Last update: Monday, September 05, 2005

 
4,5 months on the road and back home shortly. This month we backtracked through Turkey and Greece slowly entering the western world again. When we arrived in Italy, western way of life suddenly hit us. Everything around us had the feel of 'rush' to us. People moved faster, talked faster, shopped faster, simply live faster. Incredible, but why the rush? Something we asked ourselves many times, knowing that we joined the western way of rushing 6 months ago.

We felt lost, being back in Europe. Feeling unable to adjust ourselves to the western way of life. A feeling mixed with the question 'why' do we want to get back home? The cold, the rain and the snow also made our arrival in western Europe not quite attractive. All together definitely not an appealing return. Maybe a lesson for the future, never return in autumn or winter after having lived in a sunny & warm climate for a few months.

Getting back home was a shock to us both. The sudden change of routine, the huge space of our home, the exorbitant luxury, and on and on. We felt like strangers in our own home and country. The hard realization that our journey was almost over, didn't make things easier.

With still 1,5 month to spend we kept ourselves focused with the planning and logistics of getting airlifted to Yemen. Not easy to switch to backpack style thinking after having spoiled rotten with our mobile home. But surprisingly we were ready quite quickly, the routine of travelling had changed our thinking considerably. Normally we would have seduced ourselves into an overkill of preparations.

Leaving again so quickly after having returned from such a long trip, it felt like the right thing to do. We felt strongly about experiencing Yemen, a country we've been trying to reach in the past months by road.

Afterwards our short stay at home felt like a dream. As if we've seen it happen in a movie. We experienced life at home from a distance, not actually being part of life in the Netherlands. A feeling of complete detachment.
Arriving in Yemen felt less odd than returning home. In a few days we've switched from a life on the road to a backpacker style way of life in Yemen.

This amazing country is definitely the pearl of the Arabic world. Untouched, unspoiled by western influences, deeply religious and heartwarmingly open minded people. Several times we had strong deja-vue's of our experiences in Nepal. A highly civilized country with a way of living that goes way back into history.

Yemen was also the first country we visited with a very recent history of war. We had to get used to being checked and rechecked at the many roadblocks. Moving around freely is difficult and sometimes dangerous but certainly not impossible. We learned to deal with this new reality relatively quickly. And even more important we didn't feel insecure for a moment. The past months in the Middle East somehow helped us quite a bit in understanding and dealing with this reality.

The concept of independent travelling is quite new to Yemeni people. Most tourists cruise the country in a tour group, transported in the well known Toyota Landcruiser. Several western tour companies have offices in Sana'a, the logistical base from which the groups are raced through the country. Consequently the smaller local tour organizations have a hard time in acquiring a piece of the action. Independent travelling might ease their existence in the future, resulting in a more fair share on the market. And from our point of view these smaller organizations might even be capable of providing closer contact and more adventurous experiences than the bigger ones.

Gathering objective information about local circumstances requires heaps of patience and takes lots of inquiries. We've experienced this while trying to judge the possibility of following the asphalt road between Sayun and Marib and thus saving us the hefty Bedouin tax for riding the desert (non paved) route. Information ranged from dangerous, impossible to mush mush kila (no problem). In the end we succeeded in taking the route with the help of our travel companion Ahmed. Judging the situation afterwards, our information on average was in the right direction. The route was slightly risky and the chance of having to pay our way out was 50-50.

Experiencing a split society where man and woman live almost separate lives was an experience on it's own. Neither in Jordan, Syria or Iran we've experienced such a strict separation. To us it added a mystical aspect to our journey. Seeing women wearing black veils in the streets of Yemen was simply an unprecedented sight. A closer look revealed a considerable influence of Yemeni women in society. Janine's experience at the female variant of a wedding can't be described in words. Yemeni women are very self aware and radiate confidence and decisiveness. A visit to a young Yemeni couple in their home confirmed our experience.

Shortly after our arrival in Yemen we felt we made the right decision to visit Yemen in the last 6 remaining weeks of our sabbatical. It has given us a view into a society we couldn't have created otherwise. Even with 5 months of travelling experience through the Middle East. One of our objectives to visit Yemen was to gather enough information to make a next visit easier, preferably with our own transportation.
Looking back at our stay this month we concluded that we would have made it through Yemen with our own transportation. It would have taken heaps of time to pass the many checkpoints without the knowledge and experience we have now.

But again a future trip to Yemen won't be a walk in the park, and things will change quickly in the future. In total we've seen two German cars on the road. The last one was in Marib trying to reach Sayun by asphalt road. They continued with a Bedouin escort taking the faster asphalt route, an expensive encounter for sure.

Yemen is ruled by local tribes. The central government has official power but the success of government ruling is heavily influenced by the commitment of the tribes. They are heavily armed and highly mobile with surprisingly modern Toyota Landcruiser. A new rule simply can't be forced upon them, the tribes have the power to reject such measures.
As independent travellers we had to deal with their influence too. Moving around freely in the desert is simply impossible even for Yemeni people. It's the territory of Bedouin tribes and it's impossible to go there without being noticed.

Being guarded by government funded tourist police definitely limited our options to interact with the local tribes. The walls of defense are simply too high. Trying to move around without government guards is virtually impossible too, nearly each roadblock will quickly produce a new set of guards. And not only as some form as protection, but also as a 2nd source of income. The soldiers wages are low, and on good days you can earn quite a bit of money by escorting groups of foreigners.

December 2000 has been a month filled with huge changes. The changes carried a huge emotional load, although we've only been away for only 4,5 months. So far Yemen has been the best country to end our trip with. Our experiences in the other Middle-East countries helped considerably to understand Yemen society even better. Our short stay at home made us realize that we might have changed in the past 5 months. A change which might have a big impact on how we are going to live our life's in the future.