Yemenis

The BBC brought news of another terrible suicide bombing in San'a, Yemen, which saddened me greatly.  I have this running conversation with my great friend Trish about the identity of the nicest people in the world.  Not surprisingly, our choices are shaped by the countries we've visited.  For years I've championed the Indians, whereas she promoted the Tanzanians.  Recently we've reached a meeting of the minds of sorts and decided that maybe it's the Jordanians.  However, after my visit a couple of weeks ago to San'a I think I may have settled on the Yemenis.  My good friend Jyoti one time described the Omanis as God's children, which is a description that I may borrow for the Yemenis.  I've just never visited a place where the people were so kind (I'll have to recount the story of women I met having lunch in a San'a restaurant another time).  People would just stop me in the street to talk, and not the usual touts that made walking around in Nairobi or Cairo or Mumbai such a pain at times.  And when I told them that I was from the US (I never try to hide my national identity overseas like some Americans - I mean, really, they only make this size one place) they seemed genuinely happy that I had come to visit them.  Through a series of events, which I will recount later, I ended up getting a tour of a caravanesai from a tour guide, but he didn't ask for anything - and refused the money I offered - because he said he enjoyed himself and he didn't feel that he had done enough work to have earned it.  Many of the children would just yell "I love you" as I walked by.  I came across a couple boys, probably around ten years old, and one of them asked me, "where you from?"  I said America, and asked him "where you from?"  He was stunned by the question momentarily, until his friend doubled over on the ground laughing, and then he smiled so brightly.  They are all in my thoughts.

Be safe.