When I first landed in >>Oman<< in the middle of the night two years ago, I remember not being able to sleep because the view from my bedroom window was just too exciting. I had never been to the middle east and it was really too bewitching to just sleep.

Muscat is a mix of desert, beautiful, rocky mountains, traditional houses and a futurama-like network of modern superhighways with big, shiny white trucks driving on them. Contrasting scenes of wealthy, organized and clean Omani life and the more rough and lively class of migrant workers from Asia. All observed by beautiful Sultan Quaboos looking down at you from any possible angle in different outfits and gestures and always (!) dipped into the fine smell of Arabian frankincense. It was lovely coming back this time, adding new perspectives from the boat (big and small) and being reminded how damn hot it could possibly get (and, unique to Oman’s coastline, it doesn’t even cool down at night!).

Unfortunately, there were not so many chances to explore besides working, but Oman, I will be back, and then I’ll stay a little longer.

(These pictures are a combination of the ones I took in 2011 and the ones I took recently in 2013.)

All photos: Carolin Weinkopf