Dress Shopping in Sanaa

Tonight a few of us went dress shopping in downtown Sanaa. All the women here at the school have been invited to a women-only Yemeni celebration tomorrow and we were told we needed to dress for the occasion. After talking to women at the school, we discovered a few relatively surprising things. First of all, when the women here get "dressed up" for celebrations, they dress in western style clothing (only for other women to see, of course). Secondly, the "western style clothing" they wear is....ummm, well.....let's see. Let's start by saying the dresses are almost all very bright colors and mostly covered in some manner of sparkle - sequence, glitter, etc. Then imagine stores (mostly little shops) overflowing with dresses that are mostly over-the-top tacky. They range from the most showy prom style dresses to oversized can-can doll/ballet recital poofines (is that a word?) to what might possibly be the most slutty languerie-style "dresses" I have ever seen. Upon further conversation, we discovered that yes indeed, the more sparkling and over the top and the more skin you show at these things, the better. (Kinda funny for a culture where the women go out in public with only their eyes showing, wouldn't you say?) So we did it. We went into these dress shops - all staffed only by men of course - and bought dresses. I bought a little black sequenced dress with a gigantic gold flower sequence pattern, and gold stelletto heels with straps that wrap halfway up my legs. The entire outfit cost less than twenty bucks. Which is good cuz I would never wear in the states! lol I am ready to party Yemeni style. *shakes head* I am not girly enough for this. I am falling in love with this country but seriously someone let me wear jeans and a t-shirt without thinking such an outfit makes me look promiscuous, lol. As if I don't stand out enough already....

So I was excited to come back to the Middle East without blonde hair. For those of you who haven't seen me in a while, my hair is a deep red, almost maroon these days. I love it. And I was thinking, wonderful, I won't stand out as much without the blonde hair! I neglected to think about the fact that red hair is actually more uncommon here than blonde. Either makes people stare, but I can't tell you how many times I've been walking by a group of guys and even if they are respectful enough to not say anything to me, sometimes I still see them nudging each other and saying "Akhmar, akhmar" - "red, red." Oh well. Today before walking downtown a group of us were outside one of our buildings and a bunch of the Yemeni kids from the area were outside with a football. Somehow we all ended up playing a little game of football with them (as much as can be played in a narrow alleyway leading out to a street). Being very much ourselves, we yelled and cheered and ran after the boys and pulled our baltus up to our knees to kick the ball. In less than about two minutes, we had succeeded in creating a massive traffic jam from the cars who were just stopping to stare at the strange foreign women who were out playing with the kids. (Kids are very well loved and taken care of here by their parents, but the parents never "play" with them, at least not in public.) But the best part was this little old half-bent Yemeni man who stopped at the end of the alleyway. He started cheering with us, and stood there for the full time we played, helping us stop the ball from going into the street and smiling ear to ear watching the kids play. He also barked at the cars to get them to keep moving. It was really funny.

I continue to be impressed with the helpfulness of the people here. I often hear people talk about how they don't like other countries because they worry about getting ripped off when buying stuff or whatever. And yes, negotiations are part of life here, especially for foreigners. But I have to say that the people here have been very fair to us. While you might have to barter, at least they're doing it face to face. It's not like in big cities in the U.S., where you would have to worry about things like pickpockets or your purse getting stolen or a rented car broken into. That stuff doesn't happen here. If you buy something that is a little heavy, like a case of water, the shop owner will jump out his store window to carry it back for you, or summon a little boy running in the streets to come and help you. I say all of this not to try and romanticize the culture here (certainly there are things that I dislike as well), but to point out that so many of the stereotypes that the West has been fed are incredibly misplaced. I hope as you read these blogs you'll become a little more curious about this part of the world and be willing to look beyond the typical western news reports or political or religious stereotypes and see the people who are here. Sure there are still huge cultural differences. But you might be surprised at how much they are actually like you.