After ten days of traveling my back gave out. There is no comfortable position, even lying down hurts. What to do, a few advil. My meager supply of vicodine ran out. They were helpful for the seven hour bus trips through Nepal's central mountains.
But now I sit in an empty office, classes begin in two weeks, no teachers have come in this morning. Easy for them with cars and a life. I'd stay here for another year if it weren't for the lack of mobility. I did my part, got a driver's license last year, but no go. Before I took this job I envisioned driving into the mountains on the weekends to camp. I envisioned joining up with the Naturalists from Al-Ain for weekend excursions in the wadis and villages of rural Oman. I imagined having a beer once in a while at the only hotel in the city that served it. No more to all accounts. Here's an absurdity: I live three kilometers from the border and have to travel 90km to cross it! To book I have to travel another 90km when I re-enter the country. Rules on border crossings have effectively shut out those looking for bugs and fossils, no more beer for the tourist who doesn't even show up. What has changed in this town in city in the last 21 years is laughable: the roads have been widened and there's a supermarket 5km out of town. Yawn. There's only one thing that could keep me here for another year and it's the same request that goes unfulfilled year after year, job after job.
So, next month, a job fair. And what is necessary to be happy in a defaulted profession? Access. Buraimi has nothing to offer. There are no facilities that keep me off the sofa and the tv off. Access to like minded people who wish to explore photography, athletics, travel and so on is not an option. Even though Salalah didn't have access to much, it did have the beaches. Access to nature is a perk and w/o transport I'm detained in this strange house of arrest. I know if I go on it'll be the third job where I've bailed out after a year. The first two bailouts were because of Nepal, I wanted to be there, that's all and I quit work to be there. There have been no regrets. This one will be about being happy, as happy as someone living alone can be.
So for the rest of this week, I'll walk gingerly. New old books should kill time gracefully. Simon Winchester's 'The Map that Changed the World' was good enough to finish though the author's superlative cheerleading got old. This week I'm starting an old book from Jonathan Raban and then it'll be East of Eden. On the back of the book there's a pic of Steinbeck's serious mug shot and that look persuaded me to buy it. And there is Dostoevsky's 'The Idiot'.
But now I sit in an empty office, classes begin in two weeks, no teachers have come in this morning. Easy for them with cars and a life. I'd stay here for another year if it weren't for the lack of mobility. I did my part, got a driver's license last year, but no go. Before I took this job I envisioned driving into the mountains on the weekends to camp. I envisioned joining up with the Naturalists from Al-Ain for weekend excursions in the wadis and villages of rural Oman. I imagined having a beer once in a while at the only hotel in the city that served it. No more to all accounts. Here's an absurdity: I live three kilometers from the border and have to travel 90km to cross it! To book I have to travel another 90km when I re-enter the country. Rules on border crossings have effectively shut out those looking for bugs and fossils, no more beer for the tourist who doesn't even show up. What has changed in this town in city in the last 21 years is laughable: the roads have been widened and there's a supermarket 5km out of town. Yawn. There's only one thing that could keep me here for another year and it's the same request that goes unfulfilled year after year, job after job.
So, next month, a job fair. And what is necessary to be happy in a defaulted profession? Access. Buraimi has nothing to offer. There are no facilities that keep me off the sofa and the tv off. Access to like minded people who wish to explore photography, athletics, travel and so on is not an option. Even though Salalah didn't have access to much, it did have the beaches. Access to nature is a perk and w/o transport I'm detained in this strange house of arrest. I know if I go on it'll be the third job where I've bailed out after a year. The first two bailouts were because of Nepal, I wanted to be there, that's all and I quit work to be there. There have been no regrets. This one will be about being happy, as happy as someone living alone can be.
So for the rest of this week, I'll walk gingerly. New old books should kill time gracefully. Simon Winchester's 'The Map that Changed the World' was good enough to finish though the author's superlative cheerleading got old. This week I'm starting an old book from Jonathan Raban and then it'll be East of Eden. On the back of the book there's a pic of Steinbeck's serious mug shot and that look persuaded me to buy it. And there is Dostoevsky's 'The Idiot'.
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