my trip to the gulf states

19 March (Saturday) to 21 March (Monday)
After planning my early March trip to London-Paris, my independent travel buddy called and said he wanted to travel during the spring break to earn some miles.  We talked about some of the areas we could visit, and he suggested The Persian Gulf States (GCC).  I agreed, having wanted to visit that area for a long time.  So we booked a trip in late March.
We started at HNL where we arrived via Charley's taxi and checked in at UAL and spent the next hour in the Red Carpet Lounge where I enjoyed some of the cheese and veggies while continuing to read Alex Berenson’s The Midnight House.

We caught flight UA 76, and I found my seat at 20B for our departure at 2106 for SFO. We landed at Gate 82 on time after a smooth flight. 
We headed for the Red Carpet Lounge to refresh ourselves after the flight, arriving very early at 0508. The lounge had a nautical theme and served up cereals, cheeses, and crudites plus various liquids serve.  We left the lounge for gate 86 for flight UA 914 (coshared with Brussels Airlines 8818, Cont 6046, SAS 3933, Aer Lingus 6185, US Air 6572, Luft 9369, NZ 9560, Austrian 7884, South African 7405) at 0751 bound for Washington Dulles.
I noticed that the movies would be the same throughout our flights, True Grit, The King’s Speech, and The Chronicles of Narnia. We landed at Dulles (IAD) at 1555 and headed for the Red Carpet. The lounge was oddly situated, entering and then walking down to the lounge area. It was crowded with people and kids heading out for spring break. The usual cold fare was available, cheeses, crackers, and crudites.
We then headed for C4 to catch UA 982 to Kuwait (KWI) at 1805. Most of the travelers were male, most looking like military or DOD contractors. I was in seat 18B. It would be a long flight, basically over the North Atlantic through Europe over Turkey, Iraq, and Kuwait City. We were served a meat stew with salad and then a turkey-cheese sandwich (no ham for this flight). I finished The Midnight House, the ending becoming somewhat obvious.
We landed at gate 4 on Monday afternoon at 1310 and headed for immigration, no barricades provided so that we mingled with departure passengers, as advised by the Captain, only to be asked where were our visas. So it was turn around, up the stairs, and wait in the visa line, having picked a number bakery style.

Once through immigration, we caught a ride to Oasis Hotel. We entered through the rear so the hotel looked less than spectacular. We checked in and went to our room, 505. Our bell person was from Goa who arranged a driver for a quick afternoon tour of Kuwait City. We passed The Grand Mosque which is the largest and the official mosque in the country of Kuwait. Its area spans 45,000 square meters (480,000 sq ft), out of which the building itself covers 20,000 square meters (220,000 sq ft). The main prayer hall is 72 meters (236 ft) wide on all sides, has 21 teakwood doors, and has lighting provided by 144 windows. We then headed for Kuwait Tower.

The Kuwait Towers are three towers of reinforced concrete in Kuwait City. The main tower is 187 meters high and serves as a restaurant and water tower. It also has a Viewing Sphere which rises to 123 meters above sea level and completes a full turn every 30 minutes. The second tower is 145.8 meters high and serves as a water tower. The third tower houses equipment to control the flow of electricity and illuminates the two larger towers. The towers hold 4,500 cubic meters of water. The towers were designed by Sune Lindström and Malene Björn and were built by Energoprojekt, a company from Belgrade, Yugoslavia. During the Hussein Iraqi attack, there was substantial shell and bullet damage to the towers' exteriors. The interior damage was mainly to electrical gear, mostly lift equipment. Some of the large triangular glazed panels were also damaged by shell fire. The most interesting feature of the Tower, in
addition to seeing most of Kuwait City, was the pictures of the destruction during the Kuwaiti-Iraq war. I guess the Kuwaitis are not into forgiving or forgetting.

From the Towers, we headed for Hard Rock Café along the marina to purchase pins, cordial glass, and other souvenirs.souvenirs.
We then headed for Souk Sharq which I thought would be a traditional souk since it was listed on top ten things to do in Kuwait. The Souk turned out to be a Kahala Mall-type shopping center. It had a cool water clock with levels of water indicating the hour, the minute. It even had an anchor store, Debenham’s.
We returned to the hotel to rest up for dinner. In our floor’s lobby were two Bulgarians working their laptops and using the outlets in the floor lobby. They looked like common workers although they could have been enforcers for the Russian mafia.  Just joking.
We had dinner in the hotel’s dining room named after Tipu Sultan, a hero of Mysore India. Tipu was born in November 1750 in Devanahalli and died on 4 May 1799, Srirangapattana. His nickname was the Tiger of Mysore, and he was the de facto ruler of the Kingdom of Mysore. He was the son of Hyder Ali, at that time an officer in the Mysorean army, and his second wife, Fatima or Fakhr-un-nissa. His full name was Sultan Fateh Ali Khan Shahab, Tipu Saheb or Bahadur Khan Tipu Sultan. In alliance with the French in their struggle with the British, and in Mysore's struggles with other surrounding powers, both Tipu Sultan and Hyder Ali used their French trained army against the Marathas, Sira, Malabar, Coorg, Bednur, Carnatic, and Travancore. He won important victories against the British in the Second Anglo-Mysore War, and negotiated the 1784 Treaty of Mangalore with them after his father died the previous year. In the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War (1799) the combined forces of the British East India Company, the Nizam of Hyderabad defeated Tipu and he was killed on 4 May 1799, defending the fort of Srirangapattana.
Our waiter was from Nepal with a degree from a school in India in hotel management. He served up murg makkan wala, chicken butter masala, and kadai vegetable. We started with daal (lentil) soup and samosas.

After dinner, we did a walkabout the area, next door to National Bank of Kuwait corporate headquarters and took pictures of the light display of 50/20, fifty years of independence and twenty years of the war with Iraq. There is an underground, the British definition. This underground gets you from one side of the intersection to the next without having to fight the ever-present traffic.
On 22 March (Yaumuth Thulatha - Tuesday)
we began with breakfast in Tipu Sultan after a 0430 wake-up call from the mosque across the street. The set-up was buffet with vegetable curry, foul moudammas (dried fava beans in oil), eggs (done to your style). We checked out and headed for the airport which is one of the strangest in the world. We entered the departure area only to find it was closely linked to the arrival area. After entering the departure area, we could have taken a left turn to the visa section which we had entered the day before. We left via gate 5 which was next door to gate 4, our arrival gate with no barriers except to the gate itself. We shared the gate area with this a#$@hole who acted like he was CIA (probably all show and no go) and couldn’t resist “yelling” about the time he had to submit his weapon to security. These two Arabs entered the gate, one looking like his dishdasha was personally made for him, the other off the racks, fashion statements for GQ.
We left at 1020 on Flight GF (Gulf Air) 0214, an Airbus Industrie A319, in seat 8E and landed in Bahrain at 1125, our original flight’s departure of 0715 being canceled due to the turmoil in the region. We decided to stay in the airport as we didn’t have enough time to head into the city (and, shucks, Hard Rock Café) so we walked the terminal to have a snack at Starbucks, part of a large coffeehouse sub-culture not only prevalent in the Gulf States but in USA, Europe, and Asia. We also did some souvenir shopping, buying Bahraini pearls made up as necklaces for $5.00. Sssh, don’t tell my cousins.
I noticed some men in “sack clothing,” looking more like torn sheets. I guessed these guys came back from Mecca having completed hajj. Several used the washroom (the term for restrooms in the Gulf States) to sponge bathe or paper towel bathe. When undertaking the pilgrimage, Muslims shed all signs of their wealth and societal distinctions by donning simple white garments, commonly called ihram. The required pilgrimage dress for men is two white cloths, one of which covers the body from the waist down, and one that is gathered around the shoulder.

After a five hour layover, we headed for Gulf Air flight 0526 and seat 18D for our departure to Doha Qatar. It was a 45 minute flight on an Airbus Industrie A320. Once cleared through immigration, we were met by a hotel representative who drove us toThe Gloria Hotel where we checked in. The Gloria is a business hotel, and it seemed that a lot of pretty people were in the hotel Tuesday, probably a fashion shoot for some Italian fashion houses. We were told to walk over to Souk Wafiq for dinner. Before we left the room, we had to place our Bahrain pearls into the room vault. Thank God for the safe. Otherwise, we would have to hire Pinkerton or the Qatari equivalent.
We left the room, feeling much more secure. We then headed for the corniche and the famous Pearl Monument, this area starting out as fishing and pearling communities. Because of the Islamic rule against the depiction of human figure, the Qataris, and the rest of GCC, put up monuments like the oyster, pitchers, and jugs.
We walked through the old souk with its spice shops, its clothing shops, its food shops. We continued our walk to the newer side of the souk, feeling like we just entered Epcot Center, the recreated Dubrovnik. In this side of the souk, we had dinner at Restaurant Altawash. I had chicken with rice.
We ended the evening by walking a little more through the souk, passing all those people smoking the sheesha. I am now working on Nelson DeMille’s The Lion.
On 23 March Thursday, we got up early for a long day visiting Doha and heading for Dubai UAE.  Our hotel is across the alley from a mosque so I hear the call to prayer at 0430, the fajr. We are up early to have breakfast in the mezzanine dining room. It has several buffet lines, reminiscent of a German fruhstucke. I order an all-inclusive omelette, including the peppers. The omelette is brought to our table by a waiter from Kerala. I wonder if there is anyone left in Kerala. I also had beans, foul beans, sausages, and a donut.
Today our taxi driver was from Kerala. These taxi drivers work for six to eight months in GCC and then return home, during the hot months.

Our first stop was downtown Doha to take in the new buildings and all the construction which will inundate the city with high rises. The three most impressive buildings were the RasGas Headquarters with the ball clutched within the two towers, Burj Qatar with its filigree outer skin, and the split Faberge egg.
We left downtown, the business center, for Aspira Dome and Villagio. The Dome was closed with not a very receptive information desk (or was it a security desk?). We drove around the Dome and spotted some silly sculptures like a soccer ball which provided a great photo op. We then headed for Villagio, a ultra modern shopping mall with a kiddie land called Gondoleria. Also part of the Italian theme was the man-made canals with their own gondolas. I enjoyed a Krispy Kreme purchased from the Laguna duo, so many of these service workers are from the Philippines. We walked among all the ultra chic stores to find Dean and Deluca where I purchased a watermelon “jam” and a chicken-emmental panini.

We headed back to the corniche and the Museum of Islamic Arts, designed by I.M. Pei, with interior layout by Jean Michel Wilmotte. We shared the space with the school children of Doha, the boys of middle school age so no amount of shushing would quiet them until they were banned by the security cops. The girls were younger and much more behaved.

The museum is laid out in the following manner: the ground level is for the gift shop and any traveling exhibit; the second level divided by art forms like calligraphy, coins, statues, ceramics; the third level divided by regions like Iraq, Iran; and the fourth level administrative. The Museum showcases artifacts that the Al Thanis - Qatar's Royal Family - have been collecting for many years. The collection of artifacts for the Museum has stepped up in recent years, with vast sums being spent on Islamic Art, although more recently the buying has been hit by scandal over the vast sums spent. As well as the Qatar National Collection of Islamic Art - a collection of metal work, ceramics, jewelry, woodwork and glass collected from three continents - the Museum also includes 600 year old artifacts of ivory and silk inscribed with Islamic and Arabic inscriptions. Further examples of exhibits include panels lined with gold thread that decorated the imperial tents of Iran and Central Asia in the thirteenth century, as well as a curtain decorated with calligraphy that lined the walls of Al Hambra in fifteenth century Muslim Spain. The collection includes several pages of ancient Qurans, one of which is thought to have been compiled just a few years after Mohammed's death. None were compiled in his lifetime, so this must have been one of the earliest Qurans.  We finished our stay in Doha, heading for Dubai but then that's the rest of the story.