Update

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

Please excuse my ramblings...

By my calculations, took me approximately three weeks to fall into a rut. It goes something like this… Wake, Eat, Study, Eat, Class, Internet Café, Eat, Study, Sleep. It is my own personal opinion that forty-nine weeks of that isn’t going to cut the mustard, so I’ve made it a priority to try and shake up the routine every so often. I manage do this with varying degrees of success.

About this time last week, when my stomach was feeling rather “delicate”, Evan suggested a break from traditional Yemeni food so we planned on going to the Syrian restaurant. After agreeing to meet him at the internet café later that night, I headed out from the school happy in the knowledge that I was going to eat that night’s dinner with utensils instead of my hands.

But of course, that isn’t what happened, is it? By mutual agreement, Evan went to the mafraj (the common room for social gatherings, etc) to see if any of the other students wanted to go. He was able to recruit Aaron and Aussie Girl, but Aaron wanted to go to the fish souq (market) for dinner that night.

To be honest, dinner at the fish souq was tasty and enjoyable, even if I did have to eat with my hands. How it works is rather bizarre. First we stopped at a fish souq and bought our fish. Then we took the fish next door to a restaurant where they cooked it up in sort of a stew. The stew comes with a huge slab of flatbread. You tear off pieces of the flatbread and use it to scoop up the stew right out of the pot.

If you have problems with the concept of “shared” food, then this probably isn’t the dinner for you. Still, it’s was yummy and ended up only costing each of us about $2.50. I’m sure you’ll be happy to hear that I made it to the Syrian restaurant the next day :)~

I had heard from one of the other students that is here with the American Institute for Yemeni Studies that there was, no kidding, a bowling alley here in Sana’a.

“It” Ladies and Gentlemen, is FUN CITY, a cultural Chernobyl on the outskirts of Sana’a. It’s not quite Neverland Ranch and there is no Jesus Juice but they do have quite a few amusement park rides, a “southern” fried chicken restaurant, and… a bowling alley with pool tables!

It was Aussie Girl’s last night in Sana’a last Monday so six of us students got together and headed out there. It costs about $2.50 to get an entrance ticket to the bowling alley (which comes with a free game of bowling) and each game thereafter is about $0.50.

The day before we went bowling, I ran into a Yemeni gentleman that I had met at a wedding party my second day here. I had totally forgotten his face and his name, but he hadn’t forgotten mine. I incorrectly guessed his name to be Mohammed (which, by the way, is usually a safe bet) but he didn’t seem to mind.

Long story short, I spent the next three hours exhausting my Arabic vocabulary trying to be witty and interesting, which is hard for me to do in English, much less Arabic.

His name is Abdul Rahman. By the end of our talk I was invited to his village for the weekend (which is about 150 miles north of Sana’a). I managed to convince Evan (which wasn’t very hard) to join me.

While at Abdul Rahman's house, we were invited to wedding of one of Abdul Rahman’s cousins, so the following weekend, Evan and I are heading back to the village.

Evan is rather excited about going to the wedding. This is because Sheikh al-Ahmar is supposed to be there. If Evan is correct, Sheikh al-Ahmar is the leader of the Islah political party here in Yemen. He also has the dubious distinction of being a man the USA has asked be arrested by the Yemeni government and not allowed to leave Yemen. Of course it is our goal to try and get a photo-op with him.

In honor of being invited to such an auspicious event, Evan and I have decided to bedeck ourselves in full Yemeni garb, to include the jambiya (a decorative knife that all the men wear). There may be photos…