My trip over to Yemen went as well as one could hope for a two-day and one-night string of flights. On my overnight flight from Atlanta to Germany I didn’t sleep very well, but I got to listen to an endless loop of Mozart’s greatest hits, celebrating the 250th anniversary of his birth. Have I mentioned how much I love my Bose noise canceling headphones? They make a whale of a difference and I highly recommend them for anyone who has to spend any significant amount of time on those noisy airplanes. Anyway, the ride over the North Atlantic was bumpy the whole way – when I woke up as we were landing I noticed the odor of many filled airsickness bags and at least one missed – I was relieved to deplane. Going through Germany was new for me, and I now have a Germany stamp in my passport. From Frankfurt we went through Cairo on our way to Sana’a; I’ll tell you, it really brought back memories (which I’ve documented below.) Finally I arrived at the airport there in Yemen where they didn’t know what to do with the fact that I already had a visa in my passport – I think they’re used to just selling foreigners a visa on the spot rather than us having one before hand. They tried a couple of times to send me over to visa sales window, but I kept showing them the visa that I got Washington DC and eventually they found a guy in the back who knew enough to let me through after I explained to him that I was with the World Bank. By then it was nearing midnight and there were no taxis out at the front curb of the airport – which was a bit disconcerting. I finally found a taxi stand out on the far side of the parking lot. The lone cabbie was asleep and his friends had to bang violently on the windows to wake him up, at which point I wasn’t sure I wanted to ride with him after all. Then the car wouldn’t start, so his friends had to give us a push start. And then, as soon as we were rolling, the gasoline light on his dashboard came on – his gauge showed empty. Oh joy. But we did make it to the hotel OK after all. Whew!
As sleepy as I was that night, and as excited as I was to stretch out in a real bed, I couldn’t sleep very well; the nine hour time difference was insurmountable that first night. But, bright and early the next morning, I got a wake-up phone call from Jahid – our group was up and ready to hit the road and waiting for me. Oh joy. Our group consisted of Jahid (our GIS tech from Bangladesh), Amin (our Yemeni GIS tech), Ali (our hired driver who was packing heat – it looked like a .45), and Faisel (our “guide” from the ministry.) So I crawled out of bed, showered, ate a quick bite, re-packed, and we hit the road. Along the way, Faisel told me that he’d studied in Poland and that I looked Polish so I must be Polish – I guess I could try on Jackowski as a name. We drove about 200km south of Sana’a to Ibb, where we turned off the main road and drove another 50km over bumpy dusty roads to visit part of our proposed pilot project; I’ve got to say that the area we visited was so sparsely populated that I couldn’t imagine that the project would be viable. From time to time I found that I needed to translate the English between the Yemenis and our Bengali – the accents were too different for them to understand each other sometimes. That night we slept at a local hotel in Ibb; it was surprisingly nice, but non-air conditioned so it was really warm. Again, jetlag kept me from getting much sleep that second night in-country.
Dark and early Saturday morning I was startled awake an hour before dawn by the call to prayer – oh yeah, I’d forgotten. After I’ve been in a Moslem country for a while I find that I can sleep right through it. Bright and early on Saturday morning it was up and back at ‘em again, bouncing over more dusty bumpy back roads. “Praise the Lord and pass the Dramamine” is my motto. These areas were better populated, so maybe on the whole the project will be viable. Everywhere we went we were warmly received. At the end of the road we ate lunch with one of the local utility managers at his ancient home; the meal was served Yemeni style, like a big picnic on the floor where everyone eats out of common dishes with their hands. The food was tasty, but I suffered some intestinal distress on the ride home. I had to get the driver to find me a toilet – he said that it would be “Arabic-style” – I told him that in an emergency I was Arabic too. And speaking of fluctuating nationalities, at all of the checkpoints our Yemeni companions said yadda yadda Bengali yadda Kennedy yadda yadda. I couldn’t figure out why they were introducing me as a member of the Kennedy family, but later they explained that they were presenting me as a Canadian to avoid all of the red-tape and armed escorts required by the American embassy. I guess I can’t argue with that logic.
That night, back in Sana’a, safe and sound and with a bathroom right in my hotel room, I relaxed in front of the Soccer World Cup matches. I was glad not to be living in Bolivia anymore where people are actually aware that the US team made such a very poor showing. We came into the tournament as the 5th ranked team in the world and then promptly got annihilated 3-0 by Czechoslovakia and then eliminated in the first round.
The next day we spent our day working in our office down in the basement of the Ministry of Electricity building; it was very peaceful and quiet – I think we were the only people working in the whole building. We stayed at work in the office until about 7:00PM, when we headed over to Old Sana’a to find the Kashmir scarves that my wife wanted me to bring home. Amin, our Yemeni, showed me a place outside of Old Town, but they didn’t have what we wanted. So I took him and Jahid to the place that I had found before (after scouring the whole of Old Town on a previous excursion) and we got what we wanted there. I found nearly all of the colors that we wanted – I think they look nice – and got a really good price on the lot (with brutal negotiating help from Jahid and Amin.)
On my last day I was to present a half-day seminar on everything that a power engineer should know about designing power systems – twenty years of information condensed down into four hours. The thing was supposed to start at 9:00AM, which is a good hour before most Yemenis show up for work, and go until 1:00PM, a good hour after most Yemenis knock off work. So, of course we started over an hour late – so I rushed through the material and we got through, on time, at 1PM. We had decided that Amin should help me with translation into Arabic, since almost no one speaks English, but he didn’t understand the technical points himself and couldn’t begin to communicate them, so we bagged that. That night I headed back to the airport and started my trip home, condensed into one 36-hour day (since we were traveling west, chasing the sun.) Whew!
As sleepy as I was that night, and as excited as I was to stretch out in a real bed, I couldn’t sleep very well; the nine hour time difference was insurmountable that first night. But, bright and early the next morning, I got a wake-up phone call from Jahid – our group was up and ready to hit the road and waiting for me. Oh joy. Our group consisted of Jahid (our GIS tech from Bangladesh), Amin (our Yemeni GIS tech), Ali (our hired driver who was packing heat – it looked like a .45), and Faisel (our “guide” from the ministry.) So I crawled out of bed, showered, ate a quick bite, re-packed, and we hit the road. Along the way, Faisel told me that he’d studied in Poland and that I looked Polish so I must be Polish – I guess I could try on Jackowski as a name. We drove about 200km south of Sana’a to Ibb, where we turned off the main road and drove another 50km over bumpy dusty roads to visit part of our proposed pilot project; I’ve got to say that the area we visited was so sparsely populated that I couldn’t imagine that the project would be viable. From time to time I found that I needed to translate the English between the Yemenis and our Bengali – the accents were too different for them to understand each other sometimes. That night we slept at a local hotel in Ibb; it was surprisingly nice, but non-air conditioned so it was really warm. Again, jetlag kept me from getting much sleep that second night in-country.
Dark and early Saturday morning I was startled awake an hour before dawn by the call to prayer – oh yeah, I’d forgotten. After I’ve been in a Moslem country for a while I find that I can sleep right through it. Bright and early on Saturday morning it was up and back at ‘em again, bouncing over more dusty bumpy back roads. “Praise the Lord and pass the Dramamine” is my motto. These areas were better populated, so maybe on the whole the project will be viable. Everywhere we went we were warmly received. At the end of the road we ate lunch with one of the local utility managers at his ancient home; the meal was served Yemeni style, like a big picnic on the floor where everyone eats out of common dishes with their hands. The food was tasty, but I suffered some intestinal distress on the ride home. I had to get the driver to find me a toilet – he said that it would be “Arabic-style” – I told him that in an emergency I was Arabic too. And speaking of fluctuating nationalities, at all of the checkpoints our Yemeni companions said yadda yadda Bengali yadda Kennedy yadda yadda. I couldn’t figure out why they were introducing me as a member of the Kennedy family, but later they explained that they were presenting me as a Canadian to avoid all of the red-tape and armed escorts required by the American embassy. I guess I can’t argue with that logic.
That night, back in Sana’a, safe and sound and with a bathroom right in my hotel room, I relaxed in front of the Soccer World Cup matches. I was glad not to be living in Bolivia anymore where people are actually aware that the US team made such a very poor showing. We came into the tournament as the 5th ranked team in the world and then promptly got annihilated 3-0 by Czechoslovakia and then eliminated in the first round.
The next day we spent our day working in our office down in the basement of the Ministry of Electricity building; it was very peaceful and quiet – I think we were the only people working in the whole building. We stayed at work in the office until about 7:00PM, when we headed over to Old Sana’a to find the Kashmir scarves that my wife wanted me to bring home. Amin, our Yemeni, showed me a place outside of Old Town, but they didn’t have what we wanted. So I took him and Jahid to the place that I had found before (after scouring the whole of Old Town on a previous excursion) and we got what we wanted there. I found nearly all of the colors that we wanted – I think they look nice – and got a really good price on the lot (with brutal negotiating help from Jahid and Amin.)
On my last day I was to present a half-day seminar on everything that a power engineer should know about designing power systems – twenty years of information condensed down into four hours. The thing was supposed to start at 9:00AM, which is a good hour before most Yemenis show up for work, and go until 1:00PM, a good hour after most Yemenis knock off work. So, of course we started over an hour late – so I rushed through the material and we got through, on time, at 1PM. We had decided that Amin should help me with translation into Arabic, since almost no one speaks English, but he didn’t understand the technical points himself and couldn’t begin to communicate them, so we bagged that. That night I headed back to the airport and started my trip home, condensed into one 36-hour day (since we were traveling west, chasing the sun.) Whew!
1 comment:
That is a very nice picture.
Post a Comment