At this point I had made a decision to continue to stay as being on the ground, we have a sense of whether things are safe or unsafe, liveable or not. As time goes on, living conditions started to get more difficult, we had power outages that gave us only 6 hours of power a day. Food prices took a hike up as petrol became expensive and scarce and cooking gas became not only expensive but unavalable. Although the revolution was a peaceful one (and as of today still is) but the ruling government was determined to stay in power.
In May things were getting more tense and my wonderful sisters (who are really my friends) were concerned for our safety and well being in Yemen. It was really at their insistence and sponsorship that we came back to Malaysia. We had made plans to come back to Malaysia on June 1st. Somehow I decided to change the date to May 26th. When we received our exit and re-entry permit, I changed the date to May 25th. I am not sure exactly why but at that point, I felt so much the yearning to come back that a day makes so much difference that I changed the date again to May 24th. We arrived in Malaysia on May 25th only to receive news that the airport in Sana'a was closed.
The political situation just continued to deteriorate in Yemen with no end visible in sight and life continues to be hard and expensive there. The political situation sees no end and the economy is virtually destroyed. For a country like Yemen, underdeveloped and very tribal, it will take a long while before things will return to normal if and when the political unrest subsides. The people of the land will survive I am sure, but for me, there are many things to consider. In current conditions it is impossible to do anything to survive and I have three little boys to consider : their safety, their education, their future. I guess if it was just me alone, I would have stayed on.
Decisions are always hard and I don't know about anyone else, but I am never certain of my decisions. Most times, I don't think the decision were mine, but I am cornered to make those decisions: the time that I left for Yemen, the time that I have to leave Yemen, and now the time that I have to decide not to go back to Yemen, were times I felt I have no choice but that one decision because the other was not a choice.
Although I think the choice is clear, I think it is one that is very emotional. Yemen gave me shelter when I needed one, liberated me when I could not be in my homeland, sent me only kind people to make my life easy in a land foreign to me, brought up my children with part of my objective achieved for them. After 5 years, maybe it is time for me to move on.
I have always wanted to live my life as the hadeeth which says "live your life as a traveller in this world, taking only what you need from it" (will edit this and include the actual hadeeth with its sanad) ... and so a traveller I have become, ready to move when needed, owning nothing material, taking care of my trust and ready to move on to the next dimension with as little excess luggage as possible. I had nothing when I left Malaysia except for friends and family that I left behind, and now I am leaving behind nothing in Yemen too except for a new found family, wonderful people who have touched our hearts and life and just beautiful memories of a country that helped healed me.
I had always thought that Yemen was going to be my final home, especially at this age, almost a half a century, but it was not to be. Again faced with uncertainty and the thought of starting over in my own country that has changed by leaps and bounds is like again going through unchartered territories.
Well, insyaAllah if HE puts me through it, insyaAllah HE will see me through it.
