Yemen:Only for Wealthy! [Archives:2001/04/Focus]

archive
January 22 2001

I reached the conclusion: Yemen is only for wealthy people! Poor Yemenis should immediately pack their stuff and travel abroad.
While the majority are dying of hunger, Haddah Street, in the Capital Sanaa, is observing daily openings of modern and lavishly decorated restaurants and coffee shops. Such places are receiving, especially at evening times, crowds of food eaters and take-away snack lovers, in addition to those gentlemen parking their luxurious, modern, and extremely expensive cars to serve their children and families with delicious multi-flavored juices and ice-cream.
A pause to examine which segment of society those people belong to will result in a final and decisive conclusion. These are either rich Arab students studying in Yemeni colleges or individuals who belong to certain rich families who can easily be counted and identified, but whose assets are beyond the counting ability of any ordinary citizen. In brief, these are the wealthy!
A glass of ice-cream costing YR 200, for example, means nothing to any of those getting millions out of producing non-marketable products world wide. With extreme ease, they could easily spend bundles of dollars now and earn double the amount they spent from their businesses. Others find corruption a clever tactic to get illegitimate sources of income and struggle to occupy governmental jobs that represent fertile hidden income sources, even if their formal salary are not that worthy.
However, spending YR 200 for ice-cream is not a wise thing to do for the majority of Yemenis. Such an amount is used to feed a whole family for a single day. Such an amount is transferred every day to a poor old lady by a very highly-ranking official as financial aid, and I had seen his instructions to pay this humble amount written by his hand on a paper myself.
Dont bother poor folks. Dont run or bet on making money here; it is hopeless, it is a waste of time and effort.
Only listen to my sincere advice: If you get the chance to Immigrate, just go for it, and remember, Yemen is only for the wealthy!
 

——
[archive-e:04-v:2001-y:2001-d:2001-01-22-p:./2001/iss04/focus.htm]