February in Oman (oh - and some of January in Qatar, AND the beginning of March); PART 1

It's been over a month since I last wrote. Yes, I've been busy, but the real reason that I haven't written isn't because of that; it's because I've been losing myself in books during all of my free time and not making time for my blog. (The main culprit is a novel called Shantaram, and I highly recommend it to those of you who have yet to read it.) So here I am, hunkering down to write (during one of my prep periods on Wednesday - right before my weekend).

Between my travels around Oman, outside of Oman, events at work, and events around Muscat, I have plenty to write about. I guess I'll start with the last weekend in January, when I went to a teaching conference in Doha, Qatar, and from there just stick to the highlights.

NESA Conference in Doha, Qatar
As most of you know, my weekends are on Thursdays and Fridays. There are very few countries in the world who still have this schedule. (In fact, the banks and some businesses in Oman switched their weekends to be Fridays and Saturdays so that they align better with the business world.) Because of this, it is difficult to attend weekend events in any other location outside of Oman without taking time off of work. When I heard about a weekend conference in Doha, Qatar for the last weekend in January, I checked the program description three times, making sure I was not going to be wasting my time writing sub plans. I requested time off and was all set to go to a workshop about curriculum planning, when Keith, my boss, informed me that I couldn't actually go to the workshop I had requested since I didn't have a team to go with. At that point, I was already registered for the conference, so I had to choose another workshop. I chose one on middle school literacy: the reader's and writer's workshops. As far as I was concerned, literacy education is relevant through all subject areas. I was not let down.

I went one day early to Doha (the conference was Friday and Saturday), since my weekend started Wednesday night and I wanted a day to explore the city. On Thursday morning, I walked around the bay of Doha, observing the construction, driving aggressions and buildings of Doha. The city is comparable to Muscat: construction everywhere, honking horns, fast and furious traffic, and all in a dry, desertous climate. Along the coast, fishermen were selling their daily catch, dhows were docked at a port, and the occasional walker was enjoying the well-maintained path along the water.

In December of 2008, Doha was in the news for the opening of the Islamic Museum of Art - the biggest museum of its kind in the world. The museum is built over the water and the architecture is phenomenal! After passing the security upon entering, I went to pay a fee and they told me that they do not charge. It only took me a second to remember that I'm in the Middle East and that the governments in most of these countries have plenty of resources to fund the construction of such things as 4-story art museums that display permanent and traveling exhibits on a wide variety of themes and with valuable pieces. And the entrance fee did not even come close to determining the quality of the experience; I learned more about Islam and Arabic history at the museum in 3 hours than I have learned by living and working in a(n expatriate) community in Oman (that could be because I just didn't know the right questions to ask). My favorite part of the museum was the architecture - it was a visually-pleasing blend of arches, stones and space. I would try to describe it more clearly, but I think pictures would do it a little more justice than my words.

After the museum, I also meandered down some other roads and managed to find the craft souq (market). Even though the souq in Muscat is a fantastic maze of never-ending stores and stands with friendly faces around every corner encouraging me to buy things that I don't really need, and I love it just like it is, I found the souq in Doha to be more pleasant. There was more space to walk, there were less store owners pushing me to buy things, and there were cafes all along the main stretch where passersby were encouraged to relax, buy some hot tea or coffee, smoke some sheesha, or munch on some hommus and Arabic bread. I ended up visiting the souq 4 times in 2 days.

Following my walk around a small portion of the city, I went back to the hotel, read for awhile, then met up with Julie - one of my colleagues who also went to Doha for the teaching conference. She and I went back to the souq, ate dinner together and came back to the hotel somewhat early. After a day of walking around Doha and taking in my surroundings, I crashed hard and slept like a rock in the air-conditioned hotel room.

The conference filled the rest of my time in Doha. I found my workshop to be extremely applicable in the language arts class that I'm teaching now. Since then, I have already implemented several of the ideas into my teaching. It was also nice to meet teachers that are located in schools around this region of the world. I heard stories, both good and bad, about a variety of schools and about people's experiences teaching overseas. In the end, I left enthusiastic about teaching and lucky to be at the school in Oman.

Muscat Festival
During the month of February, Muscat traditionally celebrates the city's culture and people through daily events in various parts of the city. The events range from: booths where you can by both fast food and traditional food; sections of fairgrounds dedicated to booths displaying or selling typical regional/national crafts; nightly dancing and singing; concerts; camel and horse racing; fireworks and laser light shows; skydive, jet ski and motorcycle demonstrations; public service campaigns; and... really, just about anything you can imagine having at a state fair in the States.

I went to the festival several times, the highlight being the day I went with Zach, Sarah and Miguel and saw a demonstration of a camel race. I spent 3 weeks straight, while Karen was visiting me, trying to figure out how to see a camel race, without success. And on the day I happened upon the Muscat Festival while I was out with Zach driving toward a small village west of Muscat, we were lucky enough to walk in on a race. I guess it wasn't the real thing, so doesn't necessarily count, but regardless, it was cool to see the camels in action. The riders also showed the camels off by putting them into poses and lining them up along the beach in various poses. I was thrilled!

International Day & Technology Classes
It seems that in the last 2 or 3 months, my job has become more and more time consuming. Or maybe I've just started feeling more at home here and less on vacation, so have been putting more energy into teaching. Or it could be that nearly all of my friends here are also my colleagues, and nearly everything we do together involves the school in some way. The school only encourages this behavior by doing things like organizing a few events and activities that are designed to bring the community together. One of the ones I've been most impressed with is the International Day.

International Day is an annual event where parent volunteers bring traditional dishes from their country of origin, set up booths to sell the food, then raise money for the school. Oh - and there is another section of booths where people sell their crafts and goods from their countries. The evening is also full of live entertainment, and is open to the entire Muscat community. Other schools bring groups to do dances, camels were brought in for the kids, and there is a raffle for prizes that, this year, included round-trip tickets to London. (I even won a lunch for two at an Arabic restaurant!) That night I spent nearly 2 hours walking in circles around the food booths, eating food from Thailand (pad thai), Malaysia (coconut rice with seafood peanut sauce), Brazil (dulce de leite desert), Colombia (fish empanada), Ecuador (ceviche de camaron), Korea (sushi), S. Africa (some kind of bean cake), Denmark (carrot cake!), North America (they were serving chili and cornbread, but I bought a rice crispie treat for later), Lebanon (cheesy Arabic bread with other herbs and spices) and.... I think that was everything that I tried. I'm probably forgetting something, but the point is: I ate a lot. And it was fantastic! I loved that the school was open to the community and that so many people and their loved ones came to participate in the festivities.

Another activity that the school provides, but this one just for the teacher communities, are the TTT courses: Teachers Teaching Teachers. I could have volunteered to teach one (and could get paid to do so) but I decided to just join a whole bunch of the ones the other teachers taught and see how it was done. At the beginning of the year I was in one called "Get Out and See Oman" that I think I wrote about in a previous email, and this semester I've been involved in 3 others, my favorite, so far, being a technology course. We've learned about the difference between the Internet in the past and Web2.0 now, starting wikis and blogs, using GoogleDocs and iGoogle, about RSS feeds and podcasting, and we will be learning about Twitters and Personal Learning Networks. !!! It's been so exciting for me, both personally and professionally; I've been getting excited about all the possibilities of how to incorporate all of these tools into teaching, but it's also just made my personal computer-life more accessible and rewarding. I've asked Eleanor, the instructor, if we can meet indefinitely, but unfortunately, she has a life and is unable. Thank goodness I will be starting another TTT course tomorrow; one about music appreciation, where at the end we go to see a performance by the Oman Symphony Orchestra! So cool!!

Okay - this is about half of what I was going to write... I'll post now and then get the other half up a.s.a.p. Stay tuned!!