ABU HAYDN AND EL-GAR

Just had a bit of out-of-body experience last night. I attended a performance of the Royal Omani Symphony in a ballroom at a local fancy hotel. The orchestra is 90% Omani - or other Arab. Selected from towns across the Sultanate for training in the Sultan's own orchestra. Men in traditional tuxedos and bow ties, but the women are in a stylized Omani traditional uniform with red leggings, a head scarft, and a green overdress.

The audience, other than presumably family cheering sections for varous players, was mainly the same kind of audience that turns up for Classical events in the West: Westerners and a smatering of educated Asians (who are the Classical market of the future, since interest in plummeting in the US, at least).

The program was standard: Handel, Hadyn, and British Victorian composer Elgar. The guest director was from Luxembourg, Rudi De Blouw. (Flemish or Dutch name) The Omani musicians played with gusto, if not always accuracy. But it was still enjoyable - especially Haydn's "Surprise" Symphony. (For a *really* surprising version, you need to listen to the spoof of it played at the Hoffnung Music Festival in Britain in the 1950s!)

It all felt totally normal at first - standard 5-star hotel ballroom, white-faced audience in formal to formal casual dress, the standard Classical orchestra sections - but it struck me that in Omani terms this was as culturally freaky as white US college kids playing in an Indonesian gamelan orchestra in Peoria, Illinois before a mainly Indonesian audience. I wasn't surprised there were so few Omanis in the audience. The whole Classical orchestra concept is a pet project of the Sultan - his intentions are admirable, but you would expect at least some local content in the concerts other than the bodies in the tuxedos. I mean, Handel was German, Haydn Austrian, and Elgar British!

COOL MOUNTAIN AIR

Last weekend, I joined my third "star party" up in the Jebel Akhdar mountians. The national oil company (like Aramco) has an astronomy club that goes out to a light pollution-free site once a month (just before the new moon) to set up their overpriced telescopes and check out the stars and other celestial phenomena.

This time, we went to the end of the blackopped road, then another half hour up a dirt road - including the last 1/2 that was under construction as we drove past the earth moving equipment. At the end was a nice, basic campsite with ancient olive trees and ridges all around (the better to keep out stray light). Halfway up the winding mountain road, I opened my car window and was rewarded with a rare commodity these days - cool, dry air!

That evening after the sun set, it even turned chilly, and people were huddled under blankets or wearing jackets as they listened to the usual evening astronomy lecture. Club members have a laser pointer that they use to point at various planets, so it's very approachable for non-experts. The best stars, however, were much later in the night. I woke up after midnight because I had seen a flickering light (the leftovers from the fire, it turned out) and stood outside the entrance to my tent for a long while. I thought clouds had moved in, but it turned out to be the Milky Way! The Big Dipper was setting over the nearby ridge, Scorpio was fully up and the full body - plus curled stinger - visible now. It was beautiful, and I was the only one up to see it.

THE CAREER THING

Work has been isolated and frustrating the past two months now that we have 100% release time for our textbook project. Two of my three units under development for the textbook have now been nixed very late in development for various reasons - not bad writing! (can't pretend I'm not pissed off), so I'm left with just one to show for the past five months. I suddenly felt very vulnerable: I'm not keeping up - I'm not pulling my weight - I'm the weakest link among the seven writers at the moment.

Sure enough, Tuesday the Curriculum Development Unit head called me into his office and suggested a lateral move out of the Writers Group - to a new project desiging an EFL training course for Omani Administration Staff of the university. The variety of experience would ordinarily be attractive to me, but on the heels of the cancellation of yet another of my units, I saw it as a gentle demotion. I said I was open and would consider the switch but needed more information. I know the woman leading the other project and we get along fine. It might be a nicer work environment socially. Still ...

I have my early 50s now - a very narrow window of opportunity - to launch a decent career, so if SQU is suddenly standing in the way of that, I'll have no choice but to look for a better position next spring at the annual EFL conference (TESOL Arabia). Fortunately, I have had some decent variety of experience recently to help springboard to something better. In sha' Allah. (God willing.)