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[Wander]

I have been reading more and more about human rights abuses in Oman of late but this has made me seriously consider whether my husband and I should be going there at all:

http://www.dontvisitoman.com/


Any thoughts?



Wander

[dmb]

I think the author(an ex CECN employee?) of that site has a grudge. My g/f just got back from having spent 2 months in Oman, she never saw the inside of a prison nor had her mobile phone confiscated.

[mci]

It's a complete and utter farce - this person has some kind of a grudge or a weird sense of humor. Unfortunately he also has some web savvy to make a pretty decent site about it all.

I've been here for years and ask anyone who has, despite what they feel about their employers, and they will agree that Oman is as benign and pleasant as you can get.

Detained in a hotel room? A bug under the coffee cup? You can be sure that the authorities here are neither that careless nor stupid. The worst you'll find here as a tourist are things like late schedules, conditions which are Gulf standard, not contiki tours, or a lack of some amenities.

mci

[zaytuni]

deleted by author

[QatarChic]

What a site!

I think like someone else said, this person must harbour some kind of grudge. I used to live in Oman and found it to be a fantastic country to work in, it's very beautiful and the people are very very friendly.

Don't let this site put you off going there

PS The only thing you should be careful of is who you work for- then again that applies to any country you go to......

[dmb]

[Wander]

As I said, I have encountered a few disturbing things lately. I simply cited the most recent one.

If you don't reckon much to the rock hunter's web site then how about Amnesty International?

http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGMDE200012002

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE200042005



Wander

[dmb]

Take alook at Amnesty Internationals library of US abuses
http://web.amnesty.org/library/eng-usa/index. feel safe in the US?

A few reports on the internet shouldnt stop you from travelling to a country

[web fishing]

ditto, dmb, I was going to say the exact same thing.

[dmb]

thanks web fishing. you have made my day. I like when people agree with me

[veiledsentiments]

I'd consider it all to be ridiculous myself. I know both sides of the story of the woman from Aust... and personally she sounded like the often unstable individuals that are encountered in the TEFL world. She had a beef with her Ministry employer (insisting that she should choose her teaching location, not them) and she took the dispute into territory that made her break the law. The story on amnesty is only her side and largely, if not mostly, false. I know people who saw what she did and how she was acting... and I know people from the Omani side... her story holds little water. She was offered release from her contract and could have left on her own. She refused. Then she was given notice of deportation and she refused to go. Finally she was taken and put on an airplane. That is how it works in every country.

Is everything rosy and perfect in Oman? of course not. Have you been reading the stories coming out of Europe and the US about summary arrests, lock-ups with no charges and no access to lawyers, and deportations lately?

For the average teacher who goes over there and does his/her job, travels about the country and visits the sites, the chances of running into anything like from these sites is about 0%. If you engage in illegal activities, write threatening letters to government officials, have temper tantrums all over the place making threats, or get involved in perhaps smuggling drugs or weapons and explosives into a country to arm insurgents. That group of men supposedly locked up are very suspicious looking to me. Err... no females? Doesn't that strike anyone as odd? A bunch of fellows decided to take sophisticated electronic equipment around a country without permission... to do what? Those who plan to do any kind of scientific study with exotic equipment best get permission before they start... that would seem common sense. I'm not saying that is what they were doing, but if they look that way to me... they probably looked the same way to the Omani authorities. If you look like a group of ex-military commandos and are running about the interior with odd electronics... you may very well run into trouble with any number of governments.

The problem is that if you read every story on the internet and the files of Amnesty, there will be nowhere on Earth that you can go.

VS

[Wander]

Okay, I'm reassured. I had raised the issue as much to see if many people would chime in citing other instances but it seems that most people living in Oman are happy.

My take on the rock hunter's tale is that they were doing things that aroused suspicion but by the time the police determined that the hunters were not actually doing anything wrong the police had been through such a rigmarole that the best solution was to deport the hunters and deny them further entry.


You would think having lived in Dubai that I would be clued up on this type of thing but I am now beginning to ask myself whether the perfectly innocent activities that I do in the U.S. could be misinterpreted in Oman. For example, my husband has a few web sites that he maintains for purely business purposes and he expects to continue updating them from time to time while working in Oman, even though this has nothing to do with his day job.
Since internet traffic is monitored by the authorities this might be seen as odd.

We have a laptop computer, a Windows NT server (which operates as a network router), my Windows PC and my husband's Linux workstation. As indicated elsewhere, I intend to buy an iMac when we get to Oman but I have much personal data setup on my current PC and I want that out there too. So that's a total of five computers plus networking boxes plus a box that my husband uses that enables his monitor, mouse and keyboard to be shared amongst several computers. All in all, it�s a setup that has grown over time and works well for us. I am now wondering whether it will look suspicious to the Omani authorities (visitors/workmen might report it as odd) and by the time they determine that there is no nefarious activity (if ever!), we will have been locked up and deported.

What seemed like pretty straightforward situations now give me pause. I had thought that if I couldn't get TEFL work in Muscat I could do some freelance work for companies or minor government agencies in the U.S. that I have worked with in the past. I now think that, with my husband working in the oil industry, such activity might be construed as espionage. On the one hand, it sounds ridiculous. On the other hand, activities that I thought would be perfectly normal now start to look scary.


Phew! What a life!


Wander

[veiledsentiments]

I would suspect that your large number of computers wouldn't cause much problem. You are probably correct that the local providers can and will monitor your usage if they suspect, but as long as it doesn't look related to illegal activities, I don't see a problem.

If your sideline business is in weapons or political activity... well that might cause you problems. I know people who have done internet business while working in the Gulf with no problems at all.

VS

[Wander]

Thanks VS. I think I got spooked for a moment back there!

[Aliskander]

For more information re the ' don't visit oman' article take a look at omanforum. I think the post is something like 'a seriously ridiculous web site'.

Mostly the police here are okay, however wasta does count for a lot and if you do happen to ever need to bring any kind of case against an Omani be prepared for lots of documents going 'missing', intense pressure to drop the case and accept a cash buy off and wrong information about needing a solicitor or contacting your embassy.

Otherwise all is tranquil here!