Travels | Sonya and Travis

Archive for the ‘Travels’ Category

Qatar Motor Show 2012

Wednesday, February 8th, 2012

It was again time for the Qatar Motor Show, which debuted last year, as usual there were top car makers demoing cars only a Sheikh could afford, but new this year was a drift show, a Freestyle Motocross (FMX) show and even a Formula One street demonstration.

The week leading up to the Motor Show, Shell (who recently completed the words largest GTL plant in Qatar) organised a Scuderia Ferrari Formula One street demonstration, held on the Doha corniche. After an hour or so of delays the show began, a Ferrari F2008 driven by Marc Gené, completed a number of laps, Sonya and I had never experienced the speed and noise of a F1 car before, and it was interesting trying to get good photos as it zoomed past.

In the evening Friday we decided to visit the main Motor Show, I think we went at the most crowded time, as the Qatar Exhibition Centre was packed. All the car makers were their with their luxurious makes, some of the highlights were the Porsche Panamera GTS, Audi R8 GT Spyder, Bentley Continental GTC and Lamborghini Aventador. Similar to the cars the girls were also nice eye candy.

When we left the Exhibition Centre, we couldn’t resist the noise coming from next door, we approached to find the Red Bull Outdoor Show, we waited a little while for it to start, then we were entertained with a two car drift show, the highlight being when they simultaneously drifted donuts around a camera-man. After that was the Freestyle Motocross (FMX) show, where three motocross bike riders perform jumps and stunts, the most impressive being the dangerous backflips. The highlight of the outdoor show was streetbike freestyle rider Chris Pfeiffer, who performed some amazing stunts that left you wondering how he did not lose control of the bike.

Tags: Ferrari, FMX, Lamborghini, Motor Show, Porsche
Posted in Qatar, Travels | No Comments »

A day at the camel races

Sunday, February 5th, 2012

With my sister visiting us, we decided to once more check out the camel races. Over a year since our last visit, this time it was a lot more organised, plenty of police, an ambulance, more Land Cruisers (four-wheel-drives) and a lot more camels, I think this was also due to a refurbished camel track. We arrived a little too early at one o’clock and as usual didn’t really know if it was going to occur or where to watch.

As it approached half past one, Land Cruisers gathered on either side of the start, and we could see camels being herded to the starting pens, and as usual, with no prior notice, the gates were opened and the camels began to race.

We watched a few starts, and even followed the Land Cruisers with our Nissan Sunny, behind the scenes in the holding pen were plenty of camels waiting their turn to race.

Tags: camel, race, Shahaniya
Posted in Middle East, Qatar, Travels | No Comments »

Doha Zoo

Saturday, January 7th, 2012

We were a little unsure about visiting the local Doha zoo, I had read a few negative reviews that claimed very poor conditions and animals mistreated, but it was new years eve, a three-day long weekend and we didn’t have too much else to do.

Entry price was five Qatari Riyal and as usual for Qatar, it was family-day, where single males were unwelcome (unless you were Caucasian of course).

First up was the a single white-tiger, which didn’t help with the zoo’s negative image, a tiny domed cage with the tiger strutting back-and-forth along the edge. You couldn’t help feel sorry for it.

Onto the birds, a much more pleasant encounter, many varieties including Grey Crowned Cranes, ducks, geese and flamingos, which we had never seen before.

Next was a lonesome elephant, the small enclosure brought the elephant only a few metres away, so close that a man was able to extend his arm with popcorn and the elephant was able to extend its trunk to grab it, and would have, if the man hadn’t been stopped by the zoo keeper. Feeding the animals was a common occurrence in this zoo.

Similarly to the elephants, the monkeys were in arms reach, however nobody seemed to mind that they were being fed, and young Qatari boys and girls were happily feeding them popcorn and biscuits, even though there was a “Don’t feed the animals” sign right above them.

The open savannah enclosures housed zebras, giraffes, deer, antelopes, and of course Oryx, one of the main reasons for the zoo visit. Surprisingly, Oryx weren’t very lively animals, preferring to laze around on the ground.

Finally, we visited the nocturnal and small animal enclosures, similarly to the other animals the animals were easily visible and accessible, however there was minimum security, and many children were banging on the glass trying to get the animals attention.

Overall the zoo was enjoyable, animals were visible and accessible, maybe too accessible in some cases, the small enclosures and children feeding them being a result of this. Unfortunately, like the rest of Qatar, Qataris are ‘above the law’, and this isn’t a good thing for the animals.

Tags: Doha, giraffe, Oryx, zoo
Posted in Qatar, Random, Travels | 2 Comments »

Mathaf – Arab Museum of Modern Art – Cai Guo-Qiang – Saraab

Saturday, December 31st, 2011

The Christmas long weekend finally gave us a chance to visit Mathaf (‘museum’ in Arabic), Qatar’s Arab Museum of Modern Art. At the time, Mathaf was showcasing Saraab (‘mirage’ in Arabic), by Chinese contemporary artist Cai Guo-Qiang.

Guo-Qiang’s work ‘homecoming’ is visible as you walk through the Mathaf entrance, sixty-two large granite rocks all the way from Guo-Qiang’s hometown Quanzhou, China. Carved on the rocks are Arabic calligraphy, a tribute to the deaths of the Muslims minorities in Quanzhou.

Once inside Mathaf (the gallery itself was designed well, with white , minimalistic spaces, though easy to get lost), the first indoors work was ‘ninety-nine horses’, a large eighteen metre gunpowder drawn mural with additional small gold leafed horses hanging in front. One of Guo-Qiang’s signatures are the use of gunpowder in creation of his work, from simple explosions with templates creating works on canvas all the way to extravagant outdoor ‘daytime fireworks’ exhibitions.

The next work was one of Sonya’s favourites, titled ‘fragile’, it consisted of 480 porcelain square panels assembled into an eighteen metre canvas, each square had intricate ‘Blanc de Chine’ or Dehua (an area in the Fujian province in China close to Guo-Qiang’s hometown) porcelain flowers. On the large canvas the Arabic word ‘fragile’ was drawn with gunpowder and ignited, this contrasted with the delicate porcelain.

One interesting work, titled ‘flying together’ was a suspended lifelike camel with falcons surrounding, the falcons seemed to either be attacking or helping the camel to fly. Like the camel, falcons are a symbol of Qatar, where falconry (essentially, keeping falcons as pets) has existed for thousands of years.

Towards the end of the exhibit were documentaries showing Guo-Qiang’s fireworks choreography, which even included the ‘daytime fireworks’ in Doha that we unfortunately missed. Daytime fireworks use coloured powder to paint the sky, because there are no smoke trails, the powder looks to appear from nowhere (except for the big bang prior).