The Frankincense Trail (2009) s01e01 Episode Script

Frankincense.
One of the gifts given by the three wise men to the newborn Christ.
As rare and as precious as gold, its smoke was thought to have divine powers that directly connected men to his God.
From its source in Oman, an epic trade route was forged across Arabia to the holly lands, where it was shipped throughout the ancient world.
And along the way, entire civilizations emerged from the desert and prospered.
Now, five thousand years after the Frankincense trail began I'm following in the footsteps of one of the great epic trade routes of ancient times.
The Frankincense Trail.
My journey starts high in the Dofa mountains of southern Oman.
For thousands of years this is where the finest frankincense came from.
It was harvested from the highly valuable trees that covered these hilltops.
Today, Mosalam Almari is one of the last people who still make a living from the trade.
This is Boswellia Sacra, better known as the frankincense tree.
This is how frankincense is produced.
A shallow cut is made in the bark and the frankincense sap starts to bleed.
- Look! Look! Look! So this here is frankincense It has a little smell, but not a very strong one.
Each cut will produce a small handful of frankincense resin.
A few days later, once it's hardened, Mosalam will return to collect it.
He brings the resin back to dry out in this cave, his home for the three months of the harvest season.
This batch has been drying for a week.
- It's quite soft - Exactly.
- But not as gummy as the stuff that I got right from the tree.
- Exactly.
They need to be dry for another few days.
- Ok - Than it will be.
.
- Mosalam will clean them.
Ya.
- Look at this! - It's like diamonds.
- Ya - Smell it.
- OK.
- Beautiful.
I want to take some frankincense with me.
And just like the ancient traders did, use some of my supply to pay my way on route.
- So Mosalam, if I were to buy ninety kilograms, cause I've got a long journey, I have two thousand miles to travel - If I were to buy that, what is the going rate for frankincense at this time? - OK.
It's hard to sell so much frankincense.
- Two hundred and fourty Euro.
- For the whole ninety kilos? - For the whole ninety kilos.
Ya.
- So that's about three hundred pounds.
When demand for frankincense was at its height, the majority of it went to the emperors and the upper class citizens of the Roman empire.
Back then, the amount I'm buying would have cost the same as the average Roman earned in a year.
- We're going to need camels or something.
The frankincense traders walked the entire length of the Arabian peninsula to the Holly lands.
From here, the frankincense was shipped to the empires of the ancient world.
I'm going to attempt to follow that epic trail.
I've come down from the mountains to where the original camel trains started their journey.
There to meet me are the descendants of those first traders: the Almari tribe with their camels.
Together, we are going to walk towards the Yemeni border, in the footsteps of the ancient camel caravans.
So this is my frankincense and as you can see those are extraordinary scenes around me Everyone crowds round, demanding to inspect my frankincense.
- I have to take this all the way to - His name is called Hawi.
- Hawi is his name.
- Hawi is the very good.
I bought well? Before we set off, the sister of one of the tribesmen asks to see me.
As is custom, she stands away from the men.
I take a handfull of my frankincense and we trade gifts.
- Oh, I see.
OK - It looks good? Before the journey, Riah performs a traditional ritual with my frankincense.
This tribal blessing also has a practical purpose.
This is the way you keep your clothes smelling fresh and.
.
Yes.
Exactly.
Ok.
With the blessing over, we load my cargo.
The original traders would have packed up to a thousand camels per journey each one, with two hundres kilos.
I'm having trouble loading just one.
So this camel is going to be carrying.
Ooo I think I will I don't think he really wants to be carrying eighty kilos of frankincense.
It's hard going away on a family holiday and packing the car.
You know, everyone has their way of packing the car.
Clearly.
Each one of these guys Tbey got their way of tying it up.
- It's good? This manhas just given me his dagger anddo I really need a gun? So he's going to give me his gun.
- Ok.
I know nothing, precisely nothing about guns.
- Is it loaded? - It's not loaded.
- Are you sure? Can you show me? - Show me that it's not loaded.
- Ok.
That's fine.
Thank you.
The weapons are just for show.
Today, most of these men carry no more than a mobile phone and car keys.
- So I carry it like this? Like that.
- So this is good.
- So I now have my dagger, I have my gun.
- I just need my camel.
- This is my camel? So should I take the camel? - This is my camel here? - OK.
- I'm ready.
- Go! Go! - I'm following you.
The camel trains would have been accompanied by up to sixty men who would take charge of the camels and protect the cargo.
Today, we're aiming to walk twelve miles.
The original caravans would have covered twice that distance in the same time.
When the frankincense was all gathered it was then taken on caravans like this to a central trading point and from that trading point it was then taken by one group of people They were called the Meneans.
They actually originate in the Yemen, but they would come here to the Dofa region of Oman with their caravans of camels.
And they would collect all the incense and make the extraordinary journey to the port of Gaza two thousand miles to the North.
And that journey would take roughly one hundred and eighty to two hundred days.
and I've been walking forha, ha, a couple of hours and it's hard to conceive having that sort of length of journey ahead of me.
It is ahead of me, but, luckily, I'm not having to rely on my feet.
I have this guy to get me there.
Our caravan consist of three hundred camels, most of them belonging to this man: Albert.
He's fifty years old, and with two marriages behind him, both arranged and both failed, he now lives with his camels day and night, and makes money from selling their milk and newborn calves.
And although he knows their ways better than anyone getting all three hundred of them to move in the same direction is difficult enough even without a camera crew in the way.
It was a bit of mutiny amongst our camels.
All the young camels look well loaded They've bolted around the site and there's a lot of shouting going on into mobile phones which is honestly the modern way of herding camels.
I'm just going to try and find out what we do now because we obviously got separated Four wheel drive would soon round them up but this would have been a disaster for the ancient traders.
Losing control of their camels would have cost them precious time and possible the loss of some of their cargo.
So our mutiny of camels have been rounded up again and this is a very novel way of getting them up this slope.
We, the camera crew that's freaked them out in the first place have moved back, but that lorry, the truck they are following has got a big tank of water in it and the smell of the water is enough to pull the camels up the slope.
- How far can a camel travel without drinking? - One month? - No problem? Albert doesn't need much sustenance either.
He lives moslty on his camels' milk, which he thinks gives him superhuman strength.
- Look at you! Did you have your appendics out? - And they couldn't do it.
- I wouldn't want to be in a fight with him.
- I think you would win.
- He could? - Ready? - No, no, no, you can't.
That's it - I don't feel this is very elegant at all.
Before I know it, Albert has got me dancing.
This dance is how the Almari tribe seal their marriage.
I think Albert may have chosen me as wife number three.
God knows what's going to happen.
- How quickly can you get a divorce in Oman? The sun is going down, the temperatures drop dramatically, and suddenly this just feels like the best place in the world to be, surrounded by all these insane men.
I wish this guy was coming with me, cause I think we'd have some adventures.
- Hey Albert.
- Everything is good? - It's good.
- OK.
- So should I unload him here? - OK.
After ten hours, we've covered the twelve miles to the tribe's traditional campsite.
I'm exhausted, but for the men of the Almari tribe the party is just beginning.
As soon as they arrive it's tradition for them to play a game called Muftit that tests their strength.
Holding two rocks, they leap as far as they can.
Ninety-six years old Musalam was the reigning champion for fourty years and he's not giving up just yet.
But Albert's not going to be upstaged for long.
I cheer from the sidelines with the women.
The Almari tribe uses dance to tell the story of what happened to each of them during their long journey.
And they dance late into the night.
Tomorrow I'll leave Albert and his tribe to follow the trail into Yemen, a country the Foreing Office lists as one of the most dangerous places on Earth.
The Yemeni border is one hours' drive from the camp and I'm nervous.
Nearly fourty years of civil unrest between the Government and the desert tribes has been made worse by the recent discovery of oil and gas.
Independent travel is not advised and we are not sure we'll be granted visas to enter.
This is our first really big test, I think.
This border crossing.
Yemen has a slightly dodgy reputation at the moment.
I know this border isn't used too much, so what they're going to think of a British woman with two large, sticky, boiled, sweet like sackfulls of incense? I've no idea.
Salam aleikum.
Salam.
Hello! Welcome! - Thank you very much.
- Thank you.
The original frankincese traders faced check points as well.
- Salam Aleikum.
Every time they crossed tribal lines, they had to negotiate their passage with a payment of frankincense.
- It's from Dofa.
- Omani frankincense.
The custom's officials don't want any of mine, but their security check is very thorough and they go through everything.
From here on, I have to travel with a security team.
Julian Davies is an ex british army major, who's in charge of our safety.
The threat from Al Qaeda does exist, and there's a pretty steady tempo of attacks in the country.
The first thing is there's a sequence of events I want things to follow if we do have an incident or an accident.
Julian has left me in no doubt that we are entering dangerous territory.
There's only one road to our next stop and it takes us right through the ancestral homeland of Osama bin Laden.
What happened in the last Al Qaeda attack was that a tourist convoy was bunched up and they were all caught up in an ambush on the side of a popular tourist route, not that far from here, actually.
And as the tourist convoy passed, they opened fire with automatic weapons and, tragically, killed two Belgian tourists and a Yemeni driver.
Surely, the way to travel in this sort of situation is to try and be relatively low key.
That would be my feeling.
But now, we've got a police escort.
We've got a van with four guys, with their uniforms on and big guns and I would say that would make us more of a target.
But then, I'm not a Yemeni policeman.
As we get closer to our destination signs of life emerge from the desert.
The mud brick houses that line the road could have been built yesterday or a thousand years ago.
Then, the world's first city of skyscrapers appears on the horizon.
Thisis Shebab.
When the first frankincense traders passed through here three thousand years ago it was little more than a campsite, but prosperity brought by their trade built the world's first high-rise city.
Each of its five hundred buildings is made from mud.
The tallest is eleven storeys high.
In the shade of the city gates is an open air tea shop that's rumoured to have been running for 1000 years.
It's called, unsurprinsingly, the thousand-year old tea shop.
Arabic tea is strong, sweet, and delicious.
- Sugar? - Yes, please.
And this one is spiced with ginger.
It's the sort of thing your mom would give you when you had a cold.
Dominos is the game of choice to while away the time here.
These men, like most in Shebam, work the farms that surround the city.
They come here to escape the midday sun.
Inas is to be my translator here.
- Thank you so much.
- How are you? How do you feel? - Quite long journey.
- Quite tired.
- I understand.
-This is such a beautiful place.
She's arranged for me to attend the blessing of a newborn child.
It's a huge honor and a wonderful opportunity to see inside these incredible buildings.
- You know, when you've seen a lot of pictures and you've heard a lot about a place it's almost that it's mythical, you can't really believe it actually exists.
- There really are mud skyscrapers, aren't there? - Salam Aleikum! - I think we should go this way.
- This way? - Ya.
- And that lady who just went past us, she's completely, completely covered.
- ihi.
- You're not and I definitely am not.
- Is that going to be a problem here? - No, definitely not.
- These people are still sticking to the traditions, - ihi - to wear black, - ok - to be all in black.
- ya - Because I live in the other city, in Salam, the capital, - ihi - life there is different, - I can dress this way, - the main thing is I'm covering all my skin - and my hair.
- ya - For you, they expect that - you don't wear like them - ok - because you've got your own - lifestyle, you've got your own beliefs, - so they don't mind.
- But it's not, so it's not offensive if I'm not covered up.
- Not at all - Ya.
This is actually the house are waiting for us.
- Sadam I We are meeting the Sun family and as is custom here, the entire extended family lives together, in the same house.
- Salam Haleikum.
I like these hand-prints over here.
- Shoes off? - Ya, we need to take our shoes here.
The women of the house live behind closed doors and behind the veils.
To be welcomed in is a real privilege.
- Hadi Kate.
- Salam Haleikum - Afra.
Afra is the mother of the child and is the one who is going to perform the blessing.
It's an ancient custom, dating back at least two thousand years, far older than Islam.
One of my first duties as a guest in this household was to provide frankincense for the blessing of the child, which is happening today.
We have the problem though of how to film it because there are absolutely no men allowed in this room while the blessing goes on It's only the women and the children of the household.
So we are just going to set up a camera, the camera crew have got to clear off and it will just be me and the girls.
Afra's baby girl, Heba, is six months old.
Most children are blessed at around this age.
She uses the frankincense smoke to cleanse and purify the child and to ward away evil spirits.
I wonder whether the frankincense brought by the three wise men was used this way to bless the baby Jesus.
Half an hour later, the blessing is complete.
Every child born in Sheban is welcomed this way.
Now Heba joins them, protected by a tradition as old as the frankincense trail.
The calm of the blessing has made it easy to forget that this desert frontier town stands at the edge of a troubled country.
Any problems along this route here, with local tribes or anything like that? Before we leave, the police warn Julian of potential danger along the road to our next stop, the city of Shabua.
Anything further West is a really strong trouble area - Right.
- And the problems between the tribes means that some of the tribes will kidnap any foreigners that go into the area as a bargaining tool Anything West of there really is a no-go area.
as far as foreigners are concerned.
- That's really disappointing.
So, we are not allowed to go the way of the original traders to Shabua, but we can pick-up another part of the trail that began with the advent of sea trade, two thousand years ago, when frankincense was shipped to Karna and then carried overland.
This tribal conflict is real.
They are not just making it up, but it's not obvious to a foreigner You can't, you don't pick it up there aren't sort of, you know, borders as such, it's not like, you know, when you're crossing the border into hostile territory.
It's sort of insidious, it could come from anywhere.
People keep telling me: "There is a risk, there is a risk", so at the back of your mind it's like you're being forced to have a kind of jumpy feeling that you wouldn't normally have because out there it doesn't fell like you need to be jumpy.
It really doesn't.
So, we head off, away from the danger zone and towards the ancient city port of Karma, three hundred miles away.
Outside, it's fourty-seven degrees, and there's uninhabited desert as far as the eye can see, but amazingly, in the middle of nowhere is a roadside cafe.
- This is the main meal for us.
- Kind of healthy, really.
- It's fresh, - People here don't like any food that is not fresh and cooked at the same time.
- They will refuse it.
- We've been here, I would say, less than ten minutes and the Yemeni end has done far better than the Western end.
- God, these guys eat fast though, while I think, they will get back on the road, which is probably a good thing, because we've still got many, many hours to travel.
After driving all day, we reach the Arabian Sea and the port of Karna.
This now empty bay was once a major hub for the Frankincense trade.
Up to ten thousand tons of it were shipped here annually from Oman and an entire city was built around its wealth.
It's amazing to think that, well, according to the Roman historian Plinnei, five hundred BC to 500 AD, and that's a long time, that's a thousand years, this was one of the most important ports of the Arabian Gulf.
These ruins are all that remain of the fortified warehouses that stored the frankincense.
The cargo was so valuable, they were built like ancient bank vaults.
This city was rumoured to be so rich that the traders who lived here, in their stone houses, had gold and silver around their doors, apparently.
Down there, those buildings would have been stuffed to their gunnels with frankincense.
And out there, not little fishing boats, but sailing boats and rowing boats, that had come all the way from Dofa, in Oman, where I started my journey to here, carrying their priceless cargo.
Out there there would have been camel caravans, carrying the frankincense way into the heartland of Yemen The next morning I'm following the trail north, to find one of the great monuments of the frankincense trade.
It's hostile territory and I'm travelling with the protection of the Yemeni army.
It's hard to imagine what would have been going through the cameliers' heads when they got to this point in the trail.
This landscape is very unforgiving.
It's early in the morning now and it's already serenely hot.
The sun's just kicking off all this black rock and sand As many as ten thousand loaded camels walked along this track each year, tirelessly trudging twelve hours a day.
Our lead vehicle barely makes it to mid-morning before its tyre punctures.
We come to a complete stop, three miles away from the landmark I've come to see.
Basically what's happening is that the drivers of our vehicles down don't want to go any further up this wadi because they're worried about their cars.
- One hour? No, I know.
That's why we have to start.
With no alternative, we have to walk.
This barely discernible path is two thousand years old and it was the principle route that every single caravan took, and the reason that we know that they definitely did take this root is because the tribe in Shabua was so powerful that it took tax from every single caravan and that the way that they did that was that they built this astonishing gate across this wadi and every caravan was filtered down here and through this gate.
And if they didn't, if they thought, ha ha, we could be sneaky because there must be lots of ways across this mountain, they could be punished.
And it wasn't just any old punishment.
It was death.
This ancient gate is a reminder of a forgotten civilisation, which became rich on the frankincense trade.
For close to one thousand years, the tribes who controlled this region claimed a quarter of all the goods that passed through here.
Generations of frankincense traders had to pay up before they could continue their journey north.
But the ongoing tribal conflict means I can't follow their path towards Saudi Arabia.
Instead, I have to skirt around the edge of the danger zone to Aden, Yemen's modern capital of the frankincense trade.
Seven hours later, the volcanic skyline of Aden appears on the horizon.
Its port is the oldest and deepest in Arabia and the city is built in the crater of an extinct volcano.
Its strategic position made it a target for the British empire, which ruled here from eighteen thirty nine to 1967.
I'm joining Sheikh Tarik, a lawyer who remembers those colonial days.
- Did Aden feel quite British during the British era? - Oh yes, yes, I believe very much so.
- So did you have things like the red post boxes and? - All around.
- Really? - Imagine, in the early fifties, brand new buildings, five to six storeys, all of these, eighty to ninety percent were occupied by the British families.
Although Aden was a British colony for a hundred and twenty eight years, there's little left of any colonial influence.
Except of course, for a statue of the most commemorated British monarch in history.
- I can't believe there's still a statue of Queen Victoria in Aden.
- Well, after the socialists came in, after the independence, than, this was removed.
- Since then, the British government continued to ask for it.
- Oh, really? They wanted it back? - They said "we want it.
If you don't want it, where is our Queen Victoria statue? We want it back.
" - "We will take it back.
We want it.
" - And it was not given to them until the Duke of York came here and when he said that Queen Victoria was his great grandmother the shah got so shy and sentimental about it that they got it out somewhere, she was cleaned up and then put here.
- And there she is.
- That's it.
- In all her slightly rotund glory.
- But would most people living in Aden today, I mean, do they think it's slightly strange to have a British queen? - Some of them feel strange about it, but it's being tolerated.
The people of Aden have had to tolerate not only the British, but the Russians and the Portuguese, who also ruled here.
Now, its colonial days are long gone, but the port's prosperity remains, and it's become the hub from which frankincense is shipped across the globe.
I've come to the warehouse of one of the world's biggest traders This is the main warehouse district of Aden and I'm hoping that I can find someone who can tell me a bit about this frankincense.
Ah.
Look at this place It's definitely selling aromatics.
It's amazing.
- This way.
Shokram.
I feel like I've gone back about two hundred years in time.
This is amazing.
Ah.
- Salam Haleikum.
Saffras was born an incense trader.
Four generations of his family have operated out of this warehouse.
The smoke of the resin he sells will rise in temples and churches all over the world.
- My little sack is feeling very insignificant all of a sudden.
Saffras employs a team of professional incense graders who sort through the frankincense and take out all the impurities.
Like diamonds, each lump of resin is graded according to its clarity and weight.
- This warehouse is absolutely packed to the roof with sacks.
- Ya.
- It's clearly still a thriving business.
- This is actually used in a variety of uses: - one of it is for household burning oil.
- ok - And it is also used in medicine and perfumes also.
Extracts from the frankincense shipped from here will be used to make some of the world's best known perfume brands.
- OK, well I'm slightly embarrassed that I have to show you my pathetic little store of frankincense compared to yours.
- But I'd love to know what you, what you think of it.
- Where would this be on the scale of good to bad? - Well, this is on the, on the higher side of the very good one.
- You know, absolute, you know - Top, top quality.
- Top, top quality.
- This is the top of the range.
- Top of the range? - Ya.
This it the top of the range.
Saffra said he'd be able to sell my frankincense for four times the amount I bought it for in Oman.
Three thousand years on, frankincense still has the power to generate wealth in this ancient port.
The next day, I couldn't resist going to see one of the world's craziest sporting events.
It's taking place in a village just off the road, north of Aden.
I catch a lift with a local.
What I'm about to witness is camel jumping.
Not camels jumping, but men jumping camels.
Unsurprisingly, the men of the Zaranik tribe are the only people in the world who practice this sport.
The camels are lined up into position, ready for the big event.
So this is obviously how you prepare to jump over a camel.
Or, if the rumous is true, several camels.
Just to give you an idea of height, I'm about five foot nine.
This camel has got to be over two meters in height.
Camel jumping is a right of passage for the young men of the Zaranik tribe.
They claim they don't use weapons in battle.
They rely instead on their famed stamina and strength to overcome their enemies.
Camel jumping is a way of honing and proving that physical prowess.
These are today's competitors.
The rules are simple.
The man who jumps cleanly over the most camels is the winner.
It's good to see a real pride in this.
And everyone is just going to come and gather in around.
They're just coming trickling in from the villages.
With the camels firmly held in place by their tails, the competition starts.
The favourite, Ahmed, makes the warm-up - two camel jump - looks easy.
But this is just the start, and Mohammed, the smallest of all the competitors is not going to let lack of stature be a handicap.
Three camels prove a hump too far for some.
- That is not funny.
It must really hurt.
[laughter.]
And then, it's four camels and just two men left in the running.
Something's coming up.
Somebody's going to jump now.
That's four camels.
This just seems madness.
I mean, some of the guys were barely clearing four camels.
Five camels is going to be too much.
Without delay, Ahmed charges in, full steam ahead.
Now the favourite is out, sixteen year old Mohamed is the last one left.
Tribal respect is won with these jumps.
If he makes this, he'll be considered a warrior.
And in the end there can only be one champion.
Mohamed's prize is the admiration of the entire tribe.
- Where is he? Here he is.
Should we go and clap him? - You did really good.
Really well.
- Shofram, shofram.
I'm leaving the Zaranik tribe and the desert plains to cross the Haraza mountain range the home of the highest peaks in the Arabian peninsula.
Three thousand meters above sea level, it's a different world up here.
Ninety-five percent of Yemen's land is desert, so these rich, green valleys are treasured for agriculture.
Terraces cut into the steep clifs use every corner of its fertile land.
High above them, at the top of the Haraz ridge, medieval fortresses stand guard.
Their towers were built from the granite cliffs they rest on.
Today, people visit them for their magnificent views, but once, they defended the nation's capital.
Cradled in the heart of the Yemeni highlands is the ancient, beautiful city of Sanah.
It's known as Son's city, after the son of Noah, who, according to legend, built it on the highest ground he could find after the waters of the great flood has subsided.
It's a Unesco World Heritage site and like a living museum.
At the heart of the old city is the spice market, where goods have been bought and sold for thousands of years.
- No, it's not good quality, that.
- Smell.
- No, no.
- This isn't what I'm looking for.
- Do you know the white frankincense, like Omani? - Yes, yes.
- Like this.
- Ah, that's certainly a little better.
- This is number one, is it? - Yes.
- This frankincense.
Good, very good.
For this, madam.
- What are you saying? It doesn't smell that bad.
- Do you use this at home? - Yes.
- For what? - House.
For khanisa.
- For khanisa.
- For gas against insects? - Yes.
On Sona's streets many women are veiled.
So far, I haven't worn one, but tomorrow I leave for Saudi Arabia, a country so shut off from the outside world, I have no idea what to expect or what I'll have to wear.
But Inas is helping me prepare for any possibility.
- I'm just worried about how I should behave.
You know, Yemen feels very easy.
- And I think Saudi's going to be a little dark suited wall and my head down and - There is a stereotype that we don't accept the others as they are and we want them to be just like us.
- That is not true, in all Arab countriesindescernible they accept you as you are.
- Ok.
I mean, do you, are you wearing kind of jeans and t-shirts under that? - I have the same things you're wearing, just underneath it.
- So that is almost always like a kind of overcoat.
- Exactly.
- Right.
- I've even heard that it's the same translation for overcoat.
- Oh, is it? - We're going that way? - Ya.
Let's cross the street.
It's that one.
- It's got a whole sign for it and everything.
So Inas is taking me to one of Sona's best known shops for baltas.
- What do you suggest for Saudi? Do you think I should go quite simple? - No, no, no.
- Flashy? - They love flashy, more decorations.
- Really? - That's quite elegant.
Look at that.
What do you think? Yes? - This is the longest.
- The longest one they have.
- So if it doesn't fit we have to change the store.
- OK.
- I hope it fits, because it's elegant.
- Let's try it.
- Better quality.
The fabric is better.
- Yeah, this is long.
- What do you think? It's good? Ok.
- And here is the scarf, which is the same.
- Oh ya, ok.
- Have a seat.
- So that you wouldn't look funny in the store.
- You're going to have to give me intensive lessons on how to do this.
I'm hopeless.
- Tonight.
- Ya - I can't even, you know, I can barely put on a kind of, you know, warm muffler scarf.
- Do I look like mother Theresa? - If I'm putting makeup and I'm going to a wedding, I have to wear this thing, so please experience my suffering, sometimes - I am experien.
.
This is too wierd.
- And, can you breathe? - No.
- You look like some iron lady.
- Do I look like I'm looking out of a pillow box? - Oh, what about this bit? I wonder if you have to cover all of yourself.
- You put on, not so firm.
- Eyeshadow, all over ???, because, you know, in Arab countries we put a lot of makeup.
- So, can I, can I just ask an incredibly obvious question? Why don't you just wander around with no makeup? - This way I'm not wearing the veil.
- But you look beautiful.
- Oh, I don't know Inas.
Really, have I got to take this with me? - Just in case.
- I'm making myself weep.
- If it wasn't so uncomfortable, it would be really funny.
- I can't believe what you, women, are go through.
It's just a minor discomfort and I know it's something that millions of other women go through everyday.
But having to dress in a certain way has really hit a nerve.
The whole bout of experience with Inas this afternoon was, I mean, it was funny but at the same time, all my tears weren't entirely histerical laughter.
You suddenly reealize how lucky you are as a woman living in the West and not having to dress like that.
And now, I've got to go to a country which is famous for having very little rights for women.
So I'm felling a little bit, kind of, mixed.
The next morning, with my veil in my bag, I have to take a plain to Saudi Arabia, because tribal warfare has closed the border with Yemen.
I'll be arriving in possibly the most enigmatic country of the world in just over three hours.
If the border wasn't closed, I could follow the original route due North from Yemen and up the West side of Saudi Arabia.
But now, I have to fly to the capital Riyadh before I can rejoin the trail.
Saudi Arabia is a kingdom of contrasts and contradictions.
Here, devout faith and extreme wealth have to find a way to coexist.
The latest luxury cars cruise the streets, but women are forbidden from driving them.
There seems nothing is unusual about the airport, until I realize there are no women to be seenanywhere.
Women in Saudi Arabia are not allowed to go outside their houses alone.
They must either be accompanied by another woman or an approved male member of their family.
I, too, must have a male chaperone.
- Hello, Imast Adawy.
- Salam Haleikum.
- How are you? - Very good.
I had a very good flight.
It was good.
Thank you very much.
Are we ready? Now do I need to cover up my head? - Yes, please.
- OK.
I'm not very good at this yet.
I need one of your You see, the mens' ones are much easier to handle.
- Ok.
That is ok? - Ya.
- Fine.
All right.
I've no idea what the rules are, but Daui doesn't seem concerned, despite my rather unusual luggage.
- This one is very heavy.
- Ya.
- And very smelly.
- Thank you.
- You're welcome.
- Now presumably, I can't sit in the front seat.
It's not allowed.
- Right.
Ha, ha, ha.
- That's fair enough.
Since the beginning of Islam, seventeen hundred years ago, Saudi Arabia has been largely closed off to the non-Muslim world.
New government policies have only recently started giving visas to carefully controlled tour groups.
- All we here about are the bad things, the very strict rules and regulations, that women are not allowed to drive, that they are not allowed to work, that they have to travel in the back of the car, not the front.
- I don't have to be, but it would be nice to have a choice.
- You think - Yes.
- You think I'm going to see a very different Saudi in the next two weeks? - Do you think a lot of people don't come because, like me, they're worried that, particularly as a woman all you're going to do is cause offense and you can't go anywhere, you have to be shut away.
- Is that true? - Could we do that now? Can we go to one now and have a look? - Yes.
- Cause I'm afraid I'm still doubting you at this point.
Only three hours from Yemen, but suddenly I feel I'm back in the West.
Riyadh's shopping centers are depressingly similar to those back home.
Many of the shops here are recognizable brands.
- A lot of these shops are very familiar to me.
I'm really surprised, but these are all shops that you see on any British high street.
- They buy a lot of stuff? - Yes.
- But you know, there are high-heeled shoes, there are short skirts, there's like low cut things.
- And some women here, they don't cover up so much, it feels more relaxed in here.
Relaxed it may be, but women still need to be accompanied and still need to wear the obeyer, whatever they choose to wear underneath.
But at least I get the chance to meet and talk to Saudi women here, face to face.
- I don't understand because you all wear this obeyer, but can you wear anything you like underneath? - Yes.
- Anything? Short skirts? - Yes, anything.
Jeans, t-shirts.
Yeah, it's ok.
- Really? - Ya.
It's choice - It's choice" And your parents don't mind? - No.
- They don't say "you can't go out looking like that".
- There's people open in Saudi Arabia and there's closed.
- OK.
- So some families are more free and other families are more strict.
From the moment I arrived, I've been in no doubt that Islam defines life in Saudi Arabia.
And a call to prayer makes this immediately obvious to outsiders.
Unlike anywhere else I've been, every single shop closes for prayer five times a day and I'm told this happens like clockwork, every day of the year.
It's just coming up to ten to five and the call to prayer has sounded and as you can see, all the shops in this little mall are suddenly closed down and the people are melting away before my very eyes.
Although this is a fast changing society and although I've been able to walk around without covering my head conservative Islam has an inescapable hold here.
Islamic religious law, known as Sharia law, is the law.
Just a few blocks from the shopping area is Riyadh's religious center, Saffa Square.
Saffa in Arabic means sort of highly polished, gleaming white and it's here, in this square that perhaps that names takes a very, sort of symbolic, status, because this is where Saudi Arabia tries to make its society, I don't know, more unblemished, highly polished, but they do their cleaning up in a particularly brutal way to us, in the West, because the punishment for crimes like murder, rape and drug smuggling is death, and the way they put people to death is to behead them.
The square is overlooked by the headquarters of the religious police, known as the Mutua.
Doctor Abdulah is a senior member of the Mutua and amazingly, agreed to be interviewed.
I wanted to ask you about this square here and the fact that this is the square where the public executions take place, for people who have done terrible crimes, but to us, it still feels terribly brutal to behead somebody in public.
- When an execution takes place, can you, sort of describe the scene? What happens? - Do you prepare them in any way? Do they have a painkiller or is it just you kneel down, have their hands tied? - Oh, really? So it's not automatic anymore? So far, it's felt as if that call to prayer has been the only constant on my journey.
But when the traders first walked through what's now Saudi territory Islam didn't exist and instead of religion, it was the frankincense route that linked the desert tribes of Arabia.
Now, the most enigmatic and powerful Arabian nation lies ahead of me.
In the next program I explore the unseen worlds of Saudi Arabia and meet a prince whose head for business has made him one of the richest men on Earth.
- Are you constantly looking for new companies to invest in? - Oh yes, I just ??? I'm in a James Bond film.
I cross unexpected and astonishing landscapes.
- Well, I'm a little bit nervous.
- Me too.
In the pristine waters of the Red Sea, I dive an untouched shipwreck.
On the city streets, I meet a generation that's fueled by the wealth of oil, and I explore the ruins of an ancient empire that once flourished on the profits of the frankincense trade.