The children have not come back, alhamdulilah, but I'm not letting down my guard yet. Of course the music player hasn't come back either though... I thought about going to the police, but I'm just too tired of all this, and God knows if they would be helpful anyways.
Most of the kids still howl and make bizarre noises at us when we walk or bike by, but I don't even really know what to think. I have to come to terms with the fact that I just can't understand their experience of me. I just don't know what it's like to encounter someone so radically strange (after many years of nothing but the same skin, same clothes, same prayers, same language, same habits, same schedule). We must seem like utter freaks to them.
Just today as my husband and I were biking around the streets to go off road, he commented "Hey, you know, just doing this right now would blow most peoples' minds." And he's right. Just taking a stroll or biking through our area would be a culturally overwhelming educational experience. But to us now it's just home.
But not. You know?
It's a fine line between being part of the area and remaining a freak on the edge.
I guess we're both.
3 comments:
You are a wonderful writer. I've been reading your blog since I first began researching into coming to teach in Oman. It sounds intriguing....I'm in.
Thanks Brenda!
I love your blog. I am also teaching in the college in Oman. And sometimes yes I feel the same thing, being a freak. Sometimes like I am running, or sometimes I am with my bikini in Qurm Beach, but you know the best thing is everybody somehow exists next to each other here. Local women with their abayas and the expats with their bikinis are both having nice time (of course there are looks from everyone but after sometime you dont care).
I will also start writing my experiences in English
take care :))
I'd like to meet you
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