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A quick overview of the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of the Sultanate of Oman, a former empire of the Indian Ocean, located on the Arabian peninsula, with an open attitude towards the world, and stunning, diverse scenery.
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03:56But Oman is facing uncertainty with succession issues and declining oil reserves.
04:01The question of what's next is a big, if often unspoken one.
04:09So pre-1970, this was a very different, very different place to live, very different country.
04:14Quite simply, there was nothing.
04:16We had only three schools all over Oman, and only four boys.
04:20We had only two hospitals.
04:23For the whole country?
04:24Yes, for the whole country.
04:25And nine miles of paved road in Muscat.
04:29And what happened outside of Muscat was really of no concern to leadership?
04:34Yes.
04:41Sheikh Zayed bin Sulayman al-Ghafri is a businessman and the son of a tribal leader.
04:46He's the kind of guy who will likely be prominent in the future of the country.
04:51The current sultan replaced his father and took the country, really, from the 19th century into the 20th century very,
05:03very quickly.
05:04Absolutely.
05:05His majesty took over and he changed the whole scene.
05:08This is not a democracy, but everybody, everybody, it seems, has genuine affection and respect for the sultan.
05:22Sultan Qaboos bin Sayyid al-Sayyid is the much admired and enigmatic absolute ruler and monarch.
05:29He's presided over everything Omani for the last 47 years.
05:33In that time, he has raised a nation literally from a dusty, primitive backwater to a modern, functioning, largely secular
05:42society.
05:43His vision was to deliver the surfaces first.
05:47Electricity, water, healthcare, education.
05:52It was like a one-man show.
05:54Usually one-man shows are not a good thing.
05:57That's right.
05:58Historically, seldom does that work out.
06:00But, you know, you look around and see how the country is doing now.
06:03It's pretty impressive.
06:05It's a tremendous job that his majesty has done.
06:09People just felt like he's the man that they were waiting for to enlighten their life and to open doors
06:15for them.
06:27Oman, it should be understood, sits at the top of the Indian Ocean rim.
06:31The empire once stretched from Pakistan to East Africa, with important trade routes that reached from Southern Africa all the
06:39way to the China Straits, Indonesia, and deep into East Asia.
06:44Modern Oman is a fraction of that size now.
06:47But its DNA, its culture, cuisine, and to some extent, attitude toward the outside world is a reflection of that
06:55history.
06:58Matra is a port town in the capital of Muscat.
07:02For centuries, a central hub of commerce and trade.
07:05One of the first things I notice about the city is it's very low slung.
07:10This seems like a calculated aesthetic decision.
07:15If you're someone who wants to build your house, you first submit your plans to municipalities.
07:19And if you're going above a certain height, it's generally frowned upon.
07:22Because the idea is to keep a sort of traditional Omani vernacular.
07:28Aisha Stobbe is a curator and PhD student focused on Middle Eastern art history.
07:33She is, like many young people here, patriotic to the point of being nerdy, as she puts it.
07:39We have such an old history.
07:41And I think Matra is a really great example of that.
07:44You know, this is something that functions in our daily life.
07:46It functions very similarly to, say, how it would have functioned if you were coming into Matra and going into
07:50Besok, say, 200 years ago.
07:54And now we're coming to the Corniche, which is...
07:57I just love that word. I love any city with a Corniche.
08:00It's such a beautiful word.
08:29I love that word.
08:30Oman's classic special event dish.
08:33They do one version or another of this all over the world, but Shua is special.
08:39They slather a goat with a spicy paste consisting of cumin, coriander, red pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, and nutmeg.
08:46Then wrap the meat in palm or banana leaves, dig a hole, throw in some meat, cover it up,
08:57and leave underground for a day or two over hot coals.
09:02Oman has changed in a way that's unique to anywhere I've been.
09:06I mean, I haven't seen any place that has sort of maintained the architecture and the character that this country
09:14has,
09:14and that's a really unusual thing.
09:16Oman is the only country, I think, in the Gulf region that kept their tradition.
09:22And if you travel outside Muscat, you see the flavor of the old lives still there.
09:30Hassan Mir is one of Oman's preeminent fine artists who works in painting and photography.
09:36Musna Al-Mussefer is a filmmaker, artist, and provocateur,
09:41representing the increasingly vocal point of view of young Omani women in the Middle Eastern art scene.
09:47I think in Arabia we have a tradition of storytelling and saying things without saying them directly.
09:54They took this from poetry.
09:57They have a certain language with a lot of text, with a lot of...
10:00Subtext.
10:01Yeah.
10:01There's an unusual mix here.
10:03Very graceful, very proud mix of cultures and languages.
10:08I mean, the mix was existing from the beginning.
10:12There is a beauty in being different and understanding the other.
10:16It's such a difficult time to make that argument.
10:19The whole world seems to be going in exactly the opposite direction.
10:22I mean, my country, the last thing anyone seems to want to do is highlight the other.
10:29I think people discuss, like, fears of multiculturalism, but within Oman, because of our seafaring history,
10:37it's a traditional reality.
10:39It's our background.
10:41It's who we are.
11:10It's our background.
11:11I don't know.
11:52You know about the Vietnam War.
11:54What you might not know is that while that conflict raged on, Oman, along with an elite force of British
12:01special operators and military advisors,
12:03was engaged in a war in the country's southern Dofar region that was in every way far more vital to
12:11American security interests
12:12and of far more importance to global strategic and economic concerns.
12:18Where we operated were the frankincense trees, the frankincense that the wise men brought to Christ.
12:25All of a sudden it came from the mountains where we were fighting.
12:32And, you know, sitting behind a machine gun on a track which had been used for 3,000 years,
12:40one felt like an intruder in history.
12:44And if the trees were cut, you could smell the frankincense, the smell of explosives, the smell of blood,
12:56the smell of the food, cardamom, the smell of the tea.
13:02I loved it.
13:04This was a civil war.
13:06Civil wars typically are the worst wars of all.
13:09You know that well enough in your country.
13:11But most people have not heard of it.
13:14No, they haven't.
13:15But you'd have heard about it if we'd lost it, I can tell you.
13:17Right.
13:19The war began as a local rebellion by the Dofari people against the autocratic and outdated rule
13:25of then-sultan Saeed bin Temur, who had kept his nation isolated and stunted out of concern for his hold
13:32on power.
13:34What started as a local uprising quickly became a serious, full-blown, communist-backed insurgency
13:40as Soviet and Chinese influence poured in through Yemen.
13:48Ian Gardner remembers the conflict well.
13:51He fought at it, alongside Omani infantry, as a British royal marine,
13:56and later wrote about the experience in his memoir, In the Service of the Sultan,
14:00a rare chronicle of the brutal, incredibly difficult, and almost entirely unknown war
14:06fought in the rugged southern mountains.
14:09The old sultan was not an inhumane man, but he was an old man.
14:13He was deeply reactionary.
14:14So he wanted to keep his country in a medieval time war.
14:18The thing that changed it was the advent of the Japanese transistor radio.
14:24The first time his people could hear what other Arab countries were doing with their oil,
14:28and they wanted some of that.
14:31By the 1920s, Winston Churchill had switched the British Royal Navy's mode of power from coal to oil,
14:37and suddenly everything changed.
14:39They needed oil and lots of it, which made Oman vital,
14:43not for its limited oil resources, but for where it is.
14:47The Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf's femoral artery.
14:5120% of the world's oil flows through here, making it one of, if not the,
14:57most strategically important waterways on the planet.
15:03By 1970, Sultan Temur's counterinsurgency was not going well.
15:08He was deposed by his son, Qaboos bin Said al-Said,
15:12in a relatively bloodless coup.
15:14Immediately, the young sultan set out on a different tack for winning the war.
15:19Almost before the shooting had stopped, we would institute a civil aid program,
15:25build roads, build a school, build a mosque, build some shops, a clinic.
15:30But it was in this way the sultan was able to demonstrate
15:34that he was the one who had his people's best interests at heart, not the communists.
15:40Things seldom work out so well, post-insurgency or counterinsurgency.
15:45This tactic failed spectacularly in Vietnam, of course.
15:49What made the difference here?
15:51In every war in history, you end up living with the other side.
15:57And if you can open a respectable door successfully,
16:03then less likely the aftermath is going to be beset with rancor,
16:07with hatred and a thirst for revenge.
16:10The sultan took this very brave, highly intelligent political risk,
16:17which I think was the difference.
16:19And I think has been the foundation of the unambiguous
16:23and enduring peace in this country.
16:37In 1976, the Omanis laid down their weapons and never picked them up again.
16:43The resulting peace has lasted for 40 years.
16:48And while Oman ain't your system and it ain't my system,
16:51and it's far, far from being either perfect or a Western-style democracy,
16:55there is a palpable pride here in the collective identity of being Omani.
17:05Notably as well, the sultan has placed emphasis on the role of women,
17:09decreeing, at least as a matter of policy,
17:11equal access to education, to work, to political office.
17:27The only one in the house was to eat.
17:31The people who were to eat,
17:34they were to eat, they were to eat,
17:36they were to eat, they were to eat,
17:39and they were to be successful,
17:40and they were to eat, and they were to eat.
17:57Zahara Al-Ofi, daughters Asila and Aisha, and friend Samia Al-Harthi, four extraordinary
18:05women.
18:07What started as a way for Zahara to fund her charity work spawned a lucrative cottage industry
18:13of catering for events.
18:15Now rather than using her family money, her business is able to fully finance her work
18:20to educate children in the nearby mountain villages.
18:25Simpson?
18:29I was asking myself that I see you.
18:32I was on The Simpsons, yes.
18:34Really?
18:35Yes.
18:35This is the first time I've been recognized from The Simpsons.
18:38That's really nice.
18:41So, some of the money that she's making is going to open schools in rural villages,
18:46is that correct?
18:47Not only a part of the money, it goes all of it for them, to build for them the schools
18:53and to provide them the education.
19:06Why is this important to you?
19:15Kabuli Laham is slow-cooked goat in a rich rice pilaf scented with star anise.
19:22Musanif Dajaj, a local specialty, are pan-seared dumplings stuffed with chicken, pepper, ginger,
19:29turmeric and onions.
19:30And of course, there's Omani bread with honey.
19:34That's a chili.
19:35Are you okay with that?
19:36Yes.
19:37I like spicy.
19:38Oh?
19:39Okay.
19:39Good.
19:40Try them.
19:51Everyone here says that the economy is going to have to shift away from oil towards other industries.
19:58Yeah.
19:59How would you like to prepare your daughters for the future?
20:17Okay.
20:30Okay.
20:31Okay.
20:31But I have to be a leader in the future.
20:34What are the young ladies when they reach adulthood?
20:38What are your hopes and dreams?
20:40I'm going to make myself happy.
20:43I'm happy to make myself happy.
20:45I'm going to do all my dreams.
20:50I want to be a friend of mine.
20:54And the younger young lady?
20:55My name is Moulamon.
20:56I want to be a friend, but I want to be a leader in the gym.
21:05MashaAllah.
21:06God bless you.
21:08Strong women in this family.
21:10Yeah, I can say that.
21:11They're very strong ones.
21:35They're very strong ones.
21:57As one moves away from the coast and into the interior, everything changes.
22:04This is the country's more conservative core, its spiritual center.
22:16Uniquely, Oman's majority is neither Sunni nor Shia, but rather Ibadi,
22:21a very old and particularly tolerant non-sectarian form of Islam.
22:27This is a distinction we in the West would be wise to notice.
22:32Islam is not a monolith, it comes in many forms.
22:42Ibadi theology arguably forms the backbone of many of Oman's codes of conduct.
22:47It places value on concepts like politeness, acceptance, unity and understanding.
23:04Perhaps as a consequence of that, the Sultanate embraces grace and tact as a matter of foreign policy.
23:12Internally too, Oman has avoided radicalism and sectarian violence.
23:16It is considered shameful by Ibadi teachings to draw blood over religious conflicts unless attacked.
23:23The terror and bloodshed in neighboring Yemen feels very far away up here.
23:29Jebel el-Aqdar, the Green Mountain.
23:35This area, oh my God, it's beautiful. Look at this, it's so beautiful.
23:4164?
23:4264.
23:44How many generations has your family lived here?
23:47200 years maybe.
23:49200 years?
23:50More than 200 years.
23:52Can you see all these small farms?
23:54Yeah.
23:54All our grandfathers build that.
23:58And they build all these things with only their hands.
24:02They don't have any machines.
24:03Can you imagine that?
24:12Hamdan al-Sakari, his father Ali and his uncle Halal come from a very long line of hard-working farmers.
24:19They all grew up here, generation after generation, a tribal area of ancient villages and terraced farmland,
24:27which have produced pomegranate, nuts, and dates, the premier cash crops of Oman for many centuries.
24:34But like so many places I go, so many traditional agricultural communities,
24:39the young men, and increasingly the young women, are looking elsewhere, beyond the farm,
24:44to seek higher education and opportunity in the city.
24:48This is a common story.
24:50I mean, the young men, they go to university, you know.
24:54I have to study there because you know the future and I want to get a good job.
24:59Many young Omanis, they study abroad, they study in America or England, but most of them seem to come back.
25:05You are only going outside to study and get something, that thing you want to return back to your country.
25:12I grown up in this village, it's something simple and I really miss it.
25:17Muscat, you don't like it?
25:18Sometimes.
25:19It's not a life for you? Sometimes?
25:20Sometimes you go there and for big shop, malls.
25:26They go to the malls.
25:29So what do we have here?
25:31We have food.
25:33Delicious.
25:34Delicious.
25:34Delicious.
25:37Oh man, that looks good.
25:39What's in the biryani?
25:41This is rice and potato.
25:43Potato.
25:43Yeah.
25:45We often eat this in celebrations.
25:48We call it .
25:50Lamb?
25:51Yeah.
25:52That's fantastic.
25:53Wow.
25:54Never had this.
25:55Really?
25:56This is the haris.
25:57Very famous dish.
25:59Yeah, yeah.
25:59How do you say delicious in Arabic?
26:01Ladeed.
26:02Ladeed?
26:03Ladeed, yeah.
26:03Ooh.
26:04Ladeed.
26:05That's what it is.
26:06How did you learn to cook this well?
26:09In Muscat, I live with my friends.
26:11Mm-hmm.
26:12So I have to learn how to cook, because no one is taking care about you.
26:16You should take care about yourself.
26:20So if you'd rather be here, why not just continue as your parents and grandparents?
26:25I want to really improve my country economy.
26:29I want to invent something.
26:31You're planning for a post-oil Oman, like after the oil.
26:36I think the whole country feels this way.
26:38I mean, the government feels this way as well.
26:41As you say, the country is changing.
26:43You have a luxury resort right over there.
26:45Yeah.
26:46The future will look much like this.
26:48Resort opens up.
26:50They have a big golf course.
26:52They have jobs for people to carry golf bags for tourists.
26:55Yeah.
26:55For more money than he can make farming.
26:57Is this good or is this bad?
27:00You have to deal with your traditional way and your life.
27:03So you want to keep all things safe.
27:08It's more the government responsibility to make balance between advantages and disadvantages of tourism.
27:15But it's a very delicate balance here.
27:17These are old and complicated systems that have been working for a very long time.
27:23It's really difficult because there are many sides there.
27:25The life keeps changing.
27:27You cannot keep everything as it is before.
27:30Do you know this cat or just a village cat?
27:34It's the garden for us.
27:35It's the garden?
27:36No.
27:37No.
27:38No.
27:39No.
27:43No.
27:46No.
27:48No.
27:49No.
27:50No.
28:01No.
28:05No.
28:06No.
28:07No.
28:08No.
28:09No.
28:09No.
28:10No.
28:10No.
28:10No.
28:11No.
28:12No.
28:19Oman's history and future both are linked inexorably to the sea.
28:24The Sultanate began with trade, and it is likely that a new multi-billion dollar port
28:28at Dukum on the coast, intended as a center for international shipping, will play a significant
28:34role in the coming years.
29:09Satsang with Mooji
29:18Omar Abdullah Al Ghilani and Mohammed Shaban spend every free moment at sea, free diving
29:25and spearfishing, without oxygen, for grouper, kingfish, cuttlefish and tuna.
29:34Saeed Al-Namani is the captain and owner of this boat.
29:38Saleh Saeed Al-Javri is a former Navy officer who famously sailed a handmade 9th century style
29:44down 3,000 miles to Singapore.
29:50The first Omani boats that went out into the sea, around how far back, how many years?
29:55I would say more than 3,000 years.
29:57So B.C.
29:59B.C., yeah.
30:00Now in the beginning it was fishermen, but then start to trade all up and down, East Africa,
30:05Iran, Pakistan, up the China Straits, to China.
30:08Yeah.
30:09And the evidence about it, even in their China language, there is some Arabic.
30:14Interesting.
30:15It's very interesting.
30:16What did the Chinese have to trade that the Omanis wanted?
30:20They exchanged it with the silk fabric and all that kind of things.
30:23And, of course, coming back was spices.
30:26Not only Arabs went there, Indians came as well.
30:29So if you look at the Eastern coast, they like the spices and all this kind of food.
30:37Well, the people also.
30:39I mean, you know, it's a real mix of Arab, Southern Indian, African.
30:45Maybe that's why the food's so delicious.
30:48Food is so delicious because we like the taste.
30:55You have to cook up.
31:02Bunch's fresh sardines, grilled over charcoal.
31:08Some incredible prawns.
31:14And mishakik, an Omani cookout staple.
31:18Cubed beef on skewers rubbed with cumin, garlic, and cardamom, then grilled.
31:23And local slipper lobsters, of course.
31:28And do not forget the cuttlefish masala.
31:35Delicious. Wow, the cuttlefish is incredible.
31:40We cannot live without the sea.
31:43Our relationship with the sea is too strong.
31:47So you're on the water every day?
31:49Myself, I like being in the water.
31:52Even 24 hours, I don't mind.
32:02This is what's great about Oman itself.
32:05People cannot go away from the sea itself, from the sand itself.
32:12What we like is black natural.
32:14We want to make it as natural as it looks, and it appears, and how it was before.
32:22We're born in this beautiful country, and we try to look after it.
32:29It has to stay, because inside the heart here, it's like the flower.
32:34If we keep it, and look after it, and give them the right water, it will grow.
32:41Very cool.
33:22One hundred and thirty miles south of Muscat, the pavement ends and you hit this, Sharqia Sands, on the edge
33:35of Ruba Al-Hali, the largest sand desert in the world.
33:44Once you get up in a soft sand, things change. Everything changes. You change.
34:08This is the traditional domain of the Bedouins.
34:13Who for thousands of years have moved across this harsh, dry, seemingly endless landscape, making it their home.
34:25Amr al-Wahibi and his family continue the tradition.
34:30Ahmed al-Mahruhi is a hardcore ambassador for the empty places of the desert.
34:35He's spent more time there, much of it alone, than just about anyone.
34:40The Bedouins would have been crossing the empty quarter hundreds of years, thousands of years?
34:44Thousands of years. Thousands of years.
34:47The Bedouins are the kings of the desert.
34:50It's their place. It's their area.
34:53And they know how to live and they know how to suffer.
35:02Mark Evans, a polar and desert expedition leader, knows firsthand how difficult the empty quarter can be.
35:08Guided by Amr and accompanied by colleague Mohamed Al-Zajali, he recently made the crossing,
35:15walking over 600 miles with camels in tow.
35:19The first 12 days of our journey, crossing the empty quarter, we didn't touch our own food at all.
35:24And it became a competition to be more generous than the previous crew.
35:27So you'd meet people out there all along the way?
35:29You would. Even though nobody lived there, people would find you and travel.
35:31Look, I've got a beautiful boat.
35:33We have a Algerian who lived there already.
35:35We can keep the table in our mood at all.
35:39For that time, I'm at sea.
35:54Why not?
35:59I innovate.
36:22Usually the guy who come, he have to open the head.
36:25Okay.
36:26Oh, I know just what I'm going for.
36:27I got it.
36:27Pull it.
36:28Yeah.
36:29That is on.
36:30Cheek.
36:31Yeah.
36:32Remove the eyes.
36:33Here.
36:34It's too hot.
36:38This is the pot.
36:40Good.
36:41It's good if you have got whiskey or brandy.
36:46You know, the empty quarter is emptier than it's ever been.
36:48It's almost impossible to do what the old explorers did because they relied upon local people being
36:54in situ.
36:55The Bedouins have migrated to the edge of the deserts where life is easier really.
37:00But they don't want to let go completely.
37:03Amr sends his children to school in Bedir.
37:06Yet he wants them to live in the sand where they have the freedom and that connection to
37:10their roots.
37:31I love you guys.
39:07You need people with you.
39:08You need people.
39:10In my earlier years, I was taking lots of young people on expeditions up to the Arctic, which
39:15is very different to here.
39:16But the Inuit and the Bedou have a lot of similarities.
39:22They both live on the edge of human tolerance.
39:28They're much more open and friendly people.
39:37The End
41:18And deliverance will come from the lonely places.
41:22In other words, we all need places to think and calm down.
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