driving as a (barely) organized form of chaos

As I begin to settle in, different people have been asking me for details about what it’s like living in Sana’a – requests to describe my living conditions, to the clothes I wear, to the food. I will post soon about the temporary apartment in which I am living, and about the food (which is delicious). This post, however, is devoted to the experience of being a passenger in a Yemeni car. “But Tammy, you are a New Yorker,” you might say. “How different can driving in Yemen be from getting into a taxi that is careening down Broadway in Midtown rush hour?” Good question. And part of my answer is to ask if you followed the link on qat chewing in my previous post. Qat is king in Yemen. In fact, the photo I most regret NOT taking recently was of a Yemeni taxi driver, pulled over in a way that blocked 2 lanes of traffic, with an enormous wad of qat bulging out of his cheek and a cigarette dangling from his lips. He had pulled over to ask if I needed a ride.

Where to begin? First, while there are lines on most roads that ostensibly demarcate lanes of traffic, they don’t bear much weight or significance. So driving in any given lane has the appearance of a manic game of bumper cars…only – and I’m still not certain how – accidents don’t happen as frequently as you might think they should. Passing occurs on either the right or the left. Signaling is for wimps. If you are feeling a lack of confidence in the car you are overtaking, you may honk your horn. Given what I have just described, it goes without saying that the result is a maddening cacophony, as nobody trusts anybody. Coming into an intersection involves a pretty big leap of faith, as drivers may turn ahead of you, alongside to the right or left of you, or in back of you. Basically, a driver will make a turn wherever there is space to squeeze in his (and much less frequently her) car.

No wonder the taxi drivers are all stoned on qat.

Given all of this, you may wonder how I am getting around. I’ve hired a driver to take me to and from work. For the rest, I take either a taxi or friends/colleagues pick me up. The hired driver is the friend of a colleague’s driver. He is very nice, but has very, very limited English. His solution to this problem is to teach me Arabic on the drive to and from the office. And he’s a pretty tough taskmaster. So far my vocabulary consists of things we see or experience along the way…good morning, thank you, tree, dog, cat, house, flower, cold, and directions for left and right.

It’s not much, but it’s a start.