Feb 2007

...was interesting

Sorry about the delays between new posts, looks like it might become regular. Anyways, I'm finally moved in with my homestay family. They're great, and pretty fun too. Any worries I had about staying with a family are pretty much erased. They have a young daughter Fadya, who is the same age and acts the exact same as Lindy back home. I've even accidentally called her Lindy on a couple of occasions. Her new favorite preoccupation is watching the screensaver on my laptop, which is set to the aquarium, with a bunch of digital fish floating around. So, aside from the fact that I live 45 minutes from school, everything is pretty cool. Of course, getting to know the homestay family reminds of family and friends back home, but mostly SIT has us so busy that we don't have a lot of time to think about it, which I suppose is the point. But I am missing y'all back home.

So here's a rough idea of what our group has ahead of us for the next two weeks:
Tomorrow: Going to the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque to hear a lecture about Islam in pre-Columbian America (seriously)
Friday: Formal dinner. This is at the house of our sponsor, Dr. Salim Ismaili, the key Omani diplomat in the recent Oman-US FTA. Half the diplomatic corps will be there, including the US ambassador, whom I'm told I'll be meeting. Fun times
Next weekend: We fly to Salalah, the major southern city, where they still make traditional dhows.
The weekend after that: Desert excursion to go play in the dunes at the Wahiba Sands in the Sharqiyya region. I full intend to roll down a large dune.
In between all this, I have to apply for graduation at OU, apply to a program in Yemen, post my NSEP resume and get a job through them, and do major original research on Omani infrastructure development and it's affect on Middle Eastern foreign policy. Without regular Internet access. RIIIIIGHT. No wonder I'm so tired these days.

So on the plane ride over here, I was definitely in faux-Theroux mode, meeting all sorts of people going all sorts of places (Omar was off to Switzerland, Marie to Paris). Now, it's pretty much straight Lawrence of Arabia mode. We've having lectures with some of the top-notch intellectual caliber people in this country, and the SIT office is starting to feel like an intellectual embassy. Just as the US embassy in Muscat is as much a part of the US as Chagrin Falls, our office feels like we have the exact same intellectual freedoms as in the state, despite the government here. Granted it could get shut down, unlike an embassy. But, we get to hear things that most people Oman will never hear, or simply can't accept. It's starting intellectually weird me out thinking that a bunch of American students rotate through every 6 months and hear these intelectually dynamite speakers, and take for granted what the speakers will never be able to convince the natives. Then, we go home and never have our crossing-the-Sinai moment. For a diehard democratic peace type like myself, it's a little bit of shock-and-awe on my philospohical state.

I visited Shatti al-Qurm, or Qurm beach, yesterday. The area is unbelievably beautiful. If more authoritarian governments had places like Shatti al-Qurm, the people wouldn't be so pissed off (why DO I always study in authoritarian countries?). If you walk along the main road, out of your left eye you can see the mountains of Muscat, and out of your right eye, you can watch the waves roll in. There is a Starbucks, which has wireless Internet. For a small fee, you can connect and use the wireless for as long as you want. So, I've found where I'm going to do my ISP research, since the cab ride from where I'll be in Ruwi is half a rial away. Between al-Qurm beach and the Yacht Club, plus all the shopping centers we've been going to (for research believe it or not), it's hard to believe we're actually studying abroad, and not on holiday.