This is Rubbish

I had another altercation with our home this weekend, and once again it won.  I had a very confusing email conversation with a maintenance man at our compound asking him for a trashcan.  He replied that he wasn’t familiar with a trashcan.  After a few emails it was determined that I was actually looking for a ‘rubbish bin.’  This man informed me that every unit has a ‘rubbish bin,’ including mine, but I insisted that I didn’t have one.  The nice maintenance man showed up on my door step five minutes later and I showed him our carport which did not include a ‘rubbish bin.’  He then walked me to the other side of our house and showed me the second carport with in fact included a ‘rubbish bin.’  I had no idea that we had two carports and felt like a complete idiot.  I had no clue what to say to the maintenance man, so I just smiled and repeated ‘rubbish bin.’  Well, apparently we have two carports and a very nice ‘rubbish bin,’ fancy that.

 

I did win one house battle this weekend.  I set up the cable all by myself and was rewarded by watching Glee.  We have 99 channels.  About 20 of those channels show soccer 24/7, some are in Arabic, many are British channels, but there are about 10 American channels.  We get ESPN America and History (pawn stars baby) so Jonathon should be happy.

This weekend I ventured into Landmark, one of the Doha malls.  It was very crowded and overwhelming, but I did find Target’s Middle Eastern cousin named Carrefour.  Carrefour was a beautiful sight.  The store has frozen pizza!  I don’t really like frozen pizza, but for some reason I am comforted by the fact that it is available.  It is considered rude here to take someone’s photo without asking, so I didn’t snap any shots at the mall.  I am still trying to figure out all the boundaries.

I had two main fears prior to travelling over here, and I am pleased to say that both of them were silly.

        1. No toilet paper in public restrooms.  I had heard that most bathrooms had bidets and no toilet

          paper. So far, every restroom has been equipped with toilet paper.  Thankfully this is completely false.

        2. Stray cats and dogs running wild.  I have not seen one stray animal while here.  I know that

          Jonathon was looking forward to making some new kitty friends, but it doesn't look like that will be

          the case.

Thanks for checking in.