Oman Observer - Feature

Oman showcased as desirable destination
By Ali Ahmed al Riyami

SEVERAL publications, namely daily German newspapers Westfalische Rundschau, Iserlohner Kreisanzzeiger, Westdeutsche Allgemeine, Westfalenpost and Neue Ruhr Zeitung recently featured reports based on tour guide Sandra Neffgen’s reflections, entitled ‘Muscat — A Dream out of 1001 Nights’; while another article presented by Oman Tourism, titled ‘Oman — the desired oasis’, featured in the monthly German women’s magazine, Madame.

Neffgen, a tour guide aboard the cruise ship AIDA, said that Muscat is her favourite destination in the Arabian Gulf. She said, whenever they dock at Port Sultan Qaboos, she likes to visit the nearby traditional Muttrah Souq, located along the picturesque Muttrah Corniche. “It is like entering an enchanted world. The Souq offers a perfect mixture of old and new things; gold and silver jewellery, antiques, curved Omani daggers (Khanjar), precious spices and also modern clothing,” she noted.

Commenting on the charming quaintness of old Muscat, she said, it is here that the splendid palace of His Majesty the Sultan can be found, adding that, His Majesty Sultan Qaboos has instigated the modernisation of the country and has gifted to the people the capital areas latest landmark, the Sultan Qaboos Grand Mosque. The tour guide recommends visitors try out the delicious Arabic falafel sandwiches, which are available at almost any street corner.

In the tourism related article about sightseeing in the Sultanate of Oman, the magazine feature begins by stating what many visitors to the Sultanate’s shores have noted, that is “The Sultanate of Oman combines the fabulous charm of old Arabia with the amenities of the modern world.” It lists the series of endless tourist attractions that await visitors and the old traditions that are embedded in the Omani way of life.

From beautiful landscapes, Oman’s glorious history to the modern infrastructure, which includes a bevy of deluxe five-star hotels, and friendliness and open-mindedness of the population, Oman has it all. The article notes Oman as being the top-address for travellers, as well as business people, thanks to the comfort and safety that is enjoyed and is on offer here, adding that, the country is an enchanting, magical wonderland.

Charming community-based lifestyle
at The Wave’s Al Marsa Village

THE Wave, Muscat, the Sultanate’s premier real estate developer, has announced that the first apartment owners in Al Marsa Village have now made one of the most anticipated and highly reputable properties in the vast urban development project their home. The moving of the first residents marks a number of new developments taking place at The Wave, Muscat as the project advances at an exceptional rate. Two apartment owners have already settled in their new residences to date, and a constant flow of residents are expected to follow suit in the coming months.

Michael Lenarduzzi, CEO, The Wave, Muscat said, “As we expand our portfolio of properties with focus on attractive investment opportunities, we continue to rely on up-to-date market trends, constant innovation and our in-depth understanding of the needs of the local and regional market.” He added, “With the handover of the first apartments and a number of construction efforts currently under way including Al Marsa Village and Greg Norman Links golf course, we are not only witnessing the residential community come to life but the birth of a new era for integrated tourism complexes in the Sultanate.”

Hans Erlings, one of The Wave, Muscat’s first apartment residents expressed, “A number of factors have drawn us to The Wave, Muscat ranging from its strategic urban location and marina to free hold property ownership and residency visas. I am also looking forward to future hotels and shops which will add more vibrancy to Al Marsa Village.” Built with meticulous attention to detail, the finished apartments that blend Omani and European architecture, offer a number of different interior design options and spacious quarters, with a unique combination that blends modern and contemporary living with traditional Omani elements.

The several apartment category options suit every lifestyle from business to leisure. Al Marsa Village provides a charming and safe community-based lifestyle and is expected to be a local attraction, with unparallel marina and sea views and an abundance of shops, restaurants and cafes all in close proximity. Other defining features of these modern apartments include generous patio spaces and green landscaped courtyards that boast a private swimming pool.

Supported by the Sultanate’s new foreign ownership laws, foreign investors are entitled to purchase freehold properties at The Wave, Muscat and non-Omani buyers can also apply for a residency visas when purchasing property, an important element for foreign investors and potential residents looking to make Oman their home. The Wave, Muscat is expected to release new properties in the market for immediate sale in the form of apartments and town houses located in Al Marsa Village by the end of this month.

A forming landmark on the Omani real estate development scene, The Wave, Muscat offers some of the most luxurious accommodation in the region, with more than 4,000 properties spread out over more than 2.5 million square metres overlooking the Arabian Sea. Today, multiple winners of the CNBC Arabian Properties Awards and Homes Overseas Award for The Best Apartment Design and Luxury Development continue their expansion with focus on quality and timely delivery, as it sets new benchmarks in the local real estate sector.

Outward Bound Oman conducts life
skills courses for Omani students

IN the past three weeks, thirty-six young people from government schools have been given the opportunity of a lifetime on an Outward Bound Oman/Tahaddi course with ongoing support from Renaissance Services.

Under the guidance of instructors Mohammed al Zadjali and Erin Hall, eighteen boys from Jaifar bin Julanda School in Bahla spent three days in the dunes close to Wadi al Abyad, and last week eighteen girls from Um al Khair Girls School in Izki endured three days in the Sharqiyah sands, both groups

being given the opportunity, through a series of problem solving activities and challenges, to develop key life skills such as communication, time management, planning, target setting, leadership and environmental awareness.

The Outward Bound Oman/Tahaddi initiative is a first for the Middle East region, recognising the importance of training and development for local people, and supporting the commitment by His Majesty Sultan Qaboos, to develop the nation’s human resources in accordance with Oman’s Vision 2020. Outward Bound Oman is a not-for-profit educational initiative dedicated to using the outdoors to develop the life skills of young people in Oman. It was set up in May 2009 by the founding partners BG Oman, Denton Wilde Sapte, Shell and Suhail Bahwan. Renaissance Services are Lead Partners in the initiative.

Outward Bound Oman has worked with over 200 young people since running its first course in late September 2009, developing their self confidence, and giving them exposure to the skills sought by leading employers in the Sultanate, and estimates this number will reach to over 500 by the year-end. Mark Evans, General Manager of Outward Bound Oman, said, “We have been overwhelmed by the interest in Outward Bound Oman/Tahaddi.

Thanks to companies such as Renaissance, who have a genuine interest in investing in young people, and the continued, sustained development of Oman, we are able to offer the Outward Bound experience to many young people in government schools throughout the Sultanate. In addition to working with government schools, we have also worked with private establishments in Muscat such as The British School and TAISM, as well as leading international schools from Bahrain and Kuwait. We have run courses that have been endorsed by Unesco, in addition to working with leading corporate institutions such as Standard Chartered Bank.”

Outward Bound Oman does not only provide challenges for youth. It is currently inviting applications from the ‘not so young’ who want to do something special to join them on an ascent of the highest mountain in Africa in July 2010. Standing at 19,310 feet above sea level, Kilimanjaro presents a substantial challenge to anyone who wishes to reach its summit.

The team will fly from Muscat to Nairobi, then on to Arusha in Tanzania, from where the ascent of the mountain will begin. Any attempt to reach the summit involves several days of trekking, initially through jungle, before approaching the high altitude zone where temperatures can drop as low as minus 15 degrees. The final day of approach involves setting off at 0400 hrs to reach the summit, Uhuru Peak, for dawn.

Suleiman strikes back in 2010 Angler Competition

Happy participants, sponsors and supporters!

THE second round of ‘The 2010 Angler of the Year PDO Recreation Club’ competition was held last Thursday. This competition was generously sponsored by SPIE Oil & Gas Services Muscat LLC represented by the Country Manager Peter Jenkins.

The sea, wind and temperature conditions were fabulous! A total of 20 eager fishermen joined the event, hoping for the daily prizes and the end of year Fisherman of the year title. All fishermen were still hoping for last year champion to give some room away as he did at the first competition but that was not the case!

On that day it was a clear call! While most of the boat came back with little catch, Suleiman Hajri and his partner Captain Pascal Richard came back with a good bottom catch and game catch too. These gave them an excellent overall catch! The biggest fish of the day was a dorado of 4.25 kg! In terms of prizes, the first and second overall prizes went to Suleiman Hajri and Pascal Richard with 18 and 16 points respectively.

We then found five fishermen with 11 points which is pretty uncommon. The first and second game fishing prizes went to Talal Sultan and Seif Sawafi, while the first and second bottom fishing prizes went to Faisal Riyami and Salim Khatry. The prize for the biggest fish of the day went to Herman Visser for his 4.25 kg dorado. With this first competition, Suleiman and Pascal are neck-to-neck with 30 points followed by Talal Sultan with 20 points. Another seven competitions to go!

DNA tests may unveil King Tut’s ‘family secrets’

By Anne-Beatrice Clasmann in Cairo
THE riddle of King Tut's parentage may come closer to resolution tomorrow, when results of DNA tests on his mummy are announced. Known as ancient Egypt's "boy pharaoh," Tutankhamun died young about 3,300 years ago. Tissue samples were taken in 2008.

Is Tutankhamun really the son of Akhenaten, the "heretic king," or perhaps a late offspring of King Amenhotep III, on whose mummy DNA tests have already been done? And who was his mother, thought to have died in childbirth? Results of the tests will be revealed at a press conference by Zahi Hawass, head of Egypt's Supreme Council for Antiquities. A man with a flair for promoting Egyptology via the media, Hawass will undoubtedly savour the moment.

At a dramatic press conference in 2005, Hawass released pictures of Tutankhamun's reconstructed face and head based on computed tomography, or CT scans. The examination turned up no apparent

Egypt’s antiquities chief Zahi Hawass speaking to the
media over the linen-wrapped mummy of King
Tutankhamun in his underground tomb

evidence that Tutankhamun had been murdered, as some scholars had presumed. Hawass speculated that he may have died of gangrene after breaking his leg. One reason scholars have had so much difficulty in clarifying relations between the various pharaohs and queens of Tutankhamun's era is that the period between the reign of Amenhotep III and the death of Tutankhamun (c. 1310 BC) was marked by radical changes. Amenhotep IV founded a new, montheistic religion, moved the royal capital from Memphis to Amarna in Middle Egypt, where he built a new city, and changed his name to Akhenaten in honour of Aten, the sun disk. Egyptians had traditionally worshipped a whole pantheon of deities, but Akhenaten made the Aten the sole god.

After his death, Smenkhkare ruled for about three years and began to undo some of Akhenaten's religious reforms. Little is known about Smenkhkare's reign. The throne then passed to a boy aged about eight named Tutankhaten ("living image of Aten"), who may have been a half-brother of Smenkhkare. Adult regents administered the country on behalf of the child, including Ay, who succeeded him upon his death at the age of about 19.

Under the child pharaoh, many of Akhenaten's policies were reversed. The city of Amarna was abandoned and the court moved back to Memphis. Tutankhaten changed his name to Tutankhamun in honour of Amun, chief god of the old pantheon. Worship of the traditional deities was restored. Archaeologists have long been intrigued by a wall relief in the royal tomb at Amarna that possibly shows the death of a woman in childbirth, with an infant being handed off to a nurse. It has been suggested that the infant is Tutankhamun and the mother one of Akhenaten's secondary wives, Kiya.

Most scholars believe that Queen Nefertiti, Akhenaten's chief consort, was not Tutankhamun's mother. She had a much greater role than Kiya in the royal court and the new sun-god religion. Nefertiti may have been Tutankhamun's mother-in-law as well as stepmother, however, since Tutankhamun was probably married to one of his half-sisters, Nefertiti's daughter Ankhesenpaaten. Ankhesenpaaten may have been the mother of the two stillborn girls whose mummified remains were found in Tutankhamun's tomb.

Tissue samples from them were also taken for DNA testing. Doubts about Tutankhamun's parentage could very well continue after tomorrow’s press conference. Many Egyptian mummies remain unidentified. One with an elongated skull like Tutankhamun's was found in the famous KV55 tomb in the Valley of the Kings at Luxor. Is it Akhenaten? Scholars are not certain.

Both Akhenaten and Amenhotep III have been named as the possible father of Tutankhamun. The archaeological evidence is ambiguous. An inscription on a block from Hermopolis, near Amarna, describes Tut, as Hawass fondly calls him, as the son of an unnamed king. Hawass argues that Tutankhamun was likely the son of Akhenaten but played this down in monuments because Egyptian priests opposed Akhenaten's religious revolution.

Akhenaten's historial significance was much greater than Tutankhamun's, but Tutankhamun suddenly became Egypt's most celebrated pharaoh when English Egyptologist Howard Carter discovered his almost completely intact tomb in 1922 in the Valley of Kings. While other tombs were plundered by robbers, Tutankhamun's was full of priceless treasures including a now-famous gold death mask. — DPA

Food-combining diets beneficial
but not as much as claimed

By Cornelia Wolter in Berlin
PROPONENTS of food-combining diets say that you can eat meat, potatoes and even cake and still lose weight. "Basically all foods are allowed. They just have to be eaten in the proper combination," remarked Ursula Summ, a German author of books on food combining who lives in Spain.

A food-combining diet was developed about a century ago by the American physician William Howard Hay, who divided foods into three groups: protein-rich, carbohydrate-rich and neutral. Protein-rich foods such as meat, fish, cheese and eggs require acidic digestive juices, he said, while carbohydrate-rich foods such as potatoes, rice, noodles and bread require alkaline ones.

Neutral foods harmonize with both of the other groups. This means, according to food

combiners, that neither potatoes nor noodles should be eaten with a Sunday roast, for example. Vegetables are all right, though. Vegetables can also be eaten with potatoes and noodles, but minus meat. "It's a proven fact that people whose diet follows the food-combining principle lose weight," agreed Michael Krawinkel, a professor at the University of Giessen's Institute for Nutritional Sciences in Germany. But this is mainly because they practice healthier nutrition, he said. Eating the foods separately or together makes no difference.

"I'm not aware of any scientific evidence that food combining detoxifies the body," Krawinkel said. Nor is there proof, he added, that food combining prevents diseases, let alone cures them. But he approves recommendations to eat lots of fruit and vegetables, little meat, and to avoid heavily processed foods. According to Summ, one way that food combining promotes weight loss is by keeping blood sugar levels balanced and thereby preventing binge eating. In addition, she said, it keeps insulin levels low and increases fat burning.

Food-combining diets do not allow everything, however. Sweets and white-flour products should be eaten in moderation. Meat can be eaten every day, but the rule of thumb is to eat three to four times more salads and vegetables at every meal with meat, fish, eggs or cheese. "Many modern diets are based on the food-combining principle," noted German Nutrition Society (DGE) spokesperson Antje Gahl. This means that the relative percentage of alkali-forming foods — such as fruit, vegetables and salad — to acid-forming ones — such as meat and fish — should be about 80 to 20.

Uncooked vegetarian food supplies the body with essential vitamins, minerals, trace elements and dietary fibre. In Gahl's view, food combiners lose weight because they eat less meat and cheese — foods rich in fat and calories. "On the whole, food combining is beneficial," remarked Gahl, who said it was not harmful to healthy adults. The DGE advises against food-combining diets for children, however. — DPA

HEALTH AND MEDICAL ADVICE

Sleepy adolescents prone to accidents

SLEEPINESS while driving significantly increases the risk of motor vehicle accidents in adolescents, a new study has confirmed. The study suggests adolescent drivers were twice as likely to crash if they experienced sleepiness while driving or reported having bad sleep. Eighty of the 339 students surveyed for the study had already crashed at least once and 15 per cent of them considered sleepiness to have been the main cause of the crash.

Fifty-six per cent of students who had at least one previous crash reported driving while sleepy, compared with 35 per cent of subjects who had not been in a crash. Fabio Cirignotta, professor of neurology at the University of Bologna in Italy, who led the study, said that the only effective countermeasure to drowsiness is to stop

driving immediately, pull over to a safe place and nap for 10 to 15 minutes. “Commonly used countermeasures to fatigue, such as opening the window, listening to the radio, or drinking a coffee, are known to be short-lasting and, essentially, useless,” said Cirignotta. “Moreover, if a subject perceives sleepiness, he or she would probably already have a reduced performance at the wheel, and nobody can safely detect the real instant when sleep is starting in order to stop driving at that time.”

This cross-sectional study was conducted in 2004 and was supported by the Italian ministry of education. Self-administered questionnaires were distributed to 339 students who had a driver's licence and were in their last two years of attendance at one of seven high schools in Bologna. Students were between the ages of 18 and 21 years (mean 18.4 years), and 58 per cent of them were male.

Results show that students suffered from chronic sleep deprivation. Although they reported that their sleep need was a mean of 9.2 hours per night, the students reported sleeping for an average of only 7.3 hours on weeknights. Only six per cent of students slept nine hours or more on weeknights, and 58 per cent tried to catch up by sleeping nine hours or more on weekends, says a University of Bolgona release.

The combination of chronic sleep loss and poor sleep quality had a negative effect on their alertness, as 64 per cent of participants complained of excessive daytime sleepiness. These findings were published in the Monday issue of The Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine (JCSM). — IANS