It's hard to learn Arabic...(and not for a reason you'd expect)

Learning Arabic is one of my top priorities, and classes start in a couple weeks. In the meantime, I've been doing some self-study and trying to practice conversation with people everyday. Ironically, it's HARD to find Arabic speakers!

It actually quite amazing - Qatari citizens comprise only 25% of the country's population. The rest are expats - primarily from India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Phillippines, etc. So the common language is English, and therefore it's actually HARD to find people who speak Arabic! It's crazy. Qataris have to learn English to function in their own country, since all the service people are from non-Arabic speaking countries.