Yemen on my mind
From time to time — I am not sure why — I have intense flashbacks of Yemen, where I spent perhaps the most memorable stays of my life. I visited it often between 2005 and 2015, traveling around the country from the ancient cities of San’aa, Dhamar, Ibb, Ta’izz and al-Mukallah to the remote villages and fortresses atop the mountains. The people and the culture left a deep mark on me, and so did the architecture and the landscape. It is the one part of the Middle East where the most ancient manifestations of an original Arabian civilization express themselves the most vividly, without noticeable Greek, Egyptian, Roman, Persian, Ottoman or now ubiquitous Western influences.
I found these pictures on a Facebook page dedicated to Yemen (Mahdi al-Dubaybi’s page). Most of the pictures are from villages and towns in the mountain provinces of San’aa, Raymah and al-Mahwit, incuding of the towns of Haraz, al-Mahjabah, and Dar al-Hajar, which was the residence of the last Imam of Yemen before the 1962 revolution.
Edouard: Wasn’t the founder of the Dahman al Shahwan strain from Yemen?
best
Bruce Peek
Yes he was, and you can see it from his poetry
Gosh, look at that waterfall! And those high, rocky strongholds, especially the one above the clouds! What’s grown on the terraces? Date palms? Sorghum?
Wonderful, fantastic architecture, so in tune with its surroundings. Even after seeing many photos of Yemen, these are much more revealing. And to think that it is being pounded to rubble by proxies for powers that should be tending to their own issues. Just sickening. I hope the people can survive.