Muscat Mutterings

Public Holidays Announced

2012-01-30T16:48:00.000+04:00

Breaking news...

The Public Holidays for the Prophet Mohammed's (pbuh) birthday has been announced for 2012.

Public Sector are to get Saturday the 4th & Sunday the 5th off
Private Sector are to get Saturday the 4th off

Rumor has it, and past experience, says Banks will get Sunday the 5th off.

Also, while I have your attention, a last chance to enter my free prize draw for 2 Fan Pit tickets worth RO 100 for James Blunt - I'm drawing the winners tomorrow!

le fin.

The 19th Annual Canadian Stampede - March 8, 2012

2012-01-29T07:00:00.000+04:00

It's that time of year again guys and girls - the Canadian Stampede is back, bigger and better than ever on March 8th, 2012. The Canadian Stampede Committee are a very experienced and organized group of people, drawing on experience learned from throwing the party every year for the last 18 years.

This year marks the very last year the event will be held in it's usual home: The Ras Al Hamra Recreation Club volleyball courts, because it's ear-marked for demolition in the next year.

The price this year is RO 20, the same as last year. For that, you get:

Entry to the best party of the year
3 free drinks, and cheap drink prices after that
Access to the world famous Golden Garter Saloon
Buffet food with Canadian cuisine(!)
A Canadian DJ
Line Dancing
Entry into the prize draw for 2 return tickets to the 100th Annual Calgary Stampede later this year - including hotel.
Support for a local charity

Tickets to this event are always hard to come by if you are not a PDO Ras Al Hamra Rec Club member - so if you have a RAH club membership - get your tickets from their office as normal. If you are not a RAH club member, email me for information on how to obtain tickets to the best party in town. You can email me on mrsythe *at* gmail *dot* com

le fin.

Want to study in the USA?

2012-01-28T16:02:00.004+04:00

I just received this email from a friend who asked me to share it with you all, in the hopes some of you have an interest in this:

“Ask Consular: Student Visa Questions and Answers” Webchat

Sunday, January 29

10:00 a.m.

Thinking of studying in the U.S.? Join U.S. Vice Consul Christian Cardona for a question and answer session about student visas to the U.S. Log in at https://statedept.connectsolutions.com/oman on January 29 at 10:00 a.m. to engage with other students around Oman in a real-time chat and submit your questions for the speaker. We hope you’ll be able to join this virtual event, which is the U.S. Embassy’s second live webchat!

-----------

Well, there you go!

More tomorrow!

le fin.

Have a nice weekend!

2012-01-25T15:25:00.001+04:00

Just a small post this afternoon - I hope everyone has a nice weekend!

Don't forget that I'm giving away 2 VIP tickets to see James Blunt next month, I don't give out the emails to anyone (except the winner so they can be contacted by Hi FM) and never will share contacts with anyone.

Click here for more information about the concert and how to enter for the tickets.

There is the Mommy & Me exhibition today and tomorrow (9am-9pm) in MQ above Silk Route / HSBC / Subway if your interested in that stuff.

Also, the Muscat Pirates rugby kids U6,U8,U10 and U12 teams are heading to Dubai this weekend to contend in a rugby tournament - so good luck to them too!

Have a nice weekend!

le fin.

Mommy & Me

2012-01-22T07:00:00.000+04:00

This coming Wednesday 25th & Thursday 26th see's the second annual Mommy & Me exhibition here in Oman. The exhibition is held in the Al Noor Hall in MQ (thats the big hall above Subway / HSBC). Doors open on both days at 9am and close at 9pm - so 12 hours for each day.

This year it looks like the main sponsor is Pampers, but here is a list of all of the Exhibitors:

Mennez
Bespoke Memories
Cake Heaven
Afkaari Boutique
The Entertainer
Sew Chic and Unique
Heaven's Chocolates
Twinkle
Lazain Boutique
BMW
Brain Buzz Toys
Buzoor
Gatherings
Lil Bee's Boutique
iCommunicate - Speech-Language Pathology
Abracadabra
Cake House
Oman Sail
Lamar Design
Um Naif Trading
Um Mansoor for Babies Collections
Arabian Secretes
ProShots
Patchi
GlamSmile
Sweet Factory
Al Harub Medical Group
Whispers of Serenity Clinic
Aster Hospital
Medident
Al Qurm Veterinary Clinic
Azzan Bin Qais
Arsenal Soccer School
Apple Green Private School
Small Steps Nursery
Coffee bean & Tea Leaf
Bread Talk
Second Cup
Early Intervention
Art of Living
Ya Mama Foundation
Awladana
Let's Read Campaign

As you can see, it's quite a long list, so the exhibition should have something for every kind of mommy!

For more information, there is a website here, and you can follow the official twitter account here. There is also a Facebook page here, and kids enter for free - obviously!

More soon.

le fin.

Muscat Rugby Football Club Gulf Conference Champions

2012-01-21T06:30:00.000+04:00

On Thursday evening, MRFC traveled up to Al Ain to play the final of the Gulf Conference league and beat Al Ain 13-11 in a closely fought match in perfect conditions. Muscat took the cup and are the 2011-12 Gulf Conference league champions, something they are very proud of achieving, especially considering the road that was taken to get to the top.

MRFC will now spend the second half of this season playing in the Gulf Premiership with fixtures against Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar.

The sponsors of MRFC are:

DHL
Grand Hyatt Muscat
i2 Offshore
Aggreko
Lufkin
AIL
Muriya - Sifawy hotel
SNR Denton

And also a big thanks to Hi FM for consistently promoting MRFC and the Muscat Pirates youth teams' activities.

If you would like to know more about MRFC, there is a facebook group here, and a website here.

Here's a candid snap of the boys celebrating in the Al Ain Amblers clubhouse:

le fin.

Have you seen this dog in Qurum?

2012-01-19T08:41:00.000+04:00

Reading OmanForum this morning, I saw this post. It seems they lost their dog when it ran out from a vet clinic on 16th Jan to the highway behind BMW, ROP vehicle registration building, Sultan Centre area in Qurum. Please do get in touch with the owner if anyone sees her. She is a mix small size German shepherd.

If you happen to find this dog, you can email the owner at rohitakovoor [at] yahoo [dot] com

Every little helps, I hope they find their dog.

le fin.

123 Orion winners, and whats on this weekend

2012-01-18T07:00:00.000+04:00

Well, its Wednesday, which means it's the weekend, unless you work for Bechtel on the significantly delayed Muscat International Airport project, where apparently they dont give a toss about the Labour Laws and make their labourers work 11 hours a day 7 days a week. Nice.

So, first up, the winner of the 2 tickets to 123 Orion's charity gig at the Royal Flight club tomorrow night:

Congratulations to Formose Pereira - an email has been sent to you with details on how to claim your tickets!

Tickets can still be purchased for RO 6, and proceeds go to supporting the Sindbad mobile library, for more information, call Tess on 9952 5486 or Liz on 9231 6733.

Tonight, there is a Craic Attack comedy event at the Crowne Plaza - Tickets are still available at Crowne Plaza Muscat and OUA retail outlet in MQ at OMR12. Doors open at 8pm (show 9pm).

Contact +968 95555699 for more information.

Alternatively, ladies dont forget you can get a totally free drink at the Safari bar and the John Barry bar at the Hyatt any evening of the week - still a great spot to kick the night off, especially with the 40% off happy hour that runs until 10pm. I'd be remiss if I didnt also plug the fantastic Authentic Indonesian experience at the Marjan restaurant as well - bookings can be made by calling +968 2464 1234.

Over at Nuts & Bolts in the Al Falaj hotel, there is Ladies night every Wednesday night, with some RO 2 cocktails all night.

First 20 ladies get a shooter Free, Free Vodka until midnight
Cranberry, orange, sprite, lime

RO 2 ++ ladies special all night

WOO WOO -GRASSHOPPER - SILK STOCKINGS - FLAVOURED MARGARITAS & DIAQURY

Single Ladies Free

Couples RO 5/-

Single Men RO 10/-

For details contact 9 400 600 9

The people at Zouk are hosting local DJ Dub Bass with A Night with Dub Sesssions, starting at 10pm.

Not sure on ticket pricing but I imagine it's the usual: RO 20 on the door with a little card with RO 20 credit on it that you can redeem at the bar.

As for Thursday, the only thing worth writing about is MRFC twatting Al Ain at 7:30pm :)

And on Friday - again at the Royal Flight (school this time though, same place mind) is the car boot sale to raise funds for the childrens playground equipment. It's on between 9 and 11amm and the entrance fee is RO 1 per car. If you happend to want to sell stuff, it is RO 5 per car - sell as much as your car can carry - but registration for sellers ends today.

For more details you can call Brona on 9938 1093.

Have a good weekend everyone.

le fin.

MRFC V Al Ain this Thursday

2012-01-17T07:00:00.000+04:00

Now, if you've been a reader of this blog for some time - you may have noticed I support the rugby club here. MRFC in the last 4 seasons have struggled through monumental problems that would have left those less determined wrapping things up. Take the old Muscat Softball League that was based at the two diamonds on ROP land out near the Oman Automobile Club in Ghala - that suffered from dwindling numbers and ultimately ceased to exist 2 or 3 years ago.

The rugby club was closed down, then reopened a year and a bit later and never really became as popular as it had been before, and the appointed manager (the same guy who runs Feeny's) did not seem in the least bit interested in actually doing his job and regularly told patrons to fuck off, until he was, finally, told to fuck off himself. And so it was a sad day last year on May 31st when the clubhouse closed it's doors for the very last time.

The rugby team, in these last few years has not done very well either - the rise of semi-pro players being brought in to UAE teams, the elitism that the UAE has tried to (and fairly successfully) impose on the rest of the GCC rugby clubs (and pissing everyone off) and what can only be described as low team numbers and morale had left MRFC the whipping boys of the GCC tournaments.

Until this year, when we got serious. A new fitness coach drilling people to vomit and then carry on through the summer in 45'C heat, a new Forwards coach with years of experience and tips to hand out to people in technical positions and a new Backs coach that brought an entire new level of organization to the team. Coupled with a new Chairman, team manager and new sponsors (Grand Hyatt, DHL, i2 Offshore, Lufkin, AIL, Aggreko) injecting much needed funds and support into the team.

Also, a partnership with the PDO Pirates (to create the Muscat Pirates) to form the now hugely popular rugby youth section is handling up to 150 kids a week on Sundays between 5 and 6:30 has helped spread the word about MRFC here in Muscat.

This year, MRFC have lost one away fixture (in Kuwait) and are currently tied first place in the Gulf Conference league, the last game of which is this Thursday night in Al Ain. MRFC are in a strong position to take victory of this league and move on to the Gulf Premiership league which starts next month. To that end, there is a bus driving to Al Ain, leaving this Thursday morning at the Al Fair in MQ at 10:30am - the game kicks off in Al Ain at the Palm Sports Resort at 7:30pm. There are group-rates available at the Hilton in Al Ain (approximately RO 22 per person on a 2 to a room basis). Not that I expect many of you reading this to actually go and support, I just felt it was important to promote a Muscat-based team that is poised to win the Gulf Conference league which is something I'd like to think people would be pleased to hear about.

MRFC has a website here, and a facebook group here.

le fin.

An open letter to Horizon Fitness.

2012-01-16T07:00:00.000+04:00

Dear Ms Jawhara Abdullah Moosa, owner of Horizon Fitness,

Once upon a time (4 years ago) I signed up to the Horizon Fitness gym in MQ - I bought 2 annual memberships, one for me and one for Mrs Sythe. I actually got into going to the gym for a while, but Mrs Sythe found that the gym was small and felt uncomfortable with so many clearly under-age children ogling her.

I even once tried out a personal trainer, and quickly realized they clearly didnt have any interest in training me, just showing me how to use machines and do various exercises and not actually train me. The method was - here do this, OK I'll be back in a minute, at which point I'd then be introduced to some different exercise technique. I felt it wasn't worth the money so discontinued it.

The apparent relaxation of rules regarding no children in the gym became the reason why both finally I and Mrs Sythe decided to stop attending your gym. Kids hogging machines, carelessly dropping weights and equipment, failing to wipe down their stations when done and generally being an inconvenience.

Now I'm not trashing your gym, or chain of gyms as it now is (and ever expanding I see - congratulations, it appears Bank Muscat have had your back these last 13 years) - your gym's are a great thing, and there is certainly a demand for them. I just feel that the 42 spam SMS messages that you have sent me in the last 12 months (I have saved them all in my phone and am happy to prove it to anyone who doubts me) is a little over the top. Especially seeing as I have personally been into your gym 3 separate times to request my number be removed from your distribution list. I even tried sending a SMS to Oman Mobile to set my number to Do-Not-Send for commercial offers via SMS. Yet still your army of SMSing drones continue to inform me of "special offers" that I have absolutely no interest in.

Please stop spamming me with your crap, if I want to join your stupid gym I know where it is.

Love & kisses,

Mr Sythe

le fin.

Oman take on the Democratic Republic of Congo tonight

2012-01-15T14:45:00.001+04:00

An Omani footballer :)

Tonight, Oman FC take on the Democratic Republic of Congo at the Sultan Qaboos stadium in Bowsher / Ghubra - whatever they call that area. The game kicks off at 6:30pm, so I imagine you should expect lots of traffic this afternoon, and later on tonight, around the stadium.

Muscat Daily's Divesh Bhal reports today that Paul Le Guen (Oman's head coach) has had to field a weakened side against Congo as a first choice Striker (Hassan Rabee'a) and Defender (Mohammed al Musalmi) have both been ruled out due to injuries. So perhaps there will be lots of disappointed fans tonight, I hope al Plod will be prepared for any disgruntled fans should the local lads be defeated. Best of luck to them though!

In similar news, Arsenal have handed a trial to Oman international Saad al-Mukhaini. The 24-year-old left-back, who plays for Omani top-flight side Fanja SC and has earned 23 caps for his country since making his debut in 2009, is expected to arrive in North London later this week ahead of a two-day trial.

More soon.

le fin.

123 Orion Winter Warmer - Win 2 free tickets!

2012-01-14T07:00:00.000+04:00

This coming Thursday, 19th January, local band 123 Orion are playing in a charity event along with 3 other bands for the Sindbad Mobile Library which tours villages of Oman in order to promote literacy amongst children. The event is at the Royal Flight club from 7:30pm onwards. Tickets cost RO 6,and you can get some home made soup and snacks too.

To get tickets or find out more information, you can call Tess on 9952 5486 or Liz on 9231 6733

All you have to do to have a chance to win the pair of free tickets is to either leave a comment here, or email me at mrsythe [at] gmail.com - I'll announce the winners on Wednesday morning!

le fin!

Snow Patrol - Live in Muscat - Sunday March 11th

2012-01-11T15:30:00.000+04:00

Well, last week Hi FM and Alive Events announced that James Blunt is coming to town on February 15th (and I'm currently still giving away 2 fan pit tickets worth RO 100 to see him), and this week there is another announcement: Snow Patrol are coming to town on Sunday March 11th at the InterCon gardens.

Tickets are RO 25 / RO 50 (Fan pit) but are not yet on sale, but you can reserve them by clicking here. You can get more information from the Facebook events page.

Have a nice weekend!

le fin.

Authentic Indonesian at Marjan, Grand Hyatt

2012-01-11T07:00:00.000+04:00

As a special birthday treat, the very nice people at the Grand Hyatt, Muscat let Mrs Sythe & I have a sneak peak at the menu and the foods that are going to be available at Marjan between the 15th and 26th of January. Marjan the restaurant itself is situated outside by the end of the pool near to the beach, it's a pretty place to sit, but just like Tomato at the InterCon, it's a winter-only venue for dinner (but it's open year-round for lunch).

The first thing I noticed was that there were actually 2 menus - 1 was the main menu for the special themed event, and a second smaller Sushi menu. Being a huge fan of Sushi and Sashimi, I had basically given up hope of getting any decent Sushi anywhere in town except at Tokyo Taro down in Ruwi. I can report that the Sushi I ordered at Marjan was amazing, I really enjoyed it and will be going back for more - and at RO 1.500 for a Sushi dish for a starter, I think it's attractively priced. Each menu had a little light clipped on to it so you could clearly see the menu items - a nice touch I thought. Click the pictures to see the menu and their prices.

Speaking of pricing, the entire menu was, I felt, cheaper than I would have expected for a 5* hotel's restaurant. All the Entree's are priced between RO 8 and RO 10 (with the exception of the RO 25 lobster). To put that into contrast, Tomato @ the InterCon - a pretty much like-for-like setting for a restaurant (5* hotel, outdoor seating only) - has a standard entree priced at RO 8 - 15.

To start, we ordered the most expensive starter, the Chicken, Beef and Lamb satay sticks (RO 7.5) and 2 portions of Sushi (RO 1.5 x 2). Both were amazing, and the portion size of the Satay was a lot more than expected. As I already wrote above, the sushi was really good, better than the stuff served in Shining Shatti thats for sure.

I do have to apologize, I (unlike Andy and blue_chi) do not have a fancy camera and am somewhat limited with the pictures and the quality. A fancy camera, and how to use it, has been on my to-do list for quite some time. I'll get there in the end!

After the tasty starter (and more filling than expected) we ordered our main courses, which were the Soto Padang (spicy beef broth, radishes, bean sprouts and crispy shallots) for RO 8, and also the Semur Daging (Coriander marinated beef sirloin with sweet fragrant sauce) for RO 9 (second picture below). Now, I appreciate that these dishes may not look particularly well presented, but it's the camera! They were both really, really good.

Now, the atmosphere around the restaurant is also worth noting - it was very intimate with well laid out tables with subtle, yet sufficient lighting. The view of the pool and the main hotel building was also nice, see below (this was the view from my seat).

There were also a duo of guitar players walking from table to table taking requests and then singing them. By the time they got to our table I'm afraid I'd set the bar too high for them by asking them to play The Who's Pinball Wizard, but they more than made up for not knowing that song by playing Sitting on the dock of the bay by Otis Redding, and then singing me happy birthday in 3 different languages, which was fun :) Here's a snap I took of one of they when he was belting out round 3 of Happy Birthday in what I can only guess was Indonesian.

He looks happy!

All in all, we had a great time, and the Authentic Indonesian experience starts at the Marjan restaurant at the Grand Hyatt on January 15th and runs until the 26th. You can book tables by calling the hotel on +968 2464 1234.

le fin.

My Raha mattress

2012-01-10T07:00:00.000+04:00

What a subject for me to talk about today! Mattresses! Like it or not, we use them every day for a number of hours, and I wanted to share my experience with my Raha mattress - because I'm totally in love with it.

When I first got to Muscat, 4 and a half years ago, a colleague at the time took me to Lulu's on my very first day and said order a mattress now because it takes a few weeks to come. I was all a bit confused with everything and so purchased a Raha 1001 nights king size mattress for about RO 55 and carried on with all the things one does when they first move here.

Flash forward to May 2011 - my 1001 night mattress is well and truly battered, and my back was killing me - it was definitely time to find a new mattress. I went to the Towell bed centre, Fahmy Furniture, Khimji Furniture, ID Design, the IKEA catalog order store in Shatti, and a couple of other furniture places, trying to find a new mattress. I really wanted to get a TempurPedic memory foam mattress, but the price was really off-putting - North of RO 1000!!

In my search, I happened to tweet about my ongoing search for a new mattress, when someone from Raha emailed me and invited me to tour their factory right here in Rusayl. I don't know about you but I had no idea that Raha was an Omani brand, and definitely had no idea that they had a factory here, so I accepted the invitation and was actually quite excited to visit a factory. The last time I visited a factory that was not for work was an industrial photo printing plant in the UK and I was 12. Joy. I've actually been to quite a few factories but I digress.

So, last May, I went on a tour of the Poly Products L.L.C. state-of-the-art manufacturing complex spread across an area of 45,000 square meters in the Rusayl Industrial Estate of Oman. I wont get into the in-depth detail of the inner workings of the factory, but it is significant: they manufacture their own foam products, springs & coverings there, along as make additional foam products for other uses, as well as furniture too. I really was quite surprised at how involved the factory was, and how many uses there are for foam products!

I learned that Raha is a brand owned by Poly Products L.L.C. and that the parent company has been in operation since 1979, and has a factory here in Oman, as well as one in Germany & 2 smaller ones in the UAE. The InterCon, Hyatt, Al Bustan and The Chedi all have their mattresses made by Raha, and a very long list of 5* hotels in the region outside Oman also buy their mattresses from Raha. So their stuff is top-drawer quality.

After seeing how the mattresses were made, and just how much technology went into them (who knew?!) I decided that I was going to buy local, and selected the RO 320 Cloud Nine Expectations mattress. A week later the mattress was delivered, and now, 8 months later, I feel comfortable fully recommending this mattress. It is a no-turn mattress and is made up of pocketed-springs, multiple layers of foam, including a memory foam layer, and a quilted pillow top layer as well. I can guarantee that after these first 8 months the mattress has not become lumpy or uncomfortable, and my back pains have simply vanished. I won't lie, I did receive a modest discount, it was not free (no where near free!) and I don't want people to think that this is some paid-for advert, because it really is not. But none-the-less, Raha is a shining example of Omani products, and I for one had no idea they were even Omani!

If you find yourself on the hunt for a new mattress here in Oman, or even further afield, take the time to check out the Raha mattresses, I can guarantee they are built to last and are extremely comfortable. I've not had back pain in months, and I attribute a lot of that to the fact my mattress is helping me when I sleep. Here in Muscat, Fahmy Furniture in Al Khuwair is the main retail outlet for Raha mattresses.

le fin.

O'Malley's Irish bar at the Radisson Blu

2012-01-09T07:00:00.000+04:00

On Friday the 6th of January, the new Irish bar named O'Malley's replacing The Cellar at the Radisson Blu hotel in Al Khuwair started trading in what is being called a soft opening.

~~No word yet on pricing~~ I popped in there for a quick pint tonight - RO 2.7 for a pint of Stella. It sure does look pretty, here's another snap:

Well it certainly looks nice, no word yet on the menu or the bar pricing - if you've been, please comment and share your experiences with the rest of us! I'd say it'll be busy this weekend...

le fin.

Radio Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

2012-01-08T07:00:00.000+04:00

In local business magazine, Business Today, the Best Brands survey results for 2011 were published recently, you can buy it for RO 1.500 from most shops that sell magazines. In it, it reported that Hi FM had 39% of all expatriates polled for which radio station they listened to, whereas Merge had 5%. Quite the difference indeed, and amongst the Omani people polled, Hi FM had 13% of the vote versus Merge's 3%.

A rare snap of Darren attempting to fit the mic in his mouth

Now, here on Ze Blog I have run 2 polls asking you what you listened too, and both times (once when Merge launched, and again 2 months in) Hi FM were still the clear winner. Another way to look at things is that Merge have captured 5% of the expatriate market when they had 0% previously. But still, I'd imagine there are some uncomfortable people at Sabco at the moment, it's a fairly poor performance, especially after all the hype last year. Its a shame the data doesnt have some time relativity with it, but thankfully, you readers helped out and we have our own set of data - it seems people tuned in when Merge launched, but then went back to other stations or MP3's or whatever after some time. The real stinger for Merge is that this a publicly published poll and you have to assume advertising clients will consider this when making the decision to advertise with Merge or Hi FM.

Hi FM had probably their strongest year last year, closing some major advertising deals, the arrival of Marcus and a string of successful music concerts held in conjunction with Alive Events. It seems that Darren, Erin, Kathy & Marcus are dominating Chris, Rummy, Sayeh and Sami at the moment, lets see what Chris and his rebel alliance pull out of the hat this year.

Even the Ewoks over on Oman FM 90.4 (can you believe they still dont have a website?!) have got 17% of the expat audience and 27% of the Omani audience - destroying even Hi FM's audience base amongst Omanis. And rumours are circulating that Oman FM is about to get a total overhaul and new management (some sort of split, or re-positioning) from it's parent Ministry.

Oman FM's boom mike left a lot to be desired

So the big question for Radio in the Sultanate for 2012 is, will the Ewoks wake up and recognize their share of the audience and modernize their radio station? I wonder if they will hire in a Chewbacca to give them some new blood or carry on as they are? One could argue that they don't care and will just rumble on, I'd like to see them leverage their position and present a better polished range of shows. Perhaps better production of their shows, and perhaps they could try transmitting in true Stereo instead of the maxed out - defaulted to Mono - nonsense that they currently broadcast in. Perhaps they will even get a website!

Hi FM have continued to innovate, and have now rolled out Radio Text for those of you with fancy enough radio's in your cars. The title of the track being played pops up on the radio, and cycles with the name of the radio show being broadcast at the time - a nice touch and sets them technically above the rest.

Dont forget, I'm currently giving away 2 VIP tickets worth RO 100 to see James Blunt live in concert on February 15th - you gotta be in it to win it, so enter now!

More tomorrow.

le fin.

Muscat Daily's scoop on Adeyon Talents

2012-01-07T13:00:00.000+04:00

Its Saturday and that means back to work for most of us.

I was surprised to see Muscat Daily splashed across it's front page the first of a 2 part exclusive story exposing Adeyeon Talents as a scam. The story is online here, or you can buy the paper for 100bz. It's good to support genuine local journalism, so consider coughing the 100bz if you happen to see it on your travels today.

Now the sting seems to be with the raffle for the 2 lambo's - the VIP cards are accepted, I myself used one and got a discount in Adidas at MCC lately. So the VIP cards seem to be working, its just the lottery tickets. I'm sure tomorrow we'll get to read more of the juicy details - rumour has it the people at the top of Adeyeon Talents have been arrested, but no idea if thats true or not.

Moving on, still with Muscat Daily, Dhofari Journalist, Susan Mubarak wrote a very good article about domestic help workers and their plight. It's a very good read, I recommend you read it if you haven't already done so.

In other news, yesterday it emerged that Oman Air have announced their new CEO: Mr Wayne Pearce, who has previously worked at Etihad as their head of strategy and planning, Qantas and UK based travel agency Gold Medal Travel. The story broke on the Oman Air SWAP group on facebook yesterday morning and I saw a note on the cover of the Muscat Daily today confirming it.

Oman Air's new CEO, Wayne Pearce

Best of luck to him, I'm sure he'll do fine :)

And finally for today, local blogger (now retired it seems) Muscat Jet Driver, has opened his archives for reading. I highly recommend these few stories for some laughs:

Rock Bottom Muscat
Omani Space Program

Some hilarious writing, worth reading!

More tomorrow!

le fin.

James Blunt coming to Muscat

2012-01-03T15:00:00.000+04:00

Win 2 free VIP (fan pit) tickets worth RO 100!

Alive events and Hi FM are at it again! This time they are bringing back James Blunt for another concert this February 15th for a Valentines day after gig! James was first here in 2009 and now, 3 years later he's back.

Tickets are RO 25 for general admission or RO 50 for the fan pit - you can reserve tickets through the Hi FM website by clicking here, or you can purchase tickets at OUA MQ branch, Bose store in Qurum City Centre and Al Ghazal pub at t'InterCon. You can get more info from the Facebook event page here.

As always, all you have to do to win the free tickets is email me at mrsythe [at] gmail.com or leave a comment here - if you leave a comment please make sure there is a way for me to contact you should you win! I'll announce the winner at the end of January!

Bon chance!

le fin.

ROP gets some new patrol cars

2012-01-03T07:00:00.000+04:00

Just a little candid snap passed on to me by a friend recently (ok, back in October last year), it seems that the ROP have decided that their cop cars need a little more speed to do their job more effectively. I dont know who originally took the picture, it turned up on facebook apparently, but if it was you that snapped the picture... thanks :)

I could launch into some vitriol about speeding and such but that's too much effort, seeing as I did that yesterday. On a positive note though, the cars look pretty awesome. I wonder if they'll be getting more?

More soon!

le fin.

ROP announces 2011 stats for road deaths

2012-01-02T10:00:00.000+04:00

As covered yesterday by Gulf News (and today it's in the Muscat Daily), the ROP announced it's 2011 total count for accidents on the roads last Saturday (December 31st, 2011). The facts are out, and I'm not even surprised by the stark reality that, even with the bizarre way the ROP calculates its figures, deaths on the roads in 2011 had risen by 22% since 2010 with 1,051 deaths recorded. In 2010 the ROP reported 820 deaths (and 2009 reported 953 dead).

As for injuries, they were up too: 11,322 injuries on the roads last year, compared to 7,571 injuries in 2010, thats an increase of 33%. Now, the population of Oman is 2,773,479 (as found by the Census in 2010) - so, if we pretend that every one of the 2.77 million people are driving (which they obviously are not) you have a 0.04% chance of dying on the roads (4 in 10,000), a 0.41% chance of being injured on the road (41 in 10,000) for a combined total 0.45% chance of something bad happening to you on the roads (before just regular injury-free accidents), or put another way 45 out of 10,000 of us, statistically met with an injury or fatality on the roads in 2011. When you factor in that of the 2.77 million of us living here in the Sultanate, there are obviously a large number of those that are not even drivers, so, in reality the % chance of something happening to the drivers amongst us is higher. And, it gets worse than that; the ROP does not include in their figures, those people that succumb to their injuries in hospital and die later - they are recorded as injuries and not fatalities. Additionally, I understand that children that die in car accidents are not registered either - I'm not 100% sure of that claim but it's certainly one that I've heard said more than a few times before. So even with the figures massaged, the facts are incredibly alarming.

So what is going on? Obviously, Oman is currently going through a population boom, and every day more and more people are born, more are driving, more are having accidents - so as the population increases, the total number of accidents is expected to naturally, but this increase in road deaths is outstanding. It's my opinion that as more adolescent Omani's start driving, more of them are recklessly driving with no care whatsoever what they are doing. Perhaps this is due to a simple case of ignorance, driving fast, overtaking on blind corners, not changing tyres before they burst at high speed etc - perhaps people do not know that they need to think when driving. The annual maintenance check could be made stricter, so those running on bald tyres are made to change them before renewal. It's a daily occurrence I see trucks and even taxi mini-buses running with bald tyres, yet in my entire time here, I've never heard of an ROP officer fining someone for having bald tyres.

I do not have access to the raw data so I'm going to make an assumption here: I'd say the largest cause of accidents is speeding. Let's face it - most of us have had speeding fines here - I've been living here for 4.5 years, and I have had 2 speeding fines - 1 in Qurum on the flyover and 1 up near Shinas at 1am on my way back from the UAE one weekend. If this was a country like Canada or the UK, my insurance premiums would have been jacked up, and I would have had points put on my license - too many points on your license and you lose your privilege to drive. But here, in Oman, I just paid the RO 10 fine both times, and went about my day. I know people that get speeding tickets all the time, they just dont care because it's only a tenner. Speed limits are for those people without wasta. You know I'm telling the truth.

The only way that is going to get people to reign in their need for speed in this country is to use the rule of the big stick - which is used so frequently elsewhere in this part of the world for a number of things. People are inherently lazy, so will cut corners, park on hard shoulders of highways instead of getting off the highway, speed because they're late, and so on. The ROP have been fairly vocal (for them) in the press over the last year asking people to slow down and buckle up, there's been the displays around the country and a number of ad campaigns - people just dont care - because what's going to happen? A 10 rial fine, if that.

The ROP have started deploying portable speed cameras, but everyone knows where they are (18 November Street, Al Mouj Street, Muscat Expressway and the road from the Expressway to Bank Muscat r/a) and so it's not really working. RO 10 for speeding is not a deterrent that is working. But the ROP are presumably issuing more speeding tickets as a result of this. Oman used to have a points license system, back in the day. For some reason unknown to me, this system seems to have been abandoned, yet in the Oman Traffic Law multiple references to a point system are made (see page 137 of 149 on the link for a table of fines).

Take a look at what has happened up in the UAE - there driving has been brought under control by use of a very large stick : drive like an ass and you'll pay for it, ultimately (if you are an expatriate) you could even lose your residence visa for driving like an idiot. The fines are much larger there, and the point system is in effect. I might argue that the fines there, or the penalty of losing your visa is a touch on the extreme side, but it seems to have worked.

So if the ROP are serious about starting to control this situation here, which by all accounts they appear to be serious, then we should expect to see a similar methodology deployed here: an increase to speeding fines, more spot-checks on road-worthiness of peoples vehicles, and more undercover cars with speed measuring devices. An increase in the speeding fine is essential - and for all those who say RO 10 is a lot to some people, for sure - no doubt it's a lot for some people - so surely they should bear that in mind and not drive over the posted speed limits then.

I hear it so regularly from people from all walks of life: I don't know how I got these speeding fines - I wasn't driving that fast. People seem to think it's funny and cool, when in reality I want to remind them that people are dying or getting injured at the rate of 1.4 an hour in 2011.

Here are my top 5 action items that I'd like to see improvements on in 2012 for traffic safety here in Oman:

1. Increase speeding fines
2. Bring back the points system
3. Totally over-haul the driving instructor / licensing system to include a road theory test & qualified instructors who have passed a stringent exam and are qualified to instruct people to learn to drive (currently you just need to have driven for 10 years to qualify). (I'm not even joking).
4. Make the annual maintenance check stricter, including actually inspecting cars less than 3 years old.
5. Carry out spot-checks on road-worthiness

What do you think of my list? Any other suggestions?

le fin.

Happy New Year!

2011-12-31T12:00:00.000+04:00

Well, 2011 was a strange year, I think it was better than 2010 for me, but it started off horrendously with a string of bad news for me, but as the year progressed, things got better - well, for me anyway!

On the blog it's definitely been a big year, here is a few nuggets of the year on the blog:

More than 345,000 hits
Gave away 22 tickets to 10 events worth RO 558
Covered the protests in February
Had my outburst about HSBC in May
971 of you "liked" my Facebook page for this blog in 2011
1493 comments made on 209 posts published in 2011

Thank you everyone for reading and commenting upon my mutterings, I honestly never thought so many people would enjoy my little hobby.

And now we're into 2012, when according to Hollywood, the world will come to an end. ;)

Happy New Year everyone - have a great time tonight and enjoy the day off tomorrow!

le fin.

The Experiment Countdown 2012 @ Zouk

2011-12-30T00:00:00.000+04:00

This is an interesting way to advertise an event here in town, it's been done before of course but I think this is a well put together advert, its only 40 seconds long. Did you spot yourself from Hed Kandi?

VIP Tickets sold out, couples RO 40, singles RO 25. Free welcome drink & bubbly @ midnight.

One lucky winner, picked by a raffle draw at the venue, will be treated to the entire celebration on the house.

FIRST 10 GIRLS TO ENTER FREE

For Ticket bookings and Packages, call - Zameel Ameen 92369801

le fin.

My top 5 songs of 2011

2011-12-29T07:00:00.000+04:00

Well, in a departure from my normal blog posts, but regular followers of me on Twitter will know I like to listen to music, I thought I'd make a top 5 list of my favorite tracks from 2011. Now some of these tracks were released before 2011, but I've generally only discovered them in the last 12 months, and have been listening to them this year.

I'm not going to list them in any particular order of importance, that's too much effort for me to decide upon and ultimately I dont think I could ever truly be happy with the order, but here we go:

1. Linkin Park - Burning in the skies - from the album: A Thousand Suns

2. The Black Keys - Lonely Boy - from the album: El Camino

3. Foo Fighters - These Days - from the album: Wasting Light

4. DJ Fresh Feat. Sian Evans - Louder

5. Martin Solveig Feat. Dragonette - Hello

Well, thats my selection of tracks from 2011. There were thousands and thousands and I'm sure I could come up with a totally different top 5 tomorrow, but there we are. I hope you enjoy my list, and the weekend.

le fin.

The last weekend of 2011

2011-12-28T11:00:00.000+04:00

Well here we are, weekend number 52, the last of 2011. The biggest party of the weekend got cancelled (the Gorillaz thing at Zouk), and as far as I can tell, most venues are not doing anything special ahead of Saturday night which is of course New Years Eve.

There is, however, one party tomorrow night at the Ruwi hotel, Black Gold, promoted by the amusingly named events company: Stantmastaz Entertainment. The party is free for women, RO 7 for couples and RO 10 for single guys, paid admission gets you a free shot of vodka, and groups of 6 people get an entire bottle for free, so says the facebook event page. I imagine the Vodka will be terrible! I have to admit I'm kind of curious to see how sick people will get on that much free cheap vodka.

In other news today, local Twitterati Muscati shared this picture that he snapped from the paper today:

I wonder what the Muscat City Centre mall rats are going to wear now?

Thats all for now, have a good weekend!

le fin.