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Al-Ahram Weekly 4 - 10 November 1999 Issue No. 454 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 4 - 10 November 1999 Issue No. 454
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Splendour on the Nile
By Injy El-KashefNothing prepared me for what I was to encounter at the Old Cataract. Of course, every Egyptian has heard of the legendary hotel, but many people do not have the faintest idea of what it actually represents. The history, the splendour and the richesse associated with the hotel's construction had been no more than vague notions in my mind, as abstract as any mathematical hypothesis. Only upon my actual, physical, presence at the Cataract did I fully understand.
To those with a more vivid imagination, staying at the Old Cataract could prove almost disturbing. On my first night, all I wanted was to absorb as much of the place as my senses would take in and explore an institution which has witnessed the making of history. But on the second night, I began to mentally and emotionally recollect a past that I had not lived. The walls, the halls, the floors, the long corridors, the high ceilings and the very Nile seen from the Terrace, all seemed to project the ephemeral presence of people and events spanning the last century. The ease with which I found myself conjuring up memories of times gone by, was proof to me that the Cataract did not merely witness history, but was itself history; a history that temporarily erased many traces of my own present. This overpowering experience was not unlike feeling that I had walked right into a painting or even a period postcard.
The construction of the Old Cataract is linked with the British occupation of Egypt, itself linked to an empire, and to the Victorians, who were anxious to explore what they considered their domain. The technical revolution that generally characterised the era -- epitomised by the newly laid railway tracks -- rendered such exploration more accessible. At the same time, Thomas Cook's organised trips aboard its steamers had begun as early as 1869. The need to erect hotels along the Nile soon became pressing, challenging the more old-fashioned floating hotels.
The Cataract owes its name to the collision of the river with the granite barrier of land considered to be the first and northernmost cataract of the Nile and once believed to be where the civilised world ended. The hotel, located on an elevated granite platform, overlooks Elephantine Island, home of the historical Nilometre described by Strabo. Capital of the first nome of Upper Egypt, Elephantine was witness to the flourishing cult of Khnum, god of the cataract and inundation, and the temples there were constructed or maintained by some of the greatest figures of ancient history, including Tuthmosis III, Amenhotep II, Ramses III, Alexander IV (son of Alexander the Great) and Augustus Caesar. Once a great religious site, Elephantine also hosts the Temple of Yahvé, erected during the Persian era by a Jewish colony. Aramaic papyrus documents dating from 498-399 BC and discovered in 1898 and 1908 testify to this fact.
The Old Cataract's first newspaper advertisement appeared in The Egyptian Gazette on 11 December 1899 and promised: "Every modern comfort. Large and small apartment rooms, library, billiard room etc. ... fireplaces in hall, salons and the main rooms. Electrical lights running all night. Perfect sanitary arrangements approved by the authorities. Can accommodate 60 visitors." A railroad with elegant dining cars soon began to bring hotel guests to the Aswan station (now the EgyptAir office), where their luggage was collected and sent to their rooms. By 1900, after undergoing a prosperous enlargement, the hotel could already accommodate twice as many guests. Yet only one year later, guests had to be housed in tents due to overflow.
The opening ceremony of the main dining area, the 1902 Restaurant, took place on 10 December of that same year, and was attended by several prominent figures, including Khedive Abbas Helmy, the sovereign of Egypt; the Duke of Connaught, third son of Queen Victoria; Lord and Lady Cromer; Sir Winston Churchill, who came with King Edward VII's younger brother for the opening of the first Aswan Dam; John Aird, the contractor of the dam; and a host of dignitaries including engineers, ministers and officials.
Designed as a Moorish hall, the 1902 Restaurant featured four large red-and-white traditional arches topped by a 75-foot dome and decorated with fine mashrabiya and stained glass designs. The columns supporting the roof were obviously inspired by the interior of the Qalawoun Mausoleum, while many of the restaurant's interior details were borrowed from the Mosque of Ibn Touloun. An orchestra was unobtrusively seated in a gallery designed to hide it from the view of the 200 guests that the restaurant could then accommodate. The Moorish hall was the venue of nightly dancing and, each Sunday, of a masked ball that, as a resident of the hotel in 1999, I could almost hear, let alone see, when I first entered the restaurant. The place exudes the nightly happenings, the diamonds, the dresses, the cigars, the elegant dances on the polished floors.
The most popular feature of the hotel was, and still is, the Terrace at sunset, which must have been the scene of many a portentous discussion by cigar-smoking Victorian empire builders, while tea was served from 4pm to 7pm to the music of a secluded orchestra. It is also on this Terrace that classic detective Hercule Poirot mused on the crimes invented by Agatha Christie in her Death on the Nile, the film adaptation of which was naturally shot on location.
Top: the Old Cataract as they saw it; centre left, the vestibule; right, the Cataract of the 1990s. Distinguished guests (anti-clockwise from top right): the Agha Khan III and the Begum, Agatha Christie, Sir Winston Churchill, Tsar Nicolas II and King Farouk
The version of the Old Cataract that we see today is not much altered from that of 1906, then owned and operated by a Swiss firm, the Upper Egyptian Hotels Company. Open from 1 November to 1 May, the hotel featured a billiard room (reserved for men only), a spectacular garden adorned with trees from all over the world, a golf course and a post office. Donkeys waited in the parking lot to take guests to the Philae Temples and the Unfinished Obelisk, or carry them to desert picnics.
It is, therefore, no wonder that, even then, long-term residents booked their rooms a whole year in advance. One story tells of Lord Benbrook, a regular guest at the hotel, who, arriving at the Terrace to find his favourite table taken, approached the intruder thus: "I am sorry, but this table is reserved." The occupant, an American, said: "Since when?" Benbrook politely replied: "Since 20 years."
In 1909, one guest noted that Christmas day celebrations included afternoon donkey polo and races in the parking lot, the traditional paper chase and a wonderful Christmas dinner, climaxed with ice cream shaped in the form of a Pharaonic solar boat. In keeping with its traditions, the Old Cataract's millennium celebrations will include a classical music concert performed by renowned musicians before dinner, which will be followed by a ball.
Among the prestigious guests that flocked to the hotel, Mohamed Chah Agha Khan III, distinguished leader of the Ismaili sect of Islam for many years, was the most regular. After his first stay in 1937, when he and his new bride honeymooned in the southern wing of the second floor, his apartments were reserved yearly during the winter months, which he spent taking the famous "sun and sand baths" advertised in The Sphinx, a leading English magazine of the time. Before his death in 1957, he requested to be buried in Aswan. His mausoleum -- which took two years to complete -- dominates the view from the Terrace, and his widow, the Begum, faithfully paid him her respects every winter by placing a rose daily on his grave.
During the first few decades of the century, the hotel also hosted the Tsar of Russia, Nicolas II, not long before his death. Howard Carter, after his monumental discovery in 1922 of Tutankhamun's Tomb, also stayed at the Cataract. Egyptian royalty, who stayed at the Royal Suite, considered the Old Cataract their playground. King Farouk often enjoyed sitting on a solitary bench on the cliff overlooking the Nile, while El-Nahas Pasha, then prime minister, would sit on the first divan of the lobby, to the right of the revolving door. It is said that while El-Nahas was at the hotel, the area was reserved for him alone and his food prepared in a private kitchen that now houses the housekeeping offices of the hotel.
By 1939, even this peaceful, remote hotel began to feel the unrest of war-torn Europe. While it was once obligatory for guests to appear in formal clothing after 7pm, soldiers began to occupy the Terrace and dining rooms, military shorts replacing dinner jackets. British families living in Cairo sent their daughters to stay at the Cataract for safety. According to a local source, one stifling afternoon, to the dismay of their chaperones, some of these girls were seen cavorting on Kitchener's Island in the nude.
Dignitaries continued to flock to the hotel soon after the war and, to this day, the Old Cataract is fully booked all year round, even during the scorching summer months, including the eight theme suites, named after some of the distinguished guests who stayed at the hotel. All 131 rooms are designed in different decor and shape, some enjoying special touches such as Persian carpets and hand-carved, antique or signed furniture.
The hotel now accounts for 50 per cent of the total revenue of all the hotels in Aswan combined, which is easy to believe considering the four digit prices, in dollars, for the suites. I was not surprised, therefore, when the hotel's general manager, Antoine Lhuguenot, explained upon my inquiry that the sign at the entrance prohibiting entry to anyone who was not a hotel guest is taken very seriously. Lhuguenot explained that organised trips of up to 40 people, with their tour guides, used to invade the hotel in order to explore the interior of the legendary Old Cataract, disturbing the peace and quiet of the hotel residents. While the sunset thé complet of international reputation could, until recently, be enjoyed by residents of nearby Aswan hotels and tourists, one must, nowadays, show a room key or a pass at the door to be allowed entry on the premises.
Throughout my stay it became clear that the management of the hotel, the French company Accor, is very keen on preserving the exclusive treatment that the place has always been accustomed to offering its guests. In fact, the Old Cataract is hosting a series of exhibitions, exclusively for its guests, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the establishment. Beginning this month with an exhibit of spontaneous Nubian art (see p.15), the series is organised by Kubel for Engineering Works and sponsored by Accor. Subsequent exhibits, lasting until April 2000, will include pottery, textiles, paintings, batik, ceramic and glass by artists who have, throughout their life, established a rapport with Aswan, Nubia and the Cataract.
Having just returned from there myself, I know it requires no genius to achieve that.
