Qatar
The small, gas-rich desert peninsula on the Arabian Gulf that rose from pearling and Bedouin life to staggering wealth and the gleaming city of Doha, an Arab-Muslim emirate of the majlis, falconry, and famous hospitality. The complete guide.
Qatar is a small, wealthy country on a desert peninsula jutting into the Persian Gulf from the Arabian mainland, sharing its only land border with Saudi Arabia, with about three million people and a capital at Doha, where most of them live. Once one of the poorest places on earth, a flat, arid land of Bedouin herders and pearl divers, Qatar was transformed within a single lifetime by the discovery of oil and, above all, vast reserves of natural gas, becoming one of the richest nations in the world. It is a hereditary Arab monarchy, an emirate ruled by the Al Thani family, and a conservative Muslim country whose culture is rooted in Bedouin desert traditions, the sea, Islam, and the famous hospitality of the Gulf. A striking feature of Qatar is that the great majority of its people are not Qatari citizens at all but workers from abroad. This guide walks through the land, the heritage, the faith, the food, the festivals, and the customs in turn.
Overview
Qatar is a country on a small peninsula that reaches north into the Persian Gulf from the eastern side of the Arabian Peninsula. Its only land border is with Saudi Arabia to the south, and the Gulf surrounds the rest of it, with the island of Bahrain lying just to the northwest. It is a flat, low, dry desert land, hot and arid, with little rain and few natural resources above ground, and almost all of its roughly three million people live in or around the capital, Doha, a gleaming modern city on the east coast.
Qatar is an emirate, a hereditary monarchy ruled by the Al Thani family since the nineteenth century. The head of state is the emir, currently Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, who holds great power, assisted by a prime minister, currently Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, drawn from the ruling family. Islam is the state religion, and Qatari citizens are almost all Sunni Muslims. The official language is Arabic, with English very widely used in business and daily life. A defining fact of the country is that Qatari citizens make up only a small fraction of the population, perhaps a tenth or so, the great majority being workers from South Asia and elsewhere.
A few deep forces shape life in Qatar. There is the harsh desert peninsula on the Gulf. There is the old heritage of the Bedouin and the sea, of camels, pearls, and dhows. There is the astonishing transformation from poverty to wealth brought by gas. There is the divide between the small body of citizens and the vast population of foreign workers. And there is the conservative Arab and Muslim culture of faith, family, hospitality, and the majlis. The sections that follow trace these and walk through the customs.
A desert peninsula
Qatar is a small, flat, arid peninsula of desert, one of the driest and least green lands on earth, a low expanse of sand, gravel, and rock under a fierce sun, with almost no natural fresh water, no rivers, and only a few scattered patches of vegetation. The land is shaped above all by its harsh, hot, dry climate, with searing summers and mild winters, and by the surrounding sea, for the Gulf laps at the peninsula on three sides and has always been a source of life, food, and trade.
The desert is broken in the north by patches where a little rain allows some growth, and in the south by striking landscapes of rolling dunes that meet the sea at a great inland bay. For all its bareness, the desert holds deep meaning for Qataris, who feel a strong attachment to it as the ancestral home of their Bedouin forebears, and who still head out to the sands in the cooler winter months to camp, picnic, and reconnect with the old way of life.
Almost the entire population is gathered in and around the capital, Doha, on the east coast, a city transformed in a few decades from a small pearling and fishing town into a dazzling modern metropolis of glass towers, broad highways, museums, and shopping malls, set along a sweeping seaside promenade, the Corniche. Beyond Doha, a scattering of towns and the great gas works of the north make up the rest of the country. The harsh desert peninsula on the warm Gulf is the setting of Qatari life.
The Bedouin and the sea
The roots of Qatari culture lie in two old ways of life shaped by the desert and the sea: the life of the Bedouin nomads of the interior and the life of the settled coastal people who lived by the water. The Bedouin, the desert nomads, herded camels and goats across the arid land, moving with the seasons in search of grazing and water, living in tents and bound by the strong codes of tribe, honour, and hospitality, and though only a minority of Qataris were truly Bedouin, their values and traditions lie at the heart of the national identity.
Along the coast lived the settled people, the hadar, who turned to the sea for their living, above all through fishing and the pearl trade, which for centuries was the mainstay of the Gulf economy. Each year the men sailed out in wooden boats, the dhows, for long, hard months on the pearl banks, where the divers plunged on a single breath to the seabed to gather oysters in the hope of a precious pearl, a punishing and dangerous life that shaped the songs, stories, and memory of the coast.
From these two ways of life come the great symbols of Qatari heritage that the nation cherishes today: the camel, the falcon, and the Bedouin tent of the desert; the dhow, the pearl, and the sea of the coast. The traditions of poetry, song, weaving, and craft that grew from this old world are kept alive with care, and the values of tribe, family, generosity, and faith that they carried still shape Qatari society. This heritage of the Bedouin and the sea is the foundation of Qatari identity.
From pearls to gas
The story of modern Qatar is one of the most dramatic transformations any nation has known, from one of the poorest corners of the world to one of the very richest, within a single lifetime, brought about by what lay beneath the desert and the sea. For centuries Qatar lived modestly on pearling, fishing, and trade, and then, in the early twentieth century, came a crushing blow: the rise of the cheap cultured pearl and the world depression destroyed the pearl trade, plunging the peninsula into severe hardship and poverty.
Rescue came with the discovery of oil, found just before the Second World War and exported from the late 1940s, which slowly began to change the country's fortunes. But the truly staggering wealth came later, from natural gas, for off Qatar's coast lies one of the largest gas fields on earth, and the country became one of the world's leading exporters of liquefied natural gas, turning this small desert state into one of the wealthiest nations on the planet, with one of the highest incomes per person anywhere.
This sudden wealth utterly remade Qatar in a few decades. The old town of Doha grew into a glittering modern city; citizens gained free education and healthcare, generous support, and a high standard of living; and the country built universities, museums, airlines, and stadiums, and stepped onto the world stage. Yet the change came so fast that living memory still holds the old world of pearling and the desert, and Qatar works to hold onto its heritage and identity even as it embraces the modern. This leap from pearls to gas is the central fact of modern Qatar.
A nation of citizens and expatriates
One of the most striking features of Qatar is the makeup of its people, for Qatari citizens are a small minority in their own country, perhaps only a tenth of the population, while the great majority are foreign workers and residents who have come from abroad to build and run the booming nation. This makes Qatar a country of two very different worlds living side by side, the small body of wealthy citizens and the vast population of newcomers.
The foreign workers come above all from South Asia, from countries such as India, Pakistan, Nepal, and Bangladesh, along with others from across the Arab world, Southeast Asia, Africa, and the West, and they fill almost every kind of work, from construction and service to business and the professions. This has made Doha a remarkably international city, where many languages are heard and the foods, faiths, and cultures of much of the world are present, even as Qatari citizens keep their own distinct and privileged place.
The reliance on this great migrant workforce, and the hard conditions many labourers have faced, especially in construction, have drawn international attention and criticism, and Qatar has in recent years made changes to improve workers' rights and conditions. For the visitor, this layered society is part of the texture of life in Qatar: a small, traditional citizen population at the centre, holding firmly to Arab and Muslim identity, surrounded by a large and diverse world of people from across the globe. This division between citizens and newcomers shapes daily life in Qatar.
The mosque and the holy month
Islam is the religion of Qatar and the foundation of its laws, values, and way of life, and Qatari citizens are almost all Sunni Muslims, with a smaller number of Shia, following a conservative tradition in which faith shapes the rhythm of every day, from the call to prayer that sounds five times from the mosques to the customs of dress, food, and conduct. Islamic law, the sharia, is a main source of the country's legislation, especially in matters of family life.
The faith is woven through the year, above all in the holy month of Ramadan, the spiritual high point, when Muslims fast from dawn to sunset, and the days grow quiet while the nights come alive with the breaking of the fast, family gatherings, prayer, and festivity. Out of respect, eating, drinking, and smoking in public during the fasting hours are not permitted for anyone during Ramadan, and the whole rhythm of life shifts for the month. Mosques, from the grand state mosque to small neighbourhood ones, are central to community life.
Qatar is a conservative country where religion and tradition are taken seriously, and visitors are expected to respect local customs, dressing modestly, behaving with decorum, and being mindful around the faith. Yet Qataris also pride themselves on a degree of tolerance, and the great expatriate population brings many other faiths, Christian, Hindu, and more, which are practised, with some limits, by their communities. Faith, conservative and deeply held among Qataris, remains at the centre of life in Qatar.
The majlis and the falcon
Qataris share the warm and generous hospitality for which the Arab and Bedouin peoples are famous, in which the welcome of guests is a sacred duty and a point of deep pride, and a visitor is received with great kindness, served coffee and dates, and treated with a courtesy rooted in the old desert codes. At the heart of social life is the majlis, the gathering room or sitting place where men receive their guests, talk, and settle the affairs of family and community, an institution central to Gulf society.
Hospitality centres on the serving of the light, cardamom-scented Arabic coffee, the gahwa, poured from a long-spouted pot into small cups and offered with dates, in a ritual of welcome that it is rude to refuse. Family is the foundation of Qatari life, with strong extended ties of tribe and kinship, deep respect for elders, and a clear sense of the proper order of age and rank. In dress, Qatari men wear the long white robe, the thobe, and the headdress, and women the black abaya, marking their identity with pride.
A treasured passion that sets Qatar and the Gulf apart is falconry, the ancient art of hunting with trained falcons, once a means of finding food in the desert and now a beloved sport and symbol of heritage, with prized falcons cared for like family, dedicated falcon hospitals and markets, and winter trips into the desert to hunt and camp in the old way. Alongside falconry, camel racing and the keeping of fine Arabian horses are cherished traditions. For a visitor, the keys to Qatar are courtesy, modesty, respect for faith and custom, and a gracious acceptance of hospitality.
Majboos and the desert truffle
Qatari food is the rich and fragrant cuisine of the Gulf, built on rice, meat, fish, dates, and warm spices, with influences from Arabia, Persia, India, and East Africa carried in by centuries of trade across the sea. The national dish is majboos, also called machbous, a fragrant dish of spiced rice cooked with meat or fish and flavoured with a special blend of spices and dried limes, served at family meals and on every important occasion, often from a great shared platter.
Other beloved dishes fill the Qatari table: harees, a smooth, comforting porridge of wheat and meat slow-cooked for hours, especially loved in Ramadan; thareed, a stew poured over bread; grilled and stewed meats; and fish and seafood from the Gulf, long a staple of the coast. Dates, grown across Arabia for thousands of years, are eaten daily and offered to every guest, and the meal is framed by the cardamom coffee and sweet tea central to Qatari hospitality, with sweets such as the syrupy fried dumplings called luqaimat to finish.
A special delicacy treasured by Qataris is the faga, the desert truffle, which grows hidden beneath the sand after the winter rains and is hunted out with care, a prized seasonal treat that ties the modern table to the old life of the desert. In Doha's great international population, the foods of the whole world are also on offer, from South Asian to Levantine to Western. Rich, fragrant, and made for sharing, Qatari food reflects the country's bond with the desert, the sea, and the wider world.
Ramadan, Garangao, and National Day
The Qatari year is shaped above all by the Islamic calendar, and its great festivals are the holy month of Ramadan and the two Eids. Ramadan, the month of fasting, is the spiritual heart of the year, a time of prayer, reflection, charity, and family, when the breaking of the fast each evening becomes a nightly gathering and the nights fill with visiting, food, and festivity, before the joyful festival of Eid al-Fitr that marks its end with feasting, new clothes, and gifts for children. Later comes Eid al-Adha, the feast of the sacrifice, kept during the season of the pilgrimage to Mecca.
A charming tradition of Qatar and the Gulf is Garangao, held in the middle of Ramadan, when children dress in bright traditional clothes and go from house to house in their neighbourhood, singing old songs and receiving nuts, sweets, and treats from their neighbours, a beloved custom that delights the young and passes the heritage down the generations.
Alongside the religious festivals, Qatar keeps its national days, above all National Day in December, which celebrates the founding of the modern state and the heritage of the nation with parades, displays of camels, horses, falcons, and dhows, and a great show of pride in Qatari identity. Through all the celebrations runs the warmth of family, for the close and extended family is at the very centre of Qatari life, and the festivals are above all times of gathering, generosity, and togetherness. These festivals, religious and national, are warm threads of Qatari life.
The nation today
Qatar today is a small, immensely wealthy, and ambitious nation that has used its gas riches to win a place on the world stage far larger than its size. Governed from Doha by the emir, Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, and the prime minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, it has built gleaming cities, world-class museums and universities, a major international airline, and the global news network Al Jazeera, and it hosted the football World Cup, the first ever held in the Arab world. It has also made itself an important diplomatic mediator, hosting talks and brokering deals in some of the world's hardest conflicts.
The nation faces real questions. Its great reliance on a vast foreign workforce, and the conditions of migrant labourers, have drawn lasting international scrutiny and continuing efforts at reform. Its place in a turbulent region weighs heavily: Qatar endured a long blockade by some of its Gulf neighbours, since ended, and has felt the dangers of recent conflict in the Gulf directly. And like its neighbours, it works to plan for a future beyond gas while holding onto its traditions and identity amid breakneck change.
Through it all, Qatar holds firmly to the heritage built over its history. The desert peninsula and the bond with the sands still shape its life; the old world of the Bedouin and the pearl, of camels, falcons, and dhows, remains a proud memory and a living tradition; the conservative Arab and Muslim culture of faith, family, hospitality, and the majlis still orders citizens' lives; and the warmth and generosity of the Gulf still mark its welcome. Small, rich, and ambitious, yet rooted in its desert past, Qatar carries its traditions into a fast-changing future.