-Saturday morning in Muscat.
It's looking pretty quiet.
Right now, I have some difficult decisions to make.
My tourist visa expires on the 24th, so in a couple days.
And so what we've decided
is I'm going to go talk to the government
and let them know that I decided to stay here.
I felt safer here, and I couldn't --
My flight was canceled.
I don't actually have any flight back now,
but anything could happen with that.
They could tell me I need to leave right away.
So just a lot on my mind in that regard.
Hello, my name is Henry. I am 33 years old.
I am based in New York City,
but I work as an agriculture technology consultant.
Typically, I spend about 70% of my time
traveling around to conferences
and visiting clients around the world.
On one of my trips around March 7th,
we came to Abu Dhabi for a big conference.
And essentially what happened
was the conference was postponed,
so my friend and colleague Brianna and I moved on to Dubai.
Things started getting a little bit more tense
with the coronavirus.
People started being a little more anxious.
But still, we were feeling pretty good.
Then we had our next stage of our trip,
which was going down to Salalah,
and it's a really, really beautiful place
with waterfalls and beaches.
On our last day in Salalah,
we had a flight that was supposed to go to Dubai,
and we got notified by the airline
that the flight had been canceled,
that Dubai wasn't letting flights in anymore.
We had to kind of decide what we were going to do.
We started really implementing hand sanitizer,
washing your hands, we committed that
we're going to be very extra careful during the trip.
And the news obviously started accelerating.
And we had this kind of constant every day
where we were in these beautiful,
relaxing, stunning places,
and then, you know, about 4:00 p.m.,
5:00 p.m., when the U.S. starts to wake up,
we'd get notifications from our family.
Her family said come home.
But they also didn't know if that was the right thing.
The reason is this isn't my first time being here,
and I feel like this is one of the most kind
and open places in the GCC.
I made the decision that I didn't want to go to New York
because I'm not an American citizen.
And I was worried about healthcare issues,
and I was also worried about how I would be able
to perform the working from home
that I needed in such a stressful, dense environment.
My other options are go back to the U.K. or go to Canada,
and neither of those options felt really good to me.
So I took a bit of a crazy leap to stay here.
And honestly, it was just me following my gut,
just feeling like this is a lower population place.
This is a place where I know some people.
This is a place that the weather is kind of good.
So I thought that would help me improve my mood.
I thought I would come show you the Grand Mosque in Muscat,
which is one of the most famous sites.
So obviously, all throughout the Middle East,
there are amazing mosques, but this is
the main one in Muscat.
And the sultan who passed away not so long ago,
I think a little bit under a year ago,
he had his big ceremony here,
and this place was filled with people.
And I just thought it would be interesting to come here
and think about that, because now this tourist site is --
and is this religious site is completely empty.
We're at the pharmacy. They're out of hand sanitizer,
but they have masks for a much cheaper price
than some of the other places.
Take a look -- made in the USA.
Made in the USA.
You can't sell the whole box. Only one per person.
Okay.
Thank you. We got two total.
So there's pretty much no shortage of anything here
in the supermarkets.
To me, it's just really calming in this weird way
to see that there's everything here,
including tons and tons and tons
and tons and tons and tons of toilet paper.
Here we are making some masks.
We still have some left. We keep reusing them,
so we're trying to make some that we can wash.
So we're going to take the cloth
and we're going to make to a triangle
that we can cover our mouths with and we're gonna kind of
staple it and provide a spot
where we can put a coffee filter in it.
One of the things that's concerning me is that Oman
has probably only about 150 ICU beds right now.
The medical capacity here isn't very high,
and I need to be extra careful that I don't get sick
or I don't fall down or get any kind of injury.
I'm not gonna get the same priority as Omanis,
so I have to be extra careful here,
and I think that's something that, you know,
although I have been following my gut,
I didn't really consider that well.
Today is day 70 that I've been in Muscat, Oman.
70 days since I've seen my friends or family
or my company team back in New York.
For somebody who's lived around the world
and is pretty adaptable, I think I'm doing a decent job,
but it's definitely getting to me.
I'm finding my patience is less.
I'm finding I just hate my computer.
I hate my phone.
I really want to be outdoors.
I really want to just hang out with my friends
and talk about something that's not COVID-19
and not work.
But everything's relative.
And in the end, I'm lucky that I have a roof over my head.
I'm lucky that I have wonderful,
kind people in this wonderful country that bring me food.
I'm happy that I have a country that's willing to be flexible
and allow me to be here during this complex situation.
♪♪
-Okay. -Hi.
-Give you the sanitizer.
-Thank you, McDonald's. -For him, too?
For him? Please. -Thank you.
-I need some. -There you go.
-Thank you very much. You're kind, you're kind.