Why would a Jordanian from Aqaba, on the edge of the Red Sea, travel all the way to Yemen to go fishing? Ahmad al-Ahyuwaat, 28, did. He explains why.
To start with, you can make much more money in Yemen. The Arabian Sea is much richer than the Red Sea which is closed, he says. At the age of 22, Ahmed set off to the port town of Makalla in Hadramout, southern Yemen. There, he spent two years out on a sambuca catching prawns, which he calls "gamberoni" or “tamad.” He visited the UNESCO World Natural Heritage Site of Soqotra, where he stayed for a week, and when one of his colleagues fell sick, he stayed on "the island of Mahara" (in fact a governorate of mainland Yemen parallel to the Arabian Sea) for three days. His colleague was bundled onto a plane to Makalla, while he and the others jumped back onto their sambuca to catch more fish.
When he came back to Jordan, he bought a brand new taxi with which he now ferries tourists around Aqaba.
