Of Picnics & Customer Service

Wadi Tanuf, Oman

What’s Oman without a picnic in the wadis? Here’re pictures of our own wadi trip in Oman in 2013. When it rains, you can be pretty sure to see people heading to the countless wadis (dried river beds) for a splash in the water.

What’s so great about some rain and some water? Well, if you stay in a place where the only things you see are sand, dust, sandstorms, rocks, and more sand (i.e. the Arabian Peninsula), you’ll know how nice a little bit of rain and water can be.

Besides, picnics and road trips have their other plus points. For one, you don’t need to deal with the delightful customer service attitude in Oman (whether in hotels, restaurants, or car rental agencies, …but make sure you bring your own car).

An example. At the car rental booth in the airport on my last official trip.
“Brother, how long is this gonna take? We’ve been waiting here for 20 minutes now”.
Car rental fellow in a threatening tone, “Are you sure it is 20 minutes? How do you know it is 20 minutes”?
“See, I made this call when I arrived at your booth, right after I spoke to you, see the time of the call”.
Fellow: “…I’m busy” (ignoring us, and went back to chatting on the phone).
Didn’t take us so long after that, …only about 20 more minutes, and this was pre-booked, and from an international car rental chain!

On the same official trip, later that night, arriving late at a pre-booked hotel, opened the hotel room with the swipe card and heard a lady screaming. …Shit! Slammed the door shut, and ran the hell away, the check-in clerk gave us the wrong room!! …Maybe, it was just my unlucky day…

Oh, one tip, when going sight-seeing. Stock up on packet food, junk food, whatever (which Anu smartly did). Don’t expect food stalls near tourist attractions, they don’t exist. It’s either packed food, or starve. Your choice.


The road to Wadi Tanuf, with some ruins at the side. We chose an easy wadi due to a lack of time and experience. Get an Oman off-road adventure book in the bookshop for ideas (or check it out at the bookshop if you’re too stingy to buy one, …like us hahaha).


Some ruins near Wadi Tanuf


A submerged road which you can drive across – there’re tons of roads like these in Oman


And can we drive across that? You can try, but I’m pretty sure the rocks will do some serious damage to your car, and get you stuck in the wadi until something comes and pull it up. We walked across.


Papa and Justin at Wadi Tanuf, Oman


Mommy, preparing for a hike


There, papa and son, wading thru water


Waterfall time!

Neither Sunni nor Shia

Nizwa, Oman

The Oman saga continues… Just completed another submission for a huge Omani project. Have also been busy with visa renewals (our 2 years UAE residence visa was up for renewal, yup, it’s already 2 years since we returned to Dubai, quick huh?), and some major planning for our coming two week summer holiday.

Holiday planning is serious work, especially if you happen to need a visa for travelling, and Anu needs one for almost every country you can name. Just wasted 80 friggin Euros, on booking a hotel on a wrong date, with a non-refundable fare! F#@*! Serves me right for trying to save pennies, and for doing everything in a hurry. But that’s what the friggin German Schengen Visa fella said is required, or the application will be incomplete and we’d have to come back another day (and it'll cost us another 100+ dirhams for booking another appointment), plus there may not be enough time before the flight date. So, I fired away on the mobile, booking one hotel, after another, rushing off to the internet café to get it all printed out, etc, while Anu had to sit around and nurse little Jayden (Justin was at school, luckily).

Enough of this. It’s the Eid season, I shouldn’t be moaning and shooting off expletives!

Eid Mubarak, and Selamat Hari Raya to all those who celebrate Eid!

I’m putting pictures of Nizwa, Oman. Nizwa used to be the capital of the Imamate of Oman. Present-day Oman used to be called Muscat and Oman at one time, a sort of 'federation' of the Sultanate of Muscat and the Imamate of Oman. The Imamate was defeated in a civil war in the 50's and the name of the united country was later changed to the Sultanate of Oman.

Oman’s type of Islam is unique in that it is neither Sunni nor Shia. 75% of Omanis are Ibadis, including the royal family. Because of this, Oman seems to have been insulated from all the wars, strife and terrorism that is happening in the Middle East at present. It’s not involved in the bombing of Yemen, and not caught up with the rivalry between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Heck, Oman usually ends up playing the mediator between the Sunni camp (led by Saudi Arabia) and the Shia camp (led by Iran). With the ongoing sectarian strife between the Sunnis and the Shias all over the world, being an Ibadi ain’t such a bad idea, if you ask me. (If you’re Muslim, that is.)

Anyway, Eid Mubarak to everyone again! No harm in wishing everyone one more time, right?




More pictures of Nizwa, seat of the Ibadi Imamate




Pottery seems to be a thriving industry in Nizwa


Date palms in Nizwa


Bahla Fort, Oman (not strictly inside Nizwa, but… what the heck!)


Bahla old town beside the fort, in ruins (from the looks of it anyway, nope, didn’t try going in)






Noor Majan Camp, our interesting chalet on the outskirts of Nizwa (on the road to Mannah)


The trusty rented car that took us on our epic 5 day journey in Oman


Family picture, Nizwa, Oman

The Lion Rock

Sigiriya, Sri Lanka

How can I do a story about Sri Lanka without posting something on this??

Sigiriya is one of the most well-known sights of Sri Lanka. It used to be a rock citadel, with a city on top, yeah, no kidding. It was built by a renegade king of Anuradhapura. The renegade king killed his father, and usurped the throne of Anuradhapura from the rightful heir which was his half-brother. He then moved the capital to Sigiriya for better defence. (Yeah, just look at the rock, and you can understand his reasoning). Nevertheless, he was eventually defeated by his half-brother and he committed suicide (what’s meant to be, was meant to be, I guess). And Sigiriya was abandoned.

This is one story anyway.

But the renegade king sure built some pretty impressive things on and around this rock for the short time that he was king! Thanks to him (…and to nature), Sri Lanka is now getting USD 30 per tourist per visit, and there’s no other way around this (due to it being on a friggin high rock, unlike Polonnaruwa haha).

Here’re the pictures.








On the way up, with lush green scenery all the way


A view of the middle tier


The countryside, from halfway up




Getting difficult to climb, …don’t get me wrong, the steps are good. It’s Anu’s fear of heights that’s keeping us from going faster


The Lion’s Paws - this is the highest point we reached (and it took quite a lot of prompting from me to get us here…). According to records, there used to be a huge lion gate here (of which only the paws are left now). It’ll be like the Sphinx I guess, if it was still intact.


No way we’re doing that! But I’ve gone up before, in 2004, so it’s alright. Besides, I don’t really remember anything of note up there apart from more ruins and a fantastic view of the countryside.




Views of The Rock on our way down


Some odd rock formations




The beautiful park surrounding Sigiriya, Sri Lanka

Divinity in Stone

Gal Vihara, Polonnaruwa, Sri Lanka

Continuing on Sri Lanka, and the Buddhist theme. (What the heck! I’ve got nothing to write about, …except for the antics of my 2 kids, and boring work… Want some of that? Yeah, it’s coming!)

These photos are of Polonnaruwa, Sri Lanka, another ancient city. Buddhists like to leave ancient cities around, for some reason… (such as giving a good source of income for their generations to come). Like Anuradhapura, you have to pay a hefty 25 (or was it 30) USD per head per day to roam around the countryside looking at ruins and temples, even if you don’t enter them, unless you look, act and speak like a Sri Lankan, which we unfortunately don’t. That, or you can link up with a local auto-rickshaw (tuk-tuk) driver who’ll bring you to the places of interest for a fraction of the price. (Don’t tell anyone you learnt it from here, OK?) Don’t remember there was such a fee on my previous visit in 2004. But that was before the war with the Tamil Tigers ended. So this is the price tag for peace huh?

The nicest attraction here (to me) are the huge statues of Buddha carved spectacularly in stone. It’s a good thing, these are not in Afghanistan or Iraq, or we’d be looking probably at rubble... I don’t know the logic of the nutcases in charge of the Taliban or the Daesh (ISIL). What harm could ancient monuments do to Islam? You don’t see Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), and the Caliphs that followed, destroying the Pyramids, or the Sphinx, or Nimrud, do you?




Buddhas in Stone, Gal Vihara, Polonnaruwa




Ruins of Polonnaruwa, Sri Lanka


The best thing about Sri Lankan sites are the abundance of lush greenery, water bodies and the relative coolness in temperature compared to other tropical places like Thailand, Malaysia and South India.




The Vatadage, Polonnaruwa




Lankatilaka Vihara with its Headless Buddha


Kiri Vehera, Polonnaruwa – check the post before this for more stupas of Polonnaruwa


Family photo outside the Lankatilaka Vihara – Don’t ask me what all these names mean. …Heck! I don’t really remember them actually! That’s what Google’s for, haha!