Qat and Pick Up Football Games

Hiyo all!

Well I survived my first qat chew yesterday, although I must admit my gums are a bit raw and my jaw is sore. Before I get to the qat chew though let me fill you in on what I'd been up to before that.

On Wednesday I had one lesson from 4pm-6pm which went well and then went out to dinner with Ryan, Tim and Ameen. We had some lively conversation, with Ameen explaining more about his wife and upcoming wedding. It turns out he has only met his wife once and during that visit she was fully covered. He has seen a picture of her though without her nikab on, pretty risque stuff! It is funny because Ameen is a devout Muslim yet he's opening to learning and talking about all types of things which I figured would make him uncomfortable. For instance Ryan was explaining to him that they use the word "bonk" in Britain as a substitute for saying you had sex with someone. It is funny because Ameen who is 25 giggles and is completely amused by this stuff. Anyway, after dinner Tim and I went back to the cafe that shows football and watched the first leg of Barcelona vs. Liverpool. The place was absolutely packed when we got there 15min before kick-off, with people sitting on the floor and standing up. While we were a bit far from the TV we got a good seat on the floor with excellent sight lines. The guy next to me was a hardcore Barca fan and ended up in my lap a couple of times when he would jump up when they had chances on goal. Overall though it seemed like more of the Yemenis were cheering either against Barca or for Liverpool (not sure which). We were the only non-Arabs in the place. It is great though because football is so popular world wide (except for the U.S. unfortunately), so everyone sort of bonds together when ever you are watching or playing with others.

As for Thursday, I got up early, got my usual egg, potato sandwich and tea, then went to class to make up my lesson from 10am-12pm. After the lesson I met up with Abdul Qader, a young guy who works at CALES and got a huge lunch with him before we went and bought our qat. It cost about 1200r for the qat ($6). When we got back to the house I watched it off and dried it. Then we headed over to this little room with cushions around the perimeter about a block away from school. There we met up with Crazy Mohammad and a few kids who hang out on the street in front of school. I must admit I wanted to spit the stuff out for at least the first hour because it has a bitter taste and I couldn't keep it on one side of my mouth so I kept swallowing pieces of it. Eventually though I got used to it and it started to accumulate into a ball on the side of my jaw. Once it balls up it becomes easier to keep in place, hence it is much less annoying and enjoyable. About 2 hrs in the effect started to kick in and I got this very focused, relaxed feeling. It was like I was in the 'zone'. It wasn't anything too crazy but it was definitely a good feeling. During the chew the Yemenis I was with started to argue about religion and at one point I got told that everyone except for Muslims were going to hell, including the Christians. Now I understand that this is a part of their religion, but it was humorous how non-chalantly they told me this after I had told them about 30min before that I was Christian. Like, "hey buddy, want to chew some qat, how are you doing?, Christians and all other religious groups are going to hell?, so what are your plans for dinner?".

I kept chewing until we went to a little dinner party at 7:30pm, so all in all I chewed for 5 hrs and got a nice big golf ball sized qat "wad" in my cheek before I was finished. When you see the pictures I'm sure everyone will be wooed by how sexy it looks to store a nice big green wad of qat in your jaw. Anyway, all in all, it was a fun experience and I would definitely do it again, just not on a regular basis, maybe once every two weeks or something.

As for the dinner party it was enjoyable. It was a random group of us in the mafraj and Marie (older French woman) and Barry (writer from Dublin who is working on short stories in Sana'a even though they have no relation to the country or the region). We had delicious tomato salad, fruit, bread and sweets. After we sat around the mafraj, which had a really nice view, and talked about a variety of things. I was talking to Eric, who I hung out with when I first got here and he was inspiring me to travel. He has actually been to almost every Middle Eastern nation except for Israel and Palestine (I think). He's leaving to go live, take classes and work in Cairo for a year next week. It is amazing how sheltered my perspective of traveling was. For instance, my dorm mate Tim from China back packed through 15 countries in Africa by himself. His roommate Ryan from Britain has been to Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Israel, Palestine, Pakistan and India. Not to mention a lot of others I've met who have traveled all about, mostly by themselves, with no structure or plan. So since I've gotten here my passion to not only travel throughout the region, but around the world has grown ten fold.

Back to my life though, around 2am I finally came down off the qat and was able to fall asleep. As for Friday, the excitement of the day came at 3pm when me and a bunch of the CALES guys headed over to the asphalt mini soccer field behind Ala Ahli field (where we played last week). There were a bunch of kids and adults already playing there but we managed to set up a formatted system of pick up football, where there were teams of six, and when one team scored, the other team stepped off and another team came on. It was much nicer playing on a small field because we actually got to play football instead of running around like chickens with our heads cut off on the big field versus an organized team. Overall I'd say we won about half of our mini games and it was a lot of fun. The Yemenis are quite friendly and easy going even when they are playing football, so it makes for a great atmosphere. I actually scored 3 out of our 4 goals, so I personally had a good showing. Now I'm about to head home and do some studying and prepare for another twenty hours of lessons before next weekend rolls around again.

Also I am going to start putting up a section about Yemeni life, culture, politics, etc starting with my next post. These will obviously be from my perspective so don't read too deeply into them. I've noticed though that I've already pretty much adapted/gotten used to being here but I want to keep filling you guys in on all the intricacies and differences of life in Sana'a so that section will help to do that.

Well I'm sure I've left a lot out but I feel like I'm getting carpal tunnel, plus it's getting late, so until next time, have a good one everybody.

Also I set up a new e-mail address: Hthe3rd@gmail.com because my QU one gets cluttered b/c I don't have time to check up on it. So if you want to hit me up, send an e-mail to that address.

Good Luck at New Englands everyone!

I'm out.