The ones who have been on longer and relaxing trips might know exactly what I’m talking about. It is this point, this turning point of the trip. It is the moment when old worries no longer haunt you and you have freed yourself from the fragile and uncomfortable feeling towards the new culture and country. From this moment on you will be on the trip, with each single cell of your body. You understand more or less about what’s going on around you, you have obviated fear and you have almost completely forgotten about your old Self from the other side of the planet, from that cold and dark country. You are tripping. In each single sense of the word. You are here and now on this hot piece of land.

When this turning point arrived, I was in Oman, just near to Balad Seit. Marika and Tom were sleeping in a car, Berit was snoring in the tent. In the cold light of the full moon one could see huge gray bouldered stones, mountains and a canyon in between them, graceful silhouettes of palmtrees, bushes with thorns. The coils were glowing slightly. Somewhere far and high a car was slowly meandering on the slopes of the mountain, towards the sky. The lights seemed as a small moving dot, nothing else was heard any longer. And in my thoughts there was nothing else than a joyful emotion about how good was the feeling of being here and now, smoothly running a course of this trip. And this was the true beginning of my travel.

Next morning we woke up for the sunrise that is so extraordinary in real life and so little to be caught with camera. We passed our road in the bottoms of dried rivers in the middle of these monsterous canyons and found ourselves in the light blue waters of Adrian sea. Marika and Tom left us there to enjoy the sun and took off towards the unknown.

Once the brightest sun had passed and we already properly dressed, it was time to figure our how to get back to Muscat. And voila! two boys jumped next to us, with a can of lemonade and a grillstick in their hands. They had put up a huge party (with lemonades), listened to good music from Zanzibar and played drums. Once we were completely covered, there was no problem any longer to invite us to join them. A few seconds later we were in the middle of this buzz. Singing Estonian, playing drums and dancing along. That’s where we got our free ride from in the end. But more important than a free ride in a Lexus car – we had an unforgettable conversation.

When I was 24 I went to see my dad: „Dad, please find me a good wife!
Once heard that, the mother and the father combined a catalogue with the names, pictures and educational history of different women, including all the family background. From these the man had to choose.
Did you date with all of them? No, I decided in the easy way. I chose the wife from the poorest family because it is the easiest to satisfy her.
And you met before the marriage?
Sure, during the engagement. Me and my dad and my brother went to see her family. We presented our conditions.

And when did you get married? Two weeks later.

What would your wife think now if she knew that you have two women in the car? What can she do? I’m allowed to marrie four.

By time they have learned to love each other. And if you think about it – its the only sex they have ever had so it can only be the best.

What do you think abou Darwin and the theory of evolution? I’s bullshit. If people adapt to their environment why don’t the people who live in the forest have tails and why can’t they talk to animals?

But then the man suddenly declared that Mecca was the middle point of Earth and all the world was spinning around Mecca. We were explaing him something about physics and the system of planets and the axis of Earth, but the case was closed: he pointed towards a coin and brought that as an example the same time we were trying to spin around an apple. And if we don’t believe – go to Google Earth at night and see yourself – Mecca is the brightest point on earth.

When he ran out of answeres, he always kept the strongest one for the last: According to the Holy Quran..

Coming back from a strange fair for decent moslem families, man and women departed and children playing happily around mary-go-round.
We thought of going to sleep immediately, but wanted to drink a glass of water in the kitchen beforehand. I remember yellow edge of the glass. And our small talk during a courtesy grew into a huge life story just when asking how many countries have the Mr host lived in.

“Oh, that is to say not so many… Like six.”
(He seemed quite a young man)
From there began a story that lasted the next four hours. We moved to his meditation room (which was probably the most convenient place in the house) and stayed tuned to listen.
Drek. Graduated from Faculty of Mathematics and Physics in university in Canada (1). For his master’s degree he went to India (2) to study Gandhi’s philosophy, but there he didn’t feel that very lucky. In the hostels he was staying he did not have contact with women, so the man went back to Canada soon, feeling lonely, and bought a farm.
Bought a farm?
Yes, to create a community.
His mission was make a natural farm. No plastic, no flesh, no electricity, no anything “artefact”. Farm had a total of three years and there went through about 500 people. Usually a few days was enough for people to get the idea.
But what can you do in the cold of Canada  to make these cabbages grow?! So in the winter he was driving across the continent to Belize (3). These were trips by  their own, out of which could be written some novels.
And so one winter when Drek was in Belize building up a new space for his community, rumors reached him that his commune broke up because of the grace of the triangle love and power relations (in the end there were only three peoples left). The house was beaten by the vandals. Since then, he has never gone back to the farm.
But Belize’s land was mighty. He found a piece of land that the government was giving away for symbolic price. A lush of natural environment, by the river and up in the peninsula there were caves. Perfect! he was thinking.
At the meantime Drek went back to Canada a few times, got married, but still kept on building the farm to bring home a woman one day.
Something was holding Drek’s fear. In fact, there in the jungle was living a poisonous snake. This one eats poisoned muscles. These snakes, he saw them several times around the house. At first place he did not want to disturb the snakes too, but in the end in his great fear he began to kill them. At one point, he did not dare to move even in the long grass anymore – the whole time he was feeling a snake around.
One day when his wife finally flew along with him to Belize,  it came as a surprise to Drek that she did not manage to get to the farm plot. The man had no idea that a journey deep into the jungle to home could be physically so hard…
This fact and a few very poisonous snakes  flew them to Hawaii (4). The woman gave birth to her two sons and they began to build houses to survive. While working the real estate prices rose so high that they were not able to put up the money they needed to build the community. So they flew to Dominican (5).
Life was beautiful again – there were fantastic pieces of land. They built a farm and grew some plants and animals.

Then all of a sudden happened the worst thing in Drek’s life. One day his wife was gone. With the younger son. And a few days later, he heard that his wife is pregnant from a local junky.
At some point she fled the country. Drek was alone with his older son in the jungle, but it was, of course, difficult to manage the farm alone.
One day Drek heard that his older son was kidnapped from school. That was followed by police case of corruption, bribery adventures, but all that ended with great sadness for Drek. Since then, he has not heard from his wife and children.
in great grief and deluded, he accepted a proposal from a Dominican woman to give birth to another child. In return, Drek promised to take her with him to Canada (by marriage). A son was born, but the woman was not given a visa to Canada …

I heard something from the next room (6). A sleepy eye of a young black woman appeared on the door.  In the back room we heard a baby crying. This baby is probably the only thing that this strange couple have in common. Ants crawling everywhere.

Ou house in  Nizwas, Drek’s homeland nr six

The view was as such:

This is the Sultan of Oman Qabuus’ Palace in Muscat. Beautiful. Quiet, only some birds were chirping, whose presence could only be guessed.
In this dreamy state, I wanted to sit down for a moment. Berit thereupon began to take photos of me. Out of nowhere emerged a cute Arab boy, who set himself as a decoration for the next picture. Appeared another. And the third.
Before I knew I was surrounded by ten small boys. All very excited about – posing with a white woman for a picture!
What the hell. I have seen those children before in India and South America who would do anything for an exotic posing with a Snow White.
I smiled awkwardly, the kids around me tightly. Berit holding the camera.
Suddenly, my breast could sense someone’s little finger snapping.

t left me with strange feeling for many hours…

When we finally landed at night at 3 at night in Muscat, we were drunk as drunk. As we had just came thought a missing of a flight in Istanbul, because we were following an invitation to pend this three days stop-over somewhere in the South of Turkey. And thoe three day were follwed by homeless 24h in Istanbul, stressed out to find another way to Oman. So yes, as we finally got into the plane, we got drunk instantly, as we felt to deserve it after such a hassle in Turkey.

However, there was this extraordinary fact that Oman is moslem country where alcohol may not be one of the best guidelines. Evenmore for women. Secondly, we knew that in Oman there will be a complete stranger man to meet us. And that he was German.
When the two women pretending to be sober, in obviously too thick clothes, walked through Muscat airport, there was all silence around. There was a lot of people though, and some taxis were even driving around, but it all seemed to be in the other side of a sound-proof glass. Such a peace in an Arab country we were not expecting.
Then we heard something, something rough, something powerful and strong. Between men dressed in white (by the time we did not know anything about distashas) there was one tall white man with curly hair coming towards us. He led us with his big smile to hi car and we got to know what broke the sound-proof glass. It was Gordeous, as they call her. White, small, fast, Maserati, sexy Italian sports car. Rrrhhh.
With the same the Maserati, and at the same time and in the same condition, we made two circles around Muscat city until dawn, and sank into bed somewhere.

In the morning we finally got hit. His name was Heiko. Lived in Muscat for a few years in the routines of 4.5 days in the office as a geologist and 2.5 days at camp’n'surf route in Oman. Prior to that lived in four European countries, has made all possible degrees and traveled half the world. Once he was as canoeing from Vancouver to Alaska. Nine weeks. Alone.
Now he has a giant house with white walls and white floors, which have a red sofa, huge photos of huge tension and the two cats, one of them extremely horny.

A day in Muscat is of a strange rhythm. When we wake up, then there is hot inertia outside, in which the whole world  seems to be frozen or just moving in a very slow motion. If it feels noon for us, the sun will go down and a new life starts. The streets become clogged with traffic, business is booming, and my mind feels good. While sucking our freshly squeezed juice, we hear the familiar noise again. Rrrrnnnn-rrrrnnnnn ….

Maserati-man picked us up and we found ourselves in a very different world than what we saw on the streets of Muscat, and at the market. Let me introduce you – a beautiful life of expatriats.
Each one has a giant house. A large garden, at least three cars (4WD at least two of them). Sometimes also a couple of boats.
“You’re the first Independent travelers in Oman I see!”
And that’s it. They live a good life here and anyone in the world does not know much about it!
“What brough you here?”
“Well …”
This question was rotating in our own head also for quite some time.
“Well …”
Once we were thinking with Berit that when travelling you actually go to search for that you ought to be searching for.  I think that was exactly the case of Oman.

To be very  honest, ever since yesterday’s we are hanging out in the snow in Estonia. We are in the middle of a powerful acclimatization after a flight to 40 degrees lower grade, but our friends are saying we I look tanned and rested. Inside there is a beautiful harmony flowing. What is lacking though – as always after the journey, only this time especially – is money. Never seen a woman so bankrupt as I am seeing myself now. But I’m not disappointed – the harmony is beautiful still  inside. Dear friends come to visit us with some food and course mates take me collectively to the club to party.
Now, going back to the beginning – what we were looking for in such a hell of a random point on earth as it is Oman. We didnt know!
At the moment we got to AirArabia’s page the Oman caught our eye  - we did not know much more than that there are Muslims and the desert.
Here we come! The most random destination on earth! Of course in the middle of the semester during the busyiest period of a month it no longer seemed to be a brilliant idea. School work and responsibilities grew at an exponential rate. Time disappeared. No sleep. But my desire for Oman was gigantic. Without much explanation.

- And where are you going? Oman? What is there?
– I do not know! The desert!
But one fine evening in Riga airport could see the two worn-out girls like this:

Next morning we found ourselves on half of the road to Oman – the border between Europe and Asia in Istanbul, where we were thinking to stay for a few days (oh, wishful thinking!).