Yemen, a land of wonder, beauty and history. The realm of the Queen of Sheeba, the place that discovered coffee, the land the Romans called Arabia Felix, Happy or Lucky Arabia. When I had the chance to visit Yemen before the current civil war, it was like traveling back in time. I travel often to see historic buildings or historic centers, but in most cases even when beautifully preserved they sit amidst a very modern life. Yet, as I stepped through the large city gate into walled Sana’a, life inside the old town seemed to go on like it had done for hundreds, if not thousands of years.
There was the sim-sim camel, which walked in tight circles in a dim, tiny room, powering a gigantic millstone, grinding sesame seeds. The donkey market was bustling, with people checking the teeth of their prospective new beasts of burden. Vendors sold cactus fruit from wooden carts, and bakers prepared flat breads in enormous underground ovens. A little shack doubled as the key cutter’s workshop, where ancient-looking women held up keys the size of a man’s hand–keys to the large wooden gates that lead inside what are called the oldest skyscrapers in the world. Sana’a looked like the incarnation of a fairy tale ginger bread village, with its brown earth and mud buildings, several stories high and adorned with cream-colored designs around windows and edges.
According to UNESCO, Sana’a has been inhabited for more than 2,500 years and is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities on earth. In the 7th and 8th centuries it became a major centre for the propagation of Islam, and this religious and political heritage is reflected in the 103 mosques, 14 hammams and over 6,000 houses all built before the 11th century. Today, many of these ancient buildings have been reduced to rubble because of the ongoing civil war, and have been lost to history and any traveler who might have hoped to see them one day.
Despite its jaw-dropping beauty, Sana’a, and what little I saw of Yemen, were even before the current war two-sided. In the morning, the old town of Sana’a was bustling, filled with merchants, workers, shoppers, voices everywhere. But after lunch, the khat came out and a hush fell over the country, the same busy merchant turning into a ruminating, drugged being, holding his supply of khat leaves in one cheek, extending it comically.
Khat, a shrub that contains a narcotic substance likened to amphetamines, has been part of the Yemeni culture for hundreds of years. It was a social drug, indulged in at weddings and other gatherings. The drug was used maybe once a week, and mostly in the mountains where it grows. Today, it is estimated that 90 percent of men and a third of women chew khat regularly, and they are chewing the country into famine, drought and even more poverty.
Yemen is the seventh poorest country in the world, the poorest country in the otherwise well off Middle East. A country where, according to the World Food Program, the average life expectancy is below 64 years. About 18 million people, or 60 percent of the population, are food insecure, 8.4 million severely so. In 2017, the Human Response Plan showed that 3.3 million children and pregnant or nursing women were acutely malnourished, including 400,000 children under age five suffering from severe malnutrition.
Yet, the cultivation of khat is increasing by 12 percent each year, chosen over the cultivation of other desperately needed food sources because it sells well. Ironically, many say they chew the leaves to stave off hunger.
The country runs on khat, and the warring sides trade with each other, for a moment forgetting the war to feed the nation’s drug habit. According to the government, most families spend more money per day on khat than food (a bag, which is what a typical user goes through in a day, costs about $5). The worrying thing is not only the stupor and inactivity khat induces, but also that khat fields drain the very limited water resources in the country. According to the Public Authority for Agricultural Research and Extension, khat takes 38 percent of the total water used by the agricultural sector, double the amount of every other crop, draining the already sparse groundwater to desperate levels.
When I went outside Sana’a for a look at other towns and to experience the stunning Yemeni countryside, I saw not only fields of khat, but also the plastic bags the leaves are sold in covering every part of the towns, villages, roads, canyons, and countryside. Ubiquitous dust devils picked the bags up and swirled them through the air. Imagine a country of around 27 million people, with up to 70 percent of the population scattering at least one bag every day.
All this could not distract from what a rich and truly lucky Arabia this must once have been. Villages hung above canyons, towns reached up high with their tall mud buildings, at the time still well-nourished children ran through the streets, and residents welcomed foreigners. The food was tasty, the history plentiful, the sights awesome.
I had to go through regular armed check-points with a guard, as Yemen was even at the time volatile, but when I saw a wedding celebration by the incredibly beautiful Rock Palace, built in the 1700s, I was welcomed, despite being a woman and the dancers being men, and allowed to watch and take photos. People smiled, tried out their few words of English, and showed genuine interest in the few foreign visits they saw.
Yemen, and especially old Sana’a, is something I look back on in wonder. Desperately poor, littered, and dependent on a narcotic leaf, but also unique, hospitable, and simply stunning. I hope the war will end and normality can be restored, maybe a normality with more stringent controls on khat, so Yemen can pull itself up and restore its standing as Lucky Arabia.
