4G 2023 05 13

 Good day to you, how are you?

I am very well, thank you for asking!

Last weekend I had a long weekend, an extra day of holiday on Friday. Here it is called Patriot's Day. For you there was the Coronation, did you watch it?

I did not watch it, I was in Muscat getting my hair cut and my nails done, your mom can explain about mani-pedi's! It was lovely and warm at thirty degrees, like when you go on holiday, and we also went to the cinema.

Perhaps it sounds strange to go to the cinema when I go to Muscat but here in this other capital city I have only found one cinema and it does not show films in English or subtitled that I have noticed yet. So, go to Muscat and go to the cinema :-)

Work was work. School is school. How was yours?

20230513 01 Waiting for the bus, Arat Kilo

Today I went to an old railway station, it used to be the main station for trains across and out of the country. It was built by the French and although they were not in charge here they wanted to trade.

20230513 02 La Gare

 So, to help people here to trade with their place, the French built a railway and stations all the way from here to there.

It is no longer used, it was built with the French measure of a metre. 

20230513 03 The train not leaving platform 1

20230513 04 The end of the line in every way

Nowadays there is a standard guage and recently the Chinese have rebuilt the route including new stations. 

So the old station has been turned into a coffee shop and small museum, the signs on the platform area still show in French.

I met a friend and we walked from the station to a bookshop, secondhand (the books are secondhand not the shop!), but nearly all in English. Perfect place to spend time and money, I got you a book, I hope you enjoy it when I eventually get it to you!

20230513 05 Meskel Square and financial district behind

We then walked across to Meskel Square and had lunch on the rise behind which is where I took the picture from. I saw that there was an exhibition and found out from a man called Addis, who did not come from Addis, he came from Tigre, that on Sunday 14^th May the whole square will be closed and there will be parades and demonstrations to celebrate International Firefighters' Day.

20230513 06 International Firefighters' Day

There is a world Mother's Day too tomorrow (gosh it really is your mom's day isn't it?!)

So there we go, have a lovely weekend :-)