21 - 27 March 2002
Issue No.578
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 21 - 27 March 2002 Issue No.578 |
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Even oases have satellites
The major oases are surrounded by numerous smaller ones, and Jenny Jobbins discovered that many of these have a life of their own
Some of the best things in life are brought to us by accident, or serendipity, however one looks at it. Photographer Farid Atiya and I were in Farafra to go on a desert safari, but on the morning we were due to set off we were told our trip would be delayed for a day. Noticing our annoyance, the owner of one of the Qasr Farafra hotels, Saad Awlad Ali, kindly intervened to lend us a driver for the afternoon, and said we would be taken to some interesting places. I was feeling a bit let down and tetchy. "I don't want to see any tourist things," I told him. But when Farid suggested we make the best of the circumstances I had to agree that, after all, spending another night in a hotel would be better than a sleeping bag in the cold desert, and I decided to enjoy myself. I was even more cheered when Saad's brother, Hamdi, promised that when we returned I could check my e-mails on the hotel's Internet line.
We climbed in the LandCruiser and bounced off the road into the desert. All the ancient springs or wells in the New Valley are called Roman springs, and we were on our way to one called Ain Tinin, an outlying oasis lying deep in the desert 24kms from Farafra. When we arrived we were surprised by the lush vegetation: a huge orchard of fruit trees and date palms and groves of tamarisks and acacias. Beside this well- wooded copse was a large farm complex with several dwellings clustered round an open, sandy space. On one side of this was a small building used as a mosque where the extended family and farmhands were praying when we arrived. While we waited for them to appear, Farid took out his tripod and set it up with a view of the giant tamarisks.
When they emerged from prayers I asked the present head of the family, Hajj Atiya, about the history of the oasis. He said it had belonged to his family "for ever." He may have been right. Perhaps his ancestors had lived here since Roman days -- why not? He showed us the Roman spring, a wide pool with the fluid trunks of leafy acacias falling over into the water. He smiled as he described how good was this spring, as well he might, because almost all the water he had ever drunk came from this source.
Patiently dealing with my questions, Hajj Atiya showed us into the low, bare guest room which stood all alone a little way from the house. No sooner had we sat down on the blankets and reed mats spread on the floor than a round, squat-legged table was carried in and spread with a tentmaker-patterned cloth. We and the seven or eight others present were each offered a loaf of thick brown baladi bread, so thick it was almost like sun bread, to dip into a dozen or so vegetable dishes from mulukhiya to black and green olives, all homegrown.
Over lunch, Hajj Atiya told us that before 1978, when the road was paved from Cairo to Bahariya and on south to Kharga, he used to travel to Dakhla and Bahariya by camel. Everybody knew each other in those days, he said. Now there were lots of people in the oasis "from all over the place," but still the government had not given them an electricity cable. Perhaps, we tentatively suggested, the cost of laying a 24-km cable to one farm might be a little prohibitive? This did not satisfy Hajj Atiya. His generator wasn't a solution. He wanted a cable.
He told us the farm's main crops were fuul (fava beans), wheat and rice, and they also kept cows and geese and produced wood from their extensive groves of trees. They were almost entirely self-sufficient, growing most of their own food, weaving baskets and supplying their own building materials. After we had eaten, Hajj Atiya showed us the bread oven, which stood in the corner of a little outhouse inhabited by snow-white pigeons that flew into the bakery in search of warmth. His wife said the cat came in too, but she said she shooed it away because it terrorised the pigeons.
We took our leave of this paradise, slightly disappointed that Hajj Atiya's elderly and still attractive wife, who wore a bright blue gown, a yellow scarf and a beautiful silver nose ring, did not want to be photographed, despite encouragement from her husband and the rest of the gathering. But while my professional side might have wished otherwise, the inner sister was glad she had her way.
Sultan or Serendipity? Whatever its name, this little camel will grow up in a world far from anywhere
photo: Farid Atiya
From Ain Tinin we went to another small oasis set around a similar Roman spring, but growing wild and untamed because the owner preferred to use it as a weekend retreat. He had built a simple house with a small, reed-walled courtyard, but we also discovered a hide and suspected that he really came to hunt: there were numerous fox and gazelle tracks, and a foxhole leading to a den nestling in the roots of a clump of tamarisks.
We drove from there back towards Farafra until we came to an oasis of green fields where men, women and children were busy at work. This was Saad Awlad Ali's camel farm, where he housed the animals used on tourist safaris. I am a country girl and fussy about the way animals are kept, so I was a tad apprehensive about this visit. I need not have worried. Camels, donkeys, a horse, dogs, geese, hens and some fine cockerels strolled about in a biblical stable-yard fashion, and there was even a brand new camel, born the day before, quietly absorbing in a very new way all the mysterious sights, sounds and smells of the world around it. It was guarded by its amiable mother, who had a good look at everyone who approached her baby but allowed it to be handled, although I did not wish to invade the infant's space myself.
The camel handler showed me how he fed the baby which, for the first week of his life, would not be strong enough to suckle properly: he had put some of the mother's milk into a Baraka bottle, and he poured a glass of this for me. It was very thick but not at all creamy, and it tasted of camel as goat's milk tastes of goat. He poured some more of the milk into a metal teapot and forced the spout into the baby's mouth, gently stroking his throat until he swallowed. The baby struggled, and Farid couldn't bear it. "Enough, enough!" he said. I wished they had a rubber teat and a real bottle, but perhaps this was the best they could do. Although I am sure Saad could have found some feeding equipment for his camel over the Internet at Qasr Farafra. But out here, where a satellite means a place which revolves round another place and the Internet needs a power cable, IT seemed light years away.
The riding camels, which were used for tourist safaris, were in a closed corral. I walked among them and they were all curious and friendly. "Spoiled camels," Farid remarked.
The baby had not yet been named. He was quite unaware that he was giving his first interview and having his portrait taken, or that three handlers were dancing attendance, or even that his mother was by his side. He knelt, eyes half- closed, quiet, bewildered, already exhausted with life. Why not call him Serendipity? I thought. But of course that was too long an appellative, and impossible to explain. He would probably end up with a name like Sultan, or Ramses. Just like our visit, everything is up to chance.
Practical information
Transport:
The Upper Egyptian Bus Company runs a comfortable daily bus service to Farafra from Turguman Square, Cairo. Fare LE25. The bus journey takes about seven hours.
Accommodation and safari tours in Qasr Farafra:
Al-Badawiya Hotel, tel: 092 510 060, Cairo number: 345 8524.
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