Couch Surfing, and a local blog highlight.

Well today I was going to blog about Couch Surfing, seeing as I happen to know a local host or two, and well it was in the Muscat Daily today. However, local blogger Delirious in the Desert beat me to it by publishing this post earlier today.

Just while we're on Muscat Daily for a second, and to some extent, The Week too, I keep seeing evidence of poor copy & pasting journalism. In a recent issue of The Week, in the centre section which highlights a tourist destination, someone had gone to the effort of converting the US$ amounts suggested for various items, yet failed to modify the text, so it still read as if the reader was in the United States when reading the article. On today's front page, above the fold, there is a news brief on two plane's that collided here in China. Sloppy work guys. Sloppy.

If you have not already "liked" my blog on facebook, please do so, my target of 100 likes is so very near.... just 12 to go at the time of posting!

More tomorrow.

le fin.

Cost of living: 2010 update

For a general break-down on furniture shopping, groceries, alcohol, and a few others, please read my article from last year on the cost of living here.

Muscat is a large area, and depending on where you are working, you will most likely want to live in a particular area. This map is the best online map resource I can recommend, and it has helped me countless times. This is not an exhaustive list of all the residential area's within Muscat, and please comment if I've forgotten a major area frequented by expatriates.

"Central Business District"
This is sometimes referred to as the CBD, or downtown, or city centre. The residential neighbourhoods in this locality are, as a trend, usually occupied by people of Asian decent. There are not many Villa's available here, but there are plenty of flats. 1, 2, 3 or 4 bedroom apartments are commonly found here, and prices for a 1 bedroom apartment can start as low as RO 200 a month. Many people also choose to co-habit and rent just a room in an apartment here. CBD is considered as the following areas: Muttrah, Darsait, Ruwi, Wadi Kabir & Hamriyah.

Qurum
Qurum runs from the PDO camp along the coast up until the Wizarat area where many Ministry and Embassy buildings are. It is one of the most popular residential locations, and apartments are hard to find in this area (except at Bareeq Al Shatti). Rental for Villa's can range from RO 1500 - 6000 a month, depending on where exactly you want to live. There are many 5* hotels in this area, complete with bars, restaurants and night clubs. There's a cinema, the Beach road (nice to walk, have coffee). Shopping area's are in abundance: The CCC Complex (contains Al Fair, and recently renamed the Al Qurum Complex), The Sabco Centre and associated commercial buildings around it, the Qurum City Centre (containing Carrefour), The Jawharat Al Shatti shopping complex, The Al Harthy Complex (contains The Sultan Centre), the Al Masa Mall and also the Sarooj Centre (containing Al Fair)

Al Ilam
Al Ilam sits between Qurum and Medinat Qaboos (MQ). It is not on the coast, and is considered an upscale neighbourhood. There are not many apartments available for rent here, but many Villas. Rents start at around RO 1100 and range up to RO 2500 per month. It is very close to Qurum City Centre, MQ, and Al Khuwair.

Medinat Qaboos (MQ)
MQ is the original spot where Western ex-pats live. There is the British School Muscat, and the American British Academy located here. There's a wide range of both Apartments and Villa's available here, with rents starting around RO 700 - RO 3000 depending on what you are looking for. There is an Al Fair supermarket in the shopping centre in the middle of MQ. Also, of note, there are 4 or 5 alcohol retail outlets, and the popular Mexican restaurant, Pavo Real. Other restaurants of note here are Silk Route and Kargeens.

Al Khuwair
Al Khuwair is next to MQ, and fronts onto Qurum, Wizarat and Ghubra. Al Khuwair has a good split of apartments and Villa's and is an area lived in by people from all walks of life, but is very popular with Indians. There is the Zakher Mall and the very popular service road for retail elements. Supermarkets are a plenty, LuLu's, Safeer supermaket and Rawasco. Rents can start as low as RO 200 and up to RO 1500.

Bowsher
Bowsher is a large area, predominately with nothing in it. It's mainly Villa's and is where you will find the Muscat Private Hospital, and the Sultan Qaboos Sports Compelx. It also houses the TAISM school. Rents are usually for Villa's, all though a few apartments are starting to come on to the market, Villa's can be rented for RO 800 - RO 1800.

Ghala
Ghala is the industrial hub of the city. It is where there are many ware-houses, labour camps and Contractors HQ's are. Most of the manufacturing that occurs in Muscat, occurs here. However, this area has been slated for redevelopment and will become the "downtown" of Muscat in the coming years. The Bank Muscat HQ is now complete, Ministries are starting to build their offices here, Muscat Hills (and it's golf course) is now open, and the Convention Centre site are all to be located here. There are currently no main-stream supermarkets here. It's hard to price rents here, but small apartments can be rented right now at Muscat Hills for RO 850 a month.

Ghubra
Ghubra is a lot like Al Khuwair, but has some coast line. Villa's here can be rented from RO 1200 - 1800, and apartments can be rented for as low as RO 350 for a 2 bedroom. There is a 24 hour supermarket there, called Al Maya, and a supermarket called Mars. There are many other shops to be found here, particularly carpentry and drapery shops.

Azaiba
Azaiba is next down the coast from Ghubra and is fast becoming a popular hit with Western expatriates. Rents for Villa's range from RO 1000 - 2000. There is a large Horizon Fitness gym, and a branch of The Sultan Centre supermarket, and also a Safeer Hypermarket. Many people living here are working either in Qurum, or the Airport area, as this is a convenient "half-way" point (but Azaiba does butt-up to the Airport land, and Ghubra is also popular for people working in either area).

Al Hail, Seeb, Mawaleh
I've bunched these three together because they're all the same really. Al Hail is home to the popular The Wave development, and is literally minutes from the airport and Muscat City Centre (contains Carrefour), and also the Markez Al Bahja mall (contains a cinema and Al Fair). Rents here are generally cheaper due to the fact they are so far out from town, but rents in The Wave are amongst the highest in Muscat. Commute times to Qurum from Mawaleh in the morning rush hour are easily over an hour if that is an indication. However, one can rent a villa here for as little as RO 650 - it's just the commute that is hard - not such a problem if you are working at the airport though!

Estate Agents
Here's a list of estate agents in town that can help you find a rental property:

Cluttons
OmanHomes
Gulf Property World
Hamptons
Eqarat
Taif Real Estate
Engel & Volkers
Hilal Properties


Banking
Banking in Oman, much like the rest of the region, is fairly frustrating. Most landlords want their rent paid up front - be it 12 months, 6 months or 3 months and so you may need to take a loan early on to pay for this. Consider yourself very lucky if you get to pay your rent monthly.

There are quite a few banks here, and let me stress that they are all terrible. I personally use HSBC, because everyone in my office uses them, and my company banks with them. I would not trust them to do anything but peel a banana for me (because I firmly believe they are staffed by monkeys).

Here is a list of banks here in Oman:

HSBC
Bank Muscat
National Bank of Oman
Bank Sohar
Oman International Bank
Bank Dhofar

There are a few more, but these are the biggest ones. I believe Bank Muscat has the most branches.

Schools
There are a lot of schools here in Oman, and here's a list of them (thanks to Muscati for compiling it on the very useful Oman Forum). Fee's can be quite high - TAISM for example is over RO 7850 per year for a child in grades 9-12. There are also waiting lists - so do not delay getting on the waiting list once you know you are going to need schooling here.

TAISM
British School Muscat
ABA
Ecole Francaise de Mascate
Sultan's School
Choueifat
MIS
Azzan bin Qais
Sahwa
Indian Schools: Darsait, Ghubra, Wadi Kabir
Pakistan School
Egyptian School

Salalah:
British School Salalah

Sohar:
Al Batinah International School


Telecommunications
Telecommunications here in Oman has been improved dramatically in the last few years. There are two main players in the market, Omantel and Nawras. There are a few niche market mobile phone operators, such as Friendi and Renna, but I've not used their services (however their neworks are leased from Omantel's).

Omantel services are:
Fixed line phone over copper - RO 4.900 a month plus usage - calls within Oman (to land lines) are free.
ADSL (Speeds range from 512 kbps - 8MB for residential customers)
Mobile phone service - 3G (And just pioneering 4G as well) (Contract and PAYG)
3G Mobile internet

Nawras offer:
Fixed line phone over Wimax (VOIP product) - recently launched, can be as little as RO 15 a month with a 1MB internet account (6GB of usage) + cost of calls
Wireless internet over Wimax (speeds up to 5MB)
Mobile phone service - 3G (Contract and PAYG)
3G Mobile internet.

Both offer blackberry plans, as well as data plans for smart phones.

At a glance costs
A loaf of bread - RO 0.500
A litre of fuel - RO 0.120
A litre of milk - RO 0.700
4 chicken breasts (boneless) - RO 1.850
A Mcdonalds meal - RO 2.000
A news paper - RO 0.100
A 6pack of Pepsi/Coke - RO 0.650
A pint of beer in a 5* Bar - RO 2.700
Interest on a personal loan - 8%
A KG of local tomato's - RO 0.330
A KG of Holland tomato's - RO1.925
A 5KG sack of rice - RO 1.500
A 1.5KG bag of flour - RO 0.520
A large Water Cooler bottle - RO 1.000
A 250g pack of frozen bacon - RO 1.900
A case of Heineken - RO 13.000

I hope that helps. I welcome comments, but please do not ask a question such as, "I've been offered a job doing X for RO X per month - is this a fair salary". I'll only ignore them.

le fin.

Weekend manouvers.

Well another 4-day week is drawing to a close, and the weekend is nearly upon us once again. Phew.

All the usual spots are open, with the exception of the Park Inn roof top bar, which will remain closed now until after Ramadan. It's too hot anyway!

You may want to go and check out the new Zouk club at the Crowne Plaza if you have not already been. It's a great spot, but there has been some confusion over the concept of a cover charge on the door. So, here is the breakdown:

All 7 days a week: 7pm-10pm no cover charge or entry fee.
Weekdays: 10pm onwards – RO10/per couple which is fully redeemable against your bill
Weekends:10pm onwards – RO20/per couple which is fully redeemable against your bill

That means that you pay RO 20 to get inside the club, and then you have a RO 20 credit inside the club which is redeemable against food or drink available in there. I understand that there will be a smart card launched very soon which will make things easier - you are given a card with RO 20 balance on it, and just use that to pay for food & drinks until it's empty, then you can carry on as normal. The club welcomes groups and the after-work corporate crowd tonight from 7pm - not a bad way to start the weekend, if you can get your boss to pony up with the cash!

Alternatively, tomorrow night the St Georges Society are holding a quiz night at the Rugby Club. There is a set price menu of RO 5 which will get you a suitably English themed dinner and desert. Draught beers are RO 2.3 & glasses of wine for RO 1.8.

Thursday & Friday you may want to sneak in a fry-up at the Blue Marlin marina restaurant (10% discount to all WGO card holders), or if you're feeling like something more, on Friday you could check out the InterCon's Scottish Corner breakfast/brunch. I'm told the Scottish corner is becoming quite popular. This week will be the last one until after the schools start again.


Friday afternoon brings the fabulous Sundowner deal at the Left Bank. Pay RO 20 per person and then help yourself to unlimited Tapas and Cocktails (and selected beers) for 3 hours between 4 & 7pm. Last week was carnage!

Have a nice weekend everyone!

le fin.

Oman's got cash, and Dubai doesn't! Oh, and Oman's 40th year of peaceful rule.

Headlines has never really been my forté, but there we are.

Two interesting news stories over the last few days:

1/ Dubai World fails to reach a deal to refinance its $23.5 bn debt with the core group of 7 investors. And this does not even represent 25% of the debt crises that is facing the boy's up the road - the emirate of Dubai is estimated to have $109 bn debt by the International Monetary Fund. On the bright side, the hotel rates and the sales in the mall's are fabulous at the moment! I found it incredible, that with such debt's on the Emirate's books, that they then decided to place an order for $9.1 bn worth of planes recently at the Farnborough Airshow. Unresponsible much?


2/ Oman recently posted a budget surplus of RO 421.2 mn for Q1 2010, when it was expected that there would be a RO 800 mn deficit for this year. This is presumably because oil prices have rebounded a lot quicker than was anticipated... good news for Oman so far.


Also, you will have probably noticed that Oman saw it's 40th year of rule under His Majesty, Sultan Qaboos bin Said. This is the definitive example of benevolent dictatorship and when you look at his score-card you may well be amazed at what he's done for this country, one of only two remaining Sultanates in the world.

There are many fact-files on HM to be found dotted around the internet, so I'm not going to re-create that here, but I did want to share this potted history of his early life with you all:

He was born at al-Husn Palace in Salalah, Dhofar, on the 18th November 1940 and was the only son of H.H. Sultan al-Wasik Billah al-Majid Sayyid Sa’id bin Taimur, Sultan of the Saidi State of Muscat and Oman and dependencies. He went to school in the Saidiyyah School in Salalah, Dhofar, and then Feltsham House in Bury St Edmunds, UK. After this, he attended the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst. He was subsequently commissioned into the British Army as a 2nd Leftennant attached to the 1st Battalion of the Cameronians. He then went on to serve for 1 year in what was then West Germany in 1962-63, after completing this, he then served as a trainee in the Bury St. Edmunds Council (working in public administration and accounting) between 1963-64.

Now, thats a pretty good education I reckon, and it may help to explain the UK's special relationship with the Sultanate.

Thats all for today.

le fin.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yes, it's amazing how time flies.

Muscat Mutterings is one year old today!!! It all started with this blog post, quickly followed by this one on Piracy in Muscat. Over the weekend, in the Al Fair parking lot I was again asked that familiar question (no, I never want my car washed by you and your paint-scratching crew, ever): "You want DVD movies?"

I took my inspiration from the now-legendary Undercover Dragon at Muscat Confidential, and am always grateful for his support of my blog (and the traffic he sends me!).

Many thanks to all of you who have been reading and commenting on my blog. It's a fun little hobby, and I encourage you all to have a go at writing your own. A special word of thanks for Eternally Distracted for being the very first person to ever comment on my blog - thank you :)

A few statistics for you:

1. I've published 116 articles, this is the 117th.
2. I've had just over 30,000 visits in the last year, and nearly 50,000 page-views.
3. Of those 30,000 visitors, 20,000 have been visitors from Oman.
4. Muscat Confidential has sent me over 11,000 visitors.
5. I've had visitors from 109 different Countries, but strangely, none from China.
6. The top 10 countries in terms of numbers of visitors are as follows:

1. Oman
2. United Kingdom
3. United States
4. United Arab Emirates
5. India
6. Canada
7. France
8. Australia
9. Saudi Arabia
10. Netherlands

7. You lot so very rarely ever comment.
8. My most commented blog post ever was this one about the cost of ball tickets.
9. My most read (in terms of opened for comments) article is this one about the cost of living here.
10. I recently launched a Facebook group for this blog as I saw just how successful it has been for Muscat Confidential, and my statistics show that my largest readership demographic is women, between the ages of 25-34.

Thank you to all of you for reading my blog, it keeps me motivated to keep it going.

le fin.

The Asian Beach Games - an update

For all those who happen to have been wondering about the Beach games project, here's a little update. The construction of the marina is complete (thanks to Carillon) and the structures are coming along (thanks to Larsen & Touboro) as well.




The big question is this: Will they be ready for the December 8th start date? I hazard a guess that it'll be all right on the night, but it's going to be a hairy ride getting there. Completion is slated for October 2010, and with the photo's above, it's a bit hard to tell. The two main accommodation blocks do not appear to have the exterior render works complete yet, and there's no way to tell how far the interiors are progressing. Time will tell, it's not good news that Ramadan is fast approaching, either (by that I mean, traditionally productivity falls dramatically during the Holy month).

I did read with some amusement on the official Muscat 2010 website that Al-Musannah Sports City (city?!) is expecting to cater to 50,000 spectators over the course of the event. I hope they get those kind of numbers, I really do. I've got some questions though:

2000 athletes are expected to be participating in the games - where will they be staying? The two major structures do not look like they could adequately house all of the athletes, and I have not heard any news on the development of the "Athletes village". Has it been scrapped in favour of a tent city? I'm told that all of the hotel rooms and apartments in the two buildings have already been booked out for various people (not athletes though) - so it is an interesting situation.

How is the venue going to be powered? By the national grid? It's possible I guess, the heat will not be bad in December, meaning lower A/C usage. I wonder if there will be a Generator farm?

How are the games to be attended? I understand that this will be a free event with no cost for tickets per-se, but when will we see the schedule? I imagine the women's beach volleyball games will be well attended :) It's one thing for us here in Muscat to decide to nip up the road on the weekend to go and laugh at watch teams play Kabaddi, it's entirely something different for supporters from other countries who are attempting to arrange trips to come and support their teams.

Do you intend to visit the Games in December?

le fin.

Music Quiz at MRFC tonight

For those of you that didn't go running off to Dubai, you might want to check out the Music Quiz at the Rugby Club in Al Khuwair. Team registrations start at 7:30, and the quiz starts at 8:00pm. These quizzes have always proved to be great and tonight will be no different!

Go check it out if you're looking for something to do tonight, you won't regret it!

le fin.

Zouk review

Last night was the launch of the new club, Zouk (Official Facebook page here). Located on the grounds of the Crowne Plaza, it's just up the road from Rock Bottom and is a breath of fresh-air for the Muscat night club scene. The entrance is in the smaller car park - take a right when you drive into the hotel - there's a sign, you can't miss it.


I was impressed with the place - it's a very modern and nicely laid out lounge bar. There was lot of seating dotted around the place (something I find bars never have enough of) and the bar itself was split into two lengths either side of a column - a good 10-15 meters of bar space. Take a look at the pictures and see for yourself. I didn't take too many pictures because I was genuinely having a great time, free beer can do that to me, what can I say - it was a cool party ambience.

There is a large VIP section off to the right with many comfortable looking red couches - I didn't venture over there, but knowing how popular the VIP area is at the Copa, I'm sure people will flock to it. There was also another private bar in the VIP section too.

The VIP Section

The sound system was actually really very good - for the audiophiles out there, it's a Wharfdale professional system and the sound engineer was flown in from London. I had few problems hearing people when in conversation with them and enjoyed the music while having some great conversations. I have to say I'm rather jealous of the lady I was talking to that had a Ferrari California ordered and was expecting delivery in September - and I forgot to ask the colour - Red, or Yellow?




Watch out when you head to the toilets - there is a step-up into them from the corridor outside. Now I just had to take a picture of the toilet, it was great! I think that wins the award for best toilet in a bar in Oman! I don't think I've ever taken a picture of a toilet in a bar before, but I thought it was cool.

What a fancy toilet!
TV's in the back of the toilet doors!

Now, the hard facts:

The beer is all bottles, no draft. Bottles cost RO 2.5 (with some costing RO 2.7). Martini's and Cocktails cost between RO 3.3 and RO 4.5 per drink, and there is obviously also various spirits and wines available both by the measure and by the bottle. Soft drinks are fountain drinks - no cans that I saw (except Red Bull), and there is also a food menu as well.

The cost of entry is RO 20 per couple. This RO 20 is then credited to you in drinks which you can have in the club before paying more money - a great concept and one I hope proves successful. It's going to be a bit rough for those that do not drink, or just wanted to have one or two drinks - but I think it's a great idea, and time will tell if it's a popular one.

When you enter, you are given a smart card with RO 20 credit on it, when it's used up, you can then choose to buy more drinks, or not. For single ladies, there is no cover charge (but not smart card either) to enter the club. For groups of people, there is also no problem, but the RO 20 only applies to couples, it is unclear what a "third wheel" will have to pay, I imagine, either nothing with no smart card, RO 10, or RO 20 - I'm not sure. The focus of the club is for couples, not singles, but let's see how things go.

The doors open at 8.00 tonight, and close at 2.30.

Daz, hard at work

le fin.

New nightclub in Muscat: Zouk

Some of you may have heard about the new night club opening up at the Crowne Plaza here. It's called Zouk, and it opens to the public tomorrow (Wednesday July 21st) night at 8:30pm. Tonight, there is a special VIP launch event with free drinks. I'm going to check it out and will write a review for Wednesday.

Here's what I know already though: It will be RO 20 per couple at the door, but then you have that RO 20 credited to your account and you can charge it against food and drink inside. A novel concept, and hopefully one that will prove popular.

The VIP tickets (so generously gifted to me by the omni-present Darren from Hi FM) came in a DVD box, which contained a CD. The CD has a great 1 hour mix of House music on it, by dj rita x.craft (Portuguese dj). And the great news is that she'll be visiting the club within the next 2 months for a few live sets, so if you're a fan of house music, watch this space.

Now for the well-travelled readers amongst you, you may be wondering if this venue has anything to do with the Zouk mega-clubs in Singapore and K-L. No, this has no link at all to them.

Stay tuned for the review tomorrow.

le fin.

Saturday 24th July is a holiday

It's been confirmed - Saturday the 24th July has been given as a public holiday for all private sector workers. See official link here.

Long weekend number 2 for July, nice.

Image ripped from Muscat Confidential blog

I plan to spend it at the Bustan Palace. What plans do you have?

There is a new night club opening at the Crowne Plaza hotel this weekend. It's called Zouk, read tomorrow for more information!

le fin.

The weekend. And drama at Love Lane.

I took a day off from blogging yesterday, not a lot to talk about really.

Today's hot news was the attempted suicide by some guy at Love Lane. The ROP managed to rescue the guy (who really didn't want rescuing) in front of a packed crowd of rubber-neckers at the Love Lane.
Very exciting, except the man perhaps did not want to actually commit suicide, but fancied a swim (conveniently forgetting that he could not swim). The guy came with someone else who decided to call the police to get this guy out of the water after failing to get the guy to come out on his own.

The ROP responded with a 2 man unit in record time (I'm told 2 minutes but I'm not sure I actually believe that). One of the officers pulled a David Hasslehoff and ran straight in after the guy, while the other one took on the role of Pamela Anderson and went looking for a Scarab speedboat. Unable to find a boat fast enough to sufficiently blow his hair, he opted for the next best thing, a Jet Ski.

And in a very short amount of time the ROP officers managed to drag the non-swimming-swimmer back onto the beach. It's not clear what happened to the guy after that, but one would presume he's being handled by the ROP. Credit to @GazelleR from Twitter for the story.

Not a bad little story to tell whilst out socialising tonight or tomorrow!

Now, if you are a fan of a good fry-up, the Musandam brunch at the Intercon is worth a shot. A touch steep at RO 15.200 (including taxes) but a serious option if you fancy a bit of pampering. This week, there is a Scottish themed corner with the usual hangover cures, haggis, stovies, and basically lots of really unhealthy Scottish food to start your lazy friday.

Also for the hardcore just ask the Scottish chef after 2pm to sample some of his homemade rusty nail. For reservations call t'intercon on 24680000.

Have a great weekend everyone!

le fin.

Yiti

As you may have read yesterday, I took Bertha out for a spin on the weekend and wondered down to Yiti. Many years ago, Omran got together with Sama Dubai to develop the area under a project entitled Salam Yiti.


Now this is a sorry tale. Local Contractors, Douglas OHI originally won the Contract with Sama Dubai to carry out the construction of the project. They built a large labour camp near to the site (and still use it today) as well as a large Concrete batching plant. They spent some significant capital to set up for the project. All of the dredging work was completed, and then Sama Dubai flaked on the project. It turned out that no, they did not have the $2 Billion required to fund the project after all.

Sama Dubai was one of the first victims in Dubai to succumb to the Credit Crunch. In fact their website has not even been updated since 2007, and their last press release was in fact promoting Salam Yiti. Yup, that's right - not even a press release to announce that they were shutting up shop. You've got to love the Corporate responsibility there.

Meanwhile, it looks like a bomb went off at Yiti, with massive dredging and levelling works more or less completed there. There are the usual industry rumours: HM is upset at Sama Dubai, well, their owners, Dubai Holding - ultimately we're talking about Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum. And so the rumour goes; HM is considering taking the land back, with Dubai forfeiting the land (and the money paid for it) for not completing the project. What is for sure, is that Omran currently don't appear to know what to do with it. Significant money was spent on the infrastructure, massively upgrading the access and power availability to the area at significant cost. Yiti, and Seifa are lovely places, but a road to the standard that has been built, just to visit those villages... not required. That road was built to transport tourists in large coaches. It's not a total loss, there are other projects popping up in the area, but nothing even close to the magnitude of what was envisaged for Salam Yiti. Watch this space for more news on it when/if it comes though.

Gratefully though, the beach has survived so far.



And I have to say it was a nice day out. A short drive there (thanks to the new road - although I do recommend the old road from Hamriyah for a nice drive). And there was hardly anyone there! The temperature was a lot cooler than it has been in recent weeks, and it was fantastic. A really nice day trip - I highly recommend it for a sneaky beach trip if you feel the need any time soon (ie before it's "developed").

However, driving through the village, it's obvious that the recent storm, Phet, dealt a pretty hard slap to the village. The road was practically gone, almost all of it was just a gravel track again. Many houses also got wiped out, see below:




I hope those that lost their houses are going to be OK. I've not seen anything in the press about Yiti in so long, I wonder if there are any plans in place to replace these houses? Re-new the road running through the village? Upgrade the facilities and infrastructure in the village?

le fin.

ROP crack down on Road Safety "turns" blind eye to Retail concerns

What a nice weekend that turned out to be?!

I even went for a drive in Bertha down to Yiti. The old road is such a nice drive I find. Normally, on my frequent trips to Ruwi, I take Qurum heights road, as opposed to the other road via Hatat House. Seeing as I was heading for Hamriyah on the weekend, I figured I'd go via Wattayah. The road works are progressing at the Qurum wadi crossing, and now it looks like the final part of the bridge is being completed and hopefully the road works will be finished soon.

Imagine my shock when I saw the following sign (picture taken by a passenger!)



Click on the photo to make it bigger so you can really see what the sign is suggesting. Yes, that's right, some bright spark thought that it genuinely would be a good idea to have shoppers headed for The Sultan Centre (and the Al-Harthy Complex) to do a U-Turn on what is possibly the busiest stretch of highway in the country. That is staggeringly stupid. I wonder if ROP approval had to be given for this sign? Or whether ROP approval was even sought?

Now as I said, I do not regularly drive this route so have not much of an idea when this new route was made (and the subsequent kamikaze sign) but what on earth is going on there? Someone should take that sign down before a serious accident occurs.

le fin.

Local hotel's summer offers.

Summer is well and truly here. Summer's a funny time here, people tend to fly off to cooler climes in an effort to at least beat the heat for a little while. It's a scorcher of a summer globally, with Europe getting a good dose of sun, and those pasty white Brits are even experiencing sustained sunny periods of more than 42 minutes at a time. I'm told Ice Cream van's are having a fantastic season, and for once there wont be the stock story for a slow news day of the lollipop guy grumbling that his sales are low due to no sun. Even over the pond, in Toronto they are seeing temperatures exceeding 40'C this week. Sweaty stuff.

If you're like me, and actually work for a living and can't just slip off for the summer, then you might be considering a weekend at one of the lovely 5* hotels here in Oman. There's the Chedi, InterContinental, Crowne Plaza, Al Bustan or the Shangri-la to choose from locally. Or you could avail yourself of one of Oman Air's summer vacation weekends down in Salalah at the new Mariott, or Crowne Plaza or Hilton.

Oman Air are offering return flights, 3 nights stay, breakfast (& dinners in some hotels) for RO 139/person until 13th July (and then it shoots up to RO 178/pp). That's not bad for a 3 day escape. Did I mention already that Saturday is a confirmed public holiday?

A little closer to home, the InterContinental Hotels Group (which controls the InterContinental, Crowne Plaza and Al Bustan here in Muscat) have a 3 for 2 offer running at all of their locations.

The Chedi have a few packages, but I've only included the two best ones here:

SUPERIOR ROOM - OMR 88.920 all in.
- breakfast for 2 in The Restaurant per night
- 10% discount on Food and Beverages in The Restaurant
- 25% discount on any Spa Treatments

CHEDI CLUB SUITE ROOM - OMR 169.650 all in.

- breakfast for 2 in The Restaurant per night
- 10% discount on Food and Beverages in The Restaurant
- 25% discount on any Spa Treatments
- Complimentary Cocktails & Canapés in the library
- Complimentary mini-bar, laundry and internet access

I'd highly recommend going for the Suite package. All of the rooms are great, but those suites... the tub takes an hour to fill!

And finally, the Shangri-la at the Barr al Jissah resort has two offers this summer:

For a minimum of two nights @ RO 110/ night you get breakfast and dinner in a standard room at Al Waha.

Or, if you only want to stay one night, you can get the 50% off published rate offer, and that means you can get a regular room in the Al Waha with breakfast and dinner for RO 90.


Now in order to actually get these deals, you must of course have your resident card to prove you are in fact a resident here - so don't forget to mention that when booking! I'm looking forward to a weekend at the Bustan in a few weeks - does anyone have any recommendations on which spa treatments to go for?!

Well done Holland! 3-2! What an awesome game! Now to just beat ze Germans!

Enjoy the long weekend everyone!

le fin.

Muscat Daily...

In my on-going review of the latest English language daily news-paper here, Muscat Daily, I make another comment today.

Anita Joseph wrote an article on page 3 today entitled "Muscat: second least expensive city in GCC". It must really be a slow news month if Muscat Daily is allowing it's journalists to copy idea's from blogs - I wrote the same article last week, here.

I guess imitation is a form of flattery, right?!

le fin.

It's official: Saturday is a holiday!

Don't you just love long weekends? I know I do!

I think I'll seriously consider another trip up to do buy, or perhaps carry out some aggressive eye-lid inspections, who knows.

Tonight see's match 61 of the FIFA World Cup, a show down between Uruguay and The Netherlands.
Coverage is on Jazeera Sports (+10 and HD), and it kicks off at 10:30pm tonight. I hope the Dutchies win!

In local news, the ROP are cracking down on drivers again with a plan for manditory 48 hours in the slammer for the following offences (if caught): Running red lights, speeding, driving on the shoulder, driving without drivers license and not indicating.

The ROP have also been asking women to cover up more in the last few weeks too. Presumably as it's getting hotter, and women are wearing less, they're being asked to be more modest.

Thats all for today.

le fin.

Muscato's back, sort of.

Just a quick one today.

Fellow expatriate blogger, Muscato, who disappeared without a word months ago checked in on his blog yesterday to mark the July 4th celebrations. It's seems he left the country with Mr Muscato and Koko the dog stayed behind as a rear guard, shortly to be re-united with Muscato in an as-yet unknown new destination. One thing for sure though, there will be champagne available, so not Kuwait or Saudi then!

Hopefully we'll hear more from the most prolific Oman-based blogger there ever was, but I guess time will tell.

le fin.

Special guest blogger, Angry In Oman "Something for the ladies"

A little treat for those readers out there that miss the fabulous Angry In Oman. In what I hope will become a regular guest blogger here on Muscat Mutterings, may I present to you, a story by AIO:


I was recently returning to Muscat from a trip abroad. While I was abroad, I decided to buy a little something special for myself from an adult store, a vibrator.

I packed it in my suitcase and forgot about it.

As you know, when you get into Muscat airport, you collect your suitcases and then have them scanned before leaving the airport.

My suitcase went through, and the man watching the scanner called over another officer.

The officer asked me if I "had something" I shouldn't. I didn't really know what to say, so I just stood there and shrugged.

To be honest, I wasn't going to give it up readily.

The officer asked if I minded if he opened my case and took a look. I said sure.

He went in and looked around and found nothing.

I thought it was over but no.

He went back to the scanner and looked again, then came back to me and looked around some more, again he couldn't find it.

He then asked me "you have something? Something for the ladies?"

I knew then that he was going to find it, and he rooted around a little bit more and found it and thankfully I had put my something special into a plastic bag, otherwise it would have been a thousand times worse.

Immediately I started to apologise.

The officer said it was ok and asked me to go with him into his office to fill in the paper work.

I followed him and sat down.

I should point out at this time that I was not alone, but with Cush who knew all about my something special who just stood there, doing nothing, saying nothing.... presumably because he had a magazine of questionable content in his own bag!

We went into the office where I was asked for my passport and some details. The officer was shocked to find out that I lived in Muscat for such a long time but was umm...so oblivious to the uh rules.... which ok I totally knew that it wasn't allowed, but I wasn't going to admit that to the man! I'm such a coward.

So there I was sat in the office feeling super embarrassed, but actually the officer was really cool about it. We even had a little chat as he filled out the paperwork...yeah, seriously, paperwork.

Me: this must happen all the time, right? Sorry.

Officer: actually no, not really.

Me: oh... Sorry.

Officer: but it does happen sometimes.

Me: really? I'm very sorry.

Officer: Sometimes Omani girls have them.

Me: yeah that makes sense, sorry.

Officer: it's ok, you just need to pay 5 Rials.

Me: ok, sorry. So.... what do you do with them? (I so had to ask!!)

Officer: they just stay here (big grin on his face)

Me: like right there on your desk?

Officer: yes

I looked at the desk but there was no sex toys on it. So...I still don't really know where the vibrators really go, but I have some theories.

The only thing I can say is that that vibrator will never work again. It had an internal battery pack which can be removed and I took it out to avoid my toy accidentally turning itself on and causing a bomb scare. The battery pack was still in my suitcase when I got home.

So there ya go.

-Angry In Oman.