Yemen: Appointment Alert! - Part 1

From ExecutivePlanet.com

Making appointments

General Guidelines

Generally, businesses in Yemeni cities open at about nine in the morning, close for the afternoon and then re-open for some of the evening, but this varies considerably depending on the size and type of business. As in the west, the basic working week is 5 days, save that the week begins on Saturday instead of Monday.

Although many Zaydis take a relatively flexible attitude to prayer times, one must nonetheless allow for the official times. Exact prayer times vary with the season, but the five daily prayers are as follows: Fajr [between dawn and sunrise], Dhuhr [about half an hour after mid-day], Asr [mid-afternoon], Maghrib [immediately after sunset] and Isha' [from an hour or so after sunset]. As in most of the Middle East, it is better to make an appointment for a time of day rather than a precise hour. To say “between Maghrib and Isha'” is more common and practical than to specify 6 or 7 o'clock.

The majority of people live outside cities and behave quite differently.

Dealing With the Tribes

Yemen is about 90% tribal but there has been no effective central government in the north since 1962. The republic has negligible control outside the cities and relies on bribery to placate the tribes. One reason for hostility toward the republic is that it is widely regarded to have been Egyptian in origin and therefore foreign. Many shaikhs still remain loyal to the Royal Family [the House of Hamid ed-Din] nearly thirty years after they lost the civil war. There are several hundred tribes. Each has its own shaikh [literally chief] and there is a paramount shaikh for every region. The structure is very similar to that of clan chieftains and chiefs, respectively, in Scotland.

Owing to possible tribal hostility to the central government, it is essential that word of one's intended journey be sent ahead to the shaikh, especially if travelling from Sana'a. In some areas of North Yemen, the best assurance of safe-conduct remains a letter from one of the exiled princes [most of whom live in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia]. In South Yemen [where the Hamid ed-Din did not rule] the individual sultans, most of whom are also exiled in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, often command similar loyalty.

Submit a Comment on this Article