The Arabic Alphabet (part 2)

Short vowels are not represented by letters, but long vowels are. So, for example, the name Mohammed is written MHMD, and Ahmed AHMD. There are signs for short vowels, written above or under the consonant, but they are not used very often. For reading the Quran, these signs are of utmost importance, though.
Long vowels can also be used as consonants, depending on the word. So the و can be pronounced as W or as U, and the ي can be pronounced as Y or as EE.
Another difficulty for learners of the alphabet is that each letter has several ways of writing it, depending on its place in the word. But, to make it all a bit easier again, Arabic does not use capital letters.

Picture (Old Sana'a Houses)

(photo by Eveline Kuhlman)

Houses in the Old City can be extremely narrow, as you can notice here.

The Media

Each TV channel here chooses a side: with or against. And consequently, they only show what they want the viewers to see. The TV channel called Suhail is clearly against, and the way they show this would be very funny if it werent' such a serious matter.

The whole day Sunday, they showed the same shots made at the student protest the day before, especially the injuries. We had to see them over and over again. I was watching with my neighbors, and we remarked that even at soccer matches there are casualties at times, so it's not all that surprising that there are injuries at a chaotic demonstration...
At an Aden demonstration, there had been some shootings. THe only interview that was conducted was with a maybe eight-year-old boy.
Interviewer: Were you afraid?
Boy (after a long silence): When they started shooting, I was afraid.
What does the TV channel imply? Something like 'poor boy - the soldiers have made him afraid'. Why didn't the interviewer ask him who had taken him there in the first place?!
There was also the camera that zoomed in on a broken window somewhere high up near the ceiling for more than half a minute. Just one little hole in this one window. What lesson could we learn from that? Well, when you shoot at a window, the glass breaks. Obviously.
Then we got to see a couple of minutes of the pro-demonstrations. A red circle was shown on the screen around a dagger that someone was wearing. These demonstrators, you should know, are mainly tribesmen. And all tribesmen wear daggers. We certainly had to laugh at these silly red circles.
The problem is the following, though. People outside Yemen may not know that wearing a dagger is a custom, so they think that this is a violent bunch of men, armed with knives. And thus, they get a negative picture of Yemeni people.
Since the demonstrations "with" are far more peaceful than the demonstrations "against", we mainly see the latter at international TV channels. Violence is news, after all.
Let me make myself clear. Everyone is free to form his own opinion, but at least the media should help in this by showing both sides in a neutral manner. It would also help to see some good interviews with reasonable people from both sides as to understand what drives them.
I'm glad I don't have a TV myself.
And I promise not to write about any demonstrations for at least a few blogs :)

The Arabic Alphabet (part 1)

The Arabic alphabet consists of 28 letters, some of which are similar in pronunciation to English letters, and some of which give the native English speaker hard times. Examples of difficult-to-pronounce letters are the ح, a kind of H from deep down the throat; the ع, a sort of scraping of the throat deep down; the ض, which is a kind of D pronounced as if you had your mouth full; the ظ, which has a sound somewhere between a T and a Z; and the ق, which sounds like an "exploding" K in the throat. The rolling R (ر) may also be a challenge!

Letters that are similar to English are, for example, the ب (B), ج (J as in jug), د (D), ز (Z), م (M), س (S), ش (SH), etc.

These are the letters of the Arabic alphabet (Arabic is written from right to left):
أ – ب – ت – ث – ج – ح – خ – د – ذ – ر – ز – س – ش – ص – ض – ط – ظ – ع – غ – ف – ق – ك – ل – م – ن – ھ – و – ي

Having my Car Fixed

My car made a funny noise every time I let go the clutch. Now I'm not exactly a mechanic, but I thought the car might need some "shahm". No idea what I'm talking about? That's because I know terms related to cars in Arabic only since before I came here, I had never had a car repaired! I'll give you a clue here—"shahm" means something like "grease". So I had my car washed at the car wash (from the inside and outside, and, most importantly, the bottom) and went to the "benshari" to have it "shahm"ed. A "benshari" is a person who repairs flat tires (punctures—that's what the name comes from), changes the oil, fills up the gear oil, and stuff like that. However, the funny sound (gáh) was still there.
The mechanic I consulted knew at once it was the "saleeb", so I had to go and find the spare part. I had to ask several spare part-dealers before I found one that would fit.
"The 'saleeb' of the 'sabarah'?"
"Yes, I guess so."
OK, it was not "asli" (genuine), but it would do. It took the mechanic about an hour to change the thing because due to the rust, the old one wouldn't come out easily. They offered me the only chair available at the workshop—very old, as you can imagine—from where I could observe their work. There was the odd look my way ("What is a woman doing here?") from some other customers, but the mechanics, who by now know me after several visits, didn't seem to have a problem. And when I drove away, the sound was indeed gone.
It always feels good when I manage to solve a problem of this kind, and I've learned something new again.

By the way, is there an English word for "benshari"??

Recipe (Zalabiah)

In Holland, we know zalabiah as "oliebollen". The only difference is the shape. While oliebollen are shaped as balls, zalabiah is shaped like a long, curled-up snake.
Make a dough from white flour, a pinch of salt, a little yeast, and luke-warm water until the dough is soft but not watery. Cover to let it rise for an hour or two.
Heat oil in a deep pan. Wet your hands and make a long, thin piece out of some dough and put it in the oil. Repeat this to make the "snake" longer. Turn the zalabiah over when one side is brown. When the other side is brown, too, take it out of the oil and put it on a few tissues to make it less greasy.

While in Holland it is eaten with sugar, here in Yemen it is mostly used as bread, for example to eat with beans.

Picture (stones)

(photo by Eveline Kuhlman)

Sana'a is expanding rapidly and building activity on the outskirts of the city is enormous. Natural stone comes from the mountains nearby, in all kinds of colors. They are shaped and sold like this.

And Who is the Fool?

A man of great wealth and status built for himself a house, adjacent to which was a small and shabby house, not of much worth, which was owned by and old woman. Her rich neighbor needed her house in order to embark upon an expansion project that he had in mind, and so he offered her an exorbitant amount of money in order to purchase her house, but she refused to sell it.
It was said to her that the judge would freeze her assets because of her foolish persistence in not taking a large amount of wealth, especially considering the fact that her house was worth very little in the first place.
She said, "And why does the judge not freeze the assets of the one who wants to spend and waste such a large amount of money for a house of so little worth?" She refused to sell her house and she was able to silence everyone by the strength of her argument.

This is an excerpt from the book Gems and Jewels, full of wise sayings, interesting events, and moral lessons from the Islamic history. Interested? Click on the following link: http://store.dar-us-salam.com/product/180.html?a_aid=alnakhlayemen

Dutch Representative

As a foreigner, you are a true representative of your country, even if you haven't been there for fifteen years. You are asked all sorts of questions—sometimes out of sincere interest, sometimes merely to show off their knowledge.
"Holland is a kingdom, isn't it?"
"Yes, indeed."
"And what's the king's name?"
"Well, actually, it's a queen. Her name is Beatrix."
"Ah! I think I saw her on TV, with her son."
"That is possible."
"And what are the duties of the queen?"
"Ehm, good question…"
"What is your capital?"
"Amsterdam."
"And the radio broadcasts from Hiltersem, right? They broadcast in Arabic, too."
"Oh, do they? (didn't know that) Yes, Hilversum, indeed."
"How many provinces does Holland have?"
"Provinces? Honestly, I have no idea. Yemen has 21 of them I just learned from my daughter's schoolbook, but Holland?"
And then there's soccer. The Dutch national team has obviously changed completely since I left the country, so I can't say anything about it. And no, I don't follow the games, not even the World Cup. I was told that the Yemeni national team had visited Holland for some training, but they were defeated quickly in some Arab soccer competition that was held in Aden recently.
"Holland lies under the sea-level, doesn't it? And you make land out of water."
As far as I know, only a part of the country lies below sea-level, and I didn't know that the 'Flevopolder' was this famous, but I have to admit that I'm impressed with their knowledge about such a small country so far away.
"What language do you speak? Dutch? Is that similar to Spanish?"
"No, no, it's completely different. It's a bit like German."
"Can you say something in Dutch?" Not that they'll notice the difference with English, since they don't usually speak that either, but a funny sentence is "Doe de deur dicht."
"Doe what?"
Hahaha, like this, I can finally silence the inquisitive questioner!

Ambassadeur (in het NLs)

Als buitenlander ben je een ware ambassadeur van je land, zelfs al ben je er al 15 jaar niet meer geweest. Er wordt je werkelijk van alles gevraagd—soms uit interesse, soms meer om hun eigen kennis tentoon te spreiden.
"Nederland is een koninkrijk, is het niet?"
"Inderdaad."
"En hoe heet de koning?"
"Nou, het is een koningin. Ze heet Beatrix."
"Ohja, dat is waar ook; ik zag haar op de TV, met haar zoon."
"Dat is mogelijk."
"En wat doet de koningin?"
"Eh... goeie vraag zeg."
"Wat is de hoofdstad van Nederland?"
"Amsterdam."
"En radio-uitzendingen komen uit Hiltersem, he, ze zenden ook in het Arabisch uit."
"Oh, is dat zo? (nooit geweten). Ja, Hilversum, inderdaad."
"Hoeveel provincies heeft Nederland?"
"Provincies? Ik heb werkelijk geen idee. Yemen heeft er 21, dat heb ik zojuist uit m'n dochter's schoolboek geleerd, maarreh..."
En dan voetbal. Het Nederlands elftal is natuurlijk volledig veranderd sinds ik het land heb verlaten, dus ik kan er geen zinnig woord over zeggen. En nee, ik volg de wedstrijden niet, zelfs niet het WK. Er werd me verteld dat het Yemenitische elftal naar Nederland was afgereisd om daar te trainen, maar in de eerste ronde van een of andere Arabische competitie die onlangs in Aden werd gehouden, verloren ze al.
"Nederland ligt onder de zee, is dat zo? En jullie maken er land uit water."
Voor zover ik weet ligt enkel een deel van het land onder zee-nivo en ik wist niet dat de Flevopolder zo beroemd was, maar ook ben ik wel onder de indruk van hun algemene kennis over zo'n klein landje zo ver weg.
En welke taal we eigenlijk spreken. "Nederlands? Is dat zoiets als Spaans?"
"Nee, heel anders. Het lijkt wel wat op Duits."
"Zeg eens iets in het Nederlands." Niet dat ze het verschil met Engels, dat ze meestal ook niet kennen, zullen merken, maar een grappige zin vind ik altijd "Doe de deur dicht".
"Doe wát?!"
Hahaha, kan ik de andere partij eindelijk even de mond snoeren.

A Demonstration

As usual, the roundabout was crowded with workmen—builders, painters, plumbers, and others—waiting for work. One of them was praying a quick prayer, others were mainly watching the traffic. All of a sudden, while we were stuck in the middle of chaotic traffic coming from three sides, they all ran over to one side of the roundabout, shouting and cheering. I wondered what was going on but saw nothing remarkable. A little further down the road it became clear; many tens of buses and cars—mainly pick-ups—passed us at full speed. The pick-ups were full of cheering men with flags, some banners, and posters of the President. I followed them for a while to see where they were going. Most probably they were on their way to the widest road of the city where demonstrations are usually held. From the way they came and their appearance, I concluded they were mainly tribes people who had come to support the President. Since there will be parliamentary elections soon, different parties seem to have decided to make their voices known, which is perfectly all right in any democracy, so why not here?

Embargo

About three months ago, someone was said to have sent explosives from Yemen to the U.S. by an international carrier. Immediately, a number of countries imposed a ban on parcels from Yemen - whether sent by international carriers, cargo companies, or ordinary mail. Among these countries were Germany, the U.K., France, the U.S., and Canada.

Recently, I was happy to hear that several countries had decided to lift the embargo - even the U.S. itself. So I went to the post office with a parcel - finally!
"Sorry, we can't send it," I was told.
Unfortunately, most mail goes via Germany, and there they still insist on this ban. So for over three months, businesses that live of export have been deprived of making a living. Retailers in the U.S., Canada, and most European countries have not been able to order Yemeni products.

The initial reaction to the news - an embargo on Yemeni parcels - is justifiable for the countries that were involved. But to insist on this, even after a prolonged period of time and without any clear reasons, and after the target-country itself has decided to lift the embargo, is exaggerated. The decision-makers in Germany should be aware of the financial damage they are causing to innocent traders and quickly find ways to scan parcels effectively instead of simply banning them.