We flew from Melbourne to Brussels, stopping at Doha for two hours. Hamad International airport is new, it opened in April. There is a sculpture of a teddybear rising fifty feet and is impaled by an enormous reading lamp. The head of the teddy, the size of a hippo, peers from beneath the lamp shade confusedly. He is an expensive boy at nearly seven millions dollars. The bear is at odds with the geometric lines of the airport, which lead to themed oasis's. The Arabs know their lines, know maths and know deserts. I sat and ate olives and wondered what the spaces between the points, lines and surfaces would look like if they were tiled with lapis lazure, gold leaf and jade. A palace. Perhaps airports have taken on some of the functions of the palaces of old - there seems to be more going on than eating, talking, waiting, watching and sleeping.
