| Fishing Oman |
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Page 5 of 7  “Does Said mean ‘speed’ in Arabic?” Andersen asked as the Land Cruiser shot past cars.“No! ‘Happy’!” Said replied, grinning. “What’s that beeping sound?” “The speedometer,” Brothers replied. “In Oman it beeps when you hit 120 kilometers an hour.” “Then it stops,” Said added, and floored it to just over 140, roughly 90 miles per hour, in traffic. We were at Nizwa before the bidding began. The goat auction is housed in a new palomino-stucco building with King-Arthur-meets-Othello guard towers. Inside, Brothers and Andersen found crowds of men wearing dishdashas, the traditional flowing gowns of Oman, and a handful of Bedouin women in their curious face masks with metal nose plates, their arms full of bleating, reptile-eyed baby goats. If it weren’t for the parking lot full of late-model cars, you’d think you were back in the Middle Ages, another triumph of modern Oman. And it’s just what Sultan Qaboos intends: Leave Western-style glitz to Dubai and Bahrain. Oman will take the best from 21st-century technology, medicine, education, conservation, and human rights but remain culturally true to itself. At Nizwa’s goat auction, things are as they’ve been for hundreds of years. You still see sellers yanking on ropes tethered to unhappy cows, bulls, sheep, and goats in a steady procession for buyers wearing age-old expressions of studied distraction. The only sign of real interest surfaced during the sale of male animals with a gesture Brothers and Andersen soon referred to as the Test Tickle—more bluntly, a quick, strong squeeze of the cojones. At one point, this tactic so enraged a young billy that it butted Andersen in the rear, sending his right hand flying out of his pocket. The animal’s owner nodded at him. “You just bought that goat,” Brothers told Andersen. “For about a thousand dollars.” Fortunately, Andersen was soon outbid, and the group escaped with all dollars—rials in Oman—intact. Said raced back to the Oman Dive Center, in Muscat, arriving just in time for the last trip of the day. “Said!” Andersen declared. “You’re the fastest driver in Oman!” “Thank you,” Said replied. “Thank you very much.” |
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