Travelling North (Part Two)
Trip Start
Oct 13, 2005
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4
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Trip End
Dec 22, 2006
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Shihara,
Yemen
Sunday, October 23, 2005
Okay, so we've now got to Friday morning and we've finished our trip to Sa'ada, the supposedly dangerous part of Yemen - we weren't there that long and we did have a secret policeman following us around just in case, but at no stage during our time there did we feel unsafe or even uncomfortable.
So, next stage was to reach a military checkpoint south of Sa'ada where we would pick up our military escort for our trip into the tribal dominated mountains atop of which was our intended destination of Shihara. I was rather excited about this as I had seen what they entailed and thought there was something rather cool about having to have a military escort. Once we picked up our escort - consisting of about eight armed army officers aboard an army-issue pick-up truck complete with some kind of gatling gun (like one step down from what you see on top of tanks) - we headed to a traditional tribal village not far from the checkpoint, which was very interesting. It was the first time in Yemen that I'd seen the traditional village way of life - a real throwback to times that you would not expect still to find, and a very primitive culture to boot. We did not stay long as our presence was perhaps not too welcome from the locals.
However, while there one of the army officers obviously noticed me staring like a child at his Kalashnikov, and offered for me to hold it so I could pose for a picture. So, there I was holding a fully loaded Kalishnikov rifle in my arms, aviators donned, posing for a photo.
Shihara 01
It was quite an experience holding a real rifle, especially one as classical as the Kalashnikov, and especially one that I knew was fully loaded. The Italian Stallion took my picture but said afterwards that he wasn't sure if he'd taken it correctly - that damned red-eye delay function, it better not have screwed up my prized picture! A few hours further down the road we stopped for petrol and I took the chance to wander into a nearby field where some camels were standing about and I took a few pictures, being careful not to get to close as I understand them to be quite dangerous. Upon my return to the car another of the officers, having observed my previous pleasure at holding the Kalashnikov, ushered me onto the back of the army pick-up truck so that I could get my photo taken pretending to fire the big-ass anti-tank machine gun. This thing was immense and the bullets were scarily huge. Another one for the photo album for sure!
Pretty soon we'd left the smooth road and had entered Shihara wadi (valley) on a bumpy track that would lead us to the foot of the mountains. At the time we thought this road was encredibly bumpy and Veronica and I were laughing about it as we were thrown about in our positions in the back row of the Land Cruiser. However, after about an hour we reached our stop-point and transferred into the vehicle that was to get us to the top of the mountain. Honestly, looking at this thing I could not envisage how it would succeed, but we were soon on our way in this old 4x4 Toyota pick-up truck, the automobile equivalent of a mule.
Shihara 010
We soon realised what a bumpy 'track' really felt like as we slowly but surely ascended the mountain at impossibly steep angles. The trip up took about 3 hours and we literally never got out of first gear. Also, I've never known being a passenger to be a form of excercise, but by the time we were at the summit of Shihara, we were absolutely exhausted and aching just from the effort of holding on for dear life for hours on end!
Shihara was stunning - it is an entire stone-built city comprising different villages atop an 8000 foot mountain. It was built by the Turks during Ottoman rule, as was its famous and eponymous bridge which connects two mountains at their summit. The hotel was suitably basic, but you don't expect the Hilton at the top of a Yemeni mountain. Despite its inaccessabilty, they had still managed to get enough electricity up there to boom out the call to prayer in the middle of the night, so there was no reprieve on that front!
That evening we took a short walk around the village in which we were staying, taking in the breathtaking scenery. It was incredible just how green and fertile this mountainous landscape was, and, upon enquiring what was grown on this cultivated hillside, I was unsurprised to find out it is exclusively used for the growing of qat (the strongest kind too). The mountains were a beautiful contrast of brown and green, each unique from the next but at the same time complementing each other to create a vista that went as far as the eye could see, the burning sun shrouding it in a mythical haze.
Shihara 011
Apparently they are reminiscent of the Torra Borra mountains of Afghanistan - if this is true then Mr Bin Laden has a truely stunning garden to whichever cave in which he sits to concoct his next plan of evil! If I lived in a place this beautiful and awe-inspiring I think I would write poetry or something, not send tacky home videos to al-Jazeera! That night we ate another beautiful meal for iftar, then settled in the 'mafrage' (the social area of a home, normally found on the top floor of a building, consisting of floor mats and cushions) for the evening where we smoked a shisha and chewed some qat and just talked about life and politics. I really like Veronica and Sabina (the German girls) and had many insightful conversations with them during the trip - they both have similar Masters' to me and are out here with the exact same rationale. That said, they, like Sumiyo, fulfilled their own national stereotype of efficiency by complaining at several opportunities about the somewhat improvised schedule of our trip by Abdul the guide. I'll try to stay close to them while I'm out here (they live in a different building), and we're talking about possibly arranging a trip to Hadhramaut during Eid in a couple of weeks.
Before I went to bed I went to the roof of the hotel to look at the stars. This was utterly amazing - I have never seen so many stars in the sky before, nor have they ever appeared so large or bright. Yemen is fairly close to the equator and we were 8000 feet above sea level, so we really did have the night-sky in its full splendour. You could barely find a clear section of sky, the stars competing for every last space. You felt so close to the sky that you could almost reach up and grab the stars in you hand.
After another sleepless night (a combination of qat, snoring and, this time, sleeping on a stone floor), we headed in the morning to Shihara bridge. This was an incredible arched stone bridge joining two moutains 8000 feet in the sky. Looking at it at first you simply see its simple beauty. Then after a moment you start to wonder how the hell one goes about building such a thing in such a place. We took a few pictures, then headed back to the hotel where we psyched ourselves up for the bumpy, painful, and scary ride back down the mountain.
That concluded the trip, the rest was an uncomfortably long drive back to Sana'a in the blistering heat (no air-con in the car). Once back I realised I'd not applied my sun cream very well that morning and now have random strips and patches of red on my face and arms, so I kind of look stupid (more so than usual). I even got sunburnt on my hand - honestly, who gets burnt on their hand for God's sake!?
Anyway, this concludes my first excursion outside Sana'a, and also this familiarly long and tiresome email. Hope you're still reading.
Until something else interesting happens to write about, I'll say 'ma'a salaama'.
Tom
