The Metro Card & New Money – Doha, Qatar

It has been a hot minute since I posted an update here. My excuse this time? Well, life has actually just been boring. I mean, in blogging & entertainment terms it has been boring. I’ve been going to work & spending time with friends – not really things to write about.

I miss traveling so much & I hope to be back with more exciting travel stories as soon as I can.

For now, all I have to talk about is life in Qatar & I’ll be sharing two things about that in this post.

Firstly, I use the metro as my primary means of transport. It is still a little bit of a novelty for me because this isn’t a realistic option where I’m from. The Doha Metro system is comprised of 3 subway lines & 37 stations. Each station has at least one bus route, although most have more than one route. A single trip costs Qar2(USD 0.55) & the bus service is complimentary for metro users. The trains & stations are modern & kept spotless. While the bus system can be a bit unreliable at times, the trains run frequently & on time.

Three days ago, I topped up my metro card before going to work with enough money for about a month’s worth of trips to & from work. It must have slipped the wrong way when I was putting it in my pocket because I dropped it. I didn’t realize until about 9 hours later when it was time to go home. I mentally wrote off the card & the trips. I walked back to the metro station &, I kid you not, my metro card was lying right outside the entrance of the station. How cool is that?

The second thing I wanted to write about is the money. Qatar recently introduced new banknotes. The transition is still happening so both old & new notes are in circulation. I feel like this would be okay if they’d kept the colors fixed to note values, but they haven’t. The new 1 riyal note is the same color as the old 5 riyal note, the new 5 riyal is similar to both the old 1 & 100, the new 10 is the same color as the old 500 & the newly introduced 200 riyal note is the same color as the old 10 riyal note. It’s quite confusing especially when you need to pay for something quickly. Other than the change of color, I think the new banknotes look good & having unfamiliar notes in my wallet makes me feel like I’m traveling again.

Until the next post. Like the DanVenture Travels Facebook page & use #DanVentureTravels on your Insta posts so I can follow your adventures.

Keep traveling, keep safe.

DanVenture Travels