Foodie Friday: Amigos

In and near Seeb (which is near the airport here), there are 2 new malls.  One is Mall of Muscat which has created quite a bit of buzz as it has the largest aquarium in the Middle East.  I'm hoping to go soon, so I will update everyone on how the trip goes.  The other mall is the Al Araimi Boulevard Mall.

This mall is large with lots of opportunity.  But it is still new, so it is mostly opportunities.  There is a Carrefour, restaurants, a food court, and a few small shops.  Not a lot of shops yet, but there are plenty that are legitimately under construction.

The logo for Amigos

My First Ramadan

In a discussion with some friends, we discussed how back in the States, we had no notion of when Ramadan was happening.  You might see it on a calendar which really just meant you had a vague idea of when it started.  We had no idea how long it lasted.  We had no idea what it meant.  My first Ramadan in the Middle East has been quite an eye opening experience.

Ramadan Mubarak:  The way to wish your Muslim friends a happy Ramadan.

Let's start with the logistics.  The Islamic Calendar is a lunar calendar.  This means that the month of Ramadan lasts 29 or 30 days (a lunar month is 29 1/2 days).  It moves approximately 11 days forward each year.  This means that while it is mostly in May this year, next year it will start in April.  It also begins when the local moon watchers see the required first crescent of a new moon in the sky.  It was not seen here on the evening of May 5th like it was in the UAE, so we started a day later.  It's quite honestly a little insane since the phases of the moon can and are tracked.

Dinner at Golden Tulip Seeb

Back on Mother's Day in the Middle East (March 21st this year), I won a Mother's Day dinner for my family at the Golden Tulip hotel in Seeb.  Unfortunately, Stephen was out of town, J was battling lots of allergy problems, and the boys and I were just generally done by the end of the week.  It also took a little while to get the details on the dinner.  When I finally did, I was offered that I could come to the Golden Tulip for their special Mother's Day buffet or I could come any time before the end of April.  Hallelujah!

We ended up going over our Easter Break.  When I reached out to make the reservation, I was told that the day we chose wasn't the best because they were just offering a "light buffet" that night.  Tuesday night would be good for their seafood buffet.  Or Sunday night would be a special Easter buffet.  However, our schedule just didn't allow for Sunday or Tuesday mostly because Stephen was taking an Arabic class at the time.  So I had to insist on the Friday night that we had available as lovely as the other options sounded.  The man I was talking with (maybe the manager?) offered the buffet with maybe a dish or two extra.  I told him that the buffet was really fine with us.  So I made the reservation, and we headed out later that night.