| Biswo |
Posted
on 26-Jan-04 11:57 AM
"The population of Qatar is 600K and 400K of them are aliens." I read in a National Geographic last year. Due to an inexplainable fluke, I was in Qatar on my way to Nepal a few months later, and the ratio of aliens to the entire population became evident to me right at the Doha Airport. Police, Airline officers and other workers, perhaps even the immigration officers, were either from the Indian subcontinent, or at least could speak Hindi/Urdu.
A man who looked like a Nepali accosted me and asked if I were a Nepali. I said yes.Then he asked me if I were going to KTM. I replied positively. Then, for courtesy rather than curiosity, I asked him the same set of questions. He also said yes. Then I signalled him to sit next to me if that's not too much for him.
He was evidently curious about me. He looked at me, and wondered if I were also from Qatar. I said I wasn't. Then he asked me where I came from. Upon my reply, he asked me how much an average Nepali laborer could earn in USA.When I replied, he was somehow surprised, the surprise untinged by any jealousy towards his fellow Nepali brethren toiling away in USA.
Slowly and steadily, other Nepali gathered at the airport. They all had given up the pretension of becoming polished gentlemen. A lot of them were unshaven, their clothes crumpled, and they were carrying cheap bags. "Not much things to buy here" one remarked."Very expensive!"
A huge plane came slowly sliding towards the gangway connected to the small airport of Qatar. Police vehicle in Doha seemed to be all BMW300 series. The prosperity also showed in the brands of apparels/cologne on sale there.Most of the Arab women flitted in the airport with veiled face. Men came in the traditional Arab dress, topped in the head with the checkered Keffiah.Male kissed each other at the hands. At the restaurants, they chose coffee from the menu that wouldn't look different from the menu of a Houston restuarant. They sipped coffee, smoked stylishly 555, and threw their gaze to the swarming tourists of the airport.After the plane was well connected with the gangway, the announcer announced that the flight to Kathmandu-Qalalampur was ready. Some hurriedly went to be the first in the queue. I waited.
Another Nepali was brought to the counter by the Qatari police. They handed his passport to an airplane authority.They explained to him that his passport would be given back in Nepal. The boy seemed to be despondent. He was about 20. He later joined me in the gangway. I asked him what was the reason of his deportation. He said he arrived Doha just a few days ago. Later figured out he didn't have proper paperworks. He then angrily cursed the agent, who also was his distant relative, and then again ruefully remarked how he would show his face to his villagers who had bid him goodbye with some kind of fanfare.But he said he was well treated by the policemen there. His image of police evidently was formed in Nepal where they epitomize bruteness.That was when I asked my companions where they hailed from.
Udaipur.
Solukhumbu.
Khotang.
Pyuthan.
I wondered for a minute about the fact that a hardworking Nepali could earn 200 dollars a month in Solukhumbu just by working as a porter.
Inside the plane, they clumsily tried to buckle themselves, and I had to help them. For a lot of them, it was only second ride to the plane. They told me they were planning to drink heavily. May be Tequilla. May be Beer. I didn't know Qatar Airways also served liquor.The fellow from Udaipur told me he had just married before leaving for Qatar. I wondered why he married 'just before' leaving for Qatar. Wasn't that too painful for his wife and for himself too? I also asked him whether he missed his wife too. It was a bit unconventional question for a Nepali, and he shyly acknowledged he missed her. "She is too young. Just 19." He said.
Then slowly they asked me what I studied, where I studied. When they figured out I was a student of computer, they told me that if I were a "champion" in "doing" computer, jobs were aplenty in Qatar. I asked them how they spent their weekends in Qatar. A lot of them acknowledged that they played cards and drank beers. They also told me that they earned about 200 dollars a month, but could earn more than that if they worked overtime. With that paltry sum in that desert, how could they afford to squander money in beer, I wondered. They told me that a lot of Nepali earned nothing in total because of their habit. They just work, and gamble with each other.75,000 Nepali are there in Qatar:almost all are living like that. A life without ambition. A life without prospect. No desire to understand future. Facing future as it comes. Working for others like an indentured person. Some pointed out to me that there were also some Nepalis working as businessmen/doctors etc, but most of the Nepali wre working just as a cheap laborer of an emerging industrial country.
As I thought about these compatriots, a caucasian airhostess came pulling a trolley. She asked me in English what I would like to have. She was relatively tall. Her orthodontically impeccable teeth glinted in the dim light of the pressurized plane as she flashed her priceless smile.A small depression in her cheek formed a beautiful dimple.I savored her beauty for a fleeting moment,and asked if I could get a cup of coffee to keep myself awake till I reach Kathmandu. I was not very hungry.
|
