A visit to a fishing village

The tarmac road turned into a dirt road then became narrower and narrower. We descended down the little track between houses closely packed together, trying to avoid small children and goats wandering about! At last we turned the last tight corner and arrived in front of a rather impressive mosque, quite a contrast to the fishing shacks and houses of the village. I was just trying to decide where to park the car when I noticed a man waving me enthusiastically towards a space under a tin covered roof. I later discovered he was the uncle of the family we were visiting and lived next door. He, and most of the village, had been informed of our visit and were ready to be very hospitable.

The Fishing Village

Something smells a bit fishy

We were visiting some ladies that we had met previously at a friend's house in town. There was about 7 women who were all related in different ways. I had to concentrate to understand the Arabic of the grandmother of the family but she was full of smiles. After being given cold drinks, the ladies suggested that we went to the beach. It was a short walk past the fishing shacks, nets and boats to the beach. There was a strong odour of fish! Most of the men of the village were fishermen and most of the families were related in some way. Our friend pointed out her nephew's house, uncle's house and cousin's house all nearby.

The Fishing Boats

Seaside scramble

The walk along the beach turned into a scramble over rocks to walk to the head point - not the easiest thing with 2 small children! Also probably not the easiest thing for our friends wearing their baltos and head coverings, but they were used to it! When we reached the end we were surprised to see some teenage boys swimming in the waves crashing against the rocks. Most people in Yemen cannot swim but these lads had grown up by the sea and were strong swimmers.

Conservative Swimwear

We scrambled back and sat by one of the fishing shacks on some of the nets. I asked if the fishermen minded us sitting and walking on their nets but the women said it didn't matter. I wonder how many holes in the nets the fishermen have to repair! Kira and Isaiah enjoyed playing in the sand and I had to chase Isaiah a few times to stop him diving into the sea (I hadn't brought any spare clothes). The local girls went in fully clothed and enjoyed splashing around.


No fish for dinner!

After returning to the house and washing off the sand we were treated to a supper of spicy potatoes and lentils and a local dish made of bulgar wheat as well as samosas. Surprisingly, there were no fish. A plastic sheet was spread on the floor and we all ate communally from the dishes.

We said our goodbyes and I was thankful once we'd navigated the narrow track in the dark without damage! Once home, our friends called to ask if we'd arrived home safely. It was once again humbling to receive such hospitality and see their sense of responsibility for their guests.

Kira's Birthday

When we went into the children's bedroom and told Kira that it was her birthday today. "It's my Happy Birthday today?!", she excited asked. She bounced off the bed and after getting dressed enjoyed a birthday treat of freshly cooked pancakes smothered in syrup! Then it was time to open the presents. Isaiah was more interested in the shiny wrapping paper than what was inside it, whereas Kira opened each present and exclaimed "look Mummy, look!" or "look Daddy, look!". She received a book, stickers, jigsaw puzzle, game, little chair and musical jewelery box.Scary family

Isaiah's bottom lip quivered and he began to cry when he saw Daddy wearing the Bat-man mask that Kira had been given. Kira put it on and the same thing happened, so she quickly took it off saying "don't worry Isaiah, gone now"! They were also both amused by the pink dressing up hair!

We planned to leave at 4pm to go to Fun City, an amusement and play park, with some of Kira's little friends. Kate had told the neighbours to be ready at 3.30pm, as Yemenis are not renowned for their time keeping! Malak and her mum arrived on time after a reminder phone call from Kate! But Susu and Masin with their mum and aunty were nowhere to be seen. We packed up the car then went to knock on their door opposite us. Susu answered but Kate couldn't understand what she was saying. 5 minutes later with lots more knocking and some shouting in Arabic, they all emerged from the hosue and we got on our way!

Segregated transportation

To accommodate the culture here, Kate drove the women and children in one car, whilst Paul travelled with our Western friends and their son in the other car. The local women said it wouldn't be possible for them to ride in the car with Paul if they didn't have any male relatives with them.It was the first time that the local children had been to Fun City and they were all so excited to be able to play on the slides, swings, see-saw, trampoline and climbing frames. Although Malak was the oldest (6 months older than Kira) she was the most afraid and wouldn't go on the big red slide or climb to the top of the climbing frame. She probably hadn't seen anything like it in her life before!
When the children were tired out and after going on the train ride and ladybird ride, we made our way back home. Some other neighbours wanted to pop in to give Kira a present, so Kate telephoned them and told them to come, to which they replied they would come straight away. We waited for a while but then got out the pink dinosaur birthday cake and sang "Happy Birthday" in English and Arabic. We then tucked into jelly, cake, sweets and biscuits. The other neighbours eventually turned up over half an hour later so we repeated the "Happy Birthday" singing for them too!
There was plenty of cake left over for the next day when Kate invited the rest of the neighbours and children round for a little birthday party with lots of party games. To save lots of preparation, she suggested they all bring some food or drink to share instead of a present for Kira!

As Kira said at the end of it all "I'm 3. Next Happy Birthday I'll be 4" but that won't be for another year yet!

A busy day

Laziness, corruption or rebels?

Today we only had to wait for half an hour at the checkpoint for our miltary escort to arrive. That is much better than most of our recent trips. Sometimes, we wait for an hour and a half, then give up and go home because there would be no time to do anything worthwhile, before everyone went home for lunch. The soldiers are sometimes delayed because of dealing with rebels elsewhere and perhaps they are sometimes just lazy. We also wonder if they would be more helpful if we gave in to their demands for bribes, but that would be a slippery slope.

Change of plans

It was also a good day because these soldiers were happy to escort us into the centre of town. Recently they have only allowed us to the new offices in the old clinic building on the edge of town. We call them the new offices, but it seems that the immunisation office has changed their minds about moving, since they got a new manager. We may end up using the new offices as a training centre instead. The new manager is an answer to one of our prayers though, because the old one was very difficult to work with.

"Where's our gift?"

I had a good morning with the two ladies who I have been training to use the database. "Where's our gift from England?", they keep on asking, since we got back from the UK. They are keen to do a more general computer course than I have taught them so far, which has been very specific training in connection with the immunisation database I have made. Perhaps I will do this in the new offices soon, but it depends on whether or not the project continues. We will assess the situation in the new year to see if the project is viable or if the difficulties continue.

Circumcision party

As soon as we got back from Zingibar, we found out that we had to go down the road for the circumcision party of the new twin boys, down the road. The men ate meat and rice very quickly, without any talking, then most of them left very quickly, while some remained and had some interesting political discussions, which we did not fully understand, mainly concerning the Houthi rebellion in the north of Yemen. The women ate separately after the men had eaten. They all sat on the floor around a big dish of meat and rice and Kate finally realised that the reason the food infront of her seemed to not be disappearing even with eating lots, was because the other women were flicking rice and meat to infront of her - a way to ensure that guests are well fed!

Our neighbour's house

Hole in the road

After we got back from the circumcision lunch, one of our neighbours turned up at our house with his car, to take me to the people who can fix the big hole in the road in front of our house. This was caused by a big truck, which came down our road due to the main road being closed with roadworks, and it broke the manhole cover over the drains. I was glad for our neighbour's help, since he knew someone there and negotiated a fair price for us to pay them. If he hadn't taken me to fetch them it might never have been fixed and it would certainly not get done if I did not pay them. They cleared all the dirt out the drain and put a temporary cover on top so that local children don't fall down it and promised someone would return after one or two days, once they had made a new cover, meaning after one or two weeks, in reality.

The hole in front of our gate- temporarily fixed

It's who you know!

Kate contacted a respected Obstetric and Gynaecology doctor in the afternoon to try to arrange meeting to talk about teaching and training possibilities with the University. She was told to come to his clinic in an hour! So off she went and had a productive meeting, where he agreed to contact one of the heads of medical education on her behalf. It's important here to have someone who is respected to "introduce" you, since it is a very relationship orientated culture. Often this is more important than any qualifications or experience that you have (although she did give them her medical certificates to show that she is a doctor!).

Return to Yemen

Rude awakening

The early morning 4:30am call to prayer had been and gone and we were still all sleeping. There had been a buzz on the door bell at some point which we later discovered was a man from the Electricity company threatening to disconnect our house as we hadn't been able to pay the bill yet this month! Thankfully our friends upstairs sorted it out. Eventually Kira and Isaiah woke up around 10am – what a blissful lie in! We were still catching up from traveling back to Yemen which took 19 hours door-to-door.

Joyful reunion

Kira was overjoyed to see her playmate Isaac again and they spent a happy morning playing together whilst we went to get the food shopping. Most things were in stock, including Weetabix for breakfasts, but there was no unprocessed cheese and alas no Ribena for Kira.

No water

Paul then went to fill up the water containers with drinking water but was only able to fill one up as the water supply at the corner shop had run out. We then filled jugs up with this drinking water and put them in the fridge to go cool.



Cultural adaptation

I soon discovered that some little beetles had taken up residence in my spices – they seemed to have a preference for chilli! Previously when the beetles had overtaken my spices I threw them all out and bought new ones, but this time I just sieved the beetles out!


Showered with gifts

Whilst we'd been at the shops a box tied with string had arrived from the neighbours. On opening it we found lots of oranges, 2 necklaces, 5 pairs of earrings, a ring, and a dress for Kira! What a welcome back present!



Draining trip

When we tried to use our car, curiously the keys wouldn't open our car door. Unfortunately whilst we'd been away for our two month trip, the battery on the car had run flat so Paul managed to start it with jump leads and then head out to find a new battery. The solar panel trickle charger, Paul had plugged in, doesn't seem to work.

Powercuts

Meanwhile I went to visit our neighbours opposite. There were lots of hugs, kisses and “how are you? how is you family? how are your children? how was your trip?”. People are very relational here and it was interesting to hear them asking first about people (my family, Mum, Dad, Granny, Kids) before asking what I actually did whilst being away! We had great fun chatting and just as tea was being served, the lights and fan went off with a power cut. Thankfully it's not so hot and humid here as when we left in August so we can cope comfortably without the fans. Although it was a challenge keeping Isaiah away from the candle, as filled with curiousity, he wanted to crawl to it and grab it.

So we're very glad to be back and we're looking forward to this next phase of our lives here.

7th wedding anniversary

There've been no exciting days recently since we have been stuck at home recently, unable to travel to work due to the separatist violence in Abyan. We don't really want that sort of excitement, anyway.

Our 7th wedding anniversary was spent in Taiz. We have come to Taiz for a few days in order to renew our residence visas and obtain exit/re-entry visas before our trip to England.

Crazy Old City

In the morning we went into town to visit the old city- a part of town which is many hundreds of years old. It is supposed to be pedestrianised, but that doesn't stop all the noisy, smokey motorbikes from racing up and down. We were grateful for our double buggy which kept Isaiah safe and stopped Kira from running into the path of one of the motorbikes. Kira did very well not to get overwhelmed by all the noise and craziness there and even got given a nice silver necklace by one of the shop keepers.

Kira's free necklace

"Not our hotel!"

To celebrate our anniversary, we went for lunch at the Al Saeed hotel which used to be the Sofitel Hotel but has recently been disowned by the Sofitel company, much like the ex-Sheraton hotel in Aden. They seem to have given up trying to get Yemenis' to do things to their standards. The new Al Saeed sign has five stars on it, but we think they just decided to award themselves 5 stars. Anyway, we enjoyed ourselves- it was very relaxing to eat lunch in a quiet place with jazz music in the background. Most Yemeni restaurants are so noisy you can hardly talk to each other. Where else in the world could you have a huge lunch for a family of four in a "Five" star hotel for less than £20.

View of Taiz from the hotel

Deep questions

"What's the highlight of the last 7 years?", asked Kate while we were eating.
She has a habit of asking these deep questions which catch me off guard and expects an instant response.
"Err, we've had some very nice holidays.", was the best answer I could come up with at the time.
On reflection, I think that the highlight of the last 7 years has been embarking on this Middle Eastern adventure together with someone as wonderful and amazing as Kate. We keep each other going through the tough times and have a lot of fun meeting people and seeing places. We achieve so much more together than we could do individually.

A Yemeni Wedding

Inbreeding confusion

I was cordially invited to a Yemeni wedding of the brother of the husband of the daughter of the first wife of the husband who's second wife is our immediate neighbour. It can get very complicated working out all the relationships here (especially when 2 sisters often marry 2 brothers who are also their cousins!).

No cameras or birds allowed

The invitation cards are usually simple A5 cards detailing the families of the bride and groom and the date, time and place. Also they state that NO camera phones are allowed (it goes without saying that normal cameras are not allowed either, in this culture) and children are "birds which need to stay in their nests" i.e. please don't bring children with you, although there are usually quite a few children present. I left Kira and Isaiah at home with Paul.

Tattooed ladies

The women love to have an opportunity to dress up and take hours over applying bold and bright make-up and putting up their long hair. Usually the day before the wedding, an "artist" will visit the house and draw intricate designs of "nachsha" or "henna" (dark brown tattoos) on the women's hands, arms and feet. The women then have to sit for a few hours to let the dye absorb into the skin.

OTT make-up

The make-up that is considered beautiful here makes them look like a cross between a clown, a French mime artist and Michael Jackson (Peace Be Upon Him)! I think they probably thought I wasn't wearing any make-up as mine was so minimal.

One of our neighbours tried to demonstrate Yemeni make-up techniques on my face a few months ago, but not quite full-on Yemeni style

Dressed to kill

The women choose their outfit and get dressed up. The older women usually wear a "dera" which is a loose dress made out of thin fabric (often with lots of sequins on). It's a little disconcerting as the fabric is see-through, so you can see their bra and petticoat underneath- a sight Paul is glad not to be allowed to see! The younger women usually wear long dresses fully of sparkling sequins and beads. Both types of dress would cause road accidents if the women wore them outdoors without a Balto on top, the latter due to blinding headlamp reflections.

Women are the same all over the world

I drove to the wedding hall with a car full of our neighbours. We had planned to leave at 7.15pm however one of the girls was still at the hairdressers and didn't return until 8pm so we were all waiting around until she arrived. However it doesn't matter if you are late to the wedding and you can arrive and leave at any stage.

Dancing to the warbling

The wedding hall was "quite small" for about 200 guests and had rows of plastic white chairs with an area at the front for dancing, along with 2 golden thrones for the bride and groom. When we arrived, the party was in full swing, with women dancing a simple stepping dance to the accompaniment of a woman playing the drum and another lady singing/warbling. There was lots of kissing and greeting of lots of family members, and lots of stares at the foreigners (me and Philippa!). We bravely joined in the dancing which was fun and got lots of approval from the women!

Entrance of the bride

About 9.45pm the bride arrived and entered the room to lots of ululating, clapping and singing from the women who crowded around her as she tried to walk down to the thrones! Initially she looked rather nervous but soon began to smile. She was wearing a big white wedding dress with lots of sparkley silver jewelery, henna up her arms, crazy make-up and a big hair style!

Most of the guests were from the groom's family as he was living in Aden, whereas the bride was from the village so only her mother and sisters had accompanied her to the city for the wedding.

Bride but no Groom

The female members of the groom's family then handed around bags, with a can of fizzy drink and a packet of cake, to all the guests. The groom didn't enter the wedding hall but waited downstairs for his bride to appear later. Sometimes the groom chooses not to enter the wedding hall to save the women from all the hassle of covering up and then uncovering again when he leaves with the bride half an hour later.

We said our farewells and left shortly after the bride arrived. We heard that the celebrations finished around 11pm when the bride joined the groom and they traveled to his house in a specially decorated car.

A day to forget

At the start of the day, I was in a good mood. I had just got my car back from Toyota, who had taken about 2 weeks to fix it's electrical problems, mostly because they didn't have the alternator parts it needed and had to wait for them to arrive from Sana'a.

Toyota dealer in Aden

Fighting terrorism with Red Tape

I left the house in order to obtain a new travel permission letter from the security police. All foreigners in Yemen need travel permission letters to go to another province so that the police can protect them from potential threats. Our work is just across the border to the next door province, so this is a frequent and time consuming activity for us since we always have to wait at least half an hour for them to fill in the forms and get the boss to stamp and sign them. Sometimes we are denied travel permission if there is a perceived terrorist threat in the area.




Yemen's first ever speed camera

Just a few hundred metres from our house is the causeway which links the mainland and the peninsula which is home to the older part of Aden and the port. It is a road which has had a history of accidents because of 2 problems; 1) people driving too fast and 2) broken down vehicles which are stranded in the middle of this 6 km stretch of road with no way of getting their car off the road to a safe place. The combination of these two things used to cause many accidents but the first problem has improved since the police began using Yemen's first ever speed camera on the road, but there are still broken down vehicles which are a great irritation when they cause traffic jams or bring you to a stop because there's no gaps in the fast lane.


Stranded in the middle of the causeway

Today I became one of those people who I'm always annoyed at for having the inconsideration to break down in such an inconvenient place, as my car conked out right in the middle of that road. The engine cut out and I came to a stop just after a bend in the road, which meant that oncoming drivers had little warning of a stationary vehicle. There was no response from anything as I tried to restart it and I began praying that no one would crash into the car as I put my hazard lights on and opened my bonnet to see if I could diagnose the problem. Fortunately, it was before 10 am, so there was not a huge amount of traffic yet. In Yemen the rush hour happens between about 11am and midday since many people don't start work until after this, and then they stop for at least a 2 hour lunch break in the afternoon!

We live in Al Mansura at the top of the picture and I broke down just after the big bend before you go past the airport

The PAC (Police Automobile Club)

Nothing I could think of was of any help in restarting the car and there is no AA or RAC in Yemen, but some kind Yemenis stopped to offer their assistance and took me to place where tow trucks waited for business. After they negotiated a good price for me, I bade them farewell and took the Tow Truck to my car. As we headed back across the causeway, I saw my car going the other way on the back of a police tow truck! It took about an hour of the driver going round and asking people and making phone calls to track down the place where they had taken it.

Closed for lunch

The police truck agreed to take me to Toyota, rather than transfer the car from one Tow Truck to another and it took about another half an hour to get there. By the time we got to Toyota, everyone had gone for lunch and the workshop was completely locked up. The only people there were a couple of security guards and the manager of the new-car showroom who was in the middle of his prayers. I waited about 15 minutes for him to finish his prayers so that I could tell him the whole story and leave him my car key so that the mechanics could fix my car when they came back from lunch. 2 hours later. Then I went home for my lunch, in not such a good mood as I had started the day.

Update: After another week of waiting for another part, the car is now fully fixed and working fine. I now have the phone number for the Tow Truck driver stored in my phone.