Important day today, I passed my driving license exam and am the proud owner of a Qatari driver license! I have been locked up in the house for 7 ½ weeks, but from now on: FREEDOM.
The normal procedure for the Dutch is to hand over your Dutch license, and they just convert it to a Qatari one within 10 minutes. But… my Dutch one had expired while living in the Czech Republic. Because that’s an EU country, you have to convert your Dutch one into a Czech one. In theory that is possible. In real life not so much. Romke has done it with his license, and it was an utterly long and tedious battle. He had a Work Permit, I only had a Residence Permit, so for me it was even more next to impossible. That’s why I didn’t even start the (at least) 6 month process.
The fact is; a Dutch license doesn’t expire, you just go to the office when time has come and they issue you a new one, valid for the next ten years. Only, I had to convince the Qatari office here of that fact. Even with official letters from Holland, translated in Arab they didn’t buy it. So I had to take the exam after all.
It was absolute not easy. They have one driving school in Doha. You can only buy 10 lessons in one go, and they are not cheap. So I decided to take the test without the lessons. Luckily I have a friend here who took the test (and the driving school) a month ago, and she explained everything to me. But the standard rule is: you don’t pay for the driving school, you will fail your exam. It’s all about the money… Even if you pay for the lessons the standard rule is: you’re a woman, so you fail the first time.
Once a week it is women’s day, and only women take the exam, with only women instructors. And I passed!!!!!! Took a long time though, I was picked up at 5 am, and dropped off at 11.15 am. Nerve wrecking 6 hours. But I got a compliment from the man who handed me my license after I paid. It didn’t happen often someone passes the first time, and without the school, he said.
So now I have a Dutch, a Singaporean, an American and a Qatari license. And yes, for everyone of them I had to take some sort of exam. (Singapore and US were very simple).
The next step is to get used to the crazy traffic here. In my most comfortable BMW X5, 8 cylinder. Finally I can use it. Doha: here I come!
