Cool bird!

On the 2nd excursion, I saw a weird bird scuttle across the roadway. It was grey and almost quailish, but bigger than any quail I'd ever seen. Well, I think I finally found out what it was: Arabian Partridge! I've been looking and looking through photos, and this is really close. Although I thought it had a dohickey on top of its head. Oh well.

Photo updates!!!

I've updated my photos! There are now 3 sections: Muscat, Salalah, and Excursions. More photos will follow soon, I hope. Also - one of the new photo albums is in the Muscat section (be sure to check out the salad bar at Haffa House Hotel!). If you don't remember the link, e-mail me.

New Omani Qur'an

Check out the article about the new Qur'an for Oman. (If the page asks for a password, just hit cancel and that will vanish.)

Omanization

A friend sent me this Washington Post article about Gulf States trying to employ their younger citizens. It's pretty interesting.

If it's Monday, this must be America?

I feel like complete shit. I am completely jet-lagged out. My day started on Sunday. I take my medicine at 6 am, but I didn't get up until 7:00. Then it was the trip to Nizwa. It's about 1.5 hours or so, and I “napped” most of the way. By which, I mean that I had my eyes closed and I listened to music. After the trip, at 8 pm we met downstairs at the hotel with our luggage, and our flight left a little after midnight on Monday. On the way to Heathrow I slept about an hour. I slept another hour, hour and a half from Heathrow to Dulles. At which point I realized I had been traveling for about 21 hours, after being up for about 18, and still had 10 more hours to go. I started to wonder how long it took to drive from DC to Arkansas.

I was still doing okay at Dulles. Customs was fine, I made it through security again. I was one of the first so I skipped out on most of my group - I didn't feel up to a big hug-cry fest. I saw a few of them later on which was nice. So I left Dulles and flew to Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport? I slept another hour on this flight, which was most of the flight. And this was when the jet-lag hit. I got off the plane and felt completely confused and somewhat nauseous. While I was buying water I asked what time zone I was in. I mean, I know Kentucky is easterly, but I thought Ohio was a bit more central? How the hell did I end up here? This is where I am writing this post. There's free wifi at Dulles and here, but I can't seem to get online, so you probably won't see this post until I get home.

So, only a few more hours until I'm home. Frank is cooking red beans and rice. I think I need to sleep for a week.

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Well, I made it home last night, but my luggage didn't. I know it was in Dulles, because I went through customs. But then it vanished. And you'll love this: Delta only scans baggage tags on arrival. So I won't know anything about my luggage until it gets to Arkansas. It wasn't on this morning's flight, but maybe it will show up tonight. If not, we're heading out to the airport tomorrow to find something out in person.

Nizwa Rocks!

What can I say, it does. Here's a link to get you started. We only had about 1.5 hours at the fort, and that is not nearly enough. I mean, this isn't one of those forts where you can rush through it in 15 minutes - this is a FORT. It's been restored and you can wander all over and there's an exhibit hall and a bunch of exhibit rooms too. I rushed through it and only saw about 60% of what was there. I could easily have spent half a day there, maybe even all day to do a thorough examination. Also, a lot of the tourists at the fort were Omani.

The souq is nice too. I was worried the town might be too touristy, but it wasn't. I did see more white people than I have this entire trip, though. And when I bought a mango juice box the Indian clerk told me "merci beaucoup." Of course, how many people are stupid enough to go to Nizwa in the middle of August?!? It was hot. Nizwa and the Rub al-Khali are the only two places I have been where I sweated into my eyes and the salt from my sweat actually burned them. But the souq - it was nice. Not one of those mazes, but a big open place with air-conditioned stores. Nice silver and copper. I didn't spot the vegetable souq or the meat souq until we were leaving, so I don't have photos of the inside of them. I took a peek and the meat souq looked as big as the Harps on Wedington.

Anyway, that's the Nizwa update. I had to shower after that trip and I'm preparing for my 31 hour trip home. Argh! See y'all soon!

Passport Problems

Well, one of our number may not be leaving Oman any time soon. I'm not sure of the entire story, but here's what I have gleaned so far. Amy was walking along or crossing the street, which is pretty busy. A car came really close to her and almost hit her, so she kicked it. The driver was an Omani woman, and she had a passenger. This woman and the passenger both say that Amy cussed at the woman. They followed her to the hotel and called the police, and the police took her passport. Apparently cussing someone out is an insult to their honor, and it normally takes 2-3 months to clear this up. So Amy is currently in limbo. Our director is trying to fast-track the process.