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Welcome to the Cape: Part II

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Welcome to the Cape: Part II

Cape Town is a special city. A Dutch colonial outpost for trade with Asia, settlers brought slaves from modern day Indonesia in the 17th and 18th centuries. It was subsequently controlled by the British bringing a wave of Indian migration. These communities mixed with the Africans indigenous to the Cape and with people of European settler ancestry. The result is a vivid mix of race, culture and religion.

One of the main highlights was visiting the small neighbourhood of Bo-Kaap. Home to the ‘Cape-Malay’ community – it’s a small Muslim community dating back to early 1800s and comprises a mix of Indonesian, Indian and other ethnic communities settled in Cape Town by European settlers. Small tightly backed houses like the streets with each house proudly painted in bright colours.

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Welcome to the Cape: Part I

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Welcome to the Cape: Part I

The beauty of the Middle East is that most of the world is really accessible to you. When deciding where we want to travel, we literally open the map and start dreaming up possibilities.

And that’s how we thought of Cape Town. Although not particularly close to Doha, its much closer than from Canada. It also fit exactly what we were looking for: moderate weather, incredible natural beauty, a rich and incredible history and culturally vibrant.

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Qatar Nights II: Museums, Brunch, Markets Galore

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Qatar Nights II: Museums, Brunch, Markets Galore

2017 is going to be our year of sharing.  Sharing recipes (Batoul is adamant about learning how to cook 5 of her mother’s most delicious Iraqi dishes - let’s see if this actually pans out), our travels, experiences and general daily musings.    

We have had some pretty cool and hilarious travel experiences and we want to use our small space on the web to document these adventures of ours.  A few of our friends may be visiting us in Qatar this year in the off season (beware, it’s treacherously hot in the summer - only visit in the late fall, winter or early spring!), so we thought it would be timely to highlight some of our favourite spots around town.  

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Qatar Nights I: Dune Bashing in the Inland Sea

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Qatar Nights I: Dune Bashing in the Inland Sea

While it wasn't the greatest idea to go dune bashing at 6 weeks into my pregnancy (there may or may not have been some throw up along the 1.5 hour ride), it was still such an epic experience!  Our driver Sameer, a Pakistani native who grew up in Qatar and spoke perfect Arabic took us on a bumpy ride around the Inland Sea.  The Persian Gulf juts into southern Qatar near the Saudi border creating an incredible scenery fit for all sand dune and sunset lovers.