Wadi Hadramont - Tarim

Today we awoke at 530 am after not getting home until 1 am due to the most important thing in the world to non-Americans - football. Germany beat Turkey 3-2 in the Euro2008 in a thrilling match. It's official. The arabs do not say gooaaaaaal with the same gusto as the Spanish. Anyway, we were all up early, and by we I mean the four of us now living in my room. One of the other dorms has gotten a gift from the Yemenis - Bedbugs! So two Bab al-Sabah residents are squating in our room.
Regardless, our plane left Sana'a for Wadi Hadramont, a region in the east of Yemen located in a long river valley running through high plateaus. Coming in by plane, the region looks like two different worlds. The high mesas are all about the same height and a rocky brown, while the valley is green and yellow with towns spread as far as the eye can see. Oh, it's also in the desert. At 9 am when we touched down, the temperature was already nearing 100 degrees F. Luckily, we have airconditioned buses! After a quick stop at the hotel in Seiyun, the capital city of the region, we headed east to Tarim. Tarim has long been the center of Islamic learning, not just for Yemen, but internationally. Before we went into the city itself, we stopped at a gypsum-making factory and a brick-making factory. Factory is a generous term, these places were completely open air with no modern technology, which makes their acheivements all the more impressive. Gypsem is a white doughy substance used to preserve the mudbricks that about 90% of the houses in Yemen are built of. It is smeared an inch thick on the outside of houses to keep the rain away from the mud and heko keep the temperature in the houses stable. The gypsem itself (sorry, I found this absolutely fascinating) is originally from a particular type of rock. The workers pile these rocks into a giant ovan

(thats about 12 feet high) and bake them for 24 hours. After the day in the heat, workers pull the rocks out and, before they cool, pour water on them. Normal water. The resulting reaction is going to be my first question in next semesters Chemistry class. The grey rock becomes, in front of your eyes, a white powder and boils the water as it mixes. This happens even after the rock has cooled down! The picture shows the bubbling of the powder and water. After the powder and water mix and cool, it is beaten by a man with a cane. Yes, Yemeni technology. After a couple hours, the substance has become doughy, is slapped into bags, and sold for about 500 YR a bag ($2.50). Gypsem gives Wadi Hadramont is traditional white houses, different from the rest of Yemen.
Next was the brick factory where mud bricks are made from clay, dried for 2 days in the summer and 4 days in the winter, and then used to make the houses throughout Hadramont. The workers make huge pools of mud and mix in straw. Then they use wheelbarrows and wooden frames to shape the bricks and HOORAY! Mud bricks.
We headed into the city of Tarim where we walked around the souq. A lot of people bought straw hats resembling witches hats which I thought were just a tourist gimick until I saw the women in the fields wearing them! On top of their full black. I don't know how they don't all die in the heat. The library was interesting with books dating back to the 12th century, and the palaces built by rich Hadramis abroad in the 40's were beautiful, though now leaning towards run down.
Lastly, we walked by the minaret of the Tarim mosque which is one of the tallest earthen structures in the world!
Made completely of mud and straw. Yemeni Technology. It's quite impressive. So far this trip is looking amazing. Yes it's hotter than anywhere I've ever been, but the hotel filled their swimming pool just for us, and nothing cools you down like the wind in your face as you ride in the back of the Tourist Police escort.