Apr 2 - Another 'Nuk abroad!

We been looking forward to playing all kinds of pranks for when a visitor does comes to the middle east. My friend, Carla is visiting for 2.5 weeks, and has never been to the middle east. For one, we didn't tell her about the beep in the car when going 120 kph. Of course I told her you can only drive at this speed for 30 min then your car will shutdown, and the beep is the countdown.  I also thought about donning the abaya when picking her up from the airport, but was worried that I'd blend in and we'd somehow miss each other.

It's been really fun seeing a new person's perspective on what things are like. We've only been here from 3 months, and already have adjusted to certain sights and ways of doing things.
We spent Tue evening down at the beach for the first 'Beach Movie Night' of the summer. The movie 'Ride the Divide' is a documentary that I thought would be perfect for all these adventurous expats. It follows the racers of the Tour Divide, a mountain bike race from Banff, AB to Antelope Wells, NM (4300 km). We had met a couple from the UK who did the trip and were so inspired and thought more people need to know about the trail. It was a great night - the ocean was calm, the evenings are warm (about 30C) and we enjoyed it with a great group of friends.
Adam showed Carla around the Ras Al Hamra Recreational Club (RAHRC) Wed. 'Camp' is pretty convenient, visitors are usually surprised at the amentities - restaurant, boatclub, library, movie store, gym, art classes, tennis/squash courts and a liquor store (which is supposedly the cheapest in town).
Carla joined us for the weekly fun run every Wed after work. It's a good way to forget about work and switch into weekend mode! After that we headed down to the boatclub to take in a live band, have some cold ones and look forward to weekend plans. 

Cycling Trip to Sur - Mar 22/23

The Muscat Cycling Club organized a weekend getaway to Sur, which is a small coastal town about 200 km south from Muscat. We hadn't drove that route yet, so it was perfect to see something new, from a bike no less. We dropped our bikes off Wed evening on the truck and would rendevous with the group Thursday morning in Qurayyat (80 km from Muscat).
There was 15 riders of different skill levels and various nationalities - Omanis, Brits, South Africans, a German, Kiwi, Frenchman and us Canucks. It had all the elements of a true Tour - breakaways, crashes (1 of which I was involved in, but came away unscathed), king of the mountain, and a unrelenting peloton. Okay... maybe not quite like the Tour as we did take the scenic route to check out the Sink Hole, Wadi Tiwi, took a few pit stops to regroup and enjoy our cold water refills, bananas, gels, and bars. But we did clip along the 120 km route at 30 km/h, which isn't bad! The group arrived at the Sur Plaza Hotel 4 hours later. Just in time for beer o'clock!

I might as well elaborate a bit about beer o'clock. The hotels and select restaurants that sell alcohol can only serve at certain times out of Islam respect. For example at the PDO club, on weekdays alcohol is served after 6PM, Thursday (weekend) it's 12-1 and from 6 PM on, and Friday (weekend) sometimes it's after 2 PM and other times after 4PM. You can never really be sure because the times change (from week to week) and there's no sign with the hours. Best bet is to always take your cooler with you to the beach.  

The evening plan was to drive to the Turtle Reserve at Ras Al Jinz. The center is fairly new, may be a year old, which had a musuem and facts about sea turtles. The guided turtle tour is either early morning at ~4:30AM or 9:30 PM, when they are laying eggs. Unfortunately, we didn't see a turtle. It was a waiting game that a group of tired cyclists were not willing to play, so we left at 11PM to find some food. We stopped at a coffee shop over looking the bay in Sur and had a great meal - Karek Tea, grilled Hamour, Adam went for a staple burger. The fish was cooked whole (head, fins, bones all in). The tab came to $30 cdn for 6 of us!

The following day we rode round trip from Sur to Ras Al Hadd, about 100 km for the day. The road was further inland which made for much hotter riding, 38C was the peak. It was a newly paved road filled with rollers, just enough to segregate the peloton. We kept the support truck busy, a few more stops and everyone's bottle needed replenishing!
We arrived back at the hotel at noon for a quick jump in the pool and lunch. We told stories and recounted  jokes from the adventure before parting ways. It was a great trip, lots of laughs and met some great people.      

The Grand Depart

Day 2 - Ready to Ride

The Sinkhole

PDO Triathlon & Russell Peters - Mar 15 & 17

Another triathlon, another new blog ;). Janelle and I competed in the 19th annual PDO sprint triathlon last weekend. The race was 750m swim, 16.5km bike and 5.5km run. Janelle had an excellent result, finishing first overall for women and coming in 8th place overall in a time of 1:18:00, her first win! I finished 10th overall, 9th out of the men in a time of 1:19:09. It was a great race with transition at the Ras Al Hamra club basketball court (same spot the Canadian Stampede was). We had perfectly calm water, with the only concern being the jellyfish warning flags up at the boat club. Luckily no jellyfish were spotted during the swim, although with the recent surf we've had a lot of sand had been pushed into the bay and with start of the race being at low tide the swim was actually more like a 700m swim and 50m run through the water. The bike and run course followed the same loop (3x for the bike, 1x for the run). It was a fairly technical loop with substantial climbing (over 300ft in less than 1km on the bike and less than 2km on the run). There was a fantastic breakfast afterwards and Janelle received a new pair of swim googles and a rose for winning. We also met another new expat couple from South Africa and quickly hit it off as we shared much in common.

Two days after the PDO tri we went to see Russell Peters on St. Patricks day with Tom, Donna, Joanna and Darryl, all Canadians. Before the show we enjoyed a great bbq with everyone and managed to down a couple green beers, along with green lemon meringue pie for dessert (our contribution to the potluck). The venue for Russell Peter's show was at the Qurm Ampitheatre, an amazing venue outside built into a hillside. For the next 2 hours we were in stitches laughing, sitting out under the stars in 28 degree weather with the ocean just meters away. If anyone's familiar with Russell Peter's comedy, he did not disappoint and was surprisingly uncensored for the Middle East. There was a large percentage of the audience that were Indian and absolutely adored him, complete with large signs displaying one of his famous jokes "Somebody's gonna get a hurt real bad!"

Canadian Stampede - Mar 8

Moving to Oman Janelle and I were both disappointed that we'd miss the 100th Calgary Stampede this July. Not everyone enjoys Stampede time in Calgary but we definitely embrace it and have a great time. The pros of Oman easily outweighed missing Stampede for one year so we took it in stride.

Unbeknown to us was a hidden gem right here in Oman, the Canadian Stampede. An event that was hosted again for the 19th straight year. Our good friends Tom and Donna suggested that we consider joining the volunteer committee to help out with this years edition, a good way to get involved plus meet some fellow Canadian expats. So for the past 3 months Janelle and I have been attending the Monday Stampede meetings and have thoroughly enjoyed our time on the committee. Not only have we made great new friends (always seem to have an instant connection with any Canadians you meet here) but the committee meetings themselves were fantastic as the common practice was to have a beer or two each meeting. Plus you add in the food tasting for the buffet menu and more importantly shooter tasting for the shooter bar and you have possibly the best committee we've ever been on.

It wasn't all just sitting around drinking and eatting though, the days before the big event there was a lot of physical labour required to decorate and construct all the necessary pieces. The Stampede is regarded in the expat community as the best party of the year so there was a lot to live up to. By the middle of Thursday afternoon we had successfully transformed the Ras Al Hamra club basketball courts into the Calgary Stampedes grounds, complete with a bull, chuckwagon, hay bales galore, shooter bar, tepees, and a plywood cutout of the old Wainwright Hotel. Our committee even managed to find Moosehead beer in Dubai and get it delivered as our welcome drink for the night.

The big night arrived and our committee of about 20 were responsible for taking tickets, tying bandanas on (Janelle got blisters from tying, no joke) and handing out welcome drinks. I was even nominated to sport a fairly good Mountie costume at the beginning of the night. After the 800+ patrons had made through the door, the majority wearing pretty decent Stampede outfits, the remainder of the night quickly passed with much two stepping, line dancing, shooters, beer and a couple fights. For one night at least I could have been home in Calgary had I not known where I was. 

Another responsibility of the committee was tear down the following morning. Waking up with a couple nasty headaches Janelle and I made it down to help with the last remaining tasks nursing our water bottles. A fantastic experience and one that if we're still here next year would gladly partake in again. Yeehaw!!!!!!

Abu Dhabi International Triathlon

We drove to Abu Dhabi this past weekend for the 3rd Abu Dhabi Intl Triathlon. We opted for the Sprint (750m, 50 km, 5 km) and there were choices for the Short (1500, 100 km, 10 km) or Long (3 km, 200 km, 21 km) course. It was a fantastic event - the venue was great, the race was well organized, and the weather cooperated with a nice 27C (as opposed to last year it was ~38C). The volunteers were telling us that people were fainting on the run...I can't imagine doing even the sprint in that kind of heat, let alone a 7-8hr day for the long course!  This was the main reason for choosing the Sprint, not knowing how the heat would effect us. Myself, having a past of dehydration at Coeur D'Alene ironman in 29C, thought I best take it easy.

The drive from Muscat to AD is 500 km. We weren't sure what to expect at the border, having spoken to others who've crossed said it isn't all that straight forward. There are 2 separate checkpoints, 1 for Oman and 1 for UAE. It took an hour to get through, and we were on edge the whole time, not knowing what to do or where to go, and it's difficult to ask questions because of the language barrier, but we made it through. With a 30 day visa no less, not the 96 hr one.

About an hour into the UAE, you could start to see the differences from neighboring Oman. A 3-lane highway, even faster drivers (which I never thought possible). Literally 160-180 kph was typical, and nicer cars.  The desert musk hid the AD skyline until we were right downtown, and what a city. Out of nowhere in the desert,  there were huge buildings, developments, and people everywhere.  It felt a lot more western and modern, people out walking without abayas and dishdashas, streetlights, modern buildings and stores, and the grandeur of the Emirates was apparent.
We checked into the Sheraton which was right along the corniche. I couldn't have picked a better hotel spot either. We were able to bike to and from the race venue, as it was 5 km down the beach. The entire city beach was lined with a bike path, walk path, parks, and seating areas. Absolutely well done. We were very impressed, and knew that we would enjoy our time in the city. It's horrible having to be confined to a car when it's a beautiful sunny day, so this was a welcoming change.
We biked down to the host hotel, The Khalidya, on Thursday to pick up our race package. Right when I walked into the hotel, there was Julie Dibens, last year's winner and one of the top Ironman competitors.  We also saw Chris Lieto, another top pro Ironman. It was very cool. The race had 1900 athletes registered, up a few hundred from last year, which is good to see that tris are catching on in the middle east (it also helps that the race has one of the highest prizes, 1st gets 50,000 USD).
We more or less hung out by the pool and relaxed until race day, Saturday.  There was an athletes pasta party at the Hilton Thu night, by far one of the best sponsored pre-race meals. The pros started at 7:20 and the sprint didn't start until 9:20, so we had plenty of time to see the pros swim and then get ready for our race. It went by really quickly, Adam finished in 1:59:23, 32nd male and 2:00:29 for me, 3rd female. 

The pros put on a great race, close finishes by the men and women. We cheered for our fellow Canadian, Angela Naeth, who finished 2nd, and had a fantastic race! We got a chance to talk to Angela before the race and at the awards banquet later that night. It's very cool hearing her perspective on how the race went, and about training and travelling. 

The weekend flew by, we didn't get a chance to see much of Yas Island (where Ferrari world is), but we'll be back. We went to the Grand Mall to do shopping and on the way out of town, stopped by Saadiyat Island (a multi billion dollar urban development).  They are building a Louvre and Guggenheim museums! What an amazing development. That's Abu Dhabi for you! I can't wait to see Dubai as well.

Us with pro triathlete Angela Naeth

Corniche bike path

Abu Dhabi skyline at night

Etihad Towers

Red carpeted transition

Top Females - Nikki Butterfield, Angela Naeth, Caroline Stefan

At the Saddiyat Development exhibition

Grocery Shopping

There are 2 monopolies for grocery shopping in Oman - Al Fair and Lulu. Al Fairs are can be found in just about every strip mall. They are small, cater towards european products (however slightly), and thus tend to be more expensive. Lulu on the other hand is similar to Walmart, although they are 1/3 of the size and things aren't all that cheap. This is probably the only time I have ever missed Walmart....if only to have a large car park (I'm starting to go Brit already!), double-wide aisles, huge shopping carts (not for us, but for the families of +8 which is the average size) , 15 cashiers, too many products to choose from, a carousel for bagging... ahhhh I digress.
The selection of produce has been fantastic. We noticed most items tasted fresher than back at home (less time on the truck and in freezer warehouses I suppose). The origin of all fresh food - fruit, veg and meat is posted above the selection. So you have your choice of mango from Thailand, South Africa, or Australia for example. It's actually quite nice to see where the products are grown. Omani grown is obviously the freshest and surprisingly they do grow a wide selection - lettuce, tomato, cauliflower, cucumber, green beans.
There are strong Indian and East Asian influences for product selection. I've come across many varieties of eggplant, chilies, root vegetables, and dragon fruit looking things that we'd never see at home, not even in the specialty shops.  It's really interesting watching people fill their carts with this stuff that I've never seen, let alone taste! There are a few items that don't come to town very often. Broccoli was brought in from Spain this week which was a pleasant surprise. Celery, mushrooms and romaine lettuce are just about non existent.

Meat selection has been a big adjustment. There's beef, goat, lamb and whole chickens.  Being a muslim country, there is no bacon! However, there is 1 Al Fair where you go to a door at the back of the store and ring a bell to enter. This is the 'bacon' room. Pork is taxed ~20% and is close to 3x the price of at home. You also pay a premium for a small cut of beef and depending on the week, the cuts may not look all that appetizing. The butch counter is big, it's just that half of the meat is goat (or mutton) from Pakistan or India. Lamb from New Zealand ($$$), and beef from NZ. They sell everything too - hearts, liver, kidney, tripe (stomach), brain...becareful when ordering curries...
We were hoping there would be lots choices for fish, and there are, but 90% of them we've never heard of and they don't typically sell fillets. You have to either buy the whole fish or ask the butch to cut you a piece of fish. We tried a popular fish - the King Fish, but it wasn't very good. So much for being adventurous. We also bought a frozen bag of shrimp, only to find they too weren't that great. There was finally a nice fillet of Halibut last week, and it was tasty!

Non perishable groceries are not like at home at all. Adam has taken to baking and has had trouble finding very basic items. For 3 weeks, there weren't any chocolate chips, then I guess a shipment came in because at every store there is now Hershey's chips. Who knows how long the stock will last and when the next shipment is, lol. Even cocoa powder and icing sugar cannot be found. Fresh milk is there but it expires after 1 week. Most people get the non refrigerated milk, which is what we've opted for. There is also a monopoly of Corn Flakes for cereal selection. Forget everything else, it's corn flakes Kelloggs or corn flakes Sultans! Instant coffee is also a big hit here, you'll rarely find fresh brew unless you specify french press. At work the choice is instant coffee or arabic tea.

The bakery and deli counters are fantastic - lots of cheeses, varieties of flat breads and baguettes, samosas, curries, rice pilafs, hummous, yogurt spreads, fresh cut fruits and cakes and sweets.    

Aside from the difference in product selection, the crowd is very different too. Because women don't go out unless in a group or with their husband, the shoppers are predominately men or the whole family. Kids are allowed to run wild, open packages, eat food (who knows if they pay for the stuff they eat), knock stuff over off the shelf and parents don't both to pick it up...that sort of thing.  But I can't really blame the parents, it's pretty difficult to keep track of 5-8 kids under the age of 10. It's also not their culture to be as orderly as Westerners, so I can't view this as being 'wrong'. It is also common to see people sampling the grapes, chilis, anything left open really.
The evening is prime shopping time. 7-10 PM is by far the busiest time of the day for all shops. The aisles are packed, people run over each other and get in your personal space. There isn't a common language or courtesy, so people generally don't say excuse me or sorry. It's 60% arabic 30% hindu and 10% english. They are probably used to crowds, so may be don't think anything of it when standing in someones way or bumping into them...

If you're wondering 'what vehicles do they drive for a +8 size family?'. Anything from a car to an SUV. The law requires only the driver to wear a seat belt and kids carseats are not law. Usually an SUV with 5 kids hanging out the window and 2 kids sitting on the passenger is what you see leaving the parking lot. 

We look at every shopping trip as an adventure. Not only because of the sights, but also because a few items aren't price tagged so we never know what the total will be!

  

 

Tour of Oman - Feb 14 to 19

Over the past 6 days Janelle and I were lucky enough to watch some of the worlds best cyclists tackling the 3rd edition of the Tour of Oman. This tour was geared more towards the guys who specialize in the classics and as such we got to watch Mark Cavandish, Andy Schleck, Tyler Farrar, and Fabian Cancellara to name a few. There were also two Canadians racing, one of who, Svein Tuft we had a chance to actually talk to on a couple occassions.

We made it out to the finish of Stage 1 and although we got there only 15 minutes  or so before the peloton arrived, we found a spot right at the finish line. All told there might have been 20 spectators, one of benefits of watching this event in the Middle East. Following an amazing sprint finish, which seeing first hand is hard to believe just how fast and close together they ride, we literally were allowed to walk down the finishing chute where all the riders were cooling down. We had no idea we would be able to get so close them, a very neat experience. The cyclists were all in amazing shape, huge legs and small upper bodies with horrible farmers tans. I even saw my first helmet strap tan.

For Stage 3 we decided to set-up camp at the feeding station to watch them go by. Again, amazing to see the speed with which the peloton rides and to see the team support vehicles handing out bags with new bottles, gels and bars for their riders. This also turned out to be a great spot to grab water bottles as they simply toss their empties to the side of the road so we scrambled out of the car and picked up just about one from each team. After the feed station we raced ahead of the tour to watch the finish and were able to get a really good video of them, quite stretched out as they headed into the wind.

Stage 4 Janelle and I drove to Bidbid to see the start of the stage and again were allowed unbelievable access to all the riders as they were preparing. Being meters away from Cavandish and Schleck and seeing their bikes was really impressive (Cavandish was shorter than I thought and Schleck much taller). Janelle was also wearing her Ironman Canada jersey as we had been cycling in the morning and because of that a Canadian couple working in Saudi Arabia came over to chat with us. While talking to them the Director of the BMC team heard us speaking english and also came over to chat so we were able to quiz him on the race and some general questions about how the team is set-up. As we walked through the start area a cyclist rode by saying "Canadian eh" and we realized it was Svein Tuft. On his way back he stopped and chatted with us, asking the first question most people not living in Oman do is "what are you doing here?" Svein was extremely generous with his time and answered all our questions. Janelle and I didn't stick around to watch the start of the stage but again raced ahead to wait at one of the two big climbs for the day, Alamrat. This racing ahead to the next spot was a common theme for us as we found that watching the tour is more like a chasing the tour as you're working hard to find the next good spot to see them go by and trying to avoid the traffic gridlock caused by the road closures. We got to the Bousher Alamrat climb ahead of the tour and decided to ride the climb ourselves and wait for the tour at the summit, 2 miles and 1000 feet of elevation gain later (plus 3 rests) we made it to the top and were the only fans there cheering on the riders.

The final stage 6 saw the tour complete 6 laps along the Matrah Corniche which allowed us to see a lot of the peloton in action. Again not many people and unbelievable access to the cyclists. The highlight of the day for me was getting not only Svein's signature after the stage, but also Tony Gallopin's from team Radioshack-Nissan (3rd overall in GC and won the white jersey) and Andy Schleck (winner of the Tour of France! - due to Contador being disqualified) Watching our first pro cycling tour was an absolute thrill and both Janelle and I are already looking at the calendar to see if there are any other races we could see. A good website for those interested to see pictures, video, stage maps and profiles is: http://www.steephill.tv/tour-of-oman/

Andy Schleck prior to start of stage 4

Mark Cavandish's Bike after Stage 3 (look closely you can see the world champion stripes on the frame)

Climbing Alamrat

Janelle and Svein at start of Stage 3

Cavandish finishing Stage 1 (Janelle just got lucky snapping pictures to catch him)

Stage 6 on the Matrah Corniche circuit (2 cruise ships in the harbor so lots of tourists)