Well, the day finally came. Scared by imminent arrival of competition (read: Vodaphone) Q-Tel had been rolling out a bunch of new services and bundling old ones. So, finally, they came around to offer Blackberry as well. Hooray! (or not?)

(For few of you who’re not into gadgets, Blackberries are mobile phone-like devices that apart from working like any normal GSM phone also send and receive email instantly, pretty much like SMS messages, as they’re sent. BB’s are standard tool of any road warier for a while now)

So – how does Q-Tel’s BB offer stand? Unfortunately, just like anything else Q-Tel, poor and miserable.  

(I have to add the disclaimer here that I am talking only about “personal” service here. Q-Tel also has a “corporate” offer. I can’t speak about the level of service for that one… )

So – First of all, let’s see what is the deal: Q-Tel instructs you to get the devices (phones) from “Starlink”, authorized reseller. Starlink has 3 devices on offer, 8300 Curve, Pearl and another one, all in all reasonable choice. Actually, they are selling unlocked devices, so you can also bring your own unlocked BB from anywhere and get it to work with Q-TEL (more about this later).
You can convert any post-paid GSM line into BB account. It is a straight-forward procedure, and can be done over 111 line. To start, they’ll charge you 150QR, with further 125 QR / month for the service.

So far so good, right?

Well, now comes the funny part.

First of all, nobody in Q-Tel seams to know ANYTHING about BlackBerry, what it is, how it works, anything. Girls working on 111 line have two lines of text they’re obviously reading from some sheet of paper and that is absolutely ALL you can find out from them. No supervisors, no technicians, no managers. Nothing. Nobody. No. Information.

So, dear reader, to save you from what I’ve been thru, let me provide some information for you:

-    Although they say that 125 QR/month plan allows for unlimited email/internet access, it really doesn’t. Your BlackBerry DOESN’T have internet / data access, and you can’t use any 3rd party that needs it – from WorldMate, Idea Matrix, to Facebook. Nobody in Qtel knows if they have any Data plans. Nobody I managed to reach over 111 knows that such things even exist. All they will do is read over and over those two lines of text – how to read email and how to “search Internets”

-    Some weird rudimentary Internet access does exist, but only through “MOSAIC” button which shows up in your BB once Q-Tel is activated. Even then, it takes 10 minutes for it’s own start page to load, and most websites are not accessible.

-    Q-Tel drops BB signal on average once every two days. You can tell by letters “GPRS” turning to small “gprs”. Small letters means no BB. Only cure is to take the battery out of your device and put it back in.

Yes, you CAN use unlocked BlackBerries, and this is how (don’t even bother calling Q-Tel):

1 - Call 111 to activate BB service for your phone. Use post paid GSM chip, and install it in your BlackBerry
2 -  When you see letters GPRS in Caps, BB service is operational (takes them approx. One day)

3 – Go to -> options -> advanced options -> host routing tables – then click on the Menu button of BlackBerry and click on “Register now”

4 – Go to option – Advance Option – enterprise activation, and put your user name and password, and press “Register”

Once you’re registered, you can go to www.qtel.blackberry.com and do all sorts of settings for your email including filters and signature files ( Girl from Q-Tel’s 111 categorically claimed that you can’t.. but believe me, you can)

So – is it worth it? Well, if you’re out of the office much, site or travel, I’d say yes. BB is very, very usefull and well integrated with your existing email, whichever you’re using.

And if you want to actually use Internet, I’d recommend ordering unlocked BB device with WiFI (you can buy unlocked 8320 from several websites in USA, that is what I did), and then activating it here. That way you can at least go browsing when you’re in range of WiFI somewhere...

Ghost of Che Guevara is alive and well in Doha, Qatar.

Almost every day in Doha, one can see stickers with the face of famous “revolutionary” plastered on car windows. Fashion? Ignorance? Lack of cultural sensitivity? I guess the answer is all of the above...

How on Earth did this character became an idol of Doha youth? Who imports and sells these stickers? Do they have any idea who this moron was and what does he represent???

Fashion?

Give me a break.

A leader of a Communist bandit gang, best friend of Castro, person who would enter the village and immediately shoot all people of religion for being “contra-revolution” ??? Granted, he didn't kill many Moslems, but, believe me, he would've had he had a chance! He did attempt to lounch a "revolution" in Algeir if memory serves me well...

Nevertheless, his ideology did both prosecute and kill every person who believed in God, and in Eastern Europe, yes, that includes Moslems!

What do they think?? (youths plastering Che's face on their vehicle's windshields). Do they even bother reading history and finding out who this person was? Or does he, all bearded and filthy, looks to them like some Afghan Fighter? I almost feel like stopping one of them and asking!!!

I saw two cars today that made me write this (although, my hate for Che and everything Communist runs much deeper, of course).

First one, pickup truck, had a big “Allah” sticker on one side, and even bigger “Che Guevara” face on the other side of the back window. So – word of God, and a face of Communist god-denying preast-killing murderer on the same window!!!! It's kinda like having Palestinian flag and a face of Arial Sharon, right???

Other car I saw today was even worse, not Che, although it falls into the same category of ignorant stupidity – ragged car, driven by an Arab expatriate, had a HUGE sign, written all across windshield, “HITLER”. Must've stricken a note for killing all them Jews, right? I can only imagine the horror of German expatriates seeing that one!!!

So, pls. people, can you please do some thinking before you put a sticker on your car? Please? This. Hurts.

Yeah, yeah, I know. Road safety is a big issue nowadays in Qatar. And rightfully so – driving in Qatar is shockingly bad, especially for newcomers. From time to time you can read funny news on the Internet, like when some tourist websites describe driving in Qatar as “equal to practicing an extreme sport” or the recent interview of the former US ambassador to Qatar where he's saying how Qatar is safe and friendly and he felt safe here all the time, but the only thing that was dangerous while living in Doha were terrifying roundabouts when his wife had to drive by herself...

But, c'mon, these boards??? On almost every traffic light in Doha they've hanged incredibly ugly ridiculous boards with slogans like “Enough” “Brother, where are you” “Father, where are you” etc. Artwork looks as if it is done by a retarded 5-year old who had half day to learn Photoshop.

Boards contributed tremendously to uglyfying Doha, just now in times when it is becoming known and respected worldwide! This makes Qatar look like a third world country – like one of those emails circulating with stupid road signs in Syria or Bangladesh!

And, NO, they will not contribute to road safety either – only thing they CAN do is to make even more accidents as you have to squint to figure out what is meant to be represented on those ugly artworks, or you burst laughing when you see “Enough” sign written in “Rocky Horror Show” font!

ENOUGH! Remove that crap now!

And, if they really really want to improve the road safety, one word – IMPLEMENTATION. Put more police on the roads, put more cameras everywhere and be tough and strict with the implementation of existing laws. No 12-year olds racing in the Land Cruisers, which is, IMHO, the greatest cause of accidents in Doha! Impede daddy's cars! Fine them thousands of ryials! And you'll see.

Burger King!

Living here in the Middle East one gets used to a fair share of stupid, silly or even worse advertising campaigns. Yes, we all know, the industry is still new, lots of amateurish companies, etc, so you're kinda used to it, and just learn to ignore endless dumbness.

But this one is waaay and beyond and deserves a special mention.

First – Burger King started something called “Chicken Fries” that are, ehm, pieces of chicken shaped like French (for our American friends, “Freedom”) Fries. TV commercial that was endlessly aired featured two (poorly done) 3D chicken, Father and a Son, with son hanging out with French Fries and father asking him what he is doing. Young Chick answers that now he can also be Fries!

This one must be seen to be believed! It reminds you of that classic SNL animated sketch about a chicken “wow – they frying me, thank god I'm dead”, just, you know, these people are not joking...

Now – they are hanging posters (can be seen on roundabouts and in Burger Kings) that are done using complete Finding Nemo design, fonts and a layout, to ADVERTIZE HAMMOUR (FISH) BURGER !!!!!

You like a little fishy called Nemo?

Eat a fish burger.

As this campaign is developing, I can't wait to see a cute little Cow recommending you to eat his buttock because it's tender (Hitchiker's Guide anyone?)

Hi all... I didn't write for a while on my Blog... you know, vacations etc...

Well, first of all – few impressions from various airports and airlines:

During the summer, I visited Istanbul, Beirut and Abu Dhabi Airports.

Istanbul: If you're ever connecting trough Istanbul, having HSBC bank account is a MAJOR advantage – you're allowed to use “ORANGE” lounge which is wonderful, spaceus and clean. Wi-Fi available and fast. Hours pass buy quickly and easily. Highly recommended.

Beirut: For you smokers out there this place is a treat: probably the only Airport on the planet where you're allowed to light up while waiting for you luggage! Even Istanbul won't let you do that! Hooray!

Abu Dhabi: It's kinda like Doha 10 years ago. Unorganized, unprofessional mess. Apparently, Abu Dhabi is now waking up and wants to be a business hub... Ugh, it's gonna take a while. Even simple things like going to transfer desk require a fair amount of yelling, frustration, etc.

And one more thing: What's up with not having WiFi in Airport lounges? Both Beirut and Abu Dhabi make you buy a card to access it (and in Abu Dhabi – well nobody knows where to get the card, how much is it and how to use it ???????)

C'mon people, it's 2007, wake up. Having WiFi in the Business Lounge is a necessity, NOT a luxury! Ask Doha, Dubai (or any other airport in civilized world).

I’ve spent 3 days in Abu Dhabi and Dubai on business, driving between the two. Now, I’m not exactly a stranger to this place, having lived (albeit briefly) in both these cities, so, here are some of the recent impressions…

I’m pleased to announce that ridiculous and pointless marketing campaigns of Telecom Corporations are not limited to Qatar only (he, he). I’m talking about “DU” , new telecom operator from Dubai. They’re apparently all about new things, modernity, technical achievements, etc, yet ALL of their billboards (and by God, there’s more of those than Cranes in Sh Zayed Road) feature old people, Bedus, some of them in the rain. What??? Why??? Their TV commercials are equally dumb – showing traditional life of Beduins??
Marketing slogan is even sillier: “ADD LIFE TO LIFE” And you get what? More life? Another life? or maybe “Second Life” Video Game?
And in Eureka moment, after driving past them billboards for the umpth time, I finally realized what does that logo of theirs remind me of: DUREX !

(some evil-minded people might argue that there is subliminal message there, and that it is entirely appropriate for a huge Dubai company to be branded like Durex… But I’m not like those people… ;-)

……………………

Dubai is still jammed day and night, no matter how many new bridges they open… Driving from Abu Dhabi to Media City takes one hour tops. Driving from Media City to the Dubai Airport takes at least one and a half hours…

…………………….

And for those people who keep bragging “Dubai this, Dubai that, Doha sucks”, you know the type – there’s one at EVERY party in Doha – let me give a small sample of the news from the local newspapers:

- 23-year old Kazahstanian woman found dead in the trash
- Armed gang broke in the villa of a prominent Indian businessman and TORTURED him in front of his family to extort money
- Masked man stabs a girl with the knife in Sharjah

Need any more? So next time you hear this rant, just think that the quality of life is not entirely measured in a number of new nightclubs opened every month…

……………………..

And one of my favorite places on Earth has to be Dubai Airport. I am still fascinated by it like the first time I’ve seen it, eons ago. For those of you who’ve never been there, this is the place with thousands of different races, spicies, classes, colours and shades of humanity all brought into one same building… Like Jabba The Hut’s caffee, only more modern and not many get eaten…. This must be the best people-watching place ever!

Well, as you can see, I am not only gonna ridicule companies in my Blog – I also like to document the good things they do. Let me tell you about the little thing that happened to me the other day.

Small disclaimer first: I am already a fan of Qatar Airways. Whenever I can, I fly with them – IMHO they’re simply the best airline based in the Middle East, and that, yes, includes Emirates too. New fleet of planes, smiley staff, amazing First Class on the long distances, and the food, even in Economy, simply two classes better than anything I’ve ever tasted on the plane.

The other day, I was booked on QR 8 AM flight to Dubai. My luck – that was the day when that Bangladeshi plane imploded and the Dubai Airport was shut down. I was already checked in when the news broke, sitting in the Lounge. Within minutes, Qatar Airways personnel was switching people on Abu Dhabi flight which was about to take off. Unfortunately, they could only do it for people without the luggage checked in. My luck again – I NEVER check-in stuff on my Dubai flights – hand luggage is enough for a couple of days, but this time I had the boots…. Well that’s a different story…

Anyway, I came back to the passport control, left the airport and went to Qatar Airways office nearby. Within minutes, they were able to book me on the next Abu Dhabi flight, but now the bag was the problem. I had to go back to checking, and get the boarding pass cancelled and the beg unloaded… Messy, even in much more advanced airports, don’t you think? Qatar Airways guy assured me that he already informed the ground staff and everything will be fine…

Skeptical, I went back to the airport, and yes – they were already informed, and in 10 minutes or less, there was my new boarding pass, my bag re-stickered and checked in! All that followed with smiles and great hospitality!

It is relatively easy to buy the bunch of new airplanes, smile at people and ask them weather they like chicken or beef – you can only really tell if the airline is any good in a crises situation. In this case, whole Qatar Airways ground staff deserves 10 out of 10!

And yes, my bag DID show up in Abu Dhabi… Together with them boots.

……………..

And juuuust as I wrote this all, thinking to post it when I get back to Doha, I’ve boarded QR 111 on Thursday evening, 7PM… 7:20, still sitting in the plane on the tarmac, pilot Luca announces that Doha airport is too busy, so we can’t take off….. 7:45 pilot Luca announces that one of the engines fails to start, he’s calling for the ground staff …. To cut this part short, 8:30 pilot Luca gives up, and we’re unloaded…

Friendly and visibly relieved crew informs all passengers to go to the transfer desk…
And this is where the mayhem begins…

First of all, Dubai Airport is always busy, so there are hundreds of people already at the transfer desk, so when our, already frustrated, group joins, there’s mess, yelling, nervousness. Dubai Aiport staff tries to do their best, but there’s just too many people to be handled at once.

15 minutes later, Qatar Airways representative finally arrives. Person with the name tag “Ali”… To quote one other famous flier, Ali doesn’t look like someone you could give a drawing of a small sheep to take care of… Unfortunately, this impression proves to be completely true…

Arrogantly ignoring the crowd, Ali finds it very important to strike conversations and share jokes with a small group of Qatari youngsters, collecting ONLY their boarding passes, re-booking only them and ignoring all of us others cuing or attempting to ask him what is going on… In a worst racist fashion, unfortunately seen so often in this part of the world, Qataris get sorted out first, then us Europeans, and then everyone else… Mess, nervousness, people pushing and yelling at each other, in short one hell of the night.

In the end, the airline actually did everything right – all Doha bound passengers were loaded on 11 PM flight, which was reasonably fast, and all people having connections transferred to other carriers… But the bad taste remained, all thanks to Ali..

If there’s a point to this story, I guess it is that only the small things matter, and one or two persons make a whole world of difference in crisis situations such as these.

Both of these situations were not Qatar Airways’s fault – Dubai Airport closure on Monday, and engine malfunction of Thursday. In both cases, Airline itself did the right thing, and did it promptly. But, everyone dealing with Qatar Airways ground staff on Monday left Doha Airport pleased that he or she was handled professionally, while every single one of passengers stranded on Thursday cursed Qatar Airways for hours, thanks only to Ali’s ignorance and indifference.

Had QA have a nice person and not Ali-The-Numb-Nut in Dubai to greet passengers taken off the flight, tell us what’s going on and assure us that we will be on 11 PM flight, everything would be perfect and Qatar Airways would have hundreds of satisfied clients telling stories to their families and friends worldwide… Like this, even those gourmet little sandwiches left a very, very bad taste in everyone’s mouth…

I am constantly fascinated by inaccuracies, prejudice and general ignorance of writers working for Gulf Times (and, believe me, Penninsula and that other one are not much better).

Reading Gulf Times provides for almost daily amusement, and I’m not talking cartoons here… Misspellings, wrongly interpreted news, you just name it.

In my company, from time to time we have these press conferences announcing new products. Every time we bother to write full detailed press release, and include the word file and images on the CD. Not one time, and let me repeat NOT ONE TIME did they manage to print the article without misspelling executives names, writing the name of the Company or the product wrong, on generally completely convey the message of the conference badly – missing the point altogether or making one up completely. This has became a source of amusement to us in the Company – after having the press conference, buying the newspapers the next day and laughing at the stupidities.

Most recent example: today’s front page. There’s an article about Qatar installing free WiFi in one of the parks. There are photos, everything. Wireless Internet. WireLESS, get it?  Title of the article: “DOHA PARK GETS WIRED”.

I’ve promised myself I’m not gonna ridicule in my blog The Company All Expats Love To Hate (read: QTEL). But I can’t help it…. They’re just too easy…

“Let’s Connect” – marketing slogan or shouts heard all over Qatar from people desperately trying to connect their supposedly all-time DSL connections!

Of course, I’m talking about last week’s 2-day outage. Both my home DSL and my office were out…. You would think they’ll apologize? Noooo, they issued some silly little press release blaming unidentified “vendor”.

QTEL – only company in the world that can charge (and overcharge) for the services they’re NOT providing… let’s see… I’m charged 400 QR/month for my (sometimes) 2Mbs at home…. So this month, two days being off, they’ll charge me 371.4 QR, Right? Right???. Ummm, no.

And don’t you just love when they issue their annual figures in Gulf Times boosting about phenomenal profits they’ve made? It’s kinda like sticking their finger in everyone’s eye and going na-na-na-na. Give ME an absolute monopoly over a vital service that everyone has to use and let me charge however much I want, and you’ll see how profitable I’ll make MY company!!!

And just one more thing:

Message to the creative genius who came up with those posters on the roundabouts saying “Internet – the Future of Business” and “Internet – the Future of Entertainment”…
Duuuuuuuuh!

Yesterday, at the FORBES conference, (which is brilliant BTW, and if you’re missing out, you’re loser), Qatar’s FM hinted that Qatar is looking into changing visa / sponsorship laws.

For those of you who don’t live in Qatar, here, like in all other Gulf Arabian countries, your residency visa is not issued by the Country – it is rather “sponsored” by your company. In reality, this means that you can’t resign and get a better job without your company giving you a “release”. Your company can even ban you from working in Qatar for a long period.

I certainly support this decision. Qatar’s has been a leader in the Gulf for quite some time in many areas, and it’s a time now to get the visa regime in line with the rest of the world. Present system simply gives companies waay too much power over employees and one could argue that it is even out of line with the Human Rights policies. Every expat I know who’s been in the business in Qatar for a while will tell you these horror stories of foreigners starting up businesses with Qataris only to be kicked out and banned from the country by their partner. Of course, this doesn’t bode well for Qatar’s image in the world.

Most employers will argue against change, citing arguments that it is very, very difficult and expensive to recruit in Qatar (and therefore they don’t want their employees leaving), and that’s true, but this is your typical “chicken-egg” situation. It is difficult to recruit PRECISELY BECAUSE of the sponsorship laws, and a non-existent job market…

In our company, we never used our power over employees this way. We aim to create great working experience, friendly and fun atmosphere, respect for our employees work, and I think we are succeeding. And if someone wants to leave to get few pennies more somewhere else, well we wish him/her good luck…

Of course, as soon as this new de-regulation starts, expect a rush of headhunters to siege your employees. There’ll be turmoil. There’ll be disruptions in operation. But this is progress, and Darwinian (or Adam Smith’s, whichever you prefer) system will ultimately help Qatar’s economy become better.

Some companies in Qatar already use this “creative” recruitment policies, and in most cases it is for their loss, actually. Right now, talk of the town is this large construction company who’s building an island (wink wink). They’ve been a big mess with their marketing effort since they started, changing Agencies every few months, spending ridicilous ammounts of money on inconsistent campaigns, installing new marketing personnel weekly etc (and no, I’m not talking about Qatar Airways, he, he). This Company’s new strategy now is to grab employees of marketing companies they’re dealing with and attempt to do the job by themselves. Talk about “soukh” mentality in a multi-billion dollar project! First, they employed account manager of Advertising Agency they negotiated with for a long time, and now, after negotiating with the (different) production company for months and months about creating a documentary video, they’ve recruited their main cameraman. Of course, this is silly – one account manager can’t create a campaign, you need an Agency for that, and one cameraman can’t create a video – that is a team effort, but you get the picture… Expect a lot of this once the de-regulation kicks in...

I know, I know, all of us living in Qatar are supposed to be proud of Al Jazeera brand, and a fame it brought to Qatar…

And all of us non-arab speaking expats eagerly awaited (and waited and waited) for the English version, hoping to finally experience what is that famous bold and uncompromising journalistic endeavor.

Finally, when it was launched, I was oh so very proud and happy for them. All those technical achievments – High Definition TV station from scratch – something never done before anywhere, all that fuss. I watched it for days, happy that they finally pulled it off, and then I realized that it….. well, sucks!

Presenters are utterly boring, few of those “big name attractions” are, well not worth their reportedly astronomical salaries (one is, with all do respect, maybe a legend but waaaay too old and should retire, another back to news after silly stunt in Hawaiian shirt-computer-programming, and the biggest star, ex CNN, so smug and full of himself that he’s just laughable…). Not to mention a cast of others, obviously gobbled together for “diversity” some of who can barely even speak English…

And don’t even get me started on the “look and feel” of the whole thing. They could spend zillions on all that HD gear but can’t pay decent editors or graphic designers??? Yes, I understand it is a new channel, but for god sakes, have a look at Dubai’s ONE – also new, but beautifully thought over? Al Jazeera English is now visually “Worldwide Amateur Hour of Design! “ News Hour???? Do they seriously think nobody else has a Mac so they can rip off that clockhour thingy so blatently???

All in all – such a massive disappointment. Idea was great – yes, this planet desperately needs a news channel to talk about important things, challenge, inspire. But all that this Aljazeera English can do is to inspire boredom and yawns.

I do hope someone on the board will wake up soon and fix this, what now looks like a 3rd rate British local TV and make it into what was supposed to be a world leader.

PLEASE DO IT QUICK !

We’re still rooting for you, but please hurry up. This is simply unwatchable (hot Lebanese-looking babe in American studio excluded ;-) !

Hi and welcome to my blog.