Work, Ramadhan, and Lulu
1- Almost one month is exactly left for me at work before I start my official leave to go do my masters. I can’t wait. Even though work in the summer becomes less, the fact the the number of people staying at work is even lesser makes it extremely hectic for the few ones remaining in office. I have loads of files I do not know how I will ever finish them.
2- I have not booked my flight to the UK yet, but I am planning on traveling after the 20th of September because enrollment supposedly takes time around the end of September. I am not going to stay for Eid, and even though I will probably spend 20 days or so with my family this Ramadhan, it will be the longest time period I spend at home with my family for Ramadhan in 12 years! (I was in a boarding school for 7 years, spent 4 years at uni, and started working a year and a half ago).
3- Went to Lulu Ghubra right after work today to take lunch from their hot food section (their Indian rice food is not too bad) . I was carrying in my hands lunch in small container, a tiny salad container, a small biscuit pack, and two cans. All the counters were busy, so I just stood at one with a Omani girl cashier, an old Asian woman was having her trolley full of items go through the counter at that time, and a white man was behind her with his trolley.
I was not concentrating at what was going on, but the Asian lady stuff took a real while to go through, I was dreaming away when I heard the Omani cashier shout at me saying “Do you want to pay for your things?”(in Arabic), it took me a second to get what she was saying, and then I didn’t know what to do cause THE STUPID WOMAN DID NOT ASK any of these people in front of me if they would mind having me go first, so I just looked at her with a blank face and looked at these two people in front of me. She had to repeat what she said “DO YOU WANT TO PAY FOR YOUR THINGS?”. Of course the white guy in front me had no idea what that woman was saying. It was embarassing, but the quickest solution was to just go pay! I moved a step to the front, told the guy “I’m sorry, do you mind if I go?” and moved along, I can’t remember what he said but he just nodded (it’s not like he had a choice), the old woman had a problem with some item or something but she was standing still there, I paid and left!!
Because I was coming out of work so not only I was wearing a dishdasha but I also had my mussar on, I do not know if I would have received the same treatment if I was not Omani or if the people ahead of me were not foreigners. This was a very weird experience. I feel a TINY LITTLE bit guilty for having received a preferential treatment, but not enough to make a fuss about it. (Come on, the bias was in my benefit!!)
