Oman's 44th National Day

On November 18, 2014 Oman celebrated its 44th National Day, which is the date of the Sultan's birthday and commemorates him ascending to the throne 44 years ago. In expectation of the event, the whole country was decked out in red and green banners, flags, lights and a sense of celebration. It almost looked like the country was decorating for Christmas...until you realized that Oman's flag is red and green and the color scheme is merely a coincidence.

 

 

A few weeks prior to National Day, the Sultan gave a video conference to state that he would be unable to return to Oman for the festivities due to the fact that he was seeking medical attention in Germany. Many of the Omanis I worked with seemed ecstatic that he was speaking to them via video and everyone tuned in to hear him. In the days following his video, it was all anyone could talk about and I started seeing cars around town that were emblazoned with the Sultan or with the Omani flag, further showing everyone's love for the Sultan and national pride.

 

 

 

I have to admit that as an American I found all of this rather perplexing. No matter how popular one of our presidents might be, I couldn't imagine Americans getting so excited about hearing a speech, nor could I ever imagine Americans decking out their cars with images of the president or of our flag.

 

The Sultan's speech and his inability to return to Oman for National Day also sparked some questions by international journalists and expats as to his health and what his failing health might mean for Oman's future. As far as I can tell, this is not something Omanis discuss, at least not publicly. The Omanis love the Sultan and wish him well and don't seem to speculate about his health or what the future of the country might be without him, especially not during a time of celebration.  

 

Though November 18th was the actual National Day, the Sultan has historically wanted Omanis to stay in Oman for National Day, so people are not given the day off. Instead, the holiday is the following weekend, ensuring that Omanis stay in the country for the actual holiday and then get days off that they can travel with. This year we were lucky enough that the National Day holiday fell November 26-27, which meant that all of us Americans could celebrate Thanksgiving (which would otherwise have been a normal work day).

 

Since I learned my lesson about staying in Oman during holidays (and since my mom would have worried incessantly if I'd been alone for Thanksgiving), I flew to Doha, Qatar to spend the holiday with some of my friends who used to live in Oman and were relocated to Doha a few months ago. While I didn't get out and see much of Doha, what little I did see was such a contrast to Muscat. When I first visited the Gulf region, I found Muscat so much more aesthetically pleasing than the bigger cities like Abu Dhabi, Dubai or Doha. And while Muscat is much more charming than the other three, after living here almost 8 months I find myself missing the bustle of a big city and feeling a little bored by Muscat's sleepy charm. So a weekend in Doha was a nice refresher - not only to see good friends, but to also be reminded that Dubai isn't the only big city in the region. And since it's only an hour and a half flight away, it's an easy escape on the random boring weekend here.

Halloween in Transylvania

So now that I've told you why I wanted to go to Romania for Halloween, I guess I should tell you about my actual trip. I took a 7-day tour of Transylvania through the tour company G Adventures, which was pretty much the perfect amount of time to spend in Romania. 

The trip started in Bucharest, which I'd been warned to have pretty low expectations about. Supposedly Bucharest was called the "Paris of the East" in the 1800s due to its beauty, but 60 years of communism, repression and economic stagnation left it a bit wanting. Knowing there wouldn't be much to do there, we spent our one free day in Bucharest at the Escape Room, which I highly recommend. Basically you get locked in a room for an hour with a ticking bomb to solve clues to escape the room before the bomb goes off. Nothing Romanian about it, but it was definitely a fun way to spend an hour (and no, we did not escape the bomb, though apparently made it farther than most people).

We got out of Bucharest as quickly as we could and headed to Transylvania, which is a region of Romania bordering the Carpathian Mountains. Our first stop was Snagov Monastery, which is supposedly where Dracula was buried. Dracula gravesite or not, I can see why he liked this small Orthodox church so much.

Snagov Monastery

We also swung by Peles Castle before heading to the quaint, medieval town of Brasov.

Peles Castle

Brasov

I was pretty excited to see Bran Castle, which is sometimes incorrectly referred to as Dracula's Castle. It's not clear that Dracula ever visited this castle and, if he did, it was likely only for a short period of time, but it's still a pretty stunning castle. That also happens to be for sale, if you can find $88 million lying around.

Bran Castle

But the real highlight of the tour was Corvin Castle, where we spent Halloween Eve. Every tour group in the country for Halloween attended the costume ball and the castle was decked out for the event. There was medieval jousting in the courtyard, a feast, Romanian folk dancing and a costume contest.

Corvin Castle - most epic Halloween

Getting to spend Halloween in that castle would have been amazing all on its own, but with everyone decked out in costumes and the locals joining in, it was truly the best possible Halloween. I also lucked out and had a really great tour group this time around, so attending the party with a bunch of fun people also helped immensely.

We ended the trip with a visit to Poenari Castle, Dracula's actual castle. The castle was largely destroyed in an earthquake in the 1800s, but what remains is at the top of a mountain...and the top of a very strenuous climb up 1400 stairs. However, the views from the top were amazing and a good (though sweaty) way to end a great week.

Poenari Castle

A view of the Arges River from the walkway up to Poenari Castle

For any other Halloween lovers out there, I definitely recommend Halloween in Transylvania. Or, if you just like stunning mountains and fall scenery, still go.

Now to go finish packing before I'm off to Doha for Thanksgiving!

Visiting Dracula

I've been terrible about updating this blog recently but I have been traveling more than usual and absolutely slammed at work in between all the travel. Which also means that I'm pretty much perpetually tired from the never-ending jet lag cycle. But I finally have a few days off work to relax, celebrate Thanksgiving and actually update this blog!

So about a month ago I packed some warm clothes and headed off to Romania to celebrate Halloween in Transylvania, something that has always been on my bucket list. But before I launch into a description of my trip, I should probably tell you why I wanted to go to Romania so badly. For starters, in my much younger days I was a "goth" kid and went through a vampire phase (fortunately this was long before the "Twilight" craze and I had respectable Anne Rice vampires to obsess about) and, as both a goth kid and a history nerd, I naturally researched the real Dracula, Vlad Tepes. And so began my interest in traveling to the region...

Dracula was a 15th century prince in Wallachia, a region of Romania that was on the edge of the Ottoman advance into Europe. His father had joined the Order of the Dragon, a Christian secret society committed to stopping the Ottomans, and so his father was renamed Vlad Dracul, dracul meaning "dragon". By adding the "a" to the end of Dracul it merely meant "son of", so the son became Vlad Dracula and, like his father, was committed to stopping the Ottomans, which was of critical importance to Europe after the Ottomans defeated and then claimed Constantinople in 1453. 

Vlad Dracula

As a child, Dracula and his brother were held as hostages at the Ottoman court for years. He grew up witnessing torture and war and knew that his life was always at stake. When he finally returned to claim his Wallachian throne in 1456, he was a hardened man and ruled with an iron fist. To consolidate his power, one of the first things he did was bring the Wallachian nobles into line. He invited the nobles over to celebrate Easter and when they showed up in their finery, he locked the doors and killed off most of the men. The women and children he forced into slavery to build his castle, Poenari Castle, high up on a mountain. The story goes that they slaved away in their Easter finery until the clothing disintegrated from their bodies and then they toiled in the nude until they died.

Poenari Castle - an earthquake destroyed most of the castle in the 1800s, but you can still visit the ruins after climbing a grueling 1400 steps to the top. The mannequins try to recreate the impaled victims that one would have seen when nearing Dracula's castle.

While his actions towards the nobles might seem unusually cruel, the nobles had previously killed his  older brother by burying him alive. These same nobles, most of whom were German, also controlled trade and limited opportunities for ethnic Romanians. And, finally, they used their power to try to control the princes of Wallachia, which Dracula clearly wasn't having. So while his methods were cruel, they were not necessarily unjustified.

In addition to cleaning up the nobility, Dracula also took very hardline approaches on theft, adultery and other crimes. Theft was punishable by death and his favorite form of killing was impalement, though he also employed a myriad of other ways to torture, kill and maim. Sometimes he'd impale people through the stomach so they would die quickly - other times he would have a blunt stake pushed through a person's anus until the stake slowly made its way through someone's body, eventually killing them after a few incredibly painful days. And often once he impaled someone he would leave the stakes up, as a reminder to others. He impaled so many people that another one of his nicknames is Vlad the Impaler.

But it worked. There was virtually no crime in Wallachia at the time and the story goes that he used to leave a gold cup at a fountain in the city square for anyone to drink out of and the cup was never stolen. And he was the only European leader of the time to turn back the Ottomans. In 1462, the Ottomans under Mehmet II were advancing on Wallachia. When they neared Dracula's castle they encountered the forest of the impaled - over 20,000 victims, many of them Turks, impaled on sticks leading up to Dracula's castle. Mehmet II was so horrified by Dracula's cruelty that he turned around and returned to Constantinople, thereby saving Wallachia from being overrun by the Ottomans.

Dracula was killed around 1476/1477 and it was believed that he was buried at Snagov Monastery, a monastery that he helped support and which he supposedly favored due to its remote location on an island.

Snagov Monastery

Supposedly he was buried at the head of the church, where the priests would walk over praying every day, thereby helping to atone for all the sins he committed in life. However, when archaeologists dug up his remains in 1931, they found that the casket was only full of animal bones. Rumor has it that at some point Dracula's body was moved to a less holy place in the monastery, and a different casket was discovered with a human skeleton missing a head. Some believe that was Dracula's true final resting place, though rumors abound about other burial locations (and whether he's truly resting at all!).

Supposedly the location where Dracula was buried in Snagov Monastery

While Dracula is most often portrayed as a villain or a cruel and bloodthirsty tyrant, Romanians look to him as a national hero. He fought off the Ottomans, wrested control away from the German nobles, advanced Romanian national causes and made Wallachia a safe and crime-free area to live in. His rules were strict and his punishments appalling, but during a dark time in Eastern European history Wallachians had stability and security and a national champion.

But how did the story of one cruel Romanian prince in the 1400s turn into a vampire legend and make its way to Bram Stoker, an English chap in the 1800s who never even traveled to Romania? Long before Stoker told his tale, Germans, Russians and other Europeans were telling stories about Dracula, embellishing on his atrocities and creating supernatural causes for his tyranny. Pamphlets in Germany were printed during Dracula's lifetime and these early manuscripts, which became bestsellers at the time, tied him to vampires and demons and all sorts of supernatural evils. By the time Stoker turned Dracula into a household monster, Europeans had been telling the tale of Dracula for hundreds of years.

1499 German woodcut showing Dracula dining among the impaled corpses of his victims - this also helped add to the vampire myth, since Dracula did drink blood and did eat food covered in the blood of his victims

So yes, growing up I was a little obsessed with Dracula, who is also rumored to be one of the sources for Machiavelli's "The Prince". But apart from the Dracula history, I also wanted to see the country. I'd heard that the Carpathian Mountains were spookily beautiful and that Romania is one of the last few places in Europe where bears and wolves still exist in large numbers (in fact, there are more bears in Romania than in all of the rest of Europe).

Carpathian Mountains

Spooky Carpathian Mountains

And finally, the Soviet historian in me wanted to check another post-Soviet country off my list. Romania's Soviet dictator, Nicolae Ceaușescu, was one of the worst of the Soviets and Romania had a  harder time catching up to the rest of Europe after the fall of communism. It's still a very poor country by European standards - in fact, in the villages, a major mode of transportation still remains the horse and cart, which we saw repeatedly.

If you drive in Romania you have to learn to share the road with all the horse-drawn carts

A Week of Boredom

So as I've mentioned, we've had the past week off work due to the Muslim holiday of Eid Al Adha. While a week off work would normally entail me traveling somewhere exotic, I was pretty exhausted after all of my recent traveling and felt bad leaving my cat yet again. And since there wasn't anywhere I was dying to go and had no one to travel with, I opted to stay home and relax for the week.

I underestimated exactly how boring Oman can be without a single person around to do anything. While there are still lots of hikes and excursions in the country I want to do, none of them are really appropriate for a female going alone. So I read a lot. Watched a ton of TV. Explored my neighborhood, played with my cat, went on a lot of walks…and by Tuesday I was ready to hop on a plane and go somewhere, anywhere. So I did the next best thing and checked myself into a fancy resort here on Wednesday night.

The Shangri-La Bar Al Jissah Resort is about 45 minutes away from my house and on an outcropping of rock out over the ocean. While I'd never stayed there before, the drive out to Shangri-La from Muscat is pretty spectacular and something that's well worth a trip out.

So it was gorgeous and I booked myself in for a massage and then a day at the beach on Wednesday. And it was certainly better than sitting on my couch at home and watching tv, but a resort is not exactly the best place to be alone since everyone else is there with someone (as opposed to a hotel that caters to businesspeople, where at least there's a decent chance that some people are there alone for work, as opposed to a resort). 

I also planned on having a fabulous seafood dinner at their restaurant Bait Al Bahr, which is indoor/outdoor. While it has cooled off slightly here, I didn't want to get all dressed up and then sweat profusely, so I opted to eat indoors. What I didn't realize is that outside there are fans and an ocean breeze, whereas the inside is completely open and has no A/C or fans. While the people on the outside deck looked perfectly comfortable, I was so hot and so sweaty it was hard to enjoy my fabulous grilled seafood dinner. In fact, I was so hot I practically rushed through my meal just so I could get out of the restaurant and back into the fresh air, where there also happened to be a beautiful full moon.

My original plan was to head to the bar after dinner and maybe attempt to meet people (or at least just not sit in my room), but I was so hot and uncomfortable after dinner that I needed to escape to my room and get out of my dress for a little while. I had every intention of going back out, but I should have known that once I got undressed that would be it for the evening. So by 8:30 at night I was back in my room, flipping channels on the tv trying to find something to watch and wishing I was back home with my DVR and my cat. Sad, I know. 

But at least I redeemed myself slightly the next day by going snorkeling. I just wanted to get out and do something, but once I arrived at the snorkeling location the guide said that we were going to Turtle Bay and would see lots of turtles. I was suddenly so much more excited about snorkeling since I've never really swam with sea turtles before (and I'm clearly a sucker for non-fish wildlife).

The marina for snorkeling.

When we arrived at Turtle Bay I didn't see any turtles, though I did see lots and lots of slug-like things on the bottom of the ocean. At first I thought they were dead fish, then I thought they were debris in the water, then I realized they were alive and feeding off the bottom of the ocean. As long as none of them raised up off the bottom I'd be fine, since one of the biggest things I'm scared of while snorkeling is eels. And these slugs (I think they're actually sea cucumbers) looked way too snake/eel-like for me to be comfortable.

Just as I was getting comfortable swimming over the slugs, assured that they wouldn't rise up and bite me, I saw the single coolest and scariest thing I've seen while snorkeling - a giant moray eel.

Terrifying moray eel. I actually kept calling it a leopard eel because of it's distinctive markings until someone told me it's real name.

I'm very impressed with myself that I managed to swim over the eel a few times without freaking out. But he seemed pretty happy lodged in his coral and fat from all the fish, so I don't think biting me was high on his list of things to do.

Just as we were getting ready to head back I did finally see a single sea turtle. He swam right past me and an older Italian man and I took off after him (we were the only two of our group to even see the sea turtle, much less be strong enough swimmers to follow him). The little booger swam so fast it was all I could do to keep up with him, much less try to take a picture. We eventually lost him, but I would have been pretty disappointed to go to Turtle Bay and not see a single turtle.

The highlight of my day was probably going to see "Dracula Untold" on opening night to get me in the mood for my trip to Transylvania in two weeks. All in all, while the resort was a nice break from reality, it was not the best place to go when you're already feeling lonely. In fact, I'm pretty mad at myself that I missed an opportunity to travel this week (which it seems like every other person in this part of the world did this week), so in the future I need to find a way to balance needing some days to relax and unwind versus spending 10 full days doing absolutely nothing. And now I can't believe I'm back to work on Sunday...

Eid Al Adha

Yesterday started the week-long Muslim holiday of Eid Al Adha, so the Sultanate of Oman declared that we all had another 10 day vacation since all work stopped Thursday evening and we're off until next Sunday. Pretty much all the expats left already, but with my hectic travel schedule lately I just decided to stay here and rest and relax for a week. 

Last week when I was in the field I wound up talking to a couple of Omani coworkers and they were shocked to hear that I was here alone and had no plans for Eid. They also couldn't believe that I hadn't been to an Omani home yet, so they insisted that I join one of their families for Eid. I smiled, said I'd love to, and then secretly hoped that no one would call and I could spend my week quietly relaxing and sunbathing.

This morning one of the coworkers texted me and invited me to his sister's house for Eid. Though my initial thought was to come up with an excuse not to go, I accepted since I figured this was something I should experience. Plus I felt like I owed all you faithful readers with a true Omani experience. So it's clearly all your fault that I had an incredibly uncomfortable day.

When I arrived my coworker immediately handed me off to his sister, since the men and women congregate separately at gatherings and parties. His sister had a houseful of people (about 60-70), so having to babysit me was probably the last thing she needed. She asked me to sit on the couch in the front room, which happened to be the kids' room. She spent a few minutes with me, but then needed to run off and attend to the food. So after a few minutes of awkwardly sitting with the kids, I wandered out and tried to figure out where the rest of the women were. My hostess caught me awkwardly standing in the hallway and insisted I sit with the old ladies who couldn't speak English. A slight improvement over the kids. 

Finally a woman about my age came over to me and said that my coworker asked her to keep me company. Her English was excellent and she was really friendly, so I was incredibly grateful that she got volunteered to hang out with me. Shortly after she came over to me it was time to eat and all the men went through the buffet first. After the men they insisted I go next, since guests in Arab households have a sort of "guest of honor" status. 

Lunch was a giant vat of rice and lamb, a type of coleslaw salad and then some pickled vegetables that I couldn't determine. My usual approach is to try a little of everything, though before I did that I should have remembered that Arab hospitality is double-edged - you're expected to eat a lot and clean your plate, otherwise people will fret that you will go hungry! Also, in Omani households everyone eats with their hands, so everyone fussed over me washing my hands. Then the women went into a bedroom to eat - a plastic tablecloth was laid in the middle of the floor and everyone sat on the floor around it and dug in with their hands. They only eat with the right hands and somehow managed to scoop up rice and pick lamb off the bone with only one hand and without making a complete mess. I had planned on trying to eat with my hands, but I must have looked panicked, so someone brought me a fork. I was incredibly thankful for that since I would have made an absolute mess trying to eat rice with my fingers.

So one of the pickled "vegetables" was a small ball that was cut into quarters. I actually thought it might be a small tomato or something, so I popped a quarter into my mouth fully. A few miserable seconds later I realized it was a pickled lemon, complete with seeds and rind! It was so awful I actually would have tried to spit it out…if only we'd had napkins. Instead I managed to swallow it and then took a mouthful of the spiciest thing ever. At this point I decided to stick to rice, even if it made me look rude.

While the hostess fussed over me and why I wasn't eating enough, all the other women in the room completely ignored me. It could have been that they didn't speak English, but I suspect at least most of the younger ones did, so they probably just didn't want to bother having to make small talk with a stranger. The few minutes where no one fussed over me or spoke to me were actually okay. At some point during the lunch, as I was listening to everyone speaking a language I didn't understand, I realized that they weren't speaking Arabic. Turns out everyone at this party primarily spoke Swahili! The Omani empire used to encompass Eastern Africa and many Omanis emigrated there during the reign of the Sultan's father and only returned to Oman after the Sultan took over. As a result, many of them still speak Swahili as a first language. 

As soon as everyone finished eating, most people left immediately without even eating dessert. I tried to sneak out, but the hostess wouldn't have it. Actually, as more people left I spent a while talking to the hostess alone and that was pretty nice. A lot of questions (and shock) as to how I'm here alone, why I'm not married, why no children, etc. I even got invited to another lunch tomorrow, but I think I successfully managed to beg my way out of it. After a while I finally said I needed to leave to make a movie showing, otherwise I'm not sure how long I would have needed to stay.

Though the entire experience was awkward, Arab hospitality is still so impressive and the hostess really went out of her way to make sure I was fed, comfortable and enjoyed myself. It was also nice of them to invite me into their big family gathering (think of it as the equivalent of inviting someone home for Christmas dinner with your entire extended family). But now that I've experienced an Omani gathering once, I don't think I need to rush off to do that again anytime soon!

Trip to the Desert

One of my favorite things about working in the oil industry is getting to go to the oilfield. I like seeing what it is we actually do and I love meeting the people who work in the field (and being seen as an approachable lawyer). This week I finally go to go the field here, partially because it had been too hot all summer and partially because it's a 5 hour drive each way, so I needed to make sure I had sufficient time to spend a few days there.

On the drive there we passed some spectacular scenery...namely tons of small villages, ancient forts and craggy mountain ranges (of course having to stop at a gas station and use one of their horrible squatter toilets left a lot to be desired).

After about three and a half hours of driving we pulled off onto an unpaved desert road where the main hazards are dust clouds and camels. We hit a "traffic jam" as we waited for a herd of camels to cross the road in front of us - a couple even got so close to the car that I could have reached out and pet them (or at least reached out and angered them into spitting at me).

The field we were going to has some pretty spectacular orange sand dunes, so at the end of a bumpy 5-hour drive we were met with some awesome scenery of the orange dunes.

We hiked up to the top of a dune and though I didn't quite catch the sunset, it was well worth the sweating.

 

 

After three days of being in the field I felt a bit rejuvenated again. It was a good reminder of how beautiful Oman can be, how great some of the people in the field are and how many wonderful connections with people I've made at this company over the years. And on the way back we passed through a pretty large herd of camels (though none attempted to cross the road):

Jet Lagging

I just returned from my first trip back to the US since I moved to Oman and I have to say the jet lag is killing me. Against my better judgment, I spent all day yesterday in bed sleeping, which is sure to screw me up for this entire week. I'm pretty sure it's karma, since I was bragging that I had no jet lag going to the US (and even wondered whether all of my recent travels have gotten my system so used to traveling that now I don't get lagged).

It was also an incredibly whirlwind trip, since I was "home" for only 7 days (I actually consider Oman "home" now). I was there for a work conference and to spend a few days catching up in the Houston office, but I also needed to do a tremendous amount of shopping, as well as squeeze in doctors and dentists appointments. And yeah, you hear shopping and you think fun and glamorous stuff, but I was really shopping for routine things like cold medicine and heating pads and hair products and shampoo and other incredibly boring and mundane things that you don't think about needing...until you can't buy them because you live in the freaking desert. In my haste to leave Houston last Thursday, I even forgot to pack a 6-month supply of prescription meds as well as my Omani liquor license! Fortunately my tenant is sending me everything, but geez, talk about forgetting the critical stuff (and here's hoping the package makes it through customs)!

 

Since this was my first trip back and since I'd had a rough couple of weeks in Oman with no running water or internet (my water is working again, though still no internet), a few people wondered whether my trip back would cause me to want to stay back in the US. Not even a little bit. Look, it was nice to see my friends, it was great to be back in my nice house (with running water and internet and even shower pressure!), it was nice to drink gallons of Diet Coke and wander the glorious aisles of Target, but none of that made me want to move back to Houston permanently. I really like being an expat, despite all the trials and tribulations in living in a place like this. Also, as crazy as Omani drivers are, driving in Houston was so much worse because of the traffic, the enormous highways, the oblivious drivers, the narrow lanes and the sorry state of the roads. It was flat out terrifying.

 

In addition to the jet lag, I think I'm also just exhausted from all the traveling. A few weeks ago I was in Japan for two weeks, then here for one week (dealing with all the house maintenance issues), then the US for a week, then I'm here for one week, then a week off work (I'm thinking of going to Germany if I can figure out all the details in the next few days), then here for two weeks, then a week in Romania, then here for three days, then the US for a week...I got tired just listing all that. And my poor cat. But after the first few weeks of November I'm not planning on going anywhere for a good, long while, so I need to make the most of these opportunities while I have them. And because I really need to go back to the US in November so I can hug my dog.