State of happiness
Dear Sir,
In these times of widespread distress and violence, with newspapers devoting most of their space to reports about conflicts, tension and violence from various parts of the world, it was great to read two feel-good stories in Gulf Times this week.
The first one was about Qatar being the happiest place to live in the Mena region (Gulf Times, July 23). It made me happy. And I am sure that it must have made a lot of others also happy. I am happy to know that I have chosen the right to place to live and work.
Qatar is peaceful and prosperous. Peace and prosperity make a fantastic combination. But most of us, while living here, take the two “blessings” for granted. Only when a survey or study highlights it, we realise how fortunate we are.
Happiness is, of course, not related to money directly. The tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan drew international attention years ago for saying gross national happiness should trump gross domestic product when measuring a nation’s progress. If one is going to prioritise happiness, the Bhutanese thinking goes, you’d better include the environment and spiritual and mental well-being in your calculation. Since 1971, the kingdom has rejected GDP as the only way to measure progress.
That line of thinking has a certain logic to it. Money is not everything, one has to agree. But poverty does not make one happy even as pots of money do not directly contribute to happiness. One needs a certain level of financial security to feel happy. If one is hungry, happiness is not the feeling that is uppermost in one’s mind. And it is here Qatar’s ranking in the happiness scale gets more validity.
The top reasons for Qatar residents’ “satisfaction”, in the survey reported by Gulf Times, are general safety and security, availability of utilities like drinking water, electricity and stability of the political environment.
The other news that brought a smile to my face was about the British royal baby boy. What a brouhaha! But even as one felt all those reports about the royal baby - a chubby one at that with its weight being given as 3.8 kilos - was overhyped, one could not but be swept by the positive feeling that it created.
T P Rasheed, PO Box 766, Doha
Start penalising erring drivers
Dear Sir,
If the report, “Holding a mobile phone while driving is a traffic violation” (Gulf Times, July 24), is correct, then it is puzzling that why so many drivers on Doha’s busy roads are getting away with flouting the rule. Drivers using mobiles is a common sight in Qatar.
The rule is there. But it needs to be implemented. Erring drivers should be penalised heavily to stop the practice.
IN, (Full name and e-mail address supplied)
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