The stars shine on Doha

October is too much fun here! And this week in particular, you have to be selective about the events you attend because there are too many to choose from. Doha? Backwater?...psh. There's the WTA championships and the Doha Tribeca Film Festival, and TEDx--and all the appendage events taking place because such cool characters are in town. It's more than enough to make you feel pretty happy about hopping on the plane in the first place and being here to see it all in such bizarre, exciting, over-the-top glory.

Tonight we are going to the opening gala/premiere of the film festival to see the stars and watch Outside the Law. Red carpet! Gold seats! Bobby DeNiro! VIP parking! The hub for the film festival is Katara, the newly opened cultural village, which is a wild and magnificent setting on its own. If you remember anything from my report of last year's inaugural DTFF, the highlight, at least for me, was sitting in lawn chairs with my feet in the grass outside the Museum of Islamic Art and watching Cairo Time. Though the venue will not provide grassy toes (a true pleasure here in the desert), it will provide a very dramatic and very expensively lit backdrop of the gulf and the West Bay area. So exciting.

Other films on the docket:
Miral

Balls!
Grandma: A Thousand Times

The First Grader (closing film+ fireworks, I hope I hope!)

Film is life. Life is good! I'll let you know how the week goes.