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The weather can be cool in February in Ibra. At the weekly Wednesday market, children with kohl-smudged eyes peer out from beneath woollen bonnets and traders conduct their business
wearing socks under their sandals. Near the covered bazaar, a knot of chilly tourists is visible, too, drawn to the locality by the promise of an idiosyncratic event: the women-only souq.

The town of Ibra looms large on the Muscat-Sur blacktop, its status as one of the biggest inland towns in the sultanate a reflection of its former prosperity and influence, which derived from its strong trading links with East Africa and Zanzibar. Today it is a sprawling place of old and new quarters, deserted ruins and lively stalls, all of which make it a colourful destination for a day-trip from the capital.

Wednesday morning
A profusion of goods
The women-only souq is held in the modern quarter of the town. Inevitably most of the goods on offer, the cosmetics and so on, are aimed at female shoppers, although the wider market is not an exclusively feminine preserve: along the road are stalls run by both sexes selling everything from kettles to kahwa cups, mats to mattresses. Only the covered bazaar is an enclave.

One of the charms of the souq is its authenticity. Mutrah souq in Muscat is animated and picturesque, but it is also city slick – some of its stall-holders accept American Express. By contrast the souq in Ibra is run and frequented by local people, the women in traditional dress, the gorgeously colourful tunic, trousers and head covering, which gives it a truly Omani flavour.


Articles of clothing are a commercial cornerstone of the market. Laysus, the graphically printed sheets worn by local women over their heads, are widely available (expect to pay around 500bz for a single laysu), and so too is a satiny cloth called kalak-braisam, which though woven in Pakistan has long associations with Ibra. Available in a medley of strong colours – emerald, carmine, royal purple and midnight blue – with gold and silver patterns, it is used in the locality for dressmaking.

Female traders
Clothes, crafts, cosmetics
Inside the covered souq is yet more finery. Women sit in the soupy half-light making lacy silver and gold braid destined for the cuffs and hems of dresses and abayas. Others sell fat bundles of zari, black and hot-pink trimmings with tiny beads that are measured and sold in dhraa (the metal dhraa measuring rule is a little shorter than a metre rule).

In a patch of sunlight a group of friends sits and gossips surrounded by embroidered anklets, the intricately worked metallic embellishment for traditional Omani trousers. Each anklet takes one to two weeks to make, they say – if there is plenty of work to do in the house, there is less time for stitching.

Depending on the complexity of design, anklets cost from around RO15 apiece. The women learnt the skill from their mothers, just as their own daughters are learning today. In Ibra, this type of embroidery is the main cottage industry, enabling women to earn a small income while also looking after their families. Some women, those who cannot devote a morning to marketing perhaps, sell their sewing to other stall-holders who then take a cut from its sale.

Cosmetics also feature large in the souq. One lady sells sandal in powder form, which can be applied to skin and then washed off to improve the complexion. Wars, sold in lumps that look like dough balls, is for mixing with oil and smearing on to the skin to clean and soften it. Other beauty aids include a sweet-smelling black sludge that is blended with attar and used as a scent, and dofran, which is combined with dried roses and burnt as incense. Henna is available, too: the greenish powder (around RO1 per bottle) is added to water that has been boiled with dried lemons until brown, and the paste is then painted on to the skin or combed through hair.

Past glories
Exploring the ruins
After the market, which is open every Wednesday from around 7.30am to 11am, take time to visit a couple of the ruined mercantile houses that once made Ibra grand. The deserted old quarters contain several impressive buildings, some of them with carved lintels or painted ceilings intact. In Kanaatir is an abandoned souq – a pillared courtyard shaded by a tree and surrounded on three sides by derelict shops – and beyond lies Minzfah, which has many fine ruins including one house, known locally as the House of Buma, that once had five or six storeys.


Today Minzfah is empty save for occasional tourists and local children who live in the new village nearby. “My grandfather used to live here but now he works in Muscat,” says one of them. “The Municipality is coming to clean this place.” She gestures to the stacks of upturned, leafless date palms. “It will all be repaired and tourists will pay to come and visit.”

Directions
Finding the souq
Ibra is about two hours from Muscat on the road to Sur: turn right off the highway at the signpost for Ibra Sufelat (Lower Ibra) – the souq is further on, on the left. To reach Kanaatir and Minzfah, continue along the same road and turn right towards Kanaatir into the wadi bed. From here ask directions – both are nearby, to the left.