Sanaa - now you see, and you don't (May 6, 2009)

Sanaa, the capital of Yemen is marked by two things, one by it conspicuousness and the other by the exact opposite.

Sanaa claims to be the oldest continuously lived in city in the world (from around 600BC) but a few other cities in the Middle East make similar claims. What sets it apart though is that the down town area is contains almost exclusively Yemeni skyscrapers - built from traditional materials - mud, wood and straw - some of them stand 11 stories high and over 400 years old. There are so many that UNESCO declared the whole city a World Heritage Site. The architecture is unique and very impressive - tall, narrow buildings with mud brown walls and large decorative white plaster windows. The roads are very narrow which keeps traffic to a minimum, but doesn't stop drivers from driving like they are participating in a rally competition. The alleyways meander around the buildings, most ground floors are windowless, traditionally being the place where animals were kept at night, or shop fronts grouped together in areas depending on what they are selling but always with goods overflowing on to the street.

What you don't see in Sanaa, and for that matter, Yemen altogether, is women. There are a few here and there, but I went two weeks in Yemen without seeing a woman's face, which doesn't sound that strange, but imagine not seeing half the faces of people walking around you for a while - bizarre. Every woman I saw was completely covered in the big, black bag and with a veil as well - showing the eyes when they were feeling provocative, but often with another piece of material covering the eyes. Even women who work in the fields are completely covered, with only their eyes showing. I never saw a man and a woman touching, not even holding hands the whole time I was there.
Interestingly everyone in Yemen has satellite TV and they have access to programs from across the Arab speaking world - including from Egypt, where a majority of women don't even wear a veil, and from Lebanon - where woman weir the veil, but as a cloth to cover their entire bodies. But in the flesh, most men won't even see their wives face until they are married. A couple of young local guys I met explained to me that their parents were pressuring them to get married, and the process is as follows - mother and sisters find what they think is a suitable candidate, arrangements made to go to home of girl with mother,sister and father, in the presence of her father, and ask her questions - she is likely to remain veiled. Man then gets to say yes or no, enlightened men will inquire whether the woman agree to the marriage - most don't ask. Wedding date is arranged, and man has to get the dowry together - wedding is held early in the morning, and then all the men go to one tent to celebrate and all the women go to another. When I suggested it was a little sad that people didn't get to celebrate together, my new friends were perplexed - but why ? they asked. In a day and age when people have access to almost everything on the internet - access to the net is cheap and fast in Yemen, one gets the feeling that there must be a huge mass of very frustrated - both sexually and politically, young men and women, but I saw no sign of it. In fact there is the opposite - people are curious and surprised by the ways of others - a 12 year old boy I met asked if it was true that any man and women could go together in my country because he met a Korean couple who weren't married but lived together, so he presumed anyone could go with anyone else. Hard to tell what is more strange, what goes on in Yemen, or when the Yemenis think goes on elsewhere.