I have become a Tea Person

They say that studying abroad will change you, but I never expected to have my fundamental beliefs so rocked to the core. At the beginning of the exchange, they had us sign a contract promising that we would not make any "life changing decisions" (seriously, I can show you the paper) but I'm afraid I have broken that covenant, both with Amideast and myself.

It's partly due to the sore throat I've been nursing the past couple days, partly to the fact that my host family does wonderful things like growing lemon grass in the side garden and boiling fresh ginger in a real teapot, and partly to the fact that coffee made in a french press is just not the same. 

As you can see, we have drunk all the lemongrass,  and this is all that remains. Or this is some other dying plant in the garden, I'm not very good at identifying these sort of things.

Today I did a visual survey of the various tea paraphernalia around the house, to see if I was being subconsciously brainwashed. 

The evidence speaks for itself, my friends. And the evidence gives a resounding YES. 

I apologize to my family, to my friends, to my community, to anyone who ever thought me a person of principle. I ask you to please accept the person I have become, as difficult as it may be to understand, this is what living in Oman has done to me. 
=P

The Family "Farm"

One of the things I like most about Oman is how connected extended families are, family is always visiting, or  being visited, and many people count their "cousins" as close friends (Omani cousins are pretty loosely defined, there's not really any distinction made between the child of your parent's sibling and a 4th cousin-twice-removed, regardless of the convoluted line of relation, everyone is either and Aunt, Uncle, or cousin.)

Every Friday (the Omani equivalent of Sunday) my family has dinner with our Aunt and cousin, and occasionally we go over to the family "farm." Most families have a communal "farm" or misraah, where they get together for family reunions, holidays, and parties. For the Bahlanis, the misraah hosts a mini family reunion on Fridays, and different families drop in and out throughout the day. It's technically owned by my host Dad's older brother, but the whole family pitches in to keep it up. It might seem confusing to American sensibilities to have an entire house just for family gatherings, but in Oman, they happen so often it's just practical. 

Okay, so the term "farm" is somewhat misleading, while they do have a vegetable garden and some chickens,  it's more "house with lots of land" than "farm."

The farm also features this epic-ly massive tree, of which I've yet to take a satisfactorily good picture. It's beautiful. 

The green spaces are always filled with kids running around playing football and the house is usually atwitter with laughs from aunts and cousins, poking fun at one another like only family can. It's a good time, even though I only can understand a small portion of what's going on, as it's usually happening in Swahili or Arabic. 

Some Resolutions

So the mounting internal guilt and the subtle-becoming-less-subtle hints from friends and family have finally become to much and I'm forcing myself to sit down and finish a blog post. As 2012 has ended, I've resolved to make 2013 a year of semi-regular blog posting. To make up for my absence without being too long-winded, I'll just give you the hi-lights:

In October, my family celebrated Eid over three days, spending the holiday visiting extended family, eating delicious food and receiving Eidea (money that children [and somewhat-older children like myself and host sister] get when they go around begging to all their aunties and uncles)

New pakistani-style clothes for Eid and henna

Then we had Halloween, which we did up American-style, with a party and pumpkins and scouring what felt like every store in Muscat for decorations.

Mariam's first pumpkin

We're not quite sure what this mask was going for, pumpkin? Bunny? Ax murder? 

I got to participate in my first US election; although I sent in my absentee ballot months ahead with little fanfare, the swanky embassy breakfast to watch the election results was just as exciting.

 November 18th was Omani National Day so everyone dressed up in traditional Omani clothes; the kids in my grade rented a tent and gargantuan amounts of food. We spent the day dancing to Khaliji music, eating rice with our hands, and fighting over who got to play the next song over the speaker system. 

Can you spot the Americans

 I also went exploring in Ruwi one day when I went to Mass with Victoria. It was cool to see the diversity of Muscat in the mostly Filipino and Indian church congregation, as well as a less glamorous, more bustling side of the city.

Also there was delicious Filippino Siopao for breakfast

We had thanksgiving at the US Ambassador's house, where all our host families came and had the opportunity to try some American staples turkey and pumpkin pie. I also came to the sad realization that, objectively, pumpkin pie looks and sounds disgusting. 

My host sister Mariam celebrated her birthday, and was very resistant to having her photo taken

Smaller events include our field trip to Pavo Real, to have some familiar Mexican-food-by-way-of-Texas. We went on a wild west wednesday, so all the Indian waiters were decked out in ten-gallon hats and bolo ties---quite the international experience. We made Ashley wear the cowboy hat in the picture because she's from Texas and it just felt right. 

Also, it rained! A lot! During School! 

The YES crew went up to Jebel Shams for the weekend, where it was actually cold enough to wear jackets. The beautiful mountains and chilly wind was completely breath-taking.

The second day, we stopped by the Niswa souq, which sells everything from camels to pottery. 

On Christmas morning, my family opened presents around the tree, had a full breakfast, and packed up for a long road trip.

We drove up north to Musandam, on the very tip of Oman, just along the strait of Hormuz.It was definitely a strange Christmas for me, with temperatures in the 70s, the ocean outside the door, and German tourists everywhere. I think the funniest part about staying at the resort was that, for the first time in a while, I actually blended in with my surroundings.

We drove all over Musandam, going through the mountains, along the coast, and crossing the UAE border an ungodly number of times. 

2012 has been a year of adventures; it's been filled with the stuff of my wildest dreams, with amazing travels and opportunities. 2013 is looking to be just as exciting, and, walla, hopefully I'll do a better job of documenting it.

The Adventures of Little Ethnic Man

We'll call him LEM for short.

As a graduation present this past summer, our STARTALK Arabic teachers gave each student a pocket-sized, vaguely-Arabian-looking plush weeble person. We lovingly dubbed him "Little ethnic man" just to be on the safe side of not offending any particular ethnicity. 

Naturally I brought him with me to Muscat and he has been having the time of his life 

LEM has his morning coffee

LEM gets new clothes for Eid

LEM eats a traditional Omani meal

LEM goes grocery shopping for the essentials

LEM is unable to emotionally process the fact that it's raining

LEM dies alone in the hot Arabian sun

Just a silliness for now but I'll have posts about Eid and Halloween and cultural stuff up soon!

The story of the football match

After much last minute planning on the part of us exchange students, we found ourselves at the Oman v. Jordan match last week, carrying illegal backpacks and still wearing out super-attractive school uniforms. It went something like this:

*Arabic class ends*

Someone: "Hey, I wanna go to the football match tonight"

Everyone except Lisa: "Hey, me too"
Some Sultan School YES kid: "Is anyone from school going?"

Another Sultan School YES kid: "No everyone's busy supporting cancer" 

Someone: "Does anyone have a ride/know if they're allowed to go?"
Everyone: "No"

Peter and Dylan: "We're boys so Omani society says we can do whatever we want and no one will care"

*flurry of calling parents and figuring out rides occurs*

Someone: "Hazzah! We're going to the match right now!" 

Hannah: *begins to throw hissy fit* "But....I can't....I have to change first....I'm still in my school uniform......cannot cope......wahhhh" 

Everyone else: "Hannah, get over yourself" 

Lisa: "Bye guys!" 

*Lisa does not go to the game for unknown reasons*

We stumble towards the stadium 20 minutes into the game, two white chicks in long navy jumpers, one normally-dressed girl in a vintage skirt that one of the jumper-wearing girls is exceedingly jealous of, an Asian kid in Ray Bans, and some guy in a dishdasha who no one can figure out if he's Egyptian or Lawati or a weirdo American, all carrying backpacks like a grade-school field trip.

So this picture is one of the times when they scored, and, because of my exceptional photo taking skills, everything is blurry. 

There were a few minor mishaps which turned out fine, like when they told us we couldn't bring our backpacks in and we had to plead and wheedle to make an exception for the stupid Americans. Or, at the end of the match, when we momentarily lost the boys in the crowd, and thought it would be a good idea to stand on a bench to see better, which of course caused small roar and stream of "hello how are you"s from the crowd of people flooding out of the stadium, because apparently 90% of the attendants of Omani football matches are 12 year old boys who have never interacted with women before. I can't say I wasn't warned, but it was still really funny/awkward. But all was well (to both of my mothers, don't worry, we handled ourselves just fine, honestly, stop worrying).

Oman won, 2-1 over Jordan, which is super exciting here because it means they might just possibly maybe have a tiny shot at qualifying for the world cup. In November they play Japan so, ehm, we'll see how that goes...
In all, a pretty fantastic first-ever football match :) 

Adventures in Fabric and Culture

There's one kind of store I can walk into anywhere in the world and be instantly at home. Whether peopled by blue-haired old quilters, somebody's Abuelita, ironically-grey-haired hipsters, or floral-swathed Balushi women--fabric shops all have that familiar musty smell that means I'm home. 

So much shiny

We recently went to Pakistani fabric shop, in search of traditional-style Balushi dresses for Eid, the holiday that's coming up at the end of October. Long story short, we didn't find them. However that didn't keep me from getting distracted by shiny things and buying this beautiful totally non-Omani piece of fabric. 

The next day we went into the Mattrah Souk, an old-school marketplace that's 50% tourist trap 50% place where actual Omanis buy stuff. 

The souk is a maze of tight alleyways, bustling with women in abayas, men in dishdashas and old British tourists trying to haggle over prices. The main area is lined with shops selling random and generic things like camel-shaped snap-close gold leaf boxes or football jerseys. Every so often the line of shops is interrupted by a corridor jutting out, where the shops on either side sit within kissing distance of one another and the rows of vendors seem to stretch on for miles. Each of these alleyways loosely specialize in one good or another, ie textiles, silver, gold, etc. 

This entire shop was devoted to selling fancy trim

I spent most of my time flitting from one stall to another in the textiles area, constantly being distracted by the next exciting shiny thing. I think between that and the sparkly green fabric from the day before which I was wearing as a shawl, (classic white person tries to wear something "cultural" which just further accentuates their whiteness) I gave off the impression of some kind of deranged bird-woman. 

There's this feeling that pervades the entire experience of the souk that, as a foreigner, you're constantly being ripped off, so I felt kind of bitter about buying anything because I knew the "special discount price just for you" was still way too high. I ended up settling on some ribbon trim for a skirt that I will totally actually make and not just leave in the corner and sigh at while I do less productive activities like write blog posts.

All the cramped stores reminded me so much of the little junk / antique shops in old Ellicott City or Hampden. Of course "antique" here has a very different meaning than it does in the States, by a margin of about a thousand years. It was funny though to see that even, maybe especially, here in the souk, a place touted as "super actual traditional Omani" there were so many things not from Oman. Turkish antiques, Pakistani fabrics, Indian silvers, Chinese Khanjars, sold much cheaper than the real ones.

These are the traditional Omani daggers, called Khanjars, worn at weddings or cultural events by men 

So you have these distinctly-Omani daggers, which are being made in China to be sold to Americans or Brits or any number of people for whom Muscat is a port of call on their 10 day cruise. I don't know if that's a bad thing or a good thing or a the-world-is-becoming-a-mono culture-homogenized-wasteland thing, but it's definitely an interesting thing. 

It's a theme that keeps being repeated over and over in everything that i see. Omani culture is so much more than everything we think of as "traditional." Sure, it's easier to simplify Omani culture down to a twelve-person family sitting on the floor eating biryani with their hands, and I'm not saying that's not a part of the culture, but to get the full picture you need to see all the people speaking Swahili and Tamil and Tagalog. You need to see all immigrants and the native-born Omanis who don't follow any of those stereotypes. Omani culture historically has been and continues to bear strong influences from India and all over Southeast Asia. There's strong ties to East Africa, and Western Europe, particularly the UK. These influences aren't separate from "true" Omani culture to which all the rest is merely an addition. Culture isn't a snapshot of what people think it should be, it's an ever-changing, intangible conglomerate of the people who make it. 

Muscat is no Mobtown

Okay so I know that it is completely unhealthy to dwell on the super-itsy-bitsy-teeny-weeny-totally-not-even-a-big-deal-mom twinge of homesickness I'm feeling right now---but oh well, I am going to indulge myself.

I miss Mobtown, Charm City, Bawlmer, Hontown that crime-ridden-sinkhole-from-the-wire, that-super-colorful-acid-dream-place-from-Hairspray, the O's, The Ravens even, Natty Boh, crabs, insert stereotype here

I miss Mobtown Ballroom
I miss the unofficial house band The Boilermaker Band
I miss feeling totally boss about my parallel parking skills
I miss the Charles Theater, and Moonrise Kingdom which I never got to see
I miss getting lost in Druid Park and locking my doors on North Avenue
I miss the Fell's point visitors' museum and that guy who built model ships from the War of 1812 
I don't miss Cafe Hon because that shit's touristy
I miss 100% grass fed beef burgers in Hampden 
I miss turning a corner and half expecting to get mugged
I miss crab cakes and lobster and old bay potato chips (okay, I actually never really liked those)
I miss being forbidden from going to Lexington Market 
I miss public art and the mural in Pigtown
I miss The Book Thing and its extensive collection of political analysis regarding the USSR
I miss not being able to find my car after seeing the Artist at midnight and being positive I was going to die on the street that night
I miss O's games and Matt being embarrassed by his Dad
I miss the Soundgarden---physical CDs here are limited to the top 40, legally obtained music is rare, and vinyl...ahahahahahahaa, in your dreams
I miss driving super slow over the cobblestones in Fell's Point and still feeling like my tires are slowly being ripped to pieces
I miss coffee---REAL coffee, brewed in pot, no cream, no sugar
I ridiculously miss swing dancing 
I even miss fadeouts
I miss big band music and failing miserably at lindy and the weird pop songs they play if you stay long enough and generally sexy people who like great music and great dancing
I miss driving South on 95 at ridiculous hours of the night and seeing the exit for New York City...one day

Okay, that was cathartic. Honestly though, I really really love Muscat and being in Oman and like, everything. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else than here (okay, maybe if someone wants to teleport me to Cafe Jovial for for a few hours tonight I wouldn't mind--but I'm coming right back to Oman!) I think it's because I had so much fun today that it reminded me of the fun I've have back at home, seriously, today was  a really awesome outdoorsy-adventure picture-taking extravaganza. Anyways, I'll do whole post tomorrow about the beautiful Wadi Shab, the beach at Fins and every awesome cultural thing I've done so far to make up for this triple dose of self-indulgence. Promise.