Posted on December 14, 2015



SONY DSC

SONY DSC

SONY DSC

SONY DSC

SONY DSC

SONY DSC

SONY DSC

Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Culture, Middle East, Photography, Travel
Posted on December 10, 2015
MB attended a football game in Doha, Qatar, last weekend. At the Al Sadd Sports Club. It reinforced his view that the decision to award the World Cup to Qatar in 2022 is a good one.
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: 2022, Al Sadd Sports Club, Arabs, Culture, Fans, FIFA, Football, Middle East, Qatar, Soccer, Sport, UEFA, World Cup
Posted on October 30, 2015
Back home in HX, the two favourite types of music of the natives are: country and western. Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Big Tom, Children, Country Music, Culture, Death, Four Country Roads, Late Late Show, Middle East, Music, Nathan Carter, RTE, Suffering, Travel, War
Posted on October 23, 2015
Like many, MB has watched the refugees streaming into Europe on his TV screen over recent months. He didn’t realise until today that he actually knows some of them personally.
Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Austria, Middle East, Refugees, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Syrian
Posted on September 4, 2015
And so to the question from Coffeegrounded a few weeks back:
Are women not allowed to gather at cafes during the evening hours?
I live in pure ignorance of the Middle Eastern Lifestyles, mainly for fear that if I search to read about it I will be considered a person of interest…while living in a my native country that espouses freedoms galore.
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Abiya, Burka, Culture, Ladies, Lifestyle, Middle East, Shisha, Travel
Posted on August 28, 2015
MB received a response to his last post that made him stop and think………….
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Culture, Doha, Indians, Lifestyle, Middle East, Musheireb, Qatar, Subcontinent, Travel
Posted on August 23, 2015
Qatar.
MB currently resides in Qatar. It is probably most famous at present for being selected to host the 2022 football (real football) World Cup. Doha is the capital city and already a huge amount of redevelopment and infrastructure is underway to ensure a timely completion ahead of the games. Although there are still seven years to go before the event takes place, the Qataris are taking the opportunity to rebuild their entire capital city and are also modernising much of their countries roads and transport system. The new Doha airport which opened last year, after a few years delay to the works, is as modern as exists anywhere in the world.
The award of the World Cup to Qatar has come in for much criticism, but MB wrote a recent post on the Qatar 2022 tournament, which he fully supports: https://michealdebarra.com/2015/06/05/qatar-2022-the-case-for/
Property rents are extremely high throughout Qatar and in Doha especially, compared to most places in the Middle East region, or even beyond. For decent rented accommodation one can expect to pay in the region of Euro 1,250 per month for a single room in a shared apartment, or in the region of Euro 2,250 per month for a single bedroom apartment. Consequently recent years have seen a vast amount of residential developments completed. Many more are either under construction or at architectural design stage.
The below pic was taken by MB a few nights back in the new Doha ‘des res’ area called ‘West Bay’
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: 2022, arabia, Blog, Construction, Culture, Desert, Development, Doha, Middle East, Qatar, Travel, West Bay
Posted on August 14, 2015
Suddenly, one early afternoon in February 2012, MB found himself face to face with a Hezbollah street demonstration in Beirut, in support of President Bashar Al-Assad in neighbouring Syria. Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Be careful out there, Beirut, Hezbollah, Lebanon, Middle East, Syria, Travel, War
Posted on July 30, 2015
MB follows and reads the posts of a number of bloggers of varying hues and colours. Amongst them is a blog called This, That & The Other Thing. Author Janet posted a short account earlier today called Go Ahead, Give ’em The Finger and it got MB to thinking. Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Crime, Deportation, Flipping, Injury, Insult, Jail, Middle East, The Bird, Trudeau
Posted on July 1, 2015
“Seems like this whole region is going backwards”, said a friend to MB a few days back. Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Bigotry, Culture, Doha, Intolerance, islam, KSA, Middle East, Mohammad Abdul Wahaab, Politics, religion, Salafism, School, Teacher, Wahaabi
Posted on March 20, 2015
Dubai lady. Look under the cover!
Just because an Arab Muslim lady wears an abiya, like the lady in the below pic and like many other women in the Arabian Gulf, does not mean that she does not have the same hobbies and interests that a lady back home might have. MB took this shot at a food demonstration in the gourmet food and restaurant section of Galarie Lafatette in Dubai Mall. Her similarly dressed cousin was giving the demonstration at the time and a friend of MB was hosting the event.
As you can see she likes her style, within the confines of her culture, and has a high end canon camera. If MB may be a tad critical – her photo shooting technique is poor and that photo will have come out blurry for sure!
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Abiya, Arab, canon camera, Gulf, Middle East, Muslim, women
Posted on February 14, 2015
MB attended the Irish Football tournament in Qatar yesterday. For most of the day he could have sworn he was in Ireland! Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Cider, GAA, Gaelic Football, Guinness, Hurling, Ireland, Irish Culture, Irish Music, Middle East, Qatar GAA, The Dubliners, The Fureys, U2
Posted on January 25, 2015
The King is dead. Long live the long living King. Etc.
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Al Saud, islam, King Abdullah, King Salman, Middle East, Saudia Arabia, Wahhab, Wahhabism
Posted on July 18, 2014
One of the most interesting countries in the ME region is Jordan. Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Amman, Culture, Jordan, Middle East, Nabbataean, Petra, Temple Of Hercules, Travel, Wadid Musa
Posted on July 13, 2014
Had lots of hits on the ‘Relic/Yemen’ post of yesterday. New follower AKM commented to MB that he is Yemeni but is many years since he has visited his home country. Asked MB if he could post some more pics from Yemen. Read More
Category: Irish man in the Middle East Tagged: Child Brides, Culture, Hadaydah, islam, Middle East, Poverty, Red Sea, Sanaa, Travel, Yemen
It's a mad HX world!
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