oman is a small country (slightly smaller than kansas, as the CIA world factbook tells me) in the ARABIAN (not persian, as was emphasized to us several times throughout the trip) gulf. it has shared borders with yemen, saudi arabia, and the UAE. just a jump across the oman gulf is iran, and pakistan and india aren't too far away either. this geographical location makes tense power dynamics, but also a cuisine that is the bomb.com. it has about 3 million people, about 1 million of which are under the age of 14! it became independent after it kicked out the portugese in 1650, and has a history of imperialism, once controlling parts of present-day tanzania and zanzibar (as a result, there is a large african, swahili-speaking population in oman). it is a sultanate, and is under total rule (essentially) by sultan qaboos. sultan qaboos is an interesting fellow (not to mention he has the funniest name in the world) and there is a strange personality cult surrounding him in oman. he makes public appearances about once a year, if you're lucky, and he hardly ever makes public statements on anything. but over the span of about 40 years he single-handedly transformed oman from a country with no economy, virtually no education, and no political power to a modern nation (mcdonalds and everything!) built on a fuel economy whose reputation is that of a peace-keeper.
oman is a much more ethnically diverse country than jordan, largely because of the job opportunities provided by oil. interestingly, omanis have a sort of snobbery when it comes to the jobs they'll do. they look down on blue-collar work, and as such, these jobs are mostly filled by indians, pakistanis, and east africans. but in oman, as in many all the other gulf countries who are witnessing the same trends, there is an effort to "omanize" the workforce, wherein there are certain quotas that businesses have to fill of native omani workers. it's a strange idea: omani's don't want certain jobs, but then they complain that there are no job opportunities for them, so the government provides a certain percentage of jobs for them, which allows them to bargain for better salaries ("you don't want me for 50% above minimum wage? i know you need to hire another omani, and try to find another who will do the job for anything less.").
you can tell a native omani (non-"expat") apart from his dress usually. they are wear dish-dashas (which many people in jordan do too), but the omani dish-dasha has a tassle coming out from the collar. they wear scarves around their heads like a turban or they wear the kofia, a traditional east-african hat. if you aren't omani-omani, you would never wear this. it's considered disrespectful. and in oman, disrespect can get you thrown in jail. seriously!! even if someone, say, accidentally ran over your foot with his car, if you were to, in a fit of rage, spit on the ground in front of him and call him a bad name, you could be fined and spend about 3 months in jail.
talking to the kids at SIT oman, i think i would have had a really tough time. social roles are even more cemented in oman than in jordan. we always talk about jordan as being extremely influenced by tribalism; in oman, it's even more so, especially, it seems, for women. you are not even supposed to ask a man about how his wife is doing because it implies that you were thinking about her. however, women make up about 70-80% of this university we went to in nizwa. this is partly because nizwa is more rural, so families who are more nervous about sending their daughters to muscat (which used to be defined separately from the rest of oman, and still is by many citizens) where they might be corrupted can send them instead to nizwa. still, i found it interesting that so many women were in university when their job opportunities were essentially limited to teaching or nursing.
the SIT kids felt they were in a weird limbo because of these strictly defined social roles. while they weren't tourists, they weren't really a part of society either. they can't make friends with young omanis. they can't really go out. seriously. we asked them where there were fun places to go and they could offer no suggestions. "i haven't done anything in this country" one of them said. they just go to school and then go home. i'm sure they are learning a lot from class and from their families, and i'm sure all that free time makes them extremely well-read, but if i were in their place i would go majnoona (crazy).
but, oman is STUNNINGLY GORGEOUS. the slogan of their tourism website was "beauty has an address." nothing could be truer. crystal-blue waters push up against dramatic orange mountains that look like they are climbing higher before your very eyes. the buildings are fresh white in color with blue and purple and orange tiles outlining every window. paradise? i think so. the only downside was that it can reach up to 125 degrees F in the summer!!! as such, i overheated just about every day.
our first day we went to the ras al jinz turtle reserve, where many green turtles come to nest. we spent the night at a campsite in these tiny huts. so much fun, so little sleep. the next day we went to the town of sur where we saw a dhow (boat) factory. here is a picture of some dhows in front of an old outpost:
then that afternoon we hiked into wadi shab, a true oasis. after scrambling over rocks that seem to be almost alive (i immediately was reminded of zion national park in utah), we came upon bright blue freshwater pools that we spent the afternoon swimming around in. blissful relief from the oppressive heat.
the next day essentially consisted of me with my head in a toilet (thank you sketchy omani "fast food") and then a meeting with the SIT students.
monday we visited nizwa university, jabreen castle, and the old town of misfat 'abreen. my favorite part of the castle was the view it afforded. how some of these towns sprung up in the middle of the desert is beyond me.
misfat 'abreen is an old town that reminded us all of something from the land before time. on the cliffs of mountains, people have built steppes of agrigulture that have propered largely thanks to an ingenious water system called the "telege." people still lived there and yet it was a tourist destination, and something felt slightly "off" as i walked on a tourist path right past people's homes. it was almost as if the feeling we were supposed to get was that we were looking through a window into the past. weird, and sort of unethical? to make me feel a little less guilty i made sure i greeted everyone i saw (in arabic) and definitely didn't take pictures of anyone.
the last day we went to the sultan qaboos grand mosque, a structure completed in 2001 that combined mosque design from all over the muslim world. seriously grand. it coveres 416,000 sq. m. a little too opulent for my taste, but i enjoyed the gardens (i forgot what a park looks like. there are none really in amman).
we were all SO HAPPY to be back in amman. after going around in a comically small bus in a country that was underworldly hot, being sort of treated like children and getting creepy stares, we were pretty glad to leave. don't get me wrong, oman was OMAzing. but when i got my passport stamped and heard my one thousandth "welcome to jordan," it felt as good as hearing it for the first time.
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