Food and Housing

Wednesday 4 October 1972

Last evening one or two things were explained to me about the food.  The gist of the letter I was given by the Ministry of Education was that the governor personally will pay me out of the provincial funds which he controls, rather than by the local education office.  He is also to arrange a house.  While he is not here, I am to receive 300 riyals worth of food from the palace kitchen and 100 riyals of pocket money, or I can have some or all of the 300 riyals and buy my own food at a restaurant or cook it myself.  I've told themn I would like to cook my own breakfast and dinner and have the palace lunch, which is what the German-trained doctor does.

As for housing, the room in the palace is a temporary arrangement.  However, there are housing problems in Hajjah, and it is envisaged that I shall stay here some time, although they are aware that a house would be preferable.  The other teachers are being lodged at the education office (which is actually another formerly royal building) until their house or houses are ready. 

The German-trained doctor is really helpful and helps by translating between German and Arabic for me when thinkgs get a bit too complicated.  Tomorrow he will take me to the market to show me the best shops for buying food from.  The other teachers are helpful, but they are as new here as I am and don't really know their way around.  The director of education, Abdullah Ali Anash, is very helpful too.

the fruit market in Hajjah

Last thing last night was that when I went back to my room the paraffin pressure lamp which the palace man had lit for me had gone out.  I made  bit of a hash of trying to re-light it and ended up breaking the mantle.  The lamp is called an "itreek" which is from "electric" (though it isn't).  A primus stove is called a "baramoos", which is the closest they can get.

This morning I went to the education office and had a look at the English teaching books they are using.  They are pretty dire - they are from Iraq, and the very first lesson of the first book has words like "knife", which I hope I don't have to teach as "kanife".  Then we went to have tea at the local restaurant which is called the "boofiya". 

The boofiya is in the middle of this picture.

Some more first impressions, etc

Tuesday 3rd October, 1972

Ismail came round at quarter to nine yesterday and asked why I wasn't at the school, but it turned out that school is definitely starting on Saturday.  I spent the morning at the education office sorting out paperwork.  Most of the other teachers who are here so far were there too - mostly about my age, and very friendly and helpful.

I was told that a truck loaded with arms to take to Qa'tabah on the border with the south fell off the road from Hajjah yesterday, and the driver was badly injured.

After the Education Office I went over to the hospital to get the water treatment pills that the German-trained doctor had offered.  His name is Ahmed Abbas.  On the way back towards the palace he pointed out the main water reservoir of the town, which apparently is the principal source of bilharzia in the town.  There was a project to pump the water out of it into some sort of filter plant, but nothing has come of that yet.

Hajjah seems ready for modern development.  When the new road to Hodeidah is finished, and electricity and water plants have been built, it will be quite an important community.  In Sanaa - and as far as I know, in Hodeidah - there is no municipal piped water system, and people pump up water from wells.

This afternoon the man who looks after the palace, Ahmed Shawsh, suggested that I go down to the palace's large majlis downstairs.  When I got there, he said that someone wanted me to visit them in their house, but I wasn't very clear who.  He took me to a very rough house on the edge of the suq, where I was left in a small room with an ancient woman who was smoking a hubbly-bubbly and whom I could only half understand (well, perhaps less than that).  It turned out that she was the mother of the palace Ahmed, and he shortly came back with some children who belonged to the baker who owns the house.  We stayed there for about 20 minutes and then went back to the palace majlis.

When we sitting there an old man about 70 came in - I think his name is Hajj Hamud.  He turned out to have a surprisingly detailed knowledge of the countries of Europe - including knowing that Scotland was part of Britain - though the countries he described were the ones on old maps.  He had been a bandsman in the Ottoman Turkish army and could hum - in an oriental sort of way - some Scottish tunes, and the British and German national anthems.  He came out with a continuous stream of jokes, using enormous hand and face gestures, leaving everyone in stitches.

 Hajj Hamud, who was in the Ottoman army, is on the left

Later on I went with one of the teachers to see the place where the lorry had fallen off the road - at the first bend in the road as it left Hajjah, it turned out.  It had rolled over and landed upside down a couple of terraces below the road.  Someone told me that was lucky - another vehicle had gone off the road at the same point some time before and rolled several hundred feet to the bottom of the valley and all the people in it were killed.

And now I have sorted it out - Hajjah was a Republican stronghold in the middle of a Royalist area.