the Eid holidays here. School for my kids (and work for me) begins on 7 Oct. It's nice but my friends who have been here longer says that in the past, the Eid holidays would include the last 10 nights of Ramadhan so that people can actually do i'tikaf and seek Lailatul Qadr without having to worry about work.

Ramadhan here has so far been a quiet affair for us. We do our grocery shopping at the big supermakets in the afternoon, when everyone else is having their siesta or qailula. We try not to be out at night when traffic gets really bad. The masajid here are plenty so you can pretty much pick and choose which one you want to go to. I'm getting fond of the little masijd at the back of our house. It's actually like a little container, sparsely furnished but because of its size, you know your fellow worshippers, at least by face. One Bangla labourer must have left for home because I don't see him any more. He reads beautifully.

I've met a few Singaporeans here. Two families live about 5 minutes' drive from where we are. They seem like good people. Our house is still in a state of chaos because our cargo has finally arrived. But slowly, things are falling into place. Everyone's getting comfortable with the house; it's big enough to give everyone the space they need yet small enough that we don't need to look so hard for each other.

The house looks more like a home now.

For Nenek Asnah and Datuk Rahim 24 September 2008

2008-09-26T03:36:00.008+08:00

Athirah and Ammar posing at their letter holders.
We can't receive any mail from home as we don't have an address here.

The kids are thrilled to see their books again.
Inarah does nothing much except read all day long.
The Eid holidays have started. Yippee!!!

Ammar on his horse...nenek !

Ammar with his favourite "blue" horse.

Ammar is busy reading his book on horses.
It is horse, horse, horse all the time.

More pictures of our neighbourhood 24 September 2008

2008-09-26T03:26:00.006+08:00

The view just outside our house. Not much of a view..sigh!
The girls are addicted to this flame-grilled chicken.
Our girls' favourite "flower" chicken.
Check out the desert sand on the cars!!!

New Friends September 23 2008

2008-09-24T03:23:00.005+08:00

Our kids made many new friends!Life's not going to be all that lonely for them.
Ouch ! Don't force me Inarah...
The girls with their friend, Jamilah.

View of neighbourhood September 23 2008

2008-09-24T03:18:00.005+08:00

The dirt track leading to our house.

Our landlord's mansion. Rumour has it that he had just bought
a SGD 2.4 million car.

One of the uncompleted compound houses around our house.
Sand and Stones everywhere. We miss the grass !

Pictures from Doha September 22 2008

2008-09-23T05:12:00.006+08:00

Inarah and Athirah in their new school uniforms, waiting for their ride to school.

The stairs is a new toy. No playgrounds outside but it's ok.
Athirah on her first day at school. She made a friend.

The children having a splashing good time washing our desert-ravaged car. It's summer and water is always welcomed.

Getting more settled

2008-09-17T03:37:00.002+08:00

Now that I've been here in Doha for a bit more than 2 months, I think it's not that the grass is greener here, but rather it's a different sort of grass that grows. As always, nothing's perfect but I'm thankful for some things that have happened so far, despite the things that are proving to be annoying.

Our cargo finally arrived. We shipped them out from Singapore 2 months ago and after delays in Dubai and Doha, our things are finally here. The children were getting bored because they've re-read the same books many times over and I'm running out of clothes to wear.

Alhamdulillah, we managed to get schools for my 2 daughters. They are moving ahead of their peers in Singapore because down here, the school term starts in September. So instead of starting Primary 1 in 2009, my daughter starts Grade 1 now.

This is their second day at school. My eldest, Inarah, goes to an Arab private school called Little Muslim Girls. 3 other non-Arab girls (my friends' daughters) attend the same school and we've got an imam of a masjid to chaffeur them to school. The other girls are American and after only 2 days, my daughter is speaking with an American accent. I was really hoping the American girls would speak like Singaporeans.

The school's about less than 10 minutes' drive away but traffic can get really bad during peak hours. Everything''s in Arabic so Inarah's favourite subject is now English. They learn really basic English. Right now, her class is going through the alphabet so Inarah is a bit bored because she's already reading books for 11 year-olds. But she's behind in all the other subjects because of Arabic.

My second, Athirah, goes to kindergarten, also Arabic. It's housed in an old building but the teaching staff seem friendly. She seems to be coping well and seems to be picking up the language faster. School isn't really cheap but for these 2 schools, not so expensive either. There are 2 good international schools very near our house. One is about 2 minute's drive and another about 5 minutes' walk away. But they are full and expensive - about SGD$20, 000 a year.

The weather is changing. We're probably in the last few days of summer. But while the heat is dissipating, the winds are getting stronger. Today, a cloud of sand hovers in the air.

Insha Allah, once the girls get settled and I get the hang of the antics of Arab students, we can get down to the business of getting what we want out of our stay in Qatar. Top on the list is learning Arabic.

How long will we be in Qatar? Allah knows best.

Driving in Doha

2008-09-12T06:04:00.003+08:00

In a land where a litre of petrol costs about 25 cents, it comes as no surprise that almost every household owns more than just one car. And I mean thristy, petrol-guzzling behemoths of a machine.

They drive on the right hand side (I refuse to say the right side) of the road here. And the first time I drove, I kept reaching out with my left hand for the gear stick and handbrake. I looked at the wrong side of the road and walked up to the wrong side of the car.

To make things worse, they have roundabouts everywhere instead of traffic lights. If you have been on a busy one, you'd know that getting on and off a roundabout takes some skill and a whole lot of faith in your fellow motorists because you need to have faith that other motorists know when you have the right of way and when you need to give way to others. If you watch how the cars move in and out of a busy roundabout, you actually start to wonder why the accident rate is not higher than it already is.

Another thing about roundabouts is that it makes following directions difficult. I got lost many times because someone told me to go straight at the roundabout. But how do you know what "going straight" is when sometimes there are 3 or 5 roads at the roundabout? Which do you take to go straight? Or left? Or right?

And since the cars generally travel really fast, and the drivers quick with the horns, you just have to make a quick decision and risk getting lost. Which I did too many times. It's not difficult to do here in Doha. There's a conspicuous lack of road signs. People don't even have home addresses. They describe the locations of their homes in terms of landmarks. So if I want to tell someone where I live, I would say something like,"I live at the Burger King roundabout, behind MacDonald's".

It's really easy to get lost in Doha.

Dazed in Doha

2008-09-12T05:42:00.003+08:00

It's the blessed month of Ramadhan, the month of fasting, worship and reflection. That's what I should be doing more of now but reality always has a way of biting.

I've been in Doha for almost 2 months now. My residence permit is still floating around in administrative limbo land. That accounts for the lack of posts since I can't have an internet account without my residence permit. The good news is that my family is here. I cannot imagine going through Ramadhan alone.

Today also marks the end of my first week in school. It was a huge culture shock. A classroom is a classroom till you put students in it. And then you realise what all teachers know - every class is different every single day.

I've taught students who are weak in English but this is my first time teaching English as a Second Language. For some of my students, English is really a foreign language. I had to resort to getting one of the better students to translate what I say into Arabic.

But it's an amazing experience, and I say this without sarcasm. This is guerilla teaching. It's going back to the basics. You have students who don't know the language, can't understand most of what you are saying and have little inclination to learn. No computers, no language labs, no fancy gizmos. Just you, the students and a white board.

I barely made it through the first week. My friends tell me it's always tough the first time round. I pray the worse is over. Meanwhile, I just have to hang on.

2008-07-23T19:23:00.000+08:00

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This is the living room.

2008-07-23T01:02:00.000+08:00

2008-07-23T01:01:00.000+08:00

House Hunting

2008-07-22T20:33:00.003+08:00

It's a landlord's market in Doha. There are more people who wish to rent than there are houses available. And sometimes, the landlords refuse to budge on the rent; they'd rather have an empty house than reduce the rent.

So I'm having quite a hard time getting accommodation. Rents for houses now start from 13, 000 Qatari riyals a month and these are running out fast. You probably can get one quickly if you're willing to stretch to QR 15, 000.

Going by today's exchange rates QR 1,000 is slightly less than S$400.

Ok, got to keep hunting now.

2008-07-22T20:31:00.000+08:00

The back of the house. It's as wide as our balcony and 3 times longer.

There's a separate little building to the right that is the maid's quarters. It has a bathroom and a room the size of the children's room.

2008-07-22T20:27:00.000+08:00

This corridor leads to the kitchen on the right and bedrooms on the left and at the end of the corridor.

2008-07-22T20:24:00.000+08:00

This is the living room that the door on the right of the house leads to.

2008-07-22T20:23:00.000+08:00

The door to the right leads to a living room the size of Cik Yate's living room. The door to the left leads to another living room and the rest of the bedrooms and kitchen.

2008-07-21T14:18:00.000+08:00

2008-07-21T14:14:00.000+08:00

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2008-07-21T13:59:00.000+08:00

Uncertainty

2008-07-16T01:38:00.002+08:00

I'm waiting for my flight to Doha. I'm in Terminal 3. It's past midnight. My wife and children are in bed.

For the first time, I think I feel like a traveller. It's a different feeling from being a tourist.

For one, it's the uncertainty. I'm not quite sure what's in store for me. My friend in Doha had called me earlier today. He says there might be some delay with my visa and work permit applications. He'll be meeting me at the airport and we'll look for my temporary accommodation. Meanwhile, I have to also think of an alternative source of income while my work permit is being processed. I do have to eat.

I looked at Singapore differently today. My house, the trees that line the streets, the clouds. I know I'll miss these. When will I see these again?

I miss my wife and children.

Time to Move

2008-07-04T19:20:00.003+08:00

Moving is always troublesome.

First there's the inertia, then the realisation that there are so many things to pack hits you. Somehow, your things don't appear that many when they're tucked away in drawers and cupboards.

I've finally managed to pack away my stuff from my cubicle and my homeroom. Now, I just have to move them from my car and battle the four storey climb up to my house.

It's a strange feeling when you're leaving a place. A weird intoxicating mixture of relief, nostalgia and excitement.

Today, my students said goodbye many times over. They're a lovely bunch. The most enjoyable part about teaching is the interaction in the classroom - and that is what I'll miss about my students.

Anyway, this post will be the last thing I'm writing on my laptop from my cubicle at work.

So long Sports School. And thanks for the memories.

2008-05-23T00:47:00.000+08:00

They say if at first you don't succeed, try, try again. And again.

So at the behest of my soon-to-be former students, I shall make another attempt at blogging.

It's actually not the writing that proved the obstacle. Well, sometimes it is, but I actually do have plenty of thoughts swimming around my head - most of the time anyway.

The problem is always time. Between work and entertaining 3 energetic young children, it seems that the only logical thing to do when I finally do have time for myself is to not do anything or to catch up on sleep. The best way to not do anything is to just lie on the bed and stare at the ceiling. More exciting would be to just sit in front of the idiot box and channel-surf. It's quite easy to be an idiot in front of the idiot box.

One of the reasons I'm leaving the Sports School is to recapture time. To try and slow it down a little bit so that a day doesn't simply fly past. I want to actually get to enjoy the hours of the day unhurried. Wishful thinking? I pray not.

My fascination with time probably began when I was working in a certain statutory arm of the government whose main preoccupation, it seems to me, is to provide fun to the general populace of Singapore so that somehow the restless youth, the jaded elderly and the worried adults of Singapore would be happy and feel a deep sense of belonging to the Motherland.

That was the time when I worked almost 7 days a week, coming to bed past midnight, all to provide clean, fun activities for Singapore. Then, something clicked in my head. I was about 27 then and I thought to myself that if I were to die at the age of 50, I wouldn't want to spend my life working hard and worrying just so other people can get their kicks.

That search for something more meaningful led me to be a teacher. Cliche. But I do get a sense of satisfaction going into the classroom. In fact, that's the best part about teaching and about the only thing that's keeping me from leaving the teaching profession. To me, everything else is just fluff.

My fascination with time naturally led to an attempt to sieve out the unnecessary. I wanted to simplify life, to remove all things unnecessary so that you do only what's necessary in order to put food on the table, shelter over your head and the requisite red sports car to ferry you around. So that you have time to do the things you want. For your own kicks.

So that's what I'm trying to do. Remove the rubbish. Simplify my life. Spend time with my wife and children so that they'll think twice before they even consider dumping me at the old folks' home.

And get my kicks.