Enjoy, those few of you who are choosing to stay in Oman. A tip to new arrivals who are staying in Oman while all the bars and bulk stores are closed - the 5 star hotels are often an effective Ramadan-free zone AND offer low special summer rates to residents. As a hotel guest the mini-bar is always open and you can still have wine with dinner. Tourism Enriches indeed.
Please drive with extra care in the hour or so before Iftar. In fact, best to avoid driving altogether at this time. And keep your fingers crossed as you take off from Muscat folks, as last month Oman's Air Traffic Control allowed yet another near miss between a recent PIA flight and a Kingfisher aircraft. Although the Omanis blame the pilots (naturally), my sources indicate it was clearly a fault of the Oman ATC system procedures.
Meanwhile, Big Brother here:
The Oman Telecoms Regulator, the TRA, is planning to increase controls on Expat mobile communications further by explicitly linking your SIM card to your residency permit.
Oman's Telecom Regulatory Authority (TRA) is considering plans to link mobile phone SIM cards of expatriates to their resident card, Muscat Daily has reported. The SIM card will automatically get cancelled along with their resident card upon their exiting the country at the end of their service contract.
Obviously, demanding a residency card to even get a SIM card, and then listening in on all your phone calls and text messages is not enough.
And, a plug:
A big plug to relatively new Oman-based blogger The Linoleum Surfer. Sarcastic & witty political & social commentary. Wonderful. Highly recommended.
Apologies it took me this long to add you to my blog list.
