Maybe you have been wondering "where are Jack and Karen" or perhaps "why are they still here?" I spent the better part of three weeks in the Middle East in March-April (visiting Doha, Qatar; Abu Dhabi, UAE; and Riyadh, Saudi Arabia) during which I did considerable due diligence on Doha as a possible home base location. It is a livable city, but we think there's a better choice offering significant advantages.
Having won the bid to host the FIFA (soccer) World Cup in 2022, Qatar is going to be even more of a construction zone than it is now, and that's going to be the case for the next 11 years. The government has announced spending in excess of US$120 billion (with a "b") on the stadiums and other infrastructure needed to fulfill their commitment to FIFA. We want to compete for our fair share of the consulting work that will be required to accomplish that spend, but not necessarily to live in the middle of it.
Doha is not a big hub for air travel in the region. There are three daily flights between Doha and Riyadh, where most of our current clients are located, if you include the one that departs at 1:00 a.m. and arrives at 2:30 a.m. (what am I going to do in Riyadh from 2:30 a.m. until the offices open??). In contrast, there are six daily flights between Dubai and Riyadh, all at reasonable hours, and just an hour down the road is Abu Dhabi with three more.
For these and a variety of other business and personal reasons, my colleague and I simultaneously and independently arrived at the same conclusion that we should home-base in Dubai (the finanical center of the United Arab Emirates) and work out of our company's already-established office in Abu Dhabi (the political capital of the UAE).
(On more than one occasion recently, I've offered cash awards to anyone who could name without reference to any outside source the other five emirates comprising the UAE. So far, no winners. For the record, they are Ajman, Fujairah, Ras al Khaimah, Sharjah, and Umm al Quwain.)
It has taken some time to get all the corporate T's crossed and I's dotted for this re-directed endeavor, but that is now essentially complete. Karen and I are scheduled to depart on Sunday, 29 May, along with my colleague and his family, bound for Dubai. We'll likely spend the first 30 days in an extended-stay hotel while we work on residential visas and hunt for long-term housing. Once again, the adventure resumes.
