I arrived in Doha earlier this evening with no hotel reservation. My over-optimism and a stupid misunderstanding on my part led to that. For the past 48 hours my staff, our travel agencies and our business partners in Qatar have been trying, in vain, to find me a reasonably priced hotel room.

I decided to that I will simply show up at some hotels I know and talk them into giving me a room. Big mistake. There is (or was), it seems, a big natural gas conference in Doha which has filled all of the city’s hotels (I just checked and the conference had actually ended on 1 November, so I don’t know if the conference is to blame).

Anyway..

I was picked from the airport by Eyad, one of our business partner’s employees in Doha, and we started driving from hotel to hotel, begging fro a room. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

“Sorry sir. We are 105% overbooked”

“Sorry sir, all hotels are fully booked”

“We have no rooms sir”

Aaargh!

My host called a friend of his asking him for help. Then we continued our hotel room hunt. I was frantically sms’ing a friend of mine in the US who has good contacts in Qatar. No answer. And my phone’s battery was about to die soon.

FInally Eyad’s phone rang. His friend has found something. But he instructed us not to go to the hotel but to come to his office instead (by then it was already almost 10 pm). Strange. But we followed the orders.

My host’s friend works as a manager of big ceramic tiles and bathroom fixtures showroom. We went upstairs to the management office.

We met the young manager who was sitting in front of a flatscreen, on which a site called Booking.com was loaded up.

“Here, I found you a room,” he said with confidence.

The room our friend found was at a hotel called Sehati (Arabic: My Health)! Huh? Whatever man.. I just need a place to sleep tonight.

“Do you have a credit card?” He asked me.

I told him that I don’t use my normal cards online and that I didn’t have our company’s special internet debit card on me.

No problem. The guy pulled his own credit card from his wallet and in no time I had an online reservation at “Sehati Suite Hotel”

The online price was just 500 Qatari Riyals, which, believe me, is cheap for this city.

We hung around for another 20 minutes chatting and fixing a sound problem on his PC. Then my host and I were on our way to find the only Doha hotel that still had a room for me!

We quickly found it. It was located in a back street in Al-Sadd area. As we were parking, I noticed a lot of wheelchairs and other disability equipment in front of the hotel.

Apparently the hotel was hosting athletes taking part in the 8th GCC Paralympic Championships.

I was half expecting that our reservation would be rejected, after we were turned down at at least half a dozen hotels earlier in the evening. But, thankfully, the reception gave me a room. Phew!

And what a room it was.. I mean.. what can you get for QR 500?

As I opened the door I did not see the bed. Instead I saw a living room, complete with a kitchen. The bedroom was another door away. This was a suite! Wow!

Clean. Tidy. With TV. Clean modern bathroom.

And free WiFi! That’s why I am blogging this.

I dropped my bag and went with my host for a quick dinner (at Berber, a Lebanese restaurant, in which Egyptians cook the food and Philippinos wait the tables). As soon as I was back in my ‘apartment’ I checked out the hotel’s site.

Sehati hotel suites in Doha, Qatar

This revealed the mystery behind the ‘My Health’ name.

This hotel is part of an enterprise which comprises clinics and a hospital. Still a weird name for a hotel, but at least now I understand.

This hotel has restored my mental health tonight.

So did this wonderful Booking.com site. And so did the young Jordanian manager of the tiles company. And so did Eyad, who drove me around this overbooked city.

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Comments

8 responses to “My incredible Doha hotel room hunting adventures!”

  1. hussein Avatar
    hussein

    try to not eat a lot of “Falafel” at Berber..

    i like this part: “fixing a sound problem on his PC” ;)

    🙂

  2. Made in Jordan Avatar
    Made in Jordan

    I’ve been in a similar situation before! Only it REALLY didn’t turn out to be a happy ending such as yours. My friends and I (we were 5) ended up taking turns between who sleeps on the couch, on the floor or on the bed for two nights! It wasn’t a pretty scene at all!

    But I do miss Berber so much! The one in Beirut of course, I’ve never been to Doha before. Enjoy the trip!

  3. Ahmed Avatar
    Ahmed

    Good story !

    Glad you ended up finding a hotel. The hotel got good publicity :)

    Two things that surprised me though when I consider you to be figure for the tech industry in the region:

    1- You don’t do bookings online already !
    2- You don’t use CC cards online?!? This sounds so 1997 when e-commerce was first introduced, or like my aunt who is so hesitant to buy online because she assumes that if she bought online, it means that the card is automatically stolen. In reality the odds of your CC being abused online is much much less than when you use it in your average restaurant outing.

  4. Moey Avatar
    Moey

    hahaha! nice, see it turned out well

  5. Humeid Avatar
    Humeid

    Don’t get me wrong people.. I’ve been using credit cards online since 1996. I was buying clothes and books and other stuff from Amazon before 95% of the population in Jordan heard of the internet :-)

    I don’t book hotels online because our travel agency usually does this. I have no time for the hassle honestly.

    And I am not you aunt :-)

    LOL!

  6. mAIS* Avatar
    mAIS*

    If you came back from Qatar , i think you should try to get on board of the sofia cargo … one great evening …
    i don’t know if have been on board but 11.11 is the last day … just thought to let you know *

  7. Find that hotel Avatar
    Find that hotel

    I have found the people from west have misearble time hunting room in middle east. Maybe that’s because of the lanaguge or something else

  8. bathroom ceramic tile Avatar
    bathroom ceramic tile

    I have been using credit cards online since 1997. I was buying clothes and books and other things on Amazon by 98% of the population in Jordan heard of Internet