I went to the “Red” restaurant again today. I had been sitting for about 5 or 6 minutes when someone asked if I was American. I always answer in the affirmative and I’ve only gotten positive reactions. One time, a crazy homeless man wandered into the internet cafe I was using and asked if I was an American. When I said yes, he yelled for joy and started to scream that America was the best, praise be to Allah for bringing an American to Yemen, etc. He was ushered out, but he kept up his outburst outside until something else caught his attention… Anyway, the guy in the restaurant asked if I knew how to get a visa to visit the US. As I’ve mentioned before, this is the number one question I get. I have no idea how to do that, maybe I should find out so that I can stop disappointing people.:-) His daughter is a permanent resident in the US, but he is still having trouble getting a visa. Many people have told me that they were turned down even for tourist visas with no explanation given. We all know the reason, State doesn’t want to risk letting a terrorist through, so unless you’ve got ironclad character references, you don’t get to go…
As I was trying to flag down a dabob (a local mini bus) a guy pulled into the parking space next to me and told me that he hated this country. Yesterday I would have agreed with him, but today for whatever reason, I was in a better mood. He started to explain how the people were “bad” and that the country sucks. Of course he was in a Mercedes and speaking in English, so I bet he’s been to other places and has a decent frame of reference. I flagged down my dabob before we got very far in the conversation…
The meal was pretty good, it was different than the usual stuff I get because it had white rice! Now that may not sound like a big deal, but I do like rice a lot. Almost all of the rice here is cooked with cardamon (they put this in their tea too) and cloves. It tastes really exotic the first couple of times, but I got tired of it really quick. This restaurant is supposed to be a Syrian one, maybe that’s why I like it more than the others.:-)
Isaac
Yemen middle east