I don’t really want to compare my social life in the two places; it’s impossible to compare a place you have lived for years with somewhere you stay for just two months. Obviously I didn’t have the chance to develop a real circle of friends in Doha, but I did have lovely colleagues who gave me a lot of practical support, and I got to know a few other people, too. Nevertheless, one big difference for me personally was the fact that in Bahrain, the majority of my friends are Bahraini; I'm not sure that even if I lived in Doha for longer I would have that many opportunities for socialising with Qataris (though I think the stereotype of Qataris being aloof and arrogant is somewhat unfair). (Incidentally, on a number of occasions I met people - including Qataris - who, when they heard I lived in Bahrain, immediately said, "I love Bahrain! Bahrainis are so friendly!")
Another huge difference is that in Bahrain I speak Arabic frequently (even if I should speak more), while in Doha I found that I wasn’t speaking it at all. That's partly do with mixing mainly with people who weren't Arabs, and partly because Qataris don’t do the “normal” jobs that Bahrainis do, working in petrol stations, taxis, supermarkets etc. (When I mentioned to a Baluchi driver in Doha that Bahrainis do such work, he was flabbergasted, and made me repeat it, thinking he had misheard.)
That down-to-earth aspect of Bahraini society is one of the things I really appreciate about living here. But it’s not just about people, or even friends (I can be quite reclusive at times and not see anyone for days on end); it’s also about how the place feels to me. This is the thing I’m having most difficulty articulating, and all I can say is that Bahrain feels human to me. This is partly because the scale of things here is relatively small; there are a few areas (Seef, Juffair, Diplomatic Area) where everything is high-rise and imposing, but on the whole things are at a much more human level than in Qatar, where buildings and roads are much larger, everything is being developed, and you feel like you’re living on a construction site much of the time. (My impression of the place wasn’t helped by the fact it took me forever to get my bearings, and I kept getting horrendously lost when driving.)
I’m not a person that really pays much attention to aesthetics, but I do respond to the feel of a place, and Bahrain just feels a lot more organic and established (if we ignore all the land "reclamation" schemes), while Doha is very much in a process of re-creating itself.
Funnily enough, I was reading some Qatar-based blogs last night, and chanced upon an old post whose first line expressed a similar idea (even if the blogger's reasons for saying so are very different to mine):
Bahrain is everything Doha isn't: relaxed, informal, fun, interesting. It doesn't take itself too seriously.I’m not saying that Bahrain is a perfect society, and that Qatar is awful. Indeed, Doha was starting to grow on me, and I’m sure if I had spent longer there I would have learned to appreciate the place more. I just missed Bahrain enormously when I was away. It is a place where I feel happy (even if frustrated at times) and somehow connected to society, to the people around me. It’s really good to be back!
