Wadi Ash Shab and Sinkhole

 Andres gave me today a childless day and I joined his other 3 colleagues to Wadi Ash Shab. Actually there were some other reasons why we could not go there all together. First of all the 3000-kilometre limit of our rental car is full, that means it is not wise to take long trips with it any more (we have to pay extra then) until we rent a new car in January. But also because we could read from the descriptions that one has to walk 5 kilometres at Wadi Ash Shab and even if our boys are good at walking we decided to not take the risk (and it was a right decision, I can tell now). So Andres spent a day with the boys while I discovered more of Oman.

We left the villa around 9am and about 1,5 hours later we arrived at Wadi Ash Shab (“Wadi” means riverbed or valley). First we had some difficulties to find a right point but the kind locals showed us the way with their car and we parked the car under the bridge. Then there was a river we needed to cross. There are also locals providing boat transportation to the other side but we could hop on a 4WD car together with some Germans and the car took us to the other side. Actually the river was not deep at all and on the way back we just walked through it. Then there was about an hour walking in front of us, starting with pretty nice path but later we also needed to climb some rocks and play with the balance. When we were about in the “destination” we also had to go into the water. “The destination” of the hike is to reach a cave with waterfall but since one has to dive a bit to reach there I did not make it to the very end (I cannot dive and I do not like to put my head under water, I am a lousy at swimming). So while the others went to the cave I was just swimming, sitting and admiring the nature around me. Along the whole path there are steep rocks on both sides, here and there are green and crystal clear water pools – lots of stunning views! The path was not very challenging and even if we saw quite many kids (youngest could be well at Märt's age) it would have been complicated with the kids at some points. On the way back we met a group of tourists (otherwise there were some single tourists), so we were actually lucky starting quite early. When we left Wadi Ash Shab we were really hungry and so we drove on to Sur, a town about 2-hours drive from Muscat. We were lucky to find some restaurants that were open (at day time most of restaurants (at least in smaller towns but even here in Muscat) are closed, actually most of the town was rather quiet on daytime when it is hottest outside) and we had lunch at one with a nice view over the sea and lighthouse. There had been more to do and see in Sur but we rather decided to find a Bamah Sinkhole before it got dark, so after lunch and some driving in Sur we headed to Muscat again. We had seen brown (you know, the one that means some sightseeing point) Sinkhole sign on the way to Sur but of course the sign was not in opposite direction and we had to take some small roads twice and almost giving up... Then we decided to check out another brown sign and voilà! there it was – the Sinkhole. It is a grand hole with green and crystal clear water and with underwater tunnel to the sea. The hole has been created naturally by some upper layers falling down. Impressive sight! By then it was already dark, so we drove back to Muscat.

Actually Andres and me (and the boys) plan to go to Sur, maybe already next weekend and if possible make it to two-days trip. There is more to discover on the way to Sur but then I also want to show them part of Wadi Ash Shab and the Sinkhole – impressive sights that one should not miss!

More photos are uploaded to the web gallery.

Photos uploaded!

I have uploaded lots of photos of our stay in our web gallery. If you have not got an e-mail about it from me but you are interested in I will send you details via e-mail. Let me know at hipi.grrrl (at) hot.ee

Christmas in Oman

It is for the very first time in my life when I celebrate Christmas far far from home. Since Oman is Islam country Christmas is not celebrated by local people. Though, all the big shopping centers and bigger restaurants have big decorated Christmas trees and in the shops one can also buy different Christmas decorations. Also Christmas songs are played in some restaurants. Yet, it is still very difficult to get a true Christmas feeling here when it is around 27 degrees and bright sunshine outside. For us - Estonians - Christmas always go together with winter and snow, although I know this year there was no snow in Estonia either.

We had very untraditional Christmas here. The boys found Christmas presents from the balcony yesterday morning and for dinner we had tuna fish sandwich cake. That was it. I must admit, for the first time during those wonderful weeks in Oman I missed back home...

Accommodation and visas

Tomorrow we will move back to villa after living for 3 weeks at bed-and-breakfast. We have had very fast changing and messy information about the accommodation but now it seems there is one free room for us in the rented villa (where also other Estonian and Serbian colleagues of Andres live) and we can hopefully stay there until leaving. We have had really great time here at the bed-and-breakfast and the landlady said she would miss us – how sweet:) We are also sure we will miss the interesting chats with her and rich breakfasts and the boys will surely miss the company of the male servant.

In meantime when we still had information about not having possibility to move back to villa we were also looking for accommodation by ourselves. If everything else is about at same price level as in Estonia then accommodation prices are very high here. Cheapest hotels in Muscat seem to have double rooms for 60 euro per night. We were looking for some furnished villa or apartment but it seemed to be complicated to find one for short term rental at reasonable price. In example for a furnished studio flat the rent had been around 1500 euro per month! Minimum 6-months rental for two-bedroom furnished flat had been in example around 1200 euro per month. Another thing is the rental contract itself. The real estate companies can make the contract only with the local registered company or with a person with residential visa. So when you are here with tourist visa (like we are) the only possibility seems to live at the hotel after all.

Mentioning visas, the tourist visa is issued on the border (at the airport) for 30 days for 20 OR (around 40 euro) per person. We were not asked any questions about the aim of our visit or where we would stay, after the payment, they just looked at the passports and stamped the visa. This week Andres went to prolong our visas (that can be done once, for another 30 days, one just has to pay the money again). He claimed me and the boys did not need to come along to the airport, so he just took our passports and went. I was still a bit skeptic because doesn't it sound like an illegal passport issuing office when a man has 3 other passports with him? But there had been no problem, even if he admitted the man behind the desk had looked funnily at him first when he had handed 4 passports but he had “calmed down” when Andres had said “For the family!” :)

Weekend: Nizwa and Yiti beach

Another weekend is over (time really flies here!) and we have had a busy weekend with lovely memories behind us. On Thursday we went to Nizwa, to the former capital of Oman, that is situated about 150 km from Muscat. When arriving at Nizwa we first visited Nizwa Fort. We could climb to the watch tower, look around in different rooms of the fort and there were also many interesting exhibitions about the history, culture and religion. Sadly with small kids it was impossible to read all the stories but we got a quick overview anyway. By the way, in the fort there we met several European tourists and we started to talk to a nice couple from Barcelona, Spain who we ran into two times more during the day – world is small, heh heh! After the fort's visit we wandered around in souq (market) area but as it was middle of the day it was extremely quiet there. We were almost only people walking around in these streets that get probably extremely busy in the early mornings and in the late evenings. We were lucky to find one restaurant that was open and where we could eat our lunch, we had simple yet tasty rice and chicken meal. Many restaurants here usually open at dusk, this is when the locals start to have dinner. After lunch we headed to Bahla where another fort of the area (it is also UNESCO World Heritage Site) is situated. But we did not have luck, the fort was under renovation and we could not visit it. We still had a short walk around in Bahla's streets before we drove on to Jabrin, hoping to visit a fort there. Again – no luck – it was already 5pm and closed. The Spanish couple who we met again said they had luck to convince to see the fort half an hour ago (it actually closed at 4pm) but by the time we arrived the door was “eternally” closed. There was nothing else to do than start driving back to Muscat. We decided to take a road over the mountains that seemed easy having a GPS and knowing there are usually good road signs. After driving for more than 50 kilometres it became weird (and it was already dark, of course), the GPS had let us down and we finally discovered ourselves close to Ibri that meant we had not driven to north direction but to west direction. We could not think out anything wiser to do than just drive back, it seemed to be the safest and easiest to do. So we lost 1,5 hours just driving around:(, at least we could enjoy some lovely views before it got dark. At last we were back in Nizwa where we wanted to have a nice dinner but we ended up eating fast food again:( After dinner we headed back to Muscat along the highway.

Yesterday, on Friday, we decided to have a lazy beach day. Any day here is a perfect beach day with bright sunshine and clear blue sky (though, last Thursday morning we even got very few raindrops!). We decided to find the Yiti beach, around 25 km from Muscat, that we had read about and that was told to be one of the nicest beaches in Oman. The road led us over the mountains and the views were wonderful! From here and there in between the mountains we could see the blue watered sea on the background and I do not have enough words to describe how breathtaking it was! One of the most beautiful surroundings I have ever seen in my life! On the way we met lots of goats and there were also some donkeys (that Andres did not see, so he blamed me for seeing some “ghost donkeys” that nobody else but me saw but finally Andres saw one donkey as well – heh heh). We got a bit lost again but nothing serious (and the views we could enjoy were worth of getting lost!) and finally we had found a right way to Yiti beach: a beach with clear blue sea water with white waves and soft sand and mountains in background – like a paradise! There were more people on the beach (also many tourists but it was not overcrowded at all) and many of them had picnic. We had only water with us, so we had to leave when we were started to starve. Though, we spent several hours in the beach, enjoying warm water and bright sunshine. We want to go there again!

Food

Our mornings always start with rich breakfast. There is always some eggs and bread, yoghurt and flakes with milk for the boys but everything else varies. Usually, when the landlady gets to know some food we eat in Estonia she provides Oman version next day. In example, we told her we eat often and lots of potatoes in Estonia and then there was always some potatoes for lunch (together with rice). Another morning Andres asked if they also make soups here and next morning there was mushroom soup (that tasted very similar to one that I have made at home) for breakfast. When i had told the boys usually eat porridge at home for breakfast they also got some porridge here next morning (that tasted also very similar to ours but it was just much sweeter). When she got to hear we also grow pumpkins in Estonia they made dessert of pumpkins (pumpkins, coconut milk and cardamom) for us.

I have found my favourite piece at breakfast that is some kind of flat bread. I have promised to go to the kitchen to see how the maid makes it, it is just so delicious:)

The landlady always makes sure we get to taste everything on the table. She told us Oman people have tradition “to feed the guests to the mouth”. Fortunately she is not “that active” but she still puts our plates full and I try my best to eat most of it up to be polite, that is not always an easy task!

As for lunch, they have usually also brought us some lunch (even if it is not in the price). The most usual lunch is rice (with potatoes) and chicken boiled with some spices (but fortunately not too spicy). Very simple but very tasty food!

As for our dinners – we usually go out to have dinner because we do not have any cooking facility here. Muscat is picked with all kind of international fast food restaurants and coffee shops (just another fast food places) are in every corner. But there are not too many other kind (“slow food”?) restaurants (they probably have but then the price range is also rather high), so it is mostly one type of food one can get. We have found our 3 favourites: a Turkish fast food restaurant not far from us that have delicious wraps, a Chinese restaurant further from here that has good Chinese food and a place called White Coral not far from here that provides grilled meat and fish. As for the prices, at Chinese restaurant we usually pay around 7 OR(= 14 EUR) for food and drinks for 4 of us. At White Coral the main courses (grilled meat or fish) cost around 3-3,5 OR (=6-7 EUR).

Super/hypermarkets have a very good product selection here. Especially when it comes to vegetables and fruits. We have not seen either tasted even half of them they sell here! Most of the fruits and vegetables are imported from Asian and African countries, but also from Oceania (i.e. meat is imported from New Zealand). The big hypermarkets also have fresh fish and the selection is very wide again, from baby sharks to Norwegian salmon. In addition they sell rice and flour in big 5-10 kg bags – something that we can never see in regular supermarkets in Estonia. Yes, i am already waiting for an opportunity to cook here but I am not sure we can use everything interesting they have here.

Our boys far far from home

So many have asked how our boys enjoy our stay in Oman. It seems they do enjoy:) Of course Märt says almost daily that he misses granny and grandpas but we all do;) Otherwise the kids enjoy the warm and sunny weathers and possibility to go to the beach. They are really big beach fans, so when they can be on the beach, run around in the water and play in the sand – they are extremely happy! Most of the beaches where we have gone to have been great for the kids: low and with not too high waves (at least when we have been there).

In the mornings they often play outside in the garden. The landlady gave them two 3-wheel bicycles to use and they like to make rally around the villa. They are also very attached to the male servant of the house – the guy who is originally from Africa. Another day he played soccer with them. But our kids do not speak anything but Estonian and the guy does not speak any Estonian of course, so he asked me some Estonian words like “Come” and “Slow” and now he often uses those words:)

Some days ago we also went for a walk in Al Qurm park in Muscat where there were several kids playgrounds but the attractions there seemed too dangerous for small kids, so we took a walk to amusement park nearby where the boys could have a ride on battery-car. Of course, Mihkel could not agree to leave the place any more, so everybody could hear “exotic boy screaming”...

As mentioned in previous post our fair haired boys get lots of attention here and everybody want to touch them. Also, they are the only kids in the evenings here who do not wear cardigan. Evenings here are just enough warm for us while all local kids wear long sleeves in the evenings. It is winter for them after all!

Oman Wedding

On Friday the landlady asked me to join her to her sister-in-law's sister wedding ceremony. As the ceremony was for women only, Andres again had to stay at home (and babysit the boys). We were driving to the outskirts of Muscat to one very big hall where the wedding took place. There could be some 200 women at least. The landlady said that the weddings are very big here, in her wedding there were 400 people, but there can be up to 700 people! Quite crazy for us (because in Estonia it is considered to be a big wedding when there are 100 people!). We arrived around 9pm, the DJ (woman of course!) was playing music, mainly Arabic music but they also played “Waka Waka” by Shakira, younger women were dancing while older women were just sitting in the tables, watching and talking. All the women had very festive and sparkling clothes, at least half part of them had uncovered hair with grand hairdos, lots of make-up, stunning western style evening dresses, lots of jewellery and high heels. I was wondering myself about for who they have dressed up – there were no men (but well, I am European and we dress up for a reason – for men, ha ha!). In this big hall there was a stage that was nicely decorated and there was also a couch for the bride. At 10pm the bride arrived, she walked very slowly through the hall to the stage (like we use to do in the church, just that here she had not father sending him and not groom waiting for her in front of the altar). Otherwise, she looked like any other western bride with her white dress, veil and flower bouquet. When she had reached the stage she was put sitting on the coach and she remained there for rest of the evening, some people only sometimes went to talk to her or take a photo, but not everybody (no congratulating ceremony). Then people went to crab some food (it was buffet with cold and warm dishes and desserts; no one big wedding cake), ate and left. I was asking the landlady that when could the bride eat and she smiled and told me she had eaten before the ceremony. We left around 11pm. The landlady said that when all the guests have left then the groom arrives to take the bride to the hotel. I also asked about the change of family name and there is not any, the bride keeps her family name as it is and when children are born they get fathers' family name.

It was very interesting to experience and see Oman's wedding and yes, it was rather different from our traditions.

Weekend and driving

We have rented a car, so this weekend we have explored the surroundings a bit. On Thursday we drove to As Sawadi resort where there is a nice beach. We also planned to visit some forts nearby but since we drove out very late that day and it gets dark around 6pm then all the forts were closed and we could not see the surroundings any more either, so we just returned to Muscat. Hopefully we will be better in planning next time. Yesterday, after going to see one flat we also visited Fish Market in Seeb (part of Muscat). The fishermen sold different fish outside and inside the building men were cleaning the fish. The look was quite cross I must admit, fish maw all over the floor... In another open air market there were hen and other birds sold, most of them for fresh meal.

Anyway, we still think driving is crazy here. We have not got lost very much (the road signs are very good here actually) but all this speed and constant flow of the cars... During the first days i wished I had an extra brake by my seat, by now I can sit already much calmer in the car. Though, nobody doesn't seem to care about the traffic signs and even if the sign says 40km/h everybody keep driving with 100 km/h. Andres told me he felt like F1 pilot! Another mystic for us was the cross without any traffic signs (about where is the main road) and we tried to figure out who had right to drive first. In Estonia we have right hand rule in such cross but here it did not seem to work that way. We asked the landlady about the rule and first she only laughed at our question and then she told us there was not any rule. You just have to drive, and bigger cars seem to have more rights – “logical”, eh? And yet, despite the fact that Oman has the most traffic accidents in the world, and that they do not care about the rules, the traffic still functions here, somehow...

We also bought child car seats from the shop, there we paid around 22 OR per seat while the car rentals had asked at least 2 OR per day per seat. Actually child car seats are not compulsory here – to my big surprise. And indeed, one can see quite often kids in the cars moving around, sitting on the head of the seat – while driving 120-140 km/h!!! Yes, it sounds totally suicidal for us but here it seems to be rather normal. By the way, I have read that one is not allowed to drive with a dirty car here and one can get fine for it. Indeed, you don't see any dirty cars driving around here.

PS: To those who are waiting for more photos: our Internet connection here is not the best, so it would take me ages to upload lots of photos. So I just try to add 1-2 photos to every post and when I will be back in Estonia I will share more photos:)

Religion

Today at the breakfast table the landlady and me mostly talked about their religion – Islam. The landlady asked me what I know about their religion and I had to admit not too much. Of course I had heard about that Muslim men can have more than one wife, that bride and groom cannot sleep together before marriage, that it is difficult to get divorced for a woman and other this and that. I also had to admit it is mostly negative that our media talks about Islam religion. Anyway, here are some bits the landlady told me about the Islam.

Praying.

Muslims pray 5 times per day and one can hear Arabic calling through the loudspeakers of mosque when it is praying time.

Getting married.

The presents bringing ceremony that I could take part in some days ago was to bring gifts to the bride-to-be. The gifts are personal for the girl: money, gold, clothes, handbags etc, not something for the bride and groom together like we have it in Europe. The landlady's daughter who gets married is 22 years old and the wedding will be in March. Nowadays girls can choose themselves who to marry to but it is also very common that the family suggests who to marry to. It is also usual nowadays to get married around 25 years or so because they also want to make career first, before 16 or 18 years old girls got married. The bride and the groom are not allowed to sleep together before wedding because “nobody wants to get married to one who has had many partners before” or get some disease.

Wedding ceremony.

Only the groom will go to mosque on the wedding day to give promises. The bride will be decorated with henna, perfumed all over the body and all body hair will be moved. The bride has to be perfect for the first wedding night. Wedding itself lasts for 2-3 days.

A man marrying to more than one wife.

A man can marry only to more than one wife for a reason. The reason can be in example the wife not getting children after many years.

Cheating

When a man wants to have sex then the woman has to give it. Only when the woman is ill she can deny. When a woman has refused to have sex and a man goes out to have sex from somebody else then it is woman's fault.

Divorce

A man can get a divorce for a reason, but he does not have to proof anything. When a woman wants a divorce she has to have a reason and 3 witnesses. Before the divorce it will also be discussed in the family (with the parents, with siblings). If a woman does not have witnesses then she has to go to court to get a divorce and put a hand on the Koran and tell the truth. Koran is everything for them.

Heritage

When a father dies then the sons get more heritage than the daughters. This is because the son has to take care of the family (of mother, of sisters) then. A daughter can spend the heritage only on herself.

Clothing/Covering

Women cover themselves in front of men they could get married. That means they do not have to cover them for father and brothers. The landlady said that she is very much used to covering herself and when she travels she usually also covers herself. When woman's body is not covered it can be provoking for men. So covering is to protect women and for the women's good.

Violence, raping

Violence and raping is not allowed in Islam. When a woman does not want to pray the man can scold her but not use any violence. Raping is not allowed either and when a woman wears decent (covered) clothes but gets raped she is not guilty. But when there are not decent clothes then – following the landlady – the woman has provoked the man and “it is natural men get urges”.

Renting a car

Andres goes to work around 7.30am while me and the boys sleep until 9am or so. We usually have breakfast in the garden at 10am, last two mornings the landlady has been out of the house that time, so we have not had any company (but a maid or a male servant). Yesterday after the breakfast when the landlady arrived she invited me to the house and we had nice chat again about different things. In example we talked about growing the vegetables and it turned out we can grow pumpkins and watermelons both in Oman and in Estonia, just that in Oman watermelons get huge and pumpkins small while in Estonia it is vice versa:) Anyway, when it got time to take a walk with the boys (Mihkel still takes his daily nap) then the landlady insisted we needed to have some lunch. We had rice, chicken, potatoes and spinach for lunch. I have to say most of the local food is rather spicy and since our kids have not got used to spicy food it is a bit complicated for them but they find their bits and pieces to eat as well. The locals eat with (right) hand and when Mihkel saw the landlady eating with the hand he also decided to start eating with hand, kids seem to have it easiest to adopt to the local traditions;)

During the last days we have also tried to find a good deal for car rental and to find a new accommodation from the 18^th December when we have to move out from here. As for car rental, we hope we can get a car today. But one can never be sure here. Yesterday Andres was calling to one car rental and they seemed to have cars. In the evening he was calling again and then he had conversation like this (probably with some Indian on the other side):

A: “i would like to rent a car, do you have any?”

He: “Yes. We have.”

A: “Can I have one today or tomorrow?”

He: “But when do you want?”

A: “Today, then”

He: “But we do not have today”

A: “ok, tomorrow, then. When can i come to get one?”

He: “Do you want to get it in the morning or in the evening?”

A: “In the morning”

He: “But we do not have in the morning”

...

We are more than sure that today when Andres calls again nobody has any information about the deal they made. But well, this seems to be usual here. One just has to be very patient and easy-going.

Another thing with the car is driving itself. Muscat is very scattered city, it goes like 40 km along the coast, so you do nothing by going by foot, so having a car is the best option. But the speed limits are crazy here. In the city there are highways where the speed limit is 120km/h but everybody drive by 140 km/h. There are some areas with 80km/h but again, everybody seem to drive by 100 km/h. And when not knowing where exactly to drive, it gets very complicated. Yesterday we tried to buy a paper map from a small bookstore but they did not have any. Andres has downloaded some navigation system but it does not always work, so we cannot trust it completely. So let's hope Andres finds his way back to us when and if he gets a car:) One more problem that we faced was children car seats. The car rental companies ask for quite insane price for the child seats, especially since we will rent a car at least for a month and we need two car seats! So we have decided it is probably cheaper to buy the seats from the shop. (I was already joking that when we will leave in January i can open my small baby equipment market in the airport and sell all the kids' stuff we have bought here but that would be too big to take back to Estonia...)

We are also browsing through the accommodation sites, more precisely apartment rental sites. There have been some great deals out there in the web but when we have called they did not have anything available. We will call more places today.

First impressions

Less than half an year ago I did not even know where exactly Oman was situated. I had heard the country's name but that was it, I had not any imagination either knowledge about the country. When Andres left to Oman in the end of September i read a book about the country that was written by an Estonian woman who had worked here and I got some overview about the country and it made me wish to visit the country one day as well. When Andres returned he told me more about the country and I got some picture in my head but only a month ago I still had no idea I could see the country with my own eyes so soon!

After all the packing and planning we – Andres, me and our boys – left Tallinn by plane in the morning of 30^th November. We travelled via Stockholm and Doha (Qatar) and landed in Muscat, the capital of Sultanate of Oman, in the late evening. The boys managed the long flying day pretty well, even if it was rather tiring for all of us. For our bad surprise Andres' suitcase did not make it, they said it was still in Stockholm and that they would bring it only two days later. But yesterday it was still travelling around, from Stockholm to Dubai and from Dubai back to Stockholm and only today (3^rd of Dec) it arrived. And since Andres's suits were in the suitcase he could have an extra day off today and could not go to work.

We arrived here for the weekend because here Thursday and Friday are the weekend. For the first two nights we stayed in the rented villa of Andres' cooperating company but since there were more people arriving we had to move out. They had found us kind of bed-and-breakfast where we moved in yesterday. So now we stay in a garden room of a nice lady and her family. It is very beautiful here: there is a nice garden with trees and bushes, small ponds with fish and turtles and our room is rather small but cosy. We will stay here for at least 2 weeks and then we will see if we can move back to villa (if there will be any empty rooms by then), stay here or move somewhere else.

After moving in here we discovered the surroundings by foot (we do not have a car here, not yet, we probably rent a car later). We tried to not get lost because most of the streets seems to have numbers as well as houses but they are not always in logical order. And since all the houses are white or with some light beige colour and the gardens look pretty similar as well it is hopeless to orientate following surroundings. Anyway, we found our way to the seaside (that is about a kilometre from here). But we also noticed not many locals go by foot here (they always drive and the cars are very new and expensive here), this is probably also the explanations why there are hardly any pedestrian crossing on the roads. That means when you want to cross the road you just have to wait patiently when there are not that many cars and run... Later in the afternoon we also found our nearest supermarket and some Turkish fast food restaurants. We do not have cooking facilities in our room (only fridge that is actually good enough as well), so we have to go out to have some warm dish for lunch or for dinner.

Yesterday evening was very interesting to me. I could see and take part in presents bringing ceremony of wedding. One of the lady's daughters is getting married and yesterday the groom's relatives brought the gifts. The relatives (women only! So Andres had to keep himself to the room) of the bride had gathered around 7pm and started singing and playing some instruments (like small drums but even big plastic bottles and big wooden spoons were used for making music), sometimes somebody dancing and throwing money to those who were singing or dancing. Over an hour later groom's relatives were arriving with the gifts, holding them over their heads. All the presents were nicely packed and when they entered the bride's relatives stood up and held a linen over their heads and presents. That's how they danced for some time until they handed over the presents to the bride's relatives until the presents were put on the ground and then taken away (we did not see the presents any more that evening). Then there were some more singing (always performed by bride's side) until a woman held a (long) speech about the marriage. Of course I could only hear Arabic language that evening but since all (or at least most of) locals speak very good English i could get some explanations afterwards. The celebration ended with lots of good food. And all this celebration happened without the bride herself, she was not allowed to see either take part in any of this!

This morning started with a nice breakfast and the landlady also joined us, so we could have a nice chat about various topics. We were offered a local breakfast with chai but do not ask me the names of all the food... Anyway, most of it is rather spicy. The landlady told us it was her intention to provide us local food and also her company in the table so that we could get a better idea about the local traditions and local life. Very fine for us:)

The weathers have been super for us. On day time it can be around +25C and a bit up but there is also some light breeze that makes it very tolerable. Evenings are also very warm, no need for long sleeves although for the locals it is winter now and they find mornings and evenings a bit chilly. And talking about the clothes, Oman really seems to be rather liberal. Of course you still do not see women wearing mini skirts/dresses either sleevless tops in the streets but yesterday at that celebration there were some women with loose and uncovered hair or wearing western style evening dresses. Though, most of them had very beautifully decorated colourful local clothes and beautiful jewellery.

Of course our fair haired boys are very exotic here and usually get lots of locals' attention. The locals – as much as I have met them so far – seem to be very open and friendly and interested in us. Of course our country Estonia is as less known for them as Oman is for us.