The job market on North American campuses may be heading for the deep freeze, but hundreds of positions are opening up in the Persian Gulf as American universities scramble to set down roots in those petrodollar-rich states. The combination of money and opportunity on offer may seem hard to resist. But academics who trade the rich intellectual environment of America's college towns for the oil-soaked hinterlands of Arabia often perplex their friends, who wonder what kind of life their departing colleagues are in for. The longstanding reputation of the sand-swept countries leading this academic boom--Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates--is that life there is mind-numbingly boring. That the strict observance of Islam, the relative isolation from the rest of the world, and the 110-degree heat that descends for six months a year have somehow stunted intellectual life. In this article, the author discusses the benefits of teaching in Qatar.