Qatar is building on celebrations year on year. There are a number of huge milestones and events that have lead up to this as well. Look at the launch of the Museum of Islamic Art, The Media Expo, Qatar Media Freedom Center, the involvement in Philipines resolutions, advancement in Human Rights, the launch of other huge developments for example, winning the World Cup, and the list goes on. Qatar’s definitely in the spotlight and Doha will continue to shine bright as long as changes keep happening.

So whether you’re Qatari, American, British, Indian, Philipino, Japanese, Chinese or any other nationality, and let’s face it, Qatar is a melting pot of diversity, please celebrate National Day with us! Let happiness run through you like a rush of energy. Here’s a thought to make you smile. Think of each firework that goes off on December 18 as the sound of the country’s heartbeat.

One common question I’m asked is how is it that Qatar changed National Day’s date? It never changed. They’re thinking of Independence day, which is on the 3rd of September. Here’s some more info on National day (from QatarNationalDay.qa)

On 18 December 1878, Sheikh Jassem bin Mohamed bin Thani succeeded his father as the ruler of Qatar. With that, Qatar became a country with a vision… a country that would find unity, grow rapidly, and reach toward ever higher heights.

National Day, also known as Founder’s Day, celebrates the rise of Sheikh Jassem as the father and founder of the State of Qatar. And yet this holiday is a mere two years old: it was founded in 2007 to give people an occasion to honour the history and identity of their country, and to commemorate those who have worked and continue to work to make Qatar a great nation.

The 18th of December is a special day – a day of unity for the people of Qatar. We want you to be a part of it!

For the past three years (well this is the third year) we’ve put together a very special National Day event site. It started in the end of 2008 (when we officially started working on iLoveQatar) and then we got the support from Vodafone to turn the experience into something prettier. I didn’t want to simply give people an events listing page and figured that with all the traffic going to the site (last year we had around 20,000 unique visitors in around 10 days) we should be doing something helpful!

So we started promoting Qatari talent. In 2009 we promoted Rayana, an amazingly talented singer. A small girl with a big voice. In 2010 we promoted Moh’d Kamal, Qatar’s first Qatari stand up comedian. This year we’re promoting a bunch of Qatari cartoonists, each with their own style! So far we’ve got @fatoomworld @wse7en @iba7r and @mana_qtr . Many of them contribute to www.qartoon.org

So if you’re looking for some quick info on what National Day is all about, a great events guide, and want to check out some great Qatari talent, then check out www.qatarnationalday.qa (yep we’ll be using that domain from now on so bookmark it!). Oh and guess what? You’ve got a chance to also win 10,000 QR from Vodafone! Head on over to the National Day and click on the competition tab to find out more

A day to be proud of

Qatar National Day 2010 is coming!

First of all let me say that there are people in QNB that I adore. I think that they are amazing people, but I only wish that the whole organization acted the way that they do. There’s no way I’m keeping this bottled in. Qatar National Bank is a STUPID bank. Now I’ve ALREADY got an account with them, but every time I wanted to check if transfers were made, I had to drive to a branch, wait in a que, then ask for a print out. Why? Because they don’t give you internet banking by default, you have to apply for it, and at the time of joining them they didn’t TELL me that I had to apply for it.

So I finally decided that I was going to get online banking. I stepped into a bank and asked for the service. The man behind the counter told me that I could just register online at home. “Are you sure?”, I asked. “Yes of course”, he replied. So I went home and tried to register. [Please enter your atm number]. I don’t have an ATM card for my companies account… So I finally decide to go back to the bank again and explain the lovely situation I was in. The fun begins.

“Don’t worry sir, we’ll apply for an ATM card now”, the new guy I’m talking to says. I was annoyed that I had to come in again, but at least it was done. “CR and employement card please.”, he asks for. Now I start to get annoyed, why the hell would I be walking around with my company’s employment card and CR certificate. I explained to him that not ALL companies get the employment card anyway. He says that it’s a requirement. I explain to him that some companies don’t apply for an employment card because they don’t have HUGE organizations. (On a side note, I DO have one, but my point was that not everyone has one). I sat down for 20 minutes explaining the law and the process that companies go through to become legal. He’s paying attention and taking notes. Once done, he tells me that he never knew the process and thanks me for letting him know. Now this kind of shocks me. He’s a business customer agent that doesn’t understand how companies run?

No problem, I leave and decide to come back with every single document I have. When I do, I meet a woman who asks me for certificates and documents (some that the last guy didn’t even tell me to bring). While going through papers, she pauses and says, “I can’t accept this copy of the CR, I need the original”. There is NO WAY that I’m going to just be handing over the original CR. Without it, my companies couldn’t do any business in the country! I couldn’t believe that QNB asked for it! She had a stamped and authenticated copy in front of her and it wasn’t good enough.

So I started to rant. I couldn’t understand WHY they needed all of these documents again when they saw this ALL when they first set up the company. I tried to speak logically. HOW could I have opened up by bank account without them seeing all of this in the first place? She then tells me that they have the documents, but it’s in the file. “So go get the file!”, I say. “It’s in head office, I don’t have access”, she replied. “But you KNOW it exists otherwise I wouldn’t have an account right?”, I ask. She looks at me with NO emotion. (Oh I should mention this is all in City Center branch).

I get so frustrated but finally I cave. Fine! You’ll get the original, but I’ll send someone else to come in to show it to you. “No, I need you to give it to me as I need to witness you signing the request form”. I asked if she could just witness me NOW and then have someone else drop of the CR and she says no. Now I’m furious. I don’t have time to sit at the bank all day! People have JOBS. So I ask to speak to the manager. The person in charge is this Qatari woman with a soft smile. I explain the situation and she’s as shocked as I am. The Qatari woman was sitting RIGHT NEXT to the the customer agent I was speaking to (with a divider between them). The woman then tells me to tell her that she said it was fine. “You’re sitting right next to her, can you tell her yourself please?”, I asked.

She gets up and then asks the woman to just witness me and that it’s fine to have someone else bring the CR. Finally, I’m going to get this stupid ATM card so that I can apply to have online access. What’s funny is that I can’t apply for the online access easily (which allows me to transfer 37,000 QR a day max, but I have authority to walk into a branch and transfer unlimited funds myself…. What LOGIC is that?!

Now, you think that this would be the end of my blog. Sit back and relax.

A week later I get a call telling me that they would NOT be issuing me with the ATM card because they need ALL the signatures. All the signatures…. I’m the only signatory for my company. They explain that need my father and my uncle’s signatures.

Now my company is a subsidiary of the parent company that my father and uncle runs but it’s independent. The official government document SAYS that I’m the only signatory for this company.

I tried to explain this all on the phone, but they ‘couldn’t do anything for me’. I had to go into the sheraton branch (where I originally set up my account in), and then talk to the branch manager to see if he could help me. Here’s the kicker. The Sheraton branch doesn’t exist anymore! They shut it down for a month now! QNB sent me to a branch that doesn’t exist! WHAT SYSTEM IS THIS?!

So I had enough. I tried to do things the RIGHT way. I hung up the phone, called the AGM of QNB and he sorted it out in 2 minutes. Why do I have to use Wasta for something like this.

Ok so you’ve read my story, I’ll leave it to YOU to decide whether you want an account with QNB for your company. Normal customers should be worried too, but I’ll explain why in another blog one day.

This was already on the front page of iLoveQatar.net but I just wanted to share this awesome video of fireworks going over the skyline. This is probably the BEST video I’ve seen on ND.

More pictures here http://iloveqatar.net/forum/read.php?5,26010

Even MORE pictures on the ILQ Flickr group http://www.flickr.com/groups/926592@N20/

I’m sure that this national day is going to be a big one! With us winnning the 2022 World Cup as hosts, Qatar will probably want to show how awesome it can be.
Be warned though, if you are anywhere near the corniche, you’ll be stuck for a good couple of hours as people drive down on packed lanes, dancing, cheering, and waving flags.

Usually the westbay area has huge led screens showing different shows and arab celebrities (for those stuck in traffic and unable to watch the show on tv), trees are lit up with in themed colors (last year was purple and yellow), signs drip with led lights, banners and flags are waved all over the place and people parading to enjoy the festivities.

Around 6pm is when you should get on the corniche. That’s where you can see the sound and light show and enjoy the fireworks display. If you are lucky, you’ll also be able to get a table at Al Mourjan and enjoy some delicious food, desert, and if you’re partial to it, have some sheesha.

It’s going to be cold as usual, so make sure you come wearing a jacket. Last year was so amazingly cold and since the corniche is by the sea, I can assure you that you’ll regret not bringing something warm to wear.

So if you’re looking for a great guide to the events around Qatar (not just the official ones), visit http://www.nationalday2010.com You’ll find a bit of information about the history of Qatar, various events, some downloads, and you’ll also find some funny videos made by Qatar’s first Qatari comedian (and ILQ Ambassador), Mohammed Kamal! Thanks to Vodafone for helping ILQ put all this together. (To other companies, if you’re willing to partner up with ILQ and help us do other awesome stuff, please drop me a line!!)

Don’t forget to sign up to the ILQ newsletter. Registration on the site!

Original Thread Here!

Well we’re busy running around and creating a great events list. We’ll have a great little suprise for everyone soon.

More importantly, ILQ and Vodafone have teamed up for a fantastic event at Aspire park. There’ll also be details released very soon.

So get ready to have a fantastic National Day!

More here

UPDATE! This site is ready! It has a complete list of events for what’s happening, including ILQ and VF’s own event at Aspire! I’ll cover more of that tomorrow

Visit http://www.nationalday2009.com

So let me start this off by saying that I worked with a great team. I worked for a subsidiary of QNB. Independent (to an extent), challenging, and did I mention that there were great people to work with?

My issue is probably with the bank itself in ‘essence’. I cannot find fault with most people (note I said most). However since joining, there was always the feeling of confusion, no not from my end, but from QNB itself. Nobody really knew what they were doing completely; I talk about the people I interacted with of course and this post is only meant to highlight my experience.

What made the experience a bit sad was that QNB actually treated staff worse than customers. Now if the level of service given to customers is quite low, you can only imagine what staff get. No special rates, hardly any exceptions, processes are a bit more difficult and you have to pick up your account debit card 4 months after you apply in a leaky toilet under head office. Alright so I made the last one up, but that’s how it feels.

After quitting, I decided to take the professional route and stay a month in order to take care of the work left over and to ensure that the projects (and clients) that I had on my plate were completed and/or handed over professionally; after all, that is the right thing to do. Many Qataris simply leave the next day, but oh no, I had to let morals get in the way. It was a foolish mistake.

I had left to Japan when I had the lovely surprise of seeing that my cards were canceled. Yep, I had a month left, went on leave for a few days only to find that I couldn’t use my cards half way through. After returning to Qatar, I saw that I couldn’t use any of my cards! Calling up customer service was of no help because they simply said they didn’t know what the problem was.

So I waited a bit over a week and then finally decided that I didn’t want to have my money in a hidden account and went off to the main branch to set up a new account. They gave me a few papers to sign, signed them, and left with the card. Not bad, I get a debit card on the spot. The next few days didn’t go on too well since it took a while for it to link up to my online banking. It was a hassle, I had to create a new account and transfer funds, but it was over and done with. The end of the month came and my team gave me a nice lunch to say goodbye. That’s pretty nice.

Last pay and I’m out of there. Nope. No pay. Yep no pay for me. QNB didn’t put me on the pay roll. They told me that they would pay my salary 21 days after I quit. Wait what?! I have a mortgage to pay… I worked for a whole month for what? To get paid two months later? I tried called the AGM since he was a friend but he was on vacation for 3 weeks.

So I send off an email to a person I considered a friend at HR and ask him to please ‘help a brutha out man!’ He was always friendly to me, and in fact, he told me to call on him if I ever needed help. I explained the situation and got an reply “Isn’t this your signature”, with an attachment to an account cancellation form. The form was dated the 19th! They canceled my account BEFORE I signed that form. I was GIVEN that form when I created a new account! Plus canceling my original account is against policy! It should have been converted to a customer account… Guess they follow policy when it suits them.

I explained that to him and he cced in someone saying “please follow up”. Nice…. thanks Qatari bro. You really helped me out there. //end sarcasm. So the guy (who also works in QNB HR) goes an reactivates my old account… no I don’t want my old account reactivated… Just send my salary to the new one… No he can’t do that… So Saturday comes a long and I get a text that my account is 10+k overdrawn. What? Wasn’t my account reactivated so that I could get my salary and now I’m overdrawn?

The geniuses reactivated an empty account which automatically charged me an ‘empty account’ fee, then charged me some sort of interest, and then pulled out the mortgage. To make matters worse, the mortgage statement didn’t even reflect that! What the hell?!

So the office manager sends an email to HR on my behalf asking them to please sort this out. What does she get as a reply? “It’s a customer account now so it’s not our business. Let him go to main branch.”. What the F~~~~~ I don’t even want to waste a badword on them.

So now I have to go BACK to the main branch, get them to waive these fees and sort crap out. How nice of them! Who wants to bet I’ll be speaking to someone who either a) doesn’t care or b) ‘can’t do anything because it’s out of his hands’.

Moral? Sometimes you just can’t be too nice…  *sighs* No regrets from leaving a bank that couldn’t at least show me an inch of compassion. I guess I stayed as long as I did because of a few reasons, the CEO was an interesting person, one of the GM’s was a supporting individual, and I met some amazing staff at the bank. It’s thanks to them that I cannot say that all my time was a waste.

Note: Let there be no misunderstanding. My time in my line of work was great. I learned from my team, I managed to work on fantastic and amazingly huge transactions, and I was able to get a new understanding for the way the banking ‘game’ is played, it’s just that I wish things went a bit easier. We return to that classic sentence which is meant to be words of support but often get considered words of despair “Life’s not easy”.

I will soon be sharing a story about QNB and my experience with the company. It will just highlight my experience on my final days at working for the bank. Bare in mind though that I worked for a subsidiary called QNB Capital, which was independant and what I’ll share has no connection to.

Here’s a little video clip

Enjoyed some great food by the sea at Al Mourjan, smoked a bit of Shisha, watched the waves, chatted with good friends, and enjoyed a fantastic fireworks show.