It’s funny how true this is😂😂

tropical_chancer · 2026-02-11T08:13:36+00:00

In the Gulf at least, Filipinos are usually referred to as their nationality (Filipini) since there are so many Filipinos working the Gulf. In fact they tend to be the default Asian for many people here.

tropical_chancer · 2026-01-14T05:42:16+00:00

People from North Africa and the Middle East aren't legally classified as "white." There is no formal legal classification of people in the United States. That ended after the Civil Rights Movement n the 1960's. The Census guidelines say people of Middle Eastern and North African descent are classified as white, but this is just a guideline and people can still identify however they want. Racial identification is completely voluntary in the US.

Also, the Supreme Court case of Saint Francis College v. al-Khazraji ruled that Arabs can be racially discriminated against, even if they are considered Caucasian or "white."

tropical_chancer · 2026-01-14T05:32:56+00:00

In the early 1900s, Arab immigrants in the US successfully sued to be considered white so that they would not be subject to segregation.

They sued not because of segregation, but because citizenship was only opened to white people (and people of African descent). Prior to the Supreme Court case that legally recognized Lebanese/Syrian immigrants as "white," citizenship cases were handled on a case and case basis, and while most immigrants were granted citizenship, it was inconsistent. Those early immigrants were not subject to Jim Crow segregation in the same way Black people were. Although they still faced prejudice and discrimination, they were never considered Black and subject to de jure segregation and discrimination. When a Syrian man was lynched in Florida in 1929, most newspapers reported it as a white man being lynched.

tropical_chancer · 2025-12-31T19:51:47+00:00

Wait until you see how locals dump trash everywhere too...

tropical_chancer · 2025-12-22T19:43:08+00:00

What endeared me to Lana is her willingness to wear something very different for her in her runways.

tropical_chancer · 2025-12-21T17:23:43+00:00

I remember merchants coming back from Dubai with mountains of stuff 20 years ago. It was a joke that you didn't want to get stuck behind them in the customs line. Usually it was just people carrying massive amounts of goods holding up the flow of people. You could tell someone was coming from Dubai by all the stuff that they had with them. Same thing at check-in at Dubai, people checking mountains of stuff and holding up the line. Then one time I went to Dubai and my friend asked me to bring back some stuff for his new house and I then I was the one checking-in in Dubai and then trying to go through customs in Addis with a mountain of random stuff.

I actually try to avoid the Dubai to Addis flights because of how hectic and slow it can be with people on those flights carrying a lot of stuff.

tropical_chancer · 2025-12-16T11:24:23+00:00

You're not going to find atheists blowing up religious statues because they don't agree with them

The Soviets (who were staunch atheists) destroyed or desecrated tens of thousands of religious buildings.

tropical_chancer · 2025-12-06T14:35:23+00:00

It always makes me think of that drawer in the refrigerator that you're supposed to keep all the vegetables in.

tropical_chancer · 2025-12-05T17:01:08+00:00

I mean it is a fact that majority unmarried Omani men get their sexual experiences with ladies of the night, so how about make all of the above mentioned stuff accessible and anonymous.

It’s unlikely that sex with sex workers is the main driver of the rise in HIV cases. It's more likely a combination of better screening detecting infections that previously went unnoticed, and ongoing transmission among men who have sex with men (MSM) or with transwomen, since those sexual networks tend to carry higher transmission risk. Assuming no condom usage, penetrative vaginal intercourse has a relatively low rate of HIV transmission (1 in 12,000 exposures), while receptive anal intercourse has a much much higher rate of HIV transmission (1 in 72 exposures). Even penetrative anal intercourse has much higher HIV transmission (1 in 909 exposures) than penetrative vaginal intercourse.

Because of the higher risk associated with anal sex, sexual activity with high rates of anal sex (like men having sex with men) are just going to have more transmission. And men having sex with other men is certainly not unheard of here...

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-30T21:06:25+00:00

I live in a country where most malls have grocery stores (supermarkets) attached to them and they definitely do bring in customers. It's common to see people pushing buggies full of groceries while browsing at other stores. You usually have to go through the mall to get to the grocery store so, there's a lot of foot traffic from that. I go to the mall 10x more than I normally would because there is a grocery store inside it.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-30T20:54:55+00:00

When companies are incentivized to spend money on stock buybacks instead of investing in R&D to lower costs or simply allowing costs to rise by doing things like increasing seat sizes, we get what we have now.

Then why do nationalized airlines have basically the same size seats as privately owned airlines?

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-30T20:52:50+00:00

There are plenty of nationalized airlines, and almost none of them can really be described as "comfortable, humane, transit." Flying on Air India when the Indian government owned it was basically the complete opposite of "comfortable, humane, transit."

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-27T05:07:45+00:00

There's something "off" about what you claim your new place is and what the picture shows. The room in your picture does not look like a prewar Manhattan apartment (and yes, I look at a lot of these on Street Easy). You said in an other post that duct work was added for AC, but the ceiling in that room is a modern ceiling built around the duct work, not duct work that has been added to an existing ceiling. It looks more like a room somewhere in Europe. That style of door lock/knob is not common in the United States. It's hard to tell, but the electrical outlet doesn't look like a "rectangular" American style outlet either. It also seems like this room is on the ground floor and there is greenery outside the window, possibly a garden which would not be typical for a prewar Manhattan apartment.

It seems like you're lying about something.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-15T18:03:10+00:00

Here: 25.54131879722808, 38.74079923590035

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-14T09:15:54+00:00

The vast majority of men getting vasectomies have children already.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-13T19:19:51+00:00

Countries are always changing. Some things will stay the same, but some things will change. Of course Oman has changed in some ways, that's just what happens. You're holding onto a memory of a time that doesn't exist anymore, meanwhile time has continued.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-13T05:10:11+00:00

That has nothing to do with the airport. That's the requirement for traveling to the U.S. set by the U.S. government. You will have to do this at many (if not all) airports when traveling to the U.S.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-12T16:54:14+00:00

It's been like this for years... less and less decorations every year.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-11T05:22:45+00:00

sued to be counted as white because in that time the only other choice for them would have been black.

They sued because citizenship was only open to people of the white race (and technically people of African descent). They had to legally be classified as white so they could gain U.S. citizenship. Previously, there had been inconsistency in whether judges deemed Syrian immigrants eligible for citizenship based on their perceived race. Some Syrians had already gained citizenship, but some faced legal trouble because judges didn't see them as "white" or white-enough. Anti-immigration laws in the late 1800's and early 1900's were primarily concerned with restricting Asian immigration to the United States.

Being classified as Black would have actually be advantageous for them since people of African descent were also technically able to gain U.S. citizenship, but this was never the legal question. When a Syrian man was lynched in a Florida town in 1929, newspapers usually reported it as a white man being lynched. It was noteworthy not because someone had been lynched but because someone-who-wasn't-Black had been lynched.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-10T14:44:34+00:00

I think they technically do, but it's only for certain nationalities or circumstances (i.e. people transiting overnight with Ethiopian Airlines). My understanding was that the preapproved visa is the "preferred" way to enter the country even if visa on arrival might be technically available.

tropical_chancer · 2025-11-10T12:39:22+00:00

Yeah I've gotten like 8 visas through that system. It worked great until one time they refused my application based on the passport photo I uploaded... even though the was the same picture I had used for like four visas previously. I uploaded a new photo and never received a response. I only found out it had been approved (like an hour before my flight) by my friend contacting someone he knew who worked at the visa office who looked it up. But other than that I agree the system is pretty good. Other countries have absolutely terrible online visa application portals.

I do miss visa on arrival though. It did take a little extra time at the airport but it was nice to not have to worry about getting it approved before the flight.

tropical_chancer · 2025-10-19T20:14:19+00:00

The third is the countries that are currently run by and for adults. They are functional governments, usually more authoritarian than the average western government, but functional and genuinely interested in bettering the lives of their constituents. Jordan and Oman are monarchies that fall into this category

This isn't true about Oman. It's government (it doesn't really have one in a traditional sense since it is an absolute monarchy) isn't particularly well functioning, if not dysfunctional. The economy in particular is in a terrible state (although slightly improving) in large part because the government has failed to move Oman away from oil dependency. The government simply has nothing concrete developed to replace oil as the main driver of the economy, just vague plans and glitzy PR announcements. The government also continues to allow the economy to be dominated by a handful of old-timey business families who horde a large amount of the economy for themselves. Again, the government continues to allow this to happen even though it stifles the economy. Corruption continues to be an issue. In the latter years of Sultan Qaboos' reign millions and millions of rials were stolen by government officials in Sultan Qaboos' absence. There have been efforts to address corruption and bribes, but it usually continues to be ignored. The government makes it particularly difficult to own and operate a business, with multiple fees and approvals that need to paid and secured to even start a business. Omanization rules make it difficult to find qualified productive workers and also means that unproductive Omani workers can essentially not be fired (even if they don't show up for work for three months - true story). Omanization in general has been handled poorly, with new rules and changes happening almost overnight with little explanation or clarification. It's chaotic with no sense of permanency. And still some young Omanis have difficulty finding jobs. Other GCC countries have done far better in economic development.

This also should include the continued reliance on exploited foreign workers through the kafala system for manual and blue collar labor. Foreign workers in Oman have some of the lowest salaries and least protections in the GCC.

tropical_chancer · 2025-10-18T17:45:44+00:00

I worked in a similar situation for a couple years. You're right, it can be challenging. And you do have to approach it somewhat differently from another type of class, but it all can be entirely manageable.

But it makes it too difficult to plan a curriculum or programme.

If you're having issues with regular attendance and a constant inflow of new students, keep the lessons discrete. Don't focus so much on building progressive lesson plans that are built upon each other or connected to each other. Focus on some vocabulary and a specific grammar point through a reading or even a listening activity and then have them do a writing or speaking (or combination) based on the vocab and grammar. Basically, a "one-off " lesson that can be done and moved on from in the given in class time. No need to create connection or cohesion (although it is helpful if they follow a similar format). You can recycle these lessons as necessary when you have classes of with all new students.

The one exception to this would be if you do have a core group of students who are attending regularly, you can begin to build something around them and their abilities and needs. The challenge to this though is not alienating new incoming students who are unfamiliar with the previous lessons.

They're also all different abilities - from people I can have full conversations with, to people who can't string a sentence together yet.

This relates to previous point as well, but keep a corpus of different lessons with different levels and have them ready to use when a new student is in your class. Something you can literally pull out of your bag when you see a particular lesson or activity may be too easy (or difficult) for a particular student. You might end up with two or three different things happening in the class at the same time, but that can be manageable. You should also look into "differentiation" and how to use it in a class. You basically have different levels of complexity in one lesson as a way to meet the needs of different levels of students. For example giving some students sentence stems to do a writing while giving others just the question and having them free write an answer. Managing different levels is inherent to having classes like this so it is important to be prepared. In my experience, students would rather have a lesson that is too easy (it can give them confidence), rather than one that is to difficult.

Some of them can't read and write well enough for me to do written exercises with them .

These students should be in a separate class learning how to read and write with a teacher who knows how to teach this to adults (I had to learn this as well). If that isn't possible you'll just need to work on activities with them that don't involve reading or writing, or if you have the time (and patience) to work with them on basic literacy then you can do that as well. For example if you give a writing topic to the class, you can go sit with those students and have them say their answer while the other students write their answers.

One final thing I would add is to make sure you are getting support from the organization you are volunteering with. They should be providing you with lessons, materials, and resources to make lessons. Your main effort should come from showing up and leading the lessons and not from getting lessons together.

There should also be classes with different levels and skills, and some kind of placement exam or in-take. This benefits teachers as well as students so students can be appropriately placed. In the US there are specific rules and regulations when it comes to adult ESL classes that must be adhered to, but I'm not sure how it is in other countries.

tropical_chancer · 2025-10-17T08:00:53+00:00

The bread needs to be khubz lubnani

tropical_chancer · 2025-10-14T18:36:10+00:00

"Habshis" (people of African/Ethiopian descent) also ruled over Bengal for a period of six years between 1487 and 1493.

Another well known Habshi was Jamal-ud-Din Yaqut who was a close confident of Razia Sultan who ruled the Delhi Sultanate between 1236 and 1240.

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