Another weekend trip with friends

Confusion

I woke at 0630 for the 0730 pickup outside the school.  After yesterday’s adventure, it’s hard to believe I have another one today.  Yesterday with Americans and today with Europeans.

The destination of our day out hadn’t been confirmed.  I was told now that it wasn’t going to be Shihara but to the Haraz mountains, with the first top being Manakha.   It didn’t bother me as long as we weren’t going to yesterday’s places!

In our car we had the driver, English James, French Marie and Polish Joanna (pronounced Yo-ana).  The road was quite windy and surprisingly I was the only passenger not feeling queasy.

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Manakha & Al Hajjarah

There was nothing much to Manakha except for the scenery.  We stopped for snacks of sandwiches and I was surprised to see them wrapped in Singapore’s Straits Times newspaper dating from 2003!

Al Hajjarah further up the road was just absolutely stunning.  It was a gorgeous fortified town built on a rocky outcrop.

We engaged a guide to take us through the town’s narrow windy alleys while the driver went for his prayer.

We returned to Manakha for lunch.  Once fed and watered, we were treated to a dance with janbiyas (daggers).  Even the child dancer was waving a dagger.  Actually I noticed that kids around the area were wearing daggers too but some that are far too young (maybe five or six) only wore an empty holster.

At no stage did Mum shriek to Little Johnny “Put that knife down!” or “Don’t run with the scissors”!

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Al Khutayb

About 6km from Manakha was Al Khutayb, a village that is holy to Ismaili Muslims.  They are a sect which some Yemenis don’t particularly like.  Many of the visitors coming here are Indian Muslims dressed in rather peculiar pastel-coloured frilly outfits.  Well, the women, anyway.

I’m starting to see the Yemeni obsession of building in high places.  I guess it’s all about fortification and safety from enemies.  Not sure about how that fits in with water supply though!

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Qat

As with the journey out here, I noticed on the way back that it is very arid here.  Qat, a mild local narcotic, seems to be the predominant crop.
Apparently people spend too much of their days chewing this in the afternoons.  The leaves are accumulated in the mouth with saliva to form a ball that protrudes through one cheek like one-sided mumps. I’ve been told it doesn’t impair one’s judgment but is more of a stimulant … drivers chew it while on the road. Many of my new friends chew qat but I haven’t tried it yet.

So, there’s not much productivity in terms of nutritious food and there’s even less in terms of human labour in the afternoons.

We returned to Sana’a around 1815.  James, Joanna and I grabbed dinner together.  I returned to my room to do some study in preparation for more of school tomorrow.

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Yemen and Yemenis

Yemenis, as with other Arabs (except opportunistic Cairo con-artists) are a friendly bunch. It is very much a tribal culture unlike in the Levant where I’ve had most of my Middle Eastern experience. They’re dark Arabs (as I call them) compared to the fair-skinned Arabs of the Levant. There are also some Ethiopians and other Africans.  And some people are a mix with features ranging from Ethiopian, African to Indian.

As for the women, they’re in full black robes and also have their faces covered except for the eyes