Friday, June 17
(A couple friends complained about my last post, and since it made me really happy to know that there are people actually following my blog, I figured I'd make a big more of an effort to be dedicated to sharing my adventures. Haras.)
If I could make up a joke about today, it'd go like this.
Cop: "Put your hands up!"
Me: "blubblubblubblub..."
Today was a day of interesting experiences.
Firstly, after getting to bed after 3 AM last night, I got up around 8 this morning in order to go to church (does this sound familiar?). Although Islam is the official religion of Oman, the Omani are very tolerant of other religions, and there is actually a sort of church compound in the nearby area of Bousher, where there are weekly Catholic, Protestant, and Evangelical services, along with a few other denominations of Christianity. I hailed a cab and got my way to the compound without any trouble, but once I got there, I didn't know which building to enter. Being so brilliant, I stopped the nearest church-goer and asked, "Which is the Christian service?", to which they pointed to the building straight in front of them. It took until after I went inside, sat at a pew, and lasted through about 10 minutes of the service until I realized that I was in the middle of a Catholic service. If I have to claim a denomination, I call myself Protestant. But by then I felt that it would be rude to leave in the middle of service, and Christianity is Christianity, anyways. Of course, I was the only person who didn't cross themselves after prayers. I was also the only person not kneeling during the liturgy (I think that's what it was).
It's always an enlightening experience going to Sunday Mass.
When I got back, I took a nap before dragging myself and Alison out of bed to go to the Dive Centre with Hazami and Jurgen, two co-workers. It was nice - while I've gotten to know Hazami in the office and in our rides to and from the workplace in the mornings and evenings, I've never really had the chance to speak with Jurgen, who is one of the guys on the technical team at the opera house, so it was nice to talk with and get to know him today. Alison and I went together into the water first, but were so skeeved out by leering men that we got out of the water fairly quickly. One guy was stalking us, actually circling us, like a shark and its prey. Even though Hazami and Jurgen assured us that the guys wouldn't touch us, it's still kind of creepy being circled by anything, man or shark, in the water. I think I want to buy a one-piece...
The tide was way out today, at least compared to last week, so it was strange, wading out 50 meters into the sea and still being able to touch the ground with my feet. Hazami, Jurgen, and I decided to swim out (I felt safer with Jurgen swimming with us), way past everyone, nearly to the rocks on the other side of the bay. We definitely swam at least half a mile out - I don't think I've swim that far, ever. But it was a lot of fun, at least during the times when I didn't think I was surely going to drown. Which almost happened when Hazami attempted to hold me up while I tried to tie my hair out of my face. I think we could have, and would have made it all the way over to the rocks if we didn't get pulled over by the water police, who told us that we were swimming out too far. It was an entertaining moment. The only other really scary times were when boats would come speeding by, and there was the fear that they hadn't seen us and were going to mow over us. So actually, it was quite a relief to know that there actually were water police on the patrol, since there weren't any buoys, or boundary markers.
It's really interesting, how there are no lifeguards nor real boundaries past which swimmers are not allowed out. I noticed the same deal when I was in Puerto Escondido, Mexico, last summer, when a friend of mine took a thirty minute swim that took him to the cliffs on the other side of the bay that we were in. Then again, it's not exactly the most touristy area, more of a fishing village. But even at the Oman Dive Centre, a private beach, there are no lifeguards or anything. That was part of the fear of swimming so far out: people generally don't swim past a certain point, past which is considered boat area. But if there is no official boundary, and somebody decides to swim that far out, what happens if somebody driving a boat isn't paying attention to what/who is in the water ahead of the boat? Even if there was a lifeguard, it's not like he or she could do much to save somebody 100 meters out in the water who's just been run over by a boat...Speaking of which, are beach lifeguards an American phenomenon? Baywatch and all. I guess I haven't been to enough beaches around the world to be able to answer that question properly.
After a lovely dinner and a shower, Alison and I had our first Couchsurfing experience, meeting up for coffee with Sajjad, a Pakistani who's lived in Oman for all his life. I'll save the details of that for my next entry.
