My flight lands in Sana’a, the capital of Yemen, in the late hours of the night. The plane touches the ground and the airhostess welcomes us to the city in Arabic and English. The temperature outside is 13 degrees, she says. I walk down the metal stairs of the plane, wrapped in an embroidered shawl over a flowing abaya, towards the bus that takes us to the terminal.

The airport in Sana’a is not like the airports I am used to seeing. It does not smell of freshly brewed coffee or expensive duty free shops. Inside, a single conveyer belt moves slowly while people smoke cigarettes at the terminal and talk to each other to pass time. While waiting for the luggage, a woman gathers I am not from there even though I am wearing an abaya and a headscarf. I later discover that most women also wear the face veil (commonly known as the niqab) in Sana’a and an uncovered face is the sign of a foreigner. She asks me in English what brings me to Yemen. I tell her I have come for a vacation with my family at which she seems even more surprised than my friends back home had been. She tells me her country is beautiful even though tourists have stopped coming like they used to. I tell her I know what she means; I am from Pakistan.

As we drive to my father’s friend’s house where we are staying, I look at the city outside. It is barely lit and a few shops with their neon signs are visible from a distance. A few pick-up trucks being driven by turbaned men are on the roads.

Sana’a looks and feels a lot different in the mornings. It remains cold in the early hours of the day, but the sun shines brightly over the valley warming it up a little for the rest of the day. It is one of the highest capital cities of the world, located at 7,500 feet above sea level. At a glance, the city looks like different shades of brown merging into one another.

The buildings in Sana’a and in other parts of Yemen are usually made with similar architectural elements. While concrete houses are being constructed, traditional construction methods that use mud bricks and stones remain in use. A prominent architectural feature in Yemen is the Qamariya, a style of making windows with stained glass and geometric patterns to let coloured light into the homes.

Poverty and lack of order are obvious in Sana’a. Drivers break signals, exceed speed limits, drive on the wrong side of the road and take U-turns from wherever they feel like. Beggars follow us on the streets and in the bazaars. The rooftops of buildings remain unfinished looking dilapidated. Basically, the city looks like it has been left to its own devices.

But Sana’a is also beautiful in its own way. It has about it a strange kind of tranquillity and it grows on me by the time I leave. Apart from the voices and shop signs written in Arabic, Sana’a does not remind me of any other city I have seen in the Middle East. The air is crisp but dusty. There is a slow pace to life.

Although I am unable to walk around the city as much as I would have liked to, I manage to walk around inside the old city, and a market that sells jewellery.

A major tourist attraction and UNESCO world heritage site in Sana’a is the Bab-al-Yemen, or the gate way to Yemen. It is famous for its centuries-old multi-storeyed buildings decorated with geometric patterns. The old city continues to be inhabited by people, its bazaars still full of life and motor vehicles reminding me that it exists in the modern world.

I walk around a little reluctantly, aware of the stares and looks of confusion from the locals who can probably tell I am not a European tourist but can also see that I can’t understand Arabic. My father is stopped by locals, who want to be photographed with him at certain points. They write down their email address and Facebook details on scraps of paper so he can send it to them.

Inside the walled city, we find our way into a mosque where there are no women, and where many men, both young and old, are reading from large copies of the Quran. Apart from a few curious looks, nobody asks or questions the presence of foreign looking women inside the mosque. I think to myself how welcome I would be if I roamed about in a mosque in Karachi with a camera.

There is a prominent lack of female presence in the public spaces of the city. Having lived in Saudi Arabia for a few months on and off, the sight of women driving on the roads of Sana’a surprises and makes me happy. Although the abaya is not a legal requirement in Yemen, it is the culturally acceptable garment for women while they are outside the homes. The majority covers the face as well, making me look a little, well, liberal.

Banned in most countries, the chewing of Qat or (Gat), a plant that is mildly stimulating, is fairly common in Yemen. As we drive from Sana’a to Jibla to see the palace and mosque of Queen Arwa, I notice a plastic bag full of Qat next to the driver’s seat. Our Pakistani driver, who has been in Yemen for nearly 30 years, tells us that his day isn’t complete without a good dose of Qat. It is usually chewed in the afternoons and then again at night. Markets selling Qat are set up in the morning and fresh Qat is bought every day. He tells us that even at weddings, there is usually no food and the guests bring their own Qat.

In the south, Yemen’s city by the sea is Aden. We leave Hodeidah by bus and reach Aden in nearly six hours. I see the clear blue waters of the beach in Hodeidah outside for a while and then vast spaces of barren land for miles. Aden has a history of being ruled by the Portuguese, Ottomans and finally British. The city suddenly feels very different from Sana’a. It reminds me a little of Karachi with its old decaying colonial buildings, its breathtaking view of the sea and the walls of some of its houses covered with Bougainvillea branches.

The signs of winter disappear in Aden but a light breeze moves across the city. We check in at the Gold Mohur Hotel that has also given the name to its surrounding area. A simply decorated Christmas tree stands in the lobby and a revolving rack displays few slices of cake in a deserted lobby. A view of the famous Elephant Bay, a rock structure resembling a sitting elephant, is visible from the hotel’s private beach, which is empty, save for another family.

I walk on the sand wearing an abaya and watch the sky as it changes colours from orange to blue to mauve till the sun sets.

The next day, we drive around town to see an old mosque, British buildings and museums only to find that the museums (the Military museum and the National museum) are shut for some restoration work. What we do manage to see is an old mosque and a clock tower typical of colonial rulers among other British buildings.

Our host in Aden is an immigrant from Punjab who plays Bollywood music in the car and takes us out to a small Pizza place for dinner. The next day, he drives us to the airport.

Back in Sana’a, we spend the last day visiting the Dar-al-Hijr, a palace carved in rock and the incredibly beautiful Saleh mosque with its state-of-the-art lifts and carpeted halls. A group of small children sit with copies of the Quran as they move back and forth to memorise their day’s lesson.

Standing outside the mosque, I look at the palm trees and the amazing view of Sana’a’s mountains. I feel like everything is right with this place only to change my mind a couple of minutes later when I see young girls begging in the parking lot.

Racked by political violence, terrorism and poverty, Yemen is hardly the typical tourist destination but by the time I leave, I almost wish I could visit it again and get to know it better, to judge the country and its people better -- and to just sit and watch the mountains.