Still in Sanaa

 Monday November 6 1972

Still staying at Richard Jarvis's.  Yesterday saw a succession of dramas.  Mrs Bird (British Council) came round wanting to see Richard.  Her landlord was demanding more money, which put Richard into a sort of seething rage all morning.  Then at lunchtime Richard sacked his cook; and I heard that John B's cook, Hassan, had gone off at 3am to seek vengeance on a shaikh who had put his brother in prison  Apparently Richard and John had been to a place called Mahwit, where Hassan is from, a month ago, and a sub-shaikh reported to the main shaikh that the Europeans had been kissing the women.  Hassan's brother was flung into prison and chains put round his ankles, and a military guard was put on the village.  Hassan's brother was released two days ago and arrived in Sanaa late last Saturday.  Hassan went bonkers and set out at 3am to seek vengeance, leaving his wife and new child crying and John's house in total disarray.

More surprises followed.  Richard's cook, Sayyid, didn't accept his dismissal and came back to make supper, which I had at 8.15, though Richard was still out.  When he returned we went to John B's as the cannons for the end of Ramadan had started firing.  At about 11.30, just after we arrived, it started raining, apparently the heaviest rain they had had for the last 3 years.  Hassan hadn't after all been able to get a taxi to Mahwit because of the end of Ramadan and was settled behind the bar, drinking twice as much as everyone else.

After we had been at John's for a while Richard decided we should leave because he and JB and two others have been a rather compulsory invitation to visit someone at a place called Kawkaban for the next few days.  I shall stay at Richard's house until I leave Sanaa, whenever that is.

When we left JB's it was still raining, and the wadi that runs through the middle of Sanaa, where Richard had parked the Land Rover, was filling with water, flowing quite fast.  We paddled our way to the Rover and set off up the wadi into the cenbtree of Sanaa - but after about 1/4 mile the engine conked out in mid stream with water in the distributor.  It was too dark to do anything and too wet to walk home so we slept for a while.  Fortunately, after about 45 minutes it had dried enough for uys to resume our journey, and we got in at about 1.30.  It was a strange experience to be shipwrecked in the middle of Sanaa!