As Salaam

Well, it's been a hectic few weeks. Since last I wrote, we had Australia Day (heating cranked to the max so that everyone could be appropriately dressed in stubbies and thongs - and I mean the Australia type of thongs!) and then the next day I was on a plane to Oman. I'm writing this from the hotel lobby, having just checked out before I get my midnight flight to Manchester.

Yes, Manchester, I've packed up my Newcastle flat and my stuff will hopefully be waiting for me somewhere. I'll have to change the name of this blog.

Oman's been fabulous. There are tons of photos I could have posted, but I'll limit it for now. I've been over here with up to 3 other colleagues (they've come and gone a bit) working for the local electrical companies. I was a bit nervous at first about how I'd be received, never having worked in a gulf country before (note - not Middle Eastern country, that's not how they think of themselves) but it's all gone very well, inshallah. There are probably about as many women working in the industry here as there is in England or Australia, and it turned out I needn't have gone to quite so much effort to find conservative clothing!

That was a struggle - do you know how hard it is to find a shirt in Newcastle that buttons all the way to top! I ended up in the "classic" (read old lady) section of Marks and Spencer, and it was clearly pension day so it was pretty funny.

I was working pretty hard the whole time, but I did get out a little bit, including a quick trip to this beach. Unfortunately I had a cold, so I don't remember much about getting there. Paul says I carried out a whole conversation, but as far as I was concerned we left the office and got to the beach with nothing in between - I was fast asleep!

Of course, when I say office.....

I did spend most of my time spread between the offices of the four companies we were working for, but on the weekend I usually worked the day in the hotel. So this was my Friday office. The staff at the Radison Coffee Shop got to know me very well indeed, particularly when I'd show up for breakfast with my laptop and stay while they cleared it away, set up the lunch buffet, clear that away, sun go down - you get the idea.

After having just been so stunned to learn about England and the housing situation there, where no one builds their own house and the developers build them all the same, it was refreshing to come here where every house is completely different.

Now that may not be immediately apparant from this photo, but it's true. Sure, they're all glossy white, but each place has it's own distinct style, layout, decoration etc. Oman's starting to have all "planned areas", and I learnt what that meant one day when I was looking at a drawing of a power line. I asked if the route was following the roads, and I got a blank look. "No, of course not, they are following the houses!"

There are a few incriminating photos of me trying the shisha, but I decided not to post any of those! I look a bit spaced out, and with good reason. They come in all different flavours, which disguise the tobacco (otherwise I wouldn't have gone near it), and Hamed suggested I try the rose. "This is light shisha, you will like". Yeah right, light my ****. My head was spinning very quickly. I can't believe this stuff is legal! (It doesn't help that it sounds exactly like a bong) The strawberry and mint was much nicer.

Here's a good story about what sort of place Oman is now - apparently the Minister for Health tried to ban the shisha (well, it is smoking tobacco, even though it's got to be better for you as it's smoked through iced water, making it a very cool smoke). But the Minister for Tourism and Industry overruled him, as it's a very popular Arabic tradition propping up lots of little "coffee shops".

These places sell the most fantastic fresh juices and arabic grilled lamb and chicken. I've eaten very well over here, not necessary including the few trips we had to the McDonalds nearby one of the offices. Of course, my Big Mac was halal, and one day I had a McArabia burger (I kid you not!).

If I get excited, I might post some more photos next time once I've got them off my camera, but I think I'm in for a busy few weeks trying to find somewhere new to live.

Finally - Glasgow

I've had a lot of subtley disguised complaints about the lateness of this update. In my excuse, I've been doing a bit since last time I updated. For example, right now I'm in Muscat. Last weekend I was in Manchester. At some point (I can't remember when) I was in Glasgow, which is when I actually prepared something to write, so here it is.

......

Today I went to Glasgow, and as I was about to get on the train to go home to Newcastle, I realised that I’ve got to the point where I don’t take photos of every new place I go to. It’s a shame, Glasgow seems like a lovely city (I’m told that I’m lucky it didn’t rain – this side of the country noticeably gets more rain than the east coast). They’ve done a lovely job of retaining a lot of the old sandstone buildings and integrating new glass and marble buildings.

So I took some photos of the train station at least! It’s apparently the last station built with rivets, ie before welding.

I also went to Manchester on the weekend to hunt for places to stay there. Unsuccessfully for now, better luck next time. But it snowed!!! Big fat snowflakes, masses of them. I went into one house, came out and there was 2” on top of the cars. It melted pretty quickly, but was magical for a short while. I got back to Newcastle, and my courtyard was white.



Here's what my office view in Manchester will be.



I learnt something that amazed me today. Nobody in England builds their own house!!! I asked why do people build houses all the same, and was told that the developers only get one or two designs approved and go there from there. It took me a while to understand, but eventually I realised that the developers don’t develop the land – they build *all* of the houses!!! Because of planning approvals and so on, people really don’t have a choice except to buy a house off a developer, who’s built three streets of absolutely identical houses. He’ll get planning approval from the council which means he’s only allowed to use one colour brick even. It would be virtually impossible for someone to get a builder to build a house to their own design.
I passed an area in Glasgow with about 6 high rise apartment blocks sticking up, Gold Coast style, and even they were all absolutely identical.

I’d spent the day in a workshop looking at how the Scottish Executive was going to achieve its renewable energy targets, which are as high as 40% of electricity from renewables by 2020 (vs Australia’s pathetic 2%). I was taken by the way that a bunch of developers and government people were sitting around seriously discussing not whether, but how to achieve this, and how different the attitudes are here to those in Australia. And it makes me wonder if the lack of ability to design their own houses, and being forced into a much less individualistic housing, causes people here to be less defensive of their own patch and more community minded. I don’t know, just a thought. At the same time, I suggested there’d be less youth hooliganism if people could paint their houses different colours.

I finally got my boxes from Australia the other day. Lucky – just in time for Australia Day, because how could I go to the aus day party without my green and gold cricket shirt. Not to mention my stubby holders.

I realised that I hadn’t got round to putting my photos up from Hadrian’s Wall. Hadrian was roman, and his wall is an amazing structure that went the width of Great Britain in the roman days to keep out the marauding Scots. I went to one small part of it, walked along past the remains of one of the forts (located every mile along the track) and then out from the wall on the Scottish side looking back. It was another foggy day, and I was lucky to get back just before the fog completely obscured everything.

Here’s a link on the wall. Fraid that's all you're getting for now, as it's very late and the photos take quite a while to set up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadrian's_Wall