Oman Air Rebranded

Just like many others, I was not impressed with Oman Air's new brand identity, I did not understand what it meant at first, and I genuinely thought that all of their teasers that ran on the newspapers for the past week or so were made by the new Al Ahli Bank.

Oman Air, or whoever did the branding for them, clearly misunderstood what the problem is, there was nothing wrong with khanjar concept or with the choice of colours, why didn't they work with they had and remastered them instead of doing something totally random. Do they really think that using gold and silver will make them 'look' luxurious? And why in heaven's name didn't they change that ugly font?!

The brand is of course not only about the logo, but it is the image of the company within the consumers mind which is created by the quality of the service, the PR, and everything the company does. Changing the logo is the first step in telling all the consumers that Oman Air is changing, that is no longer that cheap-ass-service-company with old and dirty airplanes. But did this logo tell me anything such as that? I don't really know, I can' relate to it, I don't understand it, and I think that it looks ugly. I was discussing this with a friend earlier today, and he said that he really thinks that this logo suits Oman Air, it is a horrible logo for a horrible company.

A great number of Omani companies and institutions do not understand the importance of having a brand and the impact color and typography could have on consumers perception of their service. While new Omani companies such as Omran, Nawras, Oman Oil, and Bank Muscat, seem to know how to make the most effective use of the power of branding, the same cannot be said about Oman Mobile, OmanTel or Bank Sohar, and surely not Oman Air.

Muscat University ?

I'm sure that some of you heard before about the project of Muscat University, probably two years back or so. Wasn't it just a union of some private colleges in Muscat like the Modern College of Science and Business, Muscat College and some other colleges? Since we heard of that union, did anybody hear of the project being canceled or the colleges not agreeing on the union? All I know that the last statement from the Ministry of Higher Education showed that the ministry was aiming for that project to be done and unify those private colleges together. Though, I have never heard that the project was canceled a long time ago, till today.

Apparently, the private colleges didn't come to an agreement. So the Ministry of Higher Education just canceled the project and took back the license of the university. And according to this article on Al-Shabiba newspaper, the Oman Chamber of Commerce & Industry is willing to establish the Muscat University with a capital of 20 million Omani Rials. The project is still being studied and will most probably be announced during this year, 2008. The university will not have any of the private colleges in Muscat in it. It will be a new separated university with different majors (still not announced).

Surprisingly, the end of the article says that the Council of Higher Education has withdrawn the license of establishing Muscat University which was just a unity of some of the private colleges in Muscat, and the project was canceled because the colleges did not come to an agreement. That was surprising because we never got to know about that before. But it's not something strange anyways. A lot of things happening in the country are not reported hence we don't get to know about them...

Why did the colleges fail to come to an agreement after all this time? Did not His Majesty provide 17 million Omani Rials last July to support this project? Where did the 17 million Omani Rials go if the project is canceled? A lot of questions arose after reading that tiny bit information on Al-Shabiba newspaper which was mentioned in the very end of the article.

Identify the logos

Can you identify the following logos?

Free advertisements?

There are two things you need to perceive here, not only that they hinder those seeking a ride on the shores but also tourists with dogs. Frankly, no one pays attention as far as I can tell. You can spot a rover on the back; many other vehicles can be seen down the area too.

Now the interesting part is the advertisement that has been placed on the board itself. Well, click here to have a better view.

Who knows, we might have stop signs with ads too in the near future.

Grab it before it's gone

Whoever wants the dance that was performed for the kids in Muscat Festival, Grab it before it's gone.

RE: Muscat Festival's Embarrassing Show

Here's what Sheikh/Ahmed bin Hamad Al-Khalili, The Mufti of the Sultanate had to say about the dance everybody has been talking about during Muscat festival.

It starts from minute 2.50 if you're not bothered to hear it all.

Oman Tourism Hotline

An advert on the paper was made today to announce the Ministry of Tourism's new Tourism Call Centre which should answer all queries regarding tourism in Oman and will provide info on tourist attractions around the country. The Tourism Call Centre will have Arabic and English speaking staff should start operating on the 16th of Feb and can be reached on the free number 800 777 99. Lets all call them on the 16th and see well they do. :P

HM's Royal Directives

MUSCAT — His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said has issued royal orders to make available basic food commodities all over the Sultanate urgently, reduce the price of one tonne of flour by RO25, give the recommendations of the ministerial committee in charge of handling property rents hike at the nearest possible time, raise the salaries of employees of the state administrative apparatus units and social security families with effect from this month. The statement issued by the Diwan of Royal Court yesterday reads as follows:

Having reviewed the study prepared by the ministerial committee set up to alleviate the impact of price hike, His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said has ordered the following:

- Make available basic food commodities all over the Sultanate urgently. The respective departments should devise a sound mechanism to ensure that retail traders do not raise the prices of these commodities, enhance market monitoring and combat monopoly.

- Reduce the price of one tonne of flour by RO25.

- The ministerial committee in charge of devising a mechanism to solve the issue of property rents hike should give its recommendations at the nearest possible time.

- The consumer protection department shall report directly to the minister of commerce and industry.

- Increase the salaries of the state administrative apparatus units of the ministries, government departments, organizations, public authorities, public establishments and other juristic personalities with effect from this month as follows:

A. The salary of employees on financial Grades 8, 9, 10 and its equivalent to be raised by 7 per cent of the basic.

B. The salary of employees on financial Grade 11 and its equivalent to be raised by 8 per cent of the basic.

C. The salary of employees on financial Grade 12 and its equivalent to be raised by 12 per cent of the basic.

D. The salary of employees on financial Grade 13 and its equivalent to be raised by 21 per cent of the basic.

E. The salary of employees on financial Grade 14 and its equivalent to be raised by 43 per cent of the basic.

F. The rest of the employees of the state administrative apparatus units from the ministries, governmental units, military and security units, organizations, public organizations, public authorities and other juristic personalities by 5 per cent of the basic salary.

G. Raise the social security families salaries by 10 per cent.

His Majesty the Sultan also ordered the respective authorities to conduct the actuary studies to improve the financial allocations for employees retired from the governmental sector also.

Source: Times of Oman
Pic Source: ONA

10 Kittens and a Lion

We all were excited for this match. It was a Do or Die for sure even if it was the first match of the group stage. I admit I was very optimistic about this match, I thought the team would be fueled up and pumped up for this encounter. What more do they want? A stadium which has a capacity of 65,000 was filled up for them. Everyone there for them and a match to prove themselves again, yet all we get as a nation from these so-called professionals is a bad start to the road to Johannesburg.

From the start of the match Bahrain were attacking our open defense, running around in our side of the pitch as if they were on an empty parking lot. Our passing was sure very bad, no pass accuracy at all.

We might ask ourselves what went wrong in the team. The thing is we wouldn't know that. Don't blame the referee like the commentator did in the match. Every tackle got the commentator
blaming the referee for anything that happened.

Our midfield was shattered, Fawzi Basheer who had an attacking role on the midfield was held way back in the midfield line. There was absolutely no way the ball could reach the strikers from the midfield. Any player gets the ball and has absolutely no one to pass it to as all the rest are marked.

Our left side of the defense was like an open road. I remember one strike were the Bahraini striker easily got past in between 3 of our defenders. Good thing it wasn't a goal.

I was disappointed by the performance of all the players except one, that is Ali Al-Habsi for sure. He saved a few definite goals and the goal that was scored was not his fault but the defenders fault. Whenever a corner is played there should be two defenders between the goalkeeper, each defender marking the area of each goal post. But only the left of our goalkeeper was protected and the right side was not.

This is our first defeat in Oman since 4 years now. There was no sense of patriotism in our players today. Only Ali Al-Habsi showed that, the rest were being outplayed and seemed lost in the pitch. If only they had that sense of patriotism they would've done something about the outcome of the match today.

Speaking of Patriotism, if only you guys watched UAE's match against Kuwait today. I watched it right after Oman's match finished. That was football, that was team-work and in that match I found what I call patriotism. All the players in UAE and Kuwait (despite being 2-0 down) were giving it their all. Sadly we don't have that in our football players.

The funny thing was watching our players diving after every tackle they got from the Bahraini players. Also another funny thing is, during the 1st half and a part of the 2nd half the referee was surely on our side.

Bahrain played a good match, even though they were a bit dirty and tried to waste a lot of time. Macala sure knew how to handle the game and Bravo to him for that. He closed all the flanks, locked down Oman's midfield and marked our key players.

I just hope this loss has a good impact on our players rather than put them down. Yes this was our chance but there is no use crying over spilled milk right now. We have to focus on our coming matches and try our best to snatch every point we can get. This is not over yet, Bahrain have a bad record when it comes to home matches, so let's hope for the best.

Congratulations to Bahrain for this win, they sure deserved it.

The 10 kittens are the rest of the players, The lion is Ali Al-Habsi.

The Road to South Africa: Oman x Bahrain

Date: 6/2/2008
Venue: Sultan Qaboos Sports Complex - Bowshar, Muscat.
Time: 18:30 (Oman timing)
Match: Oman x Bahrain





Oman:

I think by now our National team needs no introduction. It is now considered as one of the best in Asia. Our national team booked it's place in Asia's best since 2004 in the Asian Federations Cup which was held in China. Even though in that tournament we did not move further than the group stage due to referee favourism (what a coincidence? He was Bahraini). The road to success was continued in 2005 at Qatar when we were beaten only once in the group stage and topped the group. Then comes the Semi finals and we came with a wonderful come back against Bahrain and reached the finals against hosts Qatar. But it appears that the rule of thumb in the Gulf Cup is that the host has to win. Same scenario happened in Abu Dhabi last year. But let's not complain, that is football. Let me just add that in my opinion our squad was at it's peak in Doha back in 2005. That is my personal opinion and many will disagree. Then came the 2007 Asian Federations Cup last summer. We actually held Australia, a team that reached the last 16 stage in the world cup in Germany back in 2006 and was knocked out by world champions Italy who had a very hard time to knock them out (comes from a die-hard Azzurri fan). Somehow, we could not advance to the second stage of the Asian Federations Cup, how couldn't we snatch that? I still don't know. It was quite shocking.

Here is the chance, we have to snatch it as this generation of players may never repeat itself. This is our golden generation but now we are suffering a problem, the same problem the best football national team is suffering as well, Brazil. As you can see, I guess 90% of our players are professionals outside Oman, yes it is great for them and we are all happy for them but here comes the problem, the club they play for is what feeds them and their families, so to continue that they have to be careful and try their best not to get injured. They might even snub the national team for the club they play for and that has happened in Brazil. The thing is, when all our players still played for Oman they all played from their hearts, they were all patriots. Now I want to ask you, do you see this patriotism in them after they all moved to Qatar and Bahrain? The only patriots I see in the pitch are: Ali Al-Habsi, Hussein Mudhafar and Ahmed Hadid who I guess all are professionals in other countries. Let us just hope that patriotism is back today on the pitch against Bahrain, months later against Japan and Thailand.

We might feel quite insecure about the national team since many changes have been made in the spine of the team and the thinking mind of the team such as the coach. But let's hope for the best. The question is, does this new coach have something new to offer for our national team?

Bahrain:

The Bahraini national team is one of the newcomers in Asian football. A team that was filled with surprises, they have preformed excellently in China's 2004 Asian Federations Cup and made it to the 4th position. even in Gulf Cup 17 and Gulf Cup 18 where they were knocked out by our national team on both occasions in the semi-finals. We all know that Bahrain was the closest Arabian team (after Saudi Arabia that is) to qualify to the World Cup 2006 in Germany as they reached the last stage of qualification but lost against Trinidad & Tobago.

Unlike us, Bahrain have more experience in the World Cup Qualifications as they have reached the final stage of qualifications. Let alone that they haven't changed anything in their team's spine, their coach hasn't been changed. I guess as Omani's we all know him, Milan Maccalla. Milan Maccalla has coached us for 5 years, he knows every single strength and weakness for sure. That would be an important factor.

The Coaches:

Ribas:
Julio Cesar Ribas, Uruguayan. This is his first match with the Omani national team (I'm not counting friendly matches). This is his first experience with national teams as he always coached club teams. This is his chance to shine. The coach sure is pumped up as he came to coach a national team like Oman. If he manages to take them to South Africa, then for sure oil-barons Saudi Arabia or sky-scrapers U.A.E will have their millions ready to lure this manage their football teams. Sure he is aware that his rival knows every weakness and strength of his team. So will he be able to lead the students (our footballers) to beat their professor(Maccalla)?

Maccalla:
Milan Maccalla, comes from Czech Republic. Our coach for 5 years until he got the sack. Maccalla still did not achieve the Bahraini dream. He disappointed them in 2007 Asian Cup and is looking forward to lift that heavy load off his shoulders. Again I am repeating he knows every single strength and weakness of his opponents. He knows the stadium pretty well, he knows the players pretty well and knows the fans pretty well. So will the Professor beat his students this time?

I expect a pretty intense match, a match where Bahrain would be defending mostly and rely on counter-attacks while our national team attacking and hold the ball possession with their fast passing.

Our national team should find the way to the Bahraini goal quite easily if they continued striking and giving too much pressure to the Bahraini defense. I also expect our defense tomorrow to be solid.

However, we will be suffering a major blow as one of the key-players in our national team will not be featuring in tomorrow's match due to injury. I guess he is just like Andrea Pirlo for Italy. Ahmed Hadid is the start of every strike and the first on the defense wall. Let's hope his replacement does the job today.

Other matches to keep an eye on tomorrow are:
Qatar x Australia
Iraq x China
Thailand x Japan
UAE x Kuwait

Good luck and may Oman win tomorrow. I would urge you all in Oman to go watch the match tomorrow. I just wish I was there for our national team, for Oman. If I could then I would certainly go to this match. Nothing will stop me from watching this match, it will be 14:30 here in England and I will go to my friends apartment to watch it.

May the best win.

Now open: 'Great Kabab Factory' and 'Mirchi'

The Great Kabab Factory has opened an outlet in Al Khuwair (Opposite to Radisson SAS hotel), and has on offer a range of delectable kababs, biriyani, Indian bread and desserts. The veg platter costs RO 6.9 and non-veg platter RO 7.9.

Mirchi, an Indian specialty restaurant, has opened at Ramee Guestline Hotel, Qurum (near Crown Plaza Hotel).

HE Abdullah Abbas to Patronage Oman x Bahrain

Our national team's encounter against Bahrain on Wednesday the 6th of February will be held under the patronage of HE Abdullah Abbas, Head of Muscat Municipality. The match will be held at 18:30 in Sultan Qaboos Sports Complex in Bowshar. The match is considered as the 3rd round of the 2010 World Cup Qualification, the World Cup will be held in South Africa.

The F.A. has sent invitations to a number of officials who are interested in the Sport event and to presidents of Omani football clubs.

The gates will be open to our loyal fans to come and support their national team on this huge event for the country. As this is a very important event for Omani football especially at this generation of players the national team has at the moment. Winning this game would highly affect the players and motivate them. So they need the loyal fans' support. I would like to urge you all to be there for the team. Just like you were all there in 2004 against Japan.

It is now certain that key-player Ahmed Hadid will miss this encounter due to the injury he suffered in the friendly humiliating match against Kuwait last week. This injury will leave him off the football pitch for 3 weeks according to tests he underwent.

The coach has chosen 22 players for the squad against Bahrain and they are as follows:
Imad Ali Al-Hosani, Fawzi Bin Bashir, Ismail Al-Ajmy, Ahmed Hadid, Ahmed bin Mubarak Al-Muhaijri, Khalifa bin Ayel Al-Nofali, Bader Al-Maimani, Mohamed Rabi'a Al-Nobi (C), Hashim bin Saleh Al-Balushi, Nabil bin Aashoor, Talal bin Khalfan Al-Farsi, Mohamed bin Mubarak Al-Hinai, Issam bin Fayel, Hussein Mudhafar, Bader bin Juma'a Al-Alawi, Mohamed bin Huwaidi, Hani Al-Dhabit, Ali bin Sleyum Al-Farsi, Mohamed bin Abdullah Al-Sheba, Hussein bin Ali Fareh, Ali Al-Habsi and Juma'a Darwish.

Good luck to the team and Inshallah this event will have it's own coverage in OCB.

Way To Go, Muscat Municipality!

I was discussing Muscat Festival with a friend, and he brought this video up. I checked it out on YouTube and got the shock of my life.

I want to clear out that whenever someone criticizes Muscat Festival, I ask that person to give them a break, they are improving year by year. But this just proves me wrong. When will these people behind organizing the festival ever learn? Who is to blame?

The video you are about to see is just disgusting, to all. Let alone KIDS! This particular show is supposed to be for kids.

I'll let you guys judge this. As I really have absolutely no comment for this.

Where is our great "History" .. Where are our "Traditions" .. Is this a part of our "Heritage"?



Way to go, Muscat Municipality! Someone seriously has to complain!

Shah Rukh Khan to rock Muscat

According to our little birdie, Indian and Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan is most likely to perform in Muscat during the concluding day of the Muscat Festival celebrations on Feb. 15, 2008. For starters, Shah Rukh is known to have a huge Omani fan base.

Saudi Law to control illegal online activity

Here is news about Saudi promoting new laws for controlling the use of technology for terrorism, fraud, pornography, defamation, violating religious values and disregarding public etiquette.

They had earlier arrested Fouad Al Farhan, a 32-year-old which was considered a the first of its type there. http://www.itp.net/news/507409

Now the law make its even more strict and The new law also covers the religious and social use of information and communications technology. Read more at http://www.itp.net/news/509250-saudi-tightens-grip-on-internet-use.

Temptations lead to havoc

While some of us enjoy new releases such as Blackberry and the 3G phones with Nawras networks, we can't seem to relax.

Just hear this news about a yet to be controlled mobile worm infecting Symbian S60 operating system devices, including Nokia 6600, 6630, 6680, 7610, N70 and N72 phones.

If sorting your infection is not enough, it is alarming to think of these worms self-spreading them to every contact in the address book. Some how I feel vulnerable with technology no matter how much I read or do for precaution: there is always a new danger round the corner and I pay dearly for the comfort I want.

For those interested in reading more about worms, their history an their morphing versions for various modes of online communications click online to my blog post http://digitaloman.blogspot.com/2008/01/computer-worms-are-more-malicious.html

New and Improved Penalties for Driving Like an Ass.

Arabic readers will see in the above photos the latest and greatest driving improvment measures from our beloved ROP.

Following, for the benefit of the non arabic readers, is an appalingly translated summary courtesy of me. Please, if someone could provide a more detailed translation I would be so, so, so, thrilled.

The one on the right is the official report / circular issued by attourney general, from back in November. It kind of highlights some undesirable driving behaviors. Red light runing, cutting in / overtaking on the yellow lane, Drifting or stunts ??? It pretty much says that these offenses are serious, dangerous, and waaaay impolite, reccomending much stronger penalties for offenders.

The one on the left is the follow up decision taken by the Attourney general, (I am pleased to not that it's the first decision of the year!!!) that states that due to the problems and accidents caused buy people driving in an impolite way on the yellow lines and running red lights and Drifting? Racing? Cruising (help?) ? that offenders who are caught doing these things will be put in jail for up to 48 hours and thier car will be taken away until the case comes to prosecution. If the car is borrowed the owner can petition for the release of the car, and the driver has to give his lisence up. I don't see a maditory fine specified anywhere.

Azzam daily carried the article today, you can read it here.

I am especially excited to see that overtaking in the yellow lane is among the offenses. ROP, if you are reading this, you could take away 75% of the vehicles belonging to Ministry employees if you set up a shakedown on ministry street around 14:15 each afternoon.

I hope the ROP agresssively enforces this, with stings, speed traps, and checkpoints. If they can do this with speeding and reckless driving I think it would have an impact on next year's road accident fatalities.

* Updated, thanks to Amjad for the PDF and the link. *

How many Omanias are there?

I'm really confused. Since Saeed Al-Rashdi (founder of Sablat Al-Arab - omania.net) decided to close down the forum after the famous incident of Sablat Al-Arab, other people started opening forums with similar domains to the original Sabla and some of them even with similar themes to the original Arabic sabla. However, day by day, they are really increasing. So far, these are the Omanias I came across:

-www.omania2.net

-www.omanya.net

-www.omanya.com

-www.omanianet.net

Any more omanias?

Dead Whale in Darsait Beach

Members of the Royal Navy of Oman try to pull a dead whale out of the sea along the coast of Darsait village in Muscat, January 16, 2008.

According to Oman's Ministry of Environment, the whale was killed after a collision with an oil tanker and DNA samples will be taken before it is buried.

REUTERS (OMAN)

Anybody heard of/witnessed this?

Three Rials for a bottle of water?

I am currently working on a review of the restaurant at the chedi, but for today, I will share one major grievance with you. Bottled water.

Our recent visits the The restaurant in the Chedi Muscat, started off on the wrong foot with something as simple as water. They used to serve locally bottled Arwa or Tanuf, in big or small bottles, for a 200% mark up over the cost anywhere else. Fair enough, this is the Chedi.

Now, they sell 750 ml glass bottles of still water, imported from Scotland, for a whopping 2.8 rials, which is slightly more than Seven US dollars. It's just water. It's not particularly great water, but it's fancy, pretentious, expensive water that required many tonnes of fossil fuels to extract, bottle, and ship it here.

Additionally, they won't sell any other type of water, nothing local, nothing cheap, and our requests for a pitcher of tap water were initially refused. They have a good scheme here, knowing full well that tourists are terrified of drinking tap water, and so will pay the extortionate rates for bottled water.

The attitude from the staff was that the Chedi is too good to serve water from plastic bottles, or to offer filtered tap water. Thus, I was rather surprised to see that the complementary water inside the suite for which we had paid RO 350 per night ( 900 USD!!!) was Arwa, in plastic bottles. So it's ok to serve water in plastic bottles in a 350 rial suite, but not in the restaurant...because in the restaurant, you can charge the guests an arm and a leg for it. It's a rip off, pure and simple, not to mention an absolute waste of resources.

If the Chedi wanted to get serious about being an environmentally conscious hotel, they would serve filtered tap water, for 100bz a glass, with the money collected going to the Environmental society of Oman, or some other charity. They could offer the guests the option of buying the premium water, and quite a few would go for it, for the snob factor.

Kids, when you go to the Chedi, do me a favor and complain long and loud about the bottled water issue. Demand tap water. I think if they get enough complaints, they might be willing to change the policy when their contract expires with the Scottish company next year. Maybe.

This is also Cross Posted over at my blog, Other Oman

For real?

I'm totally lovin' the new "middle road" which was opened this week and takes you from a new intersection in Al Khuwair where the Zakher roundabout used to be right down the center of Al Khuwair and then through the sand dunes of what used to be 3urooq until you stop at a new intersection in Bausher close to the sports stadium without having to go through the traffic of the highway. The road is still not entirely ready. They're still building some flyovers which will connect the newly opened road and extend it all the way to Hawasna filling station in Death Valley road. When construction ends later this year, the road will run from Madinat Qaboos all the way to Bausher without any stops.

However while driving there today I noticed that they had changed all the speed signs from 80 to 50. For real?!! I tried to slow down to 50 and just couldn't. How can you drive 50 km/h on a two lane road?!!

Black Helicopters. Blaaaack helicopters!

Has anybody noticed an increase in helicopters over the capital the last few days? Any thoughts?

I think It's either an increase in routine training of RAFO pilots, or GW Bush is going to be stopping through Muscat during his upcoming middle east junket.

Either that or a giant government spying conspiracy, where they are using the helicopters to read our minds and predict future crimes. I, for one, am lining my cap with tinfoil right now.

Just kidding. Do you guys think Bush wil be stopping here?

171 baisas

As far as I know Oman's smallest currency denomination is the 5 baisa. What's up with this pricing?

Gulf Common Market

Hot on news is the formation of the Common market among the 6 GCC countries, of which Omna is a member.

This will have economic, social and financial impact within these economies. For example it will be easy for GCC residents can buy property and start business within any of the GCC countries. The member countries will benefit from free trade relations among each other which will be a great boost for several industries. Even the corporate tax within these countries can become equal and thus cutting competion between the members.

Any ideas as to what will be other effects of this?

Live flight information at the click of a mouse

MUSCAT — Oman Airports Management Company (OAMC) SAOC has relaunched its website www.omanairports.com with a new look and feel. The main features of the new website include a live flight information menu and a flight timetable (plan your trip).

The live flight information product features an updated interface, with the airport flight information system which incorporates real time flight status that displays live arrival and departure details for all domestic and international flights operated from/to Muscat International Airport. (more)

UAE launches electronic immigration link with Oman

In order to ease immigration process between UAE & Oman, on 26 of December 2007. UAE has launched electronic immigration link with Oman IN Order to reduce process delay and ease commute as Thousands of passengers cross the border between the two countries daily.

The electronic immigration link is now on trial base in border checkpoints between Ras Al Khaimah and Oman and after a while it will be lunched in the other border checkpoints between UAE & Oman.

Community IT Training

IT skills is almost like a normal reading and writijng skill these days. Soon we will be digitally illiterate if we do not know the following:
- How to prepare a word doucment
- How to use spread sheets like Excel to make basic number calculations
- How to browse the websites and of course blogs
- Have and email account: receive and send emails

Is there a way to measure what part of the society is digitally literate? Just postin to invite useful and practical suggestions.

Road deaths, injuries up despite safety measures

Despite the wave of new security masures like speed cameras etc, injuries and road deaths in Oman have been going up, according to an article published in Times of Oman...

"data released by the Directorate-General of Traffic, the Royal Oman Police (ROP), show 635 deaths on Oman roads in the first 10 months of 2007 compared to 566 in October last year, an increase of 12.2 per cent."

The report also added:

"During the period (January-October 2007) under review, the number of Omanis died on roads stood 9.8 per cent higher at 471 (382 men and 89 women), and the number of expatriates died stood at 19.7 per cent higher at 164 (148 men and 16 women).

Further, the number of people injured rose by 16.4 per cent to 6,742 in October 2007 compared to 5,792 in October in 2006. The number of Omanis injured increased by 18.1 per cent to 5,663 comprising 4,079 men and 1,584 women. The number of expatriates injured increased by 8.4 per cent to 1,079 comprising 925 men and 154 women."

However, the net number of road accidents has gone down:

"Statistics, however, show a 7.5 per cent fall in road accidents at 7,124 compared to 7,705 in October last year, thanks to the stringent government measures. "

The full article can be accessed by clicking on the title of this blog entry.

Expat forum added on Oman Forum

We've added a new forum called Oman Expat Info forum on Oman Forum. This new forum was added to accommodate the recent increase in posts from expats who are either newly arrived in Oman and need information or advice on schools, clinics, where to buy stuff, etc; or people outside who get job offers in Oman and are looking for advice on whether the offers are competitive and so on.

Admin Note

Dear OCB members,

We kindly request you when copying news items or press releases to keep the copied material to a minimum. Please try to quote only the most relevant lines or paragraph from the item and add a link to the full article for those who want to read it. There's no need to copy the full article unless the source is not accessible by the members (i.e. subscription only).

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