Blogs from Yemen, Middle East - page 4

Well, Sanaa has been nice, but I began to ask the locals, "What else is there besides this historical and peaceful city?" The response, "How about some quiet and beautiful mountain towns?" What they really meant, "Care for some adventure and a chance to go where no American has gone before?" Either way, sure, sounds like a good use of time to me! Thus, a road trip through Yemen ensues. It is much easier though if you simply hire a driver and guide. It can be a bit pricey, but having people to share the car with can reduce the costs. As imagined, sometimes it got a little interesting. My first experience of being in a local restaurant with tribal man, all carrying their own AK-47's while being the only American for probably miles around was ... read more

Bombing of US Navy vessels, kidnappings of foreign tourists, tribal warfare including car bombings. This genre of headline had a lot of people asking, "why the hell are you going to Yemen?" I initially put these enquiries down to western ignorance to the everyday reality of this corner of the world. When residents of other Arab nations we have visited asked the same question, I'll have to confess some lingering doubts concerning the wisdom of visiting this country. "So answer the question Yeatesy, why did you go to Yemen?" Glad you asked but I'm not quite sure. Maybe I should simply quote Mallory, "Because it's there?" The question mark indicating there wasn't a lot of conviciton in that reply. Photographically it looked amazing, the Old city of its capital Sana'a is a World Heritage site, it ... read more

Happy to be in an Arab country again. Not just because now we can relax about taking care of our belongings or to be ripped off at everyday purchasing, but is nice to feel in a familiar culture - I'm surprised to notice how I missed the call to pray at 4:30 in the morning. After so long changing places every two or three days we needed some rest. Stop for a while in the same place, have a bed, a kitchen (is amazing how much we missed a kitchen!!). But stay without doing something can be really boring. So if we want to stay in one place, we have to do something. Well we are in the Middle East, we have been in 6 Arab countries so far, and we loved many things about it, ... read more

The Kids in Yemen Middle East » Yemen » Sanaa By leilaroundaworldJuly 16th 2007LeilaAll of them so wonderful, all of them so curious of foreigner, all of them saying how are you and welcome to you and they meet you, and all of them wanting their pictures to be taken as soon as they see you holding one. Take a look at some of the cutest one I've encountered...they were all adorable. ( sounds like I'm ready to be a mom haha)... read more

Yeah man - we’ve been in Yemen! Last Christmas and New Year dad brought us with him to Yemen. “Yemen” sounds like “Yeah man” so we first thought he was joking with us. But there is actually a country called Yemen. We think it’s a strange name for a country. But we are glad they didn’t call it “Shit man”. That would have been even more strange. To go to Yemen we had to go via Istanbul. We had one day in Istanbul and there we had a look at the central town. It was a very nice place but right then a little too cold. We don't like cold. We have too little clothes/fur on us. We prefer visiting warmer places. But we decided that we will have to go back there some other day. ... read more