Blusky ... problems with accommodation in Ain Khalid Gate are many. From the point of view of a western F/O with family, the reasons I finally had to leave that place was
- build quality of apartments is a joke, looks like something from Dhaka slums
- cleaning up dead cockroaches from kitchen floor every morning. Once in the time shortly after the rainy season, my wife and baby had to leave for a week while they fumigated the apartment a few times with strong poison to try to get on top of the heavy cockroach infestation.
- noisy, stinking trucks that park outside your house and pump from the underground sh!t tanks several times a day
- earsplitting noise from mosque if you are placed in house at the front end of compound
- Locals driving their Landcruisers like crazy lunatics right next to the kid's nursery and shop (had 2 occasions where my kids missed death by less than 6 inches)
- pool is sometimes nice, and sometimes not so nice when they don't put enough cleaning chemicals in it and you start coming out with itchy, white rashes on your skin
- kid's playground is nice at quiet times and completely unusable at busy times, due to the animal behaviour of certain groups of kids whose main sport is beating up, fighting and bullying white western kids
- Location of compound is really bad, it's close to the industrial area, miles away from the airport and even further from downtown. Villagio mall is the only place in the local area to go for decent food or shopping but it gets pretty tiresome after a few years.
- The gym in the compound to be fair, is excellent quality.
It's not a pilot only compound, it is open to the general public. So bad luck for you if (like me) you get a family next door who likes to sing Karaoke all night before your long-haul 0200 depart, or cook strong curry that stinks your whole apartment block out. You can't complain or move house because "it's not allowed".
The problem is compounded by the QR policy of giving only small 2 or 3 bed apartments to F/O's, and all captains get a 4 bed villa. (unlike EK / EY where the policy is that married with family gets villa and single guy gets apartment). So we had the crazy situation of pilots with a wife and 3 or 4 kids in a 2-bed apartment, and single captains in a huge 4-bed villa next door (renting out rooms to other people to get huge bonus to their income).
I fought with those
ers in the QR towers for 3 years to get given my QR10,000 and get away from that crazy place, but it was always "sorry it's not allowed Captain". In my final year there I even went to see the GMFO and told him my situation and that I would be looking to leave the airline as soon as possible if they wouldn't let me off that compound, but it was still "not allowed". Then he acted all surprised in my resignation interview and offered me my accommodation allowance right away
