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Saturday 2007-04-07 - Sey’un, Yemen
French fries for dinner
The road to Sey’un now curves around the mountains on our right, and we’re in a different valley of the Wadi Hadramawt area. It’s the main valley of the Wadi Hadramawt river, a very wide and flat area here, flanked on both sides with table mountains formed by water draining into the valley — a fertile area in the middle of the desert. Along the way, we make a short photo stop to take pictures of old Shibam — from a distance; tomorrow we’ll return to visit the town.
The Al Ahqaf hotel in Sey’un is nice and comfortable, and within walking distance of the city center. After writing a bit, I find out that through some miscommunication I’ll have to go out for dinner alone: the others have either already gone out, or don’t want to have dinner at all. I head into town, and on the way meet some of the others just coming back; they give me some tips for where to find something to eat. French fries sounds good to me, and sure enough at the market place I find a man with a little stall selling french fries (called “chips” here, clearly inherited from the British occupation), and little samosas. A customer next to me translates when I ask what’s in the samosas: onions (pointing at them) — that sounds good to me and I order fries (the last!) and three samosas. A piece of newspaper at the bottom of a little plastic bag to soak up the fat, that’s how my food is packed, some salt put on it before it’s handed over to me. I walk quickly back to the hotel (it’s only 10 minutes or so), buy an alcohol-free beer in the lobby, and head up to my room, where I use the metal tray for the glasses as a make-shift plate. The food is still warm, and the samosas turn out to contain not onions but potatoes, but they’re very tasty.
