I posted an entry on my food blog today about creating my own variation of the Somali stew, Maraq.
It shares a lot of my thought process in the kitchen and may even reveal a bit about my family. Don’t mess with us when we’re hungry.
It also includes my recipe… But we have no taste test until later…
My daughter enters the fifth grade tomorrow. In her district, this involves moving to a new school and riding the bus with the big kids. I have never really taken her back-to-school shopping. Instead, I quietly purchase the necessities and her grandmother buys her an outfit or two and that’s the end of it.
Not this year.
She’s older so I thought I’d make back-to-school shopping a lesson in how to handle money. We started by taking $200 out of her savings account. I had already purchased the sneakers, jeans, new coat, backpack and school supplies required. We also had cleaned her drawers, sorting everything by size and removing the items that were too small, soon to be too small or just not her style any more. Those will be passed on to another child.
At the bank, she filled out her own withdrawal slip and we headed to the counter where the teller asked her how she preferred her money. She left with an envelope of mixed bills. We kept the receipt so she could keep that inside the envelope and track her purchases. I took a “mommy” envelope for the times where she would need me to pay with my credit card.
She made a list of items she wanted. With our list in hand (and eventually forgotten in her wallet) we went to the thrift store. The thrift store I frequent is a little… shady. I told my daughter not to bother trying anything on, that we’d buy it, wash it, and then try it. If it didn’t fit, we’d donate it away. We arrived during 65% hour.
We found a pair of Ralph Lauren corduroys, skinny style, with snaps at the ankles. We found two tank tops with the built-in shelf bras. We found a camouflage tank top and a polka dot long sleeve shirt. By far, her favorite discovery was the black cropped sweatshirt, zipper down with a hood, covered with Muppet style fuzz. Total spent: $8
Next, we headed to Target. Since I work at Target, we have my employee discount plus an additional 5% off if we use my RedCard. Hence, the Mommy envelope. And this particular sales week had $5 off a $20 Target brand underwear purchase. We bought two bras, ten pairs of underwear, four pairs of socks, and a pair of buckle laden black ankle boots. Total spent: $50.
After Target, we went to the mall. I have a Gap visa which I opened one year when I wanted to buy the child a coat. The extra percentage off made the deal sweeter. This summer, the financial company offered 10X reward points on purchases outside the Gap. So, when typically it requires $1,000 in purchases for a $10 Gap gift card, this promotion meant you received a $10 gift card with only $100 in purchases. I “earned” $50 in gift cards for making the Gap card my primary card for the summer (which I pay off in full every time the bill arrives).
My daughter found a cropped sweater, a cropped red zipper down sweatshirt and a sweatshirt dress with pocket in the front. She paid $9. I put it on my Gap card and she gave me the cash for the Mommy envelope.
Now a Mommy-daughter shopping trip is never complete without lunch. Child wanted wings. She loves chicken wings on the bone. Her first thought was Buffalo Wild Wings. But after consideration, she decided on the pub near our house. I’m sure Shruty’s Pub appreciates that she chose to support the local, family-owned business.
Our final stop was The Crossings Premium Outlets. I explained to dear daughter that her money wouldn’t go nearly as far here. Her first stop was Charlotte Russe. She bought two shirts for $23. Then we visited Forever 21. She found a leopard print skirt, a nice blouse, and an umbrella for $38.
“Mommy,” she said, “this place really does eat your money.”
She had grown tired at this point. But she really wanted shoes. Women’s shoes. We went to one outlet and it was athletic shoes which didn’t interest her. We had several shoes stores lined up in front of us: Merrill, Easy Spirit and Bass among them. But those are all sensible shoes. The one at the end of the row interested me most and I knew it would appeal to her too. Nine West. We entered and I think my daughter found nirvana.
Now, my daughter is ten. She wanted some heels. She can’t wear heels to school, and she’s spending her own money, so I don’t want to tell her what to buy. I allowed her to pick out one pair of ridiculous sparkly strappy shoes. She wanted two. One pair was platform. She didn’t keep those. She decided on a beaded pink pair and a pair of leopard pumps. She spent $45.
The depletion of her envelope made her visibly sad. She opted to stop shopping and bring home the remaining few dollars.
I asked if she understood why we shopped in the order we did.
“What would have happened if we came here first?” I asked.
“I would have spent all my money,” she said.
Yesterday, Camp Mosey Wood celebrated its 75th Anniversary. Camp Mosey Wood is one of the remaining Girl Scout camps belonging to Girl Scouts of Eastern Pennsylvania, tracing its roots to the Lehigh County Girl Scouts, Bethlehem Steel and the mother of a “mature Girl Scout” who happens to share a mutual acquaintance with me.
I registered because I thought it would be nice to spend the day with my daughter at the same camp where she does her summer resident camp every year. She’s ten years old now, and we calculated that she’s done four summer sessions (one half week program, one “Baker’s Bunch” themed week, one “detective” week, and this year geocaching which ended a mere two weeks ago) and two winter sessions.
I attended camp Mosey Wood several times as a child, various weekends with my local troop including one in the winter where I clearly remember my adventures cross country skiing. I never had the opportunity to attend summer resident camp, and part of me always wondered what magic happens there.
Yesterday, I experienced a glimpse of it. The day surpassed my every expectation and like any good Girl Scout program it pushed me past my expectations. I am overwhelmed, proud and exhausted today as I think about the memories my daughter and I made.
Four of us arrived together for the day program. We carpooled with the daughter of one of the camp founders, camp name Bunny, and our mutual acquaintance. Bunny’s daughter is now near approaching seventy-five years old herself as her mother worked for the Girl Scouts before marrying. She stayed at the dining hall and the central green for most of the day, visiting with old friends and making new ones.
That left my friend, my daughter and I to have our camp adventures. Somewhere around ten a.m. we had already reached the archery course. My daughter worked with the actual archery instructor to make sure we knew exactly what we were doing. We all hit the targets! I forget exactly where mine landed but photos shall come…
What happened next is the usual conglomeration of crafts, tie-dye (my first time!), hiking, boating, eating, dining hall games… All items that gave me a glimpse into the life my daughter has when she’s at Girl Scout camp. Who can resist picking fresh wild blueberries off the bushes? Who can’t help but feel inspired by hiking paths created for gold projects? Who wouldn’t get excited by the prospect of a NEW ZIP LINE across the LAKE!
I watched in awe of my daughter as she kept checking on the older people, bringing Bunny’s daughter blueberries and helping them from place to place. I had never seen my tween so kind, considerate and empathetic.
I watched in awe of my daughter on the “s’up” board (stand-up paddle board). My friend and I struggled with a rowboat like a couple of drunken sailors as she zipped by us on her board, reaching the far side of the lake. When she eventually headed to shore, she ended up helping others get started because we were still in the middle of the lake spinning in circles… When we docked, I stood there and listened.
I suddenly knew I had to put on the bathing suit that hadn’t seen the light of day in eight years and go paddle boarding with her. I said as much to my friend and she replied, “Go ahead, if you want to.” And I didn’t want to, as much as my maternal instincts said this was a moment to share something with her that had nothing to do with what I wanted.
I changed, put on borrowed “lake shoes,” handed over my glasses and followed my daughter into the water. If you know me, you know I have balance issues thanks to cerebral palsy and my legs aren’t always reliable. Well, here I was, out on a lake, my daughter racing and gleefully barking orders. I can’t see. My depth perception is off. Kayaks, other paddle boarders, and rowboats surround me. I manage. I enjoy it. But in the end, I fell off (in part because my paddle was not adjusted to my height and because I never learned to use my paddle as a “third leg” for balance). That yoga has paid off because I did balance, but the line at the shore for the boards was getting longer so I headed to the dock. But I did it!
As soon as we got out of the water, my daughter threw clothes over her wet bathing suit and ran to the climbing wall. I watched in awe of my daughter on the climbing wall (and later the high ropes). My daughter climbed each of the three walls, the harder ones multiple times. I made it up the first two difficulties, no small task but again when I lacked in grace and coordination I compensated for with sheer stubborn will power. This was not enough for my petite thrill seeker so we headed to the high ropes course.
I have no idea why I ever thought high ropes would be something I should do. I did it. It was grueling in spots, but I never even stopped to catch my breath. I decided it would be easier to barrel forward than to stop and think about what we were doing. My daughter went first. I went second. When I reached the final platform when you jump, I looked to her on the ground. I reminded her that this was what Girl Scouts was about, pushing yourself and proving you could do it. And I jumped. I became a human piñata as the staff batted my ankles to stop me and put me on the ladder.
I laughed at my daughter as she bolted after grace from our spot in the back of the dining hall to the kitchen, performing her duty as hopper with the utmost efficiency and speed. She may have even gained a bit of a reputation for her skills.
At the end of the day, when my daughter had grown moody with disappointment that we couldn’t keep doing activities indefinitely, she turned to me and said, “Mom, I’m pretty sure you did at least three activities outside your comfort zone.”
I asked her to tell me which ones. She listed the “s’up boards,” the climbing wall and the ropes. She was very right. Maybe I inspired her as much as she inspired me.
The whole day reminded me why Girl Scouts means so much to me. I see my daughter meeting challenges and interacting with others of multiple generations and I can’t help but cry.
I spent a great deal of my youth being told what I could and couldn’t do and being teased for my limp and physical difference. I was about my daughter’s age when my junior Girl Scout leader saw me standing at the railing at our roller skating event. I didn’t have skates and I probably looked forlorn leaning on the edge of the rink. She asked me why I didn’t have skates.
I said I couldn’t skate. That I had never skated because of my legs.
I don’t remember exactly how it happened, but I know within a few minutes I had my rental skates and I was now clinging to the same wall from the other side because I had wheels on my feet. I imagine some adult must have held my hand and coaxed me out, because eventually I hugged the wall and made a lap of the rink. I spent most of my time “practicing” on the carpeted area where people put on their skates. But I had roller skates! And I hadn’t broken my neck!
My daughter may never know half my struggles, but thanks to Girl Scouts, she can learn the same lessons.
Cross-posted from my food blog: Angel Food Cooking http://bit.ly/1kOiLUT
My food blog typically shares recipes, culinary experiments and food musings.
I have not been indulging in much cooking lately because I have been eating boring items as I bring my weight and general health back into line.
Salad, fresh fruit, lots of water and no more sweets have been the norm. And it’s worked. I’ve shed between ten and fifteen pounds. Now my goal shifts to gaining muscle, strength, endurance and flexibility. I have health issues and I’m not getting younger.
So, I started walking, biking, doing 20-minute yoga routines, stretching and doing my physical therapy routines, lifting weights and punching the bag in my garage… Something… Every day.
Having a child helps this. When you say, “What are we going to do today?” you get ideas & someone to hold you accountable.
I use myfitnesspal to track my calories, mapmyfitness for cute little maps of distance activities, talabata lite to time intervals, freepedometer to track steps during housework & my job and I have a weight lifting one too. But I thought this was getting neurotic of me.
So I made myfitnesspal my “homebase,” linked my mapmyfitness and bought a fitbit flex. Yup. A fitbit.
After that crazy breakfast and sending my daughter to her grandparents, I suited up with my laptop and my wallet for a morning walk. I planned on stopping at the corner market for sparkling mineral water as a bribe for myself and at the library. I had to head to the library to sync my fitbit as I don’t have internet at home and my iPhone 4 is a dinosaur with no ‘low energy Bluetooth’ capabilities.
Coconut water starts here…
I headed to the corner store and they didn’t have sparkling water as the neighborhood is more Hispanic than European. I tried coconut water, as coconut water has calcium just like mineral water.
My friend Gayle has a fitness challenge where she pushes herself to try new things, I may start a food challenge…
I gagged after the first three sips. Lightly syrupy yet water with chunks of coconut and sweet yet not… Weird. But I kept walking and got thirsty. Tried another sip. Not appealing but not bad.
I continued this every five minutes for a half an hour.
Verdict: weirdly refreshing and staved off dehydration. Still don’t like the chunks. Spit them out. Would certainly do it again for something different and not fake like sports drinks. Cannot chug it.
Would be delicious as a smoothie base… Or with pineapple juice and light rum…
July has brought much excitement into my nerd camp. It started with a call for proposals on H-net Africa for the second edition of Sage Publications’ Encyclopedia of World Poverty. They needed someone to write an updated entry on the Republic of Djibouti, only 900-1000 words so I thought I’d take a go. I emailed the editor. It bounced. Twice.
I quickly went into journalism stalker mode and found another email address. I apologized for not using the listed email, but she didn’t mind and thanked me for my persistence. The Djibouti entry was indeed available, but as I have no Ph.D. I could not write the article without a friend, with the appropriate academic credentials to co-author.
I reached out to my beloved friend, former college peer and in some ways my role model, Annette Varcoe. She’s interested in 19th century American history, I believe areas like temperance, suffrage, and other stuff I can’t even remember. She has no interest in Africa, or the postcolonial age, or the colonial influence of France on exotic locales. Yet, she speaks some French, has an interest in women’s/gender issues and shares my type of nerdiness. Poverty, and perhaps even more so in the developing world, has a great impact on women so there we found our overlap.
The beauty of this proposed project rested in the fact that I had researched the basic statistics on poverty in Djibouti during my capstone project for my international affairs seminar at Lafayette College. I merely needed to update the facts, condense relevant info into the required format, send it to Annette, accept her feedback, and add her name.
We had three weeks to submit. I think we polished seven drafts in five days. We haven’t heard from the copy editors yet, but it was a great collaboration and we worked well together. We also pulled ridiculous amounts of scholarly info on Djibouti not quite connected to our project but stuff that crossed our mutual interests. You know a friend is special when you’re emailing PDFs on female circumcision to each other…
From that experience, I reflected on my need for my own Ph.D. It’s on my list of things to do, but hey, so is “de-clutter the house.” I think the Ph.D. is more likely to happen. I figured I’d bold send an email to _the one person I would most like to study under_ because really, what did I have to lose? I will refrain from naming the person or the school, both are amazing, because I don’t want to find myself embarrassed if when he meets me and thinks I’m an idiot.
Yes, I said “when he meets me.” He not only responded to my email but said to contact him again in September so we could arrange for a visit to campus. At that point, we could discuss my previous work and my future plans.
Finally, today, after taking a week to focus on my health (short version: gained weight and lost some physical strength/balance after breaking my dominant hand this winter) and with that on the right path (talked to my doctor! lost five pounds! feel less achy and clumsy!), I received even more “Good News for Nerds.”
The apparently unstoppable Ally Bishop asked me to drop by her class “Topics in Multiculturalism” to present France as a case study in “Multiculturalism and Religion.” I will be talking about “French vs. Islam” as an avoidance of multiculturalism in favor of unyielding universalism and the roots of the what I would term Muslim discomfort in the colonial empire. This is the backdrop for the laws of 2004 and 2010 which outlaw, respectively, headscarves in schools and face coverings in public.
Exciting stuff for a nerd, right?
Cross-posted with my cooking blog:
www.AngelFoodCooking.blogspot.com
Nearly everyday that we were in Djibouti, my traveling companion (M) and I visited the juice bar at Cafeteria Sana’a a couple blocks from our hotel. It was normal a late morning break, usually after our second walk around the city.
Around 7:30 a.m., we’d have breakfast on the porch of our hotel, a cup of café crême with a big cube of sugar accompanied by a basket of baguette slices and a couple croissants. The plates that came with the basket had a dollop of strawberry jelly and a large pat of butter. With my recovering broken hand, sometimes the butter started too cold to manipulate but within seconds it literally would begin to melt.
After this breakfast, we’d walk. With temperatures at 90 degrees F (even that early) and humidity around 85 percent, it didn’t take long to find ourselves drenched in our own perspiration. We’d return to our hotel to drink a liter of water and let ourselves dry out and then we’d repeat.
On the second morning tour, we capped everything off with a juice from Cafeteria Sana’a.
The first day I ordered ginger juice. I thought, since gastro-international issues can pop up during travels in Africa, ginger would help keep my insides healthy. It was fabulous. Spicy and zesty and refreshing, even 20 minutes later still walking around in the heat that ginger juice left and incredibly pleasant taste in my mouth.
The next visit they had run out of ginger. This afternoon, they said. I was heartbroken so I let M order me a mango. It was delightful but lacked the zip and surprise of the ginger.
We returned the next day. No ginger. Maybe tomorrow, they said. I ordered “melon.” I had no idea what type of melon to expect. I’m not a huge melon fan, but isn’t the point of traveling to expand your horizons and be adventurous? Would it be watermelon? Honeydew?
Cantaloupe. Served in a frozen mug. Not as breathtaking as ginger but a flavor I soon learned to crave after an hour or two in the hot sun. That day we had a second juice, lemon. Our server offered us lemon with mint, something not on the board, but at this point we may have become regulars. This became M’s pick.
The final trip to the juice bar we ordered large juices instead of regular. Still no ginger. So I stayed with my melon.
And today I made a breakfast that incorporates all of these taste memories:
– Take and bake Archer Farms baguette with Brie from Aldi and a chunk with butter.
– Simply Balanced green tea with ginger.
– Cantaloupe juice
My first attempt at my own cantaloupe juice smoothie included about 2 cups cantaloupe and 1/2 cup water in the blender. Suitable, but lacked the frozen mug.
Borrowed from my cooking blog:
www.angelfoodcooking.blogspot.com
One day soon I shall blog about my culinary adventures in Djibouti and Yemen. I fell in love with freshly made cantaloupe juice, could have survived on bread and butter (in temperatures so hot the butter melted on your plate) and decided maybe I’m not so fond of Ethiopian. The Yemeni cuisine was worth returning for– never have I eaten somewhere where the spices were so effectively used in a dish. I now believe I have never had a true saffron rice, the blend of saffron (which did more than merely turn the rice yellow) and the touch of clove really did tease the palate.
Oh, look at that. I did blog about the food. My true lament is that I did not bring home honey from Yemen. The color was so richly yellow it almost appeared orange. We had a small bowl of yogurt with this honey at our hotel and it was so simple and fulfilling. I miss it. Painfully.
I brought home American sauce as a joke for my family, purchased in the Nougaprix in Djibouti. I thought it was Thousand Island dressing and my husband confirmed it on our burgers tonight. Thousand Island without pickles. That works for my husband as he loves Thousand Island but hates pickles.
Almost a week has passed since I arrived home, a marathon of flights, train ride and car voyage. I walk through my ordinary life as if it’s the dream, my travels feeling more real than my everyday routine here in the United States.
Yesterday, I loaded a compact disc of Yemeni music (purchased from the musician at our hotel in Old Sana’a, Arabia Felix) into my car. I opened the windows and the sunroof and played the music loudly, My mind drifted to Yemen, that evening ride into the city from the airport. The music was loud, our host’s English soft and my ears clogged from the plane.
On the road, we found ourselves beside a caravan of vehicles celebrating a wedding. They drove with their four-way flashers, honking and carrying on. Later in our trip, our guide asked us about American weddings. He explained what he had seen in movies and we verified that that was correct. We get a license from the government, say vows in a church if we want a religious wedding and then have a big dinner for family and friends usually with dancing.
These are the conversations I remember from Yemen. They usually happened on rooftops with a spectacular view as the backdrop. We compared our cultures and our countries, even our jobs.
But this piece should delve into the tourism. My companion and I each purchased the guide published by Yemen Tourism, “101 things to see & do in Yemen,” offered by our hotel. Our guide led the way, but the book makes it much easier to remember the names of where we visited. I was recovering from a broken hand so there are few notes on what occurred during this trip.
My chronology may not be perfect, though I suppose careful examination of my photos would reveal the proper order. Memory is more fun. We drove through the outskirts of Sana’a, the landscape a sea of greenery and beautiful beige mountains with those distinctive sandcastle buildings. Gingerbread houses made of sand. Like other parts of the developing world, formal garbage collection doesn’t exist and people use as much of their trash as they can. Plastic and food wrappers (often emblazoned with images like Bert and Ernie or Spongebob) form islands of trash along the streets. Yemen had the usual contingent of stray cats and lots of dogs.
We walked through one village, where our tour guide translated some of the Arabic graffiti. Lots of children, some with shoes, some without, some dressed like mini-adults in robes and tailored jackets. Girls in dresses while their mothers, if out, wore head-to-toe black with only the eyes showing. One pair of boys asked us to take their picture, so we did, and we showed them the results on our screens. They were delighted.
We visited Dar al Hajar (the Rock Palace), an amazing structure atop a breathtaking rock, which once housed the imam and his four wives.. While we imagined life in this tower at various points of time— seeing the bedrooms, the food storage, the grain mill, classic colored glass— from the windows of our perch we could watch the village below. Laundry hanging on one rooftop, a man harvesting khat/qat/ghat, people playing drums and dancing in the courtyard.
We also went to Bayt Baws, an ancient Jewish settlement deserted when the Jews there emigrated to Israel. Amazing to see from a distance, even more breathtaking from the narrow rocky paths within. People, I suppose you’d refer to them as squatters, live there now. While the climate in Yemen is delightfully temperate and not as humid as Djibouti, I found myself struggling through Bayt Baws. I supposed at the time that I was a touch dehydrated, but then my breathing started giving me trouble. My companion pointed out that the asthmatic sensation I was experiencing was probably altitude sickness since we went from the lowest point in Africa to 2200 meters above sea level.
From here, we returned to the old city and the suq. The meandering passageways of this market contained everything from food to clothes, black robes for the women and craftsmen. I saw blacksmiths, silversmiths, carpenters, those who made jewelry, souvenir sellers, coffee and spice dealers… everything.
After freshening up at the hotel, we headed into modern Sana’a for lunch. We ate at a large restaurant where the food was on display and one merely had to select a dish. I think my companion M and I would both say that the food delighted us. He had chicken with a saffron rice unlike any saffron rice I have ever tasted. You could taste the saffron flavor and a note of clove that really made it come alive. Yemen is a hand-eating culture, so it is expected to wash your hands before and after the meal. Luckily, with my right hand (the eating hand) out of commission, my meal came with a plastic spoon. My chicken had an incredible blend of spices, including curry and just tasted so perfect I could not even try to discern the ingredients.
The restaurant spanned several floors. It had an outdoor terrace, some curtained booths for conservative families needing to maintain their privacy and on the top floor a communal eating area with lots of windows. Golden upholstered seats complemented the rich purple striped tablecloth that the staff covered with plastic for easy cleaning.
We had another round of travels through the suq, where our guide lavished us with gifts: a keychain, coffee, and a scarf. I don’t think I’ve removed my scarf since I received it, but that could be due to the difference in temperature between the United States and Djibouti.
We sat with the men in a coffee house. We were the only white people there and I felt awkward as the only woman, but no one cared. The laughter and discussion continued despite our appearance. We sat together on benches, everyone crowding together as someone else came. Definitely my favorite moment of the day. Sipping piping hot sweetened tea from a small glass.
Our final stop took us to a rooftop in Old Sana’a of what our guide referred to as a business hotel. We took the elevator to the eighth floor I believe, removed our shoes and entered a lounge. We climbed out a window and found ourselves on a narrow terrace with only a couple bricks between us and the drop. We chatted out there for quite some time then went to the restaurant. M and I were stuffed from lunch, so we had juice and water while our host had french fries. We watched the sunset over Sana’a while someone smoked hookah beside us and a woman asked what had happened to my hand.
At that point, we returned to the hotel and rested before our return flight to Djibouti.
M wanted to know what I thought at various points during the day and I told him he’d have to wait. I knew between the altitude sickness (and a bloody nose), and I’d stumbled in the suq and scraped an elbow, and a child had kicked a ball into my broken hand, that my initial impressions of Yemen were emotional. But at one point, as I sat in a hotel courtyard waiting for my companion and guide to return from a rooftop, I watched the everyday rhythm around me and couldn’t believe my good fortune.
The men sat in a small room chewing qat and smoking cigarettes, their shoes on a mat outside. The woman of the household stepped out in her long black robe, jeans poking from the hem, and returned later with a shopping bag. A boy appeared in the gate, a man encouraged another boy into the street with a ball, the universal parenting maneuver of “go outside and play.” An older man with a can hobbled to a table, a young child, at the elder’s bidding, retrieved a beverage for him.
Universal.
Tourism is a blend of meeting people, sharing the sameness, and allowing another place to show its beauty and its treasures.
(Our visas and travel arrangements via Arabian Voyages Travel, www.ArabianVoyages.com)
I recently spent the day in Yemen. Not something your average American would contemplate doing these days. It’s not even something simple to do as the embassies here in the United States won’t issue tourism visas. In order to go, you have to find a travel agency to sponsor you and do the paperwork for entry visas and receive your full visas upon arrival at the airport.
We visited Sana’a, Yemen, as a break from our travels in Djibouti. Our host was Arabian Voyages Travel (www.ArabianVoyages.com). We literally spent a day. An unfortunately timed day as an American drone strike had happened about 48 hours before coloring some Yemeni opinions about Americans and our foreign policy.
My friends used words like ‘courageous’ and ‘brave’ when discussing my plans. I wondered if ‘naive’ and ‘stupid’ might be a better fit. The Yemen day trip was completely the brainchild of my traveling companion who thought 1. a week in Djibouti could get monotonous (he was wrong, I think I could stay there forever) and 2. I needed to see old Sana’a, one of the oldest living cities in the world inhabited for about 2500 years (he was right).
Air Yemenia proved to have the smoothest flight out of the multiple plane trips I took that week. I have issues with my ears and the pressurization of aircraft and Air Yemenia caused me the least discomfort. Plus, they provided a light meal service on a flight only 45 minutes long. Those flight attendants really hustled.
Our entry into Yemen went smoothly, and our guide, Mohammed, met us at the airport door. It was about 11 p.m. so I don’t think the reality of culture shock had set in, though the difference in language intimidated me. In Djibouti, one hears French, Arabic, Somali and occasionally English. Yemen was the first place I ever visited where I did not speak the language.
We climbed into a small white taxi, listening to local music as we drove through Sana’a. Mohammed passed us each a bottle of cold water as he and my companion discussed our visit, the recent drone strike and kidnappings. It was during that car ride that it was suggested that if anyone spoke to us, we should claim to be Canadians. Just in case. We were also not to go anywhere alone, as the travel agency would vouch for our whereabouts upon exiting Yemen.
My companion had warned me that Yemeni’s never sleep. Sure enough, even at such a late hour, the shops of the city were lit. Haircuts were in process. Groceries being procured. It was probably more fully alive than Manhattan would be at a similar hour. We drove into old Sana’a and the electricity was out. The old buildings became an unlit maze connected by narrow streets. We entered a gate, walked through a courtyard, and found ourselves at a quaintly lit reception desk.
From there we climbed stone stairs of unequal height to what would be in the United States the fourth floor. The door to our room resembled a cross between something from a castle and a submarine as we and to step up and duck at the same time to get inside. We opened the windows and shutters to get some air. A single fluorescent bulb powered by a generator lit the room. Even with such dim lighting, the room gleamed with high ceilings and stained glass windows. The car headlights from the street below danced on the ceiling in a kaleidoscope pattern.
I collapsed into bed. My traveling companion picked up the English language leaflets on Islam for nighttime reading. He read some of it aloud until finally the light went dead, some unseen figure had declared bedtime.
We could see nothing but darkness and shadow from the window. I finished my water from the car ride and stared at the missing view. The sounds of life out there matched those of any other city and I knew in the morning there would be an amazing view upon waking.
Our first wake-up call came with the early call to prayer. I had grown accustomed to them in Djibouti but here… It sounded like the mosque was right outside our room. My traveling companion closed the windows, as it was not quite dawn, and we went back to sleep.
When the sun bathed our room, we stirred. I again stared out the window. The buildings, so old, stood like sandcastles decorated with icing.
We dressed (I fashioned a hijab) and went down for breakfast in a different courtyard. The meal consisted of local bread (like a cross between a pita and an English muffin), a couple varieties of cheese, butter, jam, tea, and yogurt with the best, richest, most vibrant honey I’d ever eaten. The other patrons of the hotel were European. A family including two children. I’ve forgotten whether they were Slovenian or Armenian or something else.
If I had been nervous about visiting Yemen, it faded.
More about our tourism later…
Yesterday we traveled to Yemen, courtesy of Arabian Voyages Travel. We arrived in the middle of the night Thursday (seeing a variety of shops still open as we breezed through town) and left 24 hours later. I had no idea what to expect of Sana’a. I have never really studied Arab culture except in the context of French colonialism.
We were sponsored for travel by our agency, and we acquired our visas with no difficulty or delay. When we got into the taxi with our guide, he handed us each a bottle of cold water. At that moment, despite the proximity of the American drones and the warnings you hear about traveling in a conservative Muslim country, I felt immediately at ease. I also realized, after several days now in a land where heat is stifling and water limited, that if you offer me a cold bottle of water I will trust you implicitly. More on that later. Now back to Djibouti.
This morning, we went to bed at 2:30 a.m. (midnight flight) after a disappointing attempt to FaceTime with the family. I had hoped to use the hotel internet to contact them, but when planning to get the family together at a certain time, my American sensibilities did not factor that the outside area where M smokes as I play with wi-fi doubles as a bed for one person and the other place where internet is available, the lobby, also serves as a sleeping space for the person working the desk. The man outside slept on two tables pushed together with a flattened cardboard box as a mattress.
So, M and I woke about 8 a.m. to find the hotel out of coffee and croissant. We sat there with our Lipton tea and bread and the server went to the store for croissant. We then headed to Bunna House for coffee. We had heard yesterday from a cab driver that everyone knows the two white people who’ve been tooling around town. The coffee house (bunna is a green coffee that they roast, as the young woman at the Ethiopian restaurant showed us) was full of a wide range of people. At this point the staff knows us and smiles as we head in every day at some point.
Next came the ATM machine. I had been having issues getting money. It declined my requests. So a local explained to us that you have to use Fast Cash. You cannot enter your own amounts. Today, I used the Djiboutian Franc fast cash button. AND IT WORKED! I felt like I had played in Atlantic city and won (even though I completely understand it was my money the machine spit out).
We did some shopping. That in itself is an experience. For clothing, there is a pile of inventory on the table. If you don’t see what you want, the shopkeeper pulls out this giant plastic bag and starts piling his additional inventory on top of the table. If you still don’t see what you want, you tell him and he will go look for it.
I also needed stamps. The tourist office instructed us to visit the tabac. Weaving our way into a crowded group of coffee drinkers, we came to a high wooden counter where an old African woman, shriveled with gold teeth, sat at a desk with her cash box making change as quickly as her long, bent hands could do it. When we asked for stamps, once the crowd thinned, she crossed to the counter. Opening a big drawer, she rummaged within and pulled out a small plastic bag with Djiboutian francs and two stamps. She carefully unknotted the plastic. She pulled out the stamps, which had been stored decorative side in. She warned us that these were not for letters, only postcards. We paid 100 francs each for the two stamps, face value 70.
Stamps found, we went for juice at Cafeteria Sana’a. We also do this every day. Ginger is my favorite, but since our arrival the first day, there has been no ginger. It’s also a place where they have grown to know us. The juice— I got cantaloupe again— comes in a frosted mug and hits the spot when the humidity has all but melted you into a puddle.
M and I don’t design many plans for our travel, but we always develop certain routines. There’s something about a daily trip to the juice bar or an evening stop for coffee that allows me to watch the city and find a place for myself in its rhythm.
