Qatar National Day 🇶🇦
(Doha)
She doesn't force you to like her, this pretty little city — she's not aggressive. You wake up one day and find yourself disarmed, fallen for her without intention. She's gentle, mostly, not abrasive - perfectly comfortable with what she combines of radically contrasting elements. And there is privilege of course, in not being entirely privy to the unpleasant. Every existence is not without secrets - but even in her rougher edges, in the back streets with dustier walks, in the expanses and sometimes corners where the bushes aren't as pruned, the spaces more clustered — there is a charm. She is charming in her authenticity, when the glitter and glam do too much — and even then, she remains authentic throughout. Or perhaps it's her people, those who reside within her, who have made her a home through their multitudes and diversity - an effervescent simplicity contagious in them all.
It's not entirely true, what they say of the Gulf — the generalisations of money and bling — a narrative omitting almost entirely the growth of those young. Not all descend from empire, not all claim heritage from aged roots — some spring later, from tribes and collectives, from nomadic movement matured into settlement, at their own pace, forging a present in a world so obsessed with past grandeur.
(The only country where some have genuinely felt at home though it will be never theirs)
December 18, 2023
@pursuit_of_truth
(Doha)
She doesn't force you to like her, this pretty little city — she's not aggressive. You wake up one day and find yourself disarmed, fallen for her without intention. She's gentle, mostly, not abrasive - perfectly comfortable with what she combines of radically contrasting elements. And there is privilege of course, in not being entirely privy to the unpleasant. Every existence is not without secrets - but even in her rougher edges, in the back streets with dustier walks, in the expanses and sometimes corners where the bushes aren't as pruned, the spaces more clustered — there is a charm. She is charming in her authenticity, when the glitter and glam do too much — and even then, she remains authentic throughout. Or perhaps it's her people, those who reside within her, who have made her a home through their multitudes and diversity - an effervescent simplicity contagious in them all.
It's not entirely true, what they say of the Gulf — the generalisations of money and bling — a narrative omitting almost entirely the growth of those young. Not all descend from empire, not all claim heritage from aged roots — some spring later, from tribes and collectives, from nomadic movement matured into settlement, at their own pace, forging a present in a world so obsessed with past grandeur.
(The only country where some have genuinely felt at home though it will be never theirs)
December 18, 2023
@pursuit_of_truth