​

Moca was also the main port of the only sea route to Mecca, the busiest place in the world at that time.  The Arabs, however, had a strict policy of not exporting fertile coffee beans, so that it could not be grown anywhere else.  The coffee bean is the seed of the coffee tree, but when the outer layers are removed it becomes infertile.  Many were the attempts that were made to get some coffee trees or fertile grains, but that race was finally won by the Dutch in 1616, who managed to take some to Holland and there they grew them in greenhouses.

At first, the Yemeni authorities strongly encouraged the consumption of coffee, as its effects were considered preferable to the stronger effects of “Kat”, a bush whose leaves and shoots were chewed as a stimulant.  The first coffee serving establishments were opened in Mecca and were called "kaveh kanes".  Such an establishment quickly spread throughout the Arab world, and cafes became busy places where chess was played, gossip was exchanged, and singing, dancing, and music were enjoyed.  Nothing had been like the coffee shop before:  a place where you could socialize and do business in a comfortable environment and where everyone could go for the price of a coffee.

Arab coffee houses soon became centers of political activity and were suppressed.  Then, in the following decades, coffee and coffee shops were banned several times, but they kept coming back.  Eventually a solution was found:  coffee and coffee establishments had to pay taxes.

​

​