Travelogue: 26 hours in the air
The TV screen persists in drawing my attention to the direction of Mecca in reference to the position to the aircraft. I've been listening to the screams of a neglectful mother's crying infant for about 12 hours. The meals come at regular intervals and I eat mechanically, no longer aware of when my body is actually hungry. In a few more hours, Mecca and this layover will be over and I’ll continue my journey to the Far East… but until then the door swings open and I walk into an open-air sauna.
Good god, it’s hot as Hades and someone's wrapped a hot towel around my head. I can hardly breathe.
Therein lies before me the dessicated lip of the Arabian penninsula: Doha is no oasis, but a cardboard cutout city perched on the edge of oblivion, bleached by having been left too long in the sun. Against this backdrop, black lilies are swaying and bowing in their delicate silk garments, hair piled high under veils as thick as petals resembling Galician princesses guided by men no more impressive than camel herders. They're as mesmerizing as any dancing snake in a street-side bazaar. Alluring as they are haughty and conjuring only the smallest bit of tragedy in this empty place with little else than gleaming walls and miles of sand. The desert air lends itself to a deafening silence, a semi-imagined hum or buzz that comes more from sheer emptiness than overhead planes or industrial generators.
Good god, it’s hot as Hades and someone's wrapped a hot towel around my head. I can hardly breathe.
Therein lies before me the dessicated lip of the Arabian penninsula: Doha is no oasis, but a cardboard cutout city perched on the edge of oblivion, bleached by having been left too long in the sun. Against this backdrop, black lilies are swaying and bowing in their delicate silk garments, hair piled high under veils as thick as petals resembling Galician princesses guided by men no more impressive than camel herders. They're as mesmerizing as any dancing snake in a street-side bazaar. Alluring as they are haughty and conjuring only the smallest bit of tragedy in this empty place with little else than gleaming walls and miles of sand. The desert air lends itself to a deafening silence, a semi-imagined hum or buzz that comes more from sheer emptiness than overhead planes or industrial generators.
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