For a spell back at the end of the 80s/early 90s whenever I was walking around Downtown Cairo I used to have guys shout at me, “Hey! Kaboria!” The reference was to a hit film that was playing at the cinemas, staring Ahmed Zaki. In it, he sported a distinctive close-crop hair cut and, unasked for by me, my local barber had given me the same cut. Then the film finished its run and my hair grew out and that’s the last I heard of Kaboria, until last month.
It unexpectedly popped up again in British newspaper The Guardian in an interview with Cate Blanchett. Rehashing old history with the journalist, she explains how aged around 20, she was doing the Australian thing of travelling the world for a year. She was hanging out in Cairo when she was approached by some guy at her hostel and asked if she wanted to appear as an English-speaking extra in a local film. And so she went along and it turned out to be Kaboria. However, contrary to what sources on the internet say, Blanchett says it was so hot and boring she left and was never in the film.
The hostel where the future Elizabeth I and Galadriel was staying in Cairo was the Oxford pension. A “fleapit” she calls it. A fleapit? That’s not half the story. It was cockroach central. A fetid lice incubator. A rodent ranch. It had a rickety lift with the greater part of its back kicked out that carried guest up to the sixth-floor reception and which felt uncomfortable like an ascending coffin. It had nicotine-hued walls, showers that spouted only rusty trickles and rooms that weren’t rooms at all, just widenings in the corridor with a mattress on the floor.
But it had a prime location midway up Talaat Harb and it was cheap, cheap enough that it was always full of long-term boarders, paying just a few pounds a week for a place to flop. It had the added attraction of a reception area that was the place to score drugs, pick up work, sell a Walkman or a passport, buy a false student ID, or just to share Stellas and stories with like-minded warriors on the overland trail.
I never stayed there – I valued my health too much – but I knew plenty who did. These memorably included a guy from Manchester who had to be medivaced out after catching hepatitis and an American who taught English up the street at a cowboy school where the pay didn’t allow for anything more than a bed at the Oxford. To brighten up his room the American bought some red cloth from Khan al-Khalili and draped the ceilings and walls. For company he bought a white rabbit from the butchers and named her Miss Fifi. When he left a few months later, the management at the Oxford left his room as it was and certain guests got given a room that looked like a brothel, complete with white rabbit and droppings.
Who said the golden age of travel ended with World War II?
Funny, was telling my daughter a story of long ago at the Oxford, climbing Cheops etc and a white rabbit, drugs etc! So googled your story! Great to have some proof, thanks
what year were you there? I was teaching and lived there on and off in 89-90
I was around the Oxford in late 1988-early 1989, not living there but meeting people and sharing a beer in the lobby. The guy with the white rabbit was called Randy, I think.
I was 1st there summer of 89 into 90. You probably met Simon who was in Cairo buying vintage motorcycles. I recall the rickety lift bearing graffiti ‘Charleton Heston put his vest on’ and the scandal when someone left a turd in the tub.
… and the toilets didn’t work (in the morning you just ran to the falafel restaurant a hundred yards down the road , for breakfast), sheets got changed once a week regardless of how many had crashed on the mattress, but there was room service in the shape of two young boys who ran a tea and coffee business in there. Was there in 1983 and loved every minute of it.
I was there in 89 the same time the guys who did a charity tour through Africa were ending their trek so the Goodies three man tandem was in the hall. I was teaching English at IBI and am writing an essay on Dahab even as I took a break and saw this. If anyone was there at that tine please message. me some wonderful people. One night over beer I helped a man edit his story of travels. Another time I got into a profanity laden rant about religion with Angus who also taught (wondering if he was the rabbit owner)
I just realized that I might have been with Ms Blanchet There were several of us who took a taxi from the Oxford to a film site.As I recall it might have been on Zamelek I do remember the front of the hotel was marble and think it was raining. We sat around before being told it was not going to happen and my memory of it was we might not have even been given cab fare to get back
Now that I think about it we left the hotel when we realized the film was a bust and went for dinner at an Italian restaurant.This wa almost 30 years ago but the timeline and details match up
The Oxford was a major recruiting ground for Western extras for local filming. There were travellers being taken off to hang around on film sets all the time.
I was recruited as a khawadja crusader in an Egyptian historical soap opera from the Oxford back in ’84 – wooden swords and wooden movements, run by a fellow in mirrored shades who called himself mister Perfection, overseen by a gaggle of directors shouting commands over each other and shouting ‘don’t listen to heem – listen to me – I am in charge !
Back then I did share an apartment with a fellow teacher from Sudanese elite During Ramadan knock came on door and flatmate Mat introduced me to the former Sudanese President. We forget it now but before 1st Iraq War so much seemed to be moving in a progressive direction as Soviet empire crumbled though ex-wife’s mother was from Tanzania and said for Africa it was seen as problematic as they relied on playing US against USSR
Has nobody recalled Mustafa – the chai-server of deep soul, and infinite gravitas: ‘yaaaaaah, Habiiiibiiiii…’ ?
I remember Mustafa very well, very tall, thin and nubian dark skin. “Chai…Aswani karkade…”. A very good man.
Stayed at the Oxford many times between ’85-’87. Magical place. Great sudanese weed.
Mustafa was a man among men… at 6am when we went to check out and I said “I want to settle up” he ran to the fridge and got me a 7-Up – like I said a man among men (circa Nov 1988)
I was beginning to think I had imagined the Oxford as there was nothing on the Internet. I stayed there on a few occasions, the longest being for about a month in 1996. Dirty, roach ridden but cheap cheap cheap. Plenty of wheeling and dealing in the reception area but the fridge for the beer (0.5% ‘Stella’) would give you an electric shock when you opened it! Very fond memories. Anyone got any photos?
I stayed there January 87 with a bunch of rather shady Israeli guys who smoked weed from dusk til dawn. There were Siamese cats in the reception, or did I imagine that?
Was that Akiva? He had his own room with a double bunk bed like really high that he had built himself of lovely strong wood the ceilings was so high there lol not just the people lol
I stayed a few days, probably March or April 1984. I also remember that elevator as a death trap, the toilet that didn’t flush, which didn’t stop people from using it anyway, and that someone had written “Bug run” with big letters on the wall above my bed.
The second worst hotel in my life.
Maybe one of the worst, but definitely one of the most interesting. And hey, what can you expect for 25 cent per night????? And there was excellent roomservice!
For a while in the 1980’s I lived in the legendary Pension Oxford in Cairo. The longer you stayed the better the room you could score. The wire semi-see-through elevator was touch and go. Sometimes clean-cut American girls would show up at the reception desk and pretty much do a U-turn as the Pension Oxford was a strictly a 40-watt bulb place. One day I bought a heavyweight Remington typewriter off two Greek brothers working in their underpants in ankle-deep water in their nearby basement stationery supply store. They told me their basement flooded regularly and they were quite cheerful, sloshing around in their underpants, filling orders. With the typewriter I wrote out fake letters attesting to the student status of incoming and outgoing Pension Oxford guests in the (vain) hope such a letter would get them a student discount flight out of Cairo to Europe etc. My very brief scheme failed as the typewriter had a couple of visibly misaligned keys hardly making my student status documents looking like official university verified letters.
The Pension Oxford tea boy, Mustafa, was about 70 and he would shuffle along the dimly-lit corridors bringing glasses of tea on a hardly-sparkling silver tray to the mostly stoned guests, prostrate in their rooms. I sometimes cooked on a petrol stove in my corner room (which had two big windows) – I seem to remember “perfecting” an eggplant and milk stew dish – anyway it was eaten with no complaints by various London-to-India-overland hippies. I particularly remember one long-haired guy from Switzerland or Austria who was on a years long trip to first-hand see every sacred/holy place in the world in Iran, India, Cambodia, Indonesia etc. He didn’t come across as zealously religious but he impressed me as a free, unworried, non-material traveller. In one of the other rooms there was a German girl waiting for her Israeli boyfriend to come out of an Egyptian prison (!) To pass the time she’d built a mezzanine level in her room.
The manager of the Pension Oxford had really thick-lensed spectacles, that were held together by a bandage. He called me “The Professor”. Whenever he saw me he’d rasp/intone in a ten thousand Egyptian cigarettes voice, “AH, The Professor!” The Pension Oxford was my Beat Hotel. I heard it got closed down by the authorities. pbakowski54@gmail.com
Hi Peter, I’m Andy, I lived with Lisa in room 42, opposite the kitchen, a mate had built a sleeping platform in it and I painted it pink and black. I remember you writing a book, Thunder Road.
Oh Shit get out of here…that is Akiva… I also stayed in that room but I’m not the one who built the bed I also wasn’t his girlfriend I I just come through from Eilat and we got talking so he offered me to stay in his room I think I might have stayed there once or twice after chatting to early morning but I kept my own bed in the other room with all the other tourists. I later met Akiva and his girlfriend in Israel and he looked really worth for where after being in prison for years. Sexually abused it was not a good site but he still had his humour which was great and that was the last time I ever saw them
I do, with his white long egyptian vest, sometimes he went in the rooms asking if there were any spoons. I was there in the summer of 1989, and the person in charge was a French woman called Madam. So, one night we were in a room from a Belgium guy who was living there for 2 years, actually his occupation was, to beg, and we got a bit enthusiastic, and I being a painter, and having art material with me, did a painting on the room’s wall. Quite nice, actually. Mine wasn’t the only one. So Mustafa saw and tells Madam. Next day she calls me and told me I had to leave. I wanted to go somewhere anyway, then I took a short trip to Luxor. I had long hair, in Luxor I cut it short, went back to Cairo, to the Oxford Hotel, checked in again, Madame didn’t recognize me. It was true that it was filled with cockroaches, but I also remember the great view from the balconies, good conversations in the lobby, over a beer, day or night, really special guests, also walking at night in this long corridors, and from some open doors you hear music, see and talk to people. One early morning, my the room had so much cockroaches, that i went walking in the long corridors, so, then i saw a door in a corner, and it was open, I came in and was this very clean room, with a nice clean bed, all white Egyptian linen, small verandah and little spotless bathroom, I even remember the sink and toilet, they were old French made. In that place, it was a small miracle, like a lotus flower. It became my secret room to the rest of my stay there, I would wait for people to go to sleep and kind of hidden went there, for a some reading and nice sleep.
Madam was the Greek/ Egyptian manager’s sister. His name was Bondarley. I lived there from ’84 to ’92, on and off.
Oh wait, from ’89 to ’92 I lived in Mohandiseen, teaching English under a new name. Had to keep away from the Oxford so as not to get deported again.
Wow…… I weekly remember that room and thinking who stays here? I remember the Cockroaches better lol…. You couldn’t go anywhere without shoes on in that place. I remember climbing into the bath to use the shower trying not to step on any Cockroaches whilst getting in there and not taking my eyes off of them whilst I was in the shower it was mad but hilarious. Especially now that I’m sitting my bed in the UK This is just so crazy to read. It is correct what someone said it’s like a place that never existed whoever put this post up they are up fantastic!
Yeah I remember the big windows and the balconies I used to stand outside watching across the rooftops . I loved to listen to the sounds of the prayers echoing across Cairo and fading off into the smog
Wow! I stayed in the Oxford Pension for several months in 1987 (and I returned for a short time in 1991 after a three-year stint in Japan). I actually knew and met some of the people mentioned above – Randy the guy with the rabbit, Mustafa the tea man who sadly passed away while I was in Japan (though I kept in touch for a time with his son), the manager with thick rimmed glasses Mr. Bendali (I believe), and Angus was my friend. I also used to sit in the reception talking to Musa the receptionist from Sudan and later to Ahmed and Mohammed, Egyptians that replaced him) drinking Stella. I also recall the dodgy elevator which would not return to the ground floor if the door was not shut properly and how annoying it was to have to walk up the 6 flights of stairs whenever that happened. The Oxford Pension was for me a magical place, and I will always remember it through the smoky drug-filled haze that seemed to permeate its rooms and corridors. I remember Talaat Harb, the Metro Cinema where everyone smoked during the film, the Cafe Americane just down the street. I think I might have even met some of you above who posted comments.
Hiya Rob!
How are you keeping? Must be a quarter of a century since Cairo and the Oxford scene. Bengali, Hamad, Hassan (Angus), Ted, Itchem, Andy and Lisa, Simon Harvey, Tara, Paul, and me.
Remember playing Risk in your flat as you kept watch for stooges in the street below? I kept a diary of those years, of the fights, police raids, drug deals, scams and the great fire of the Oxford. Still have it. 🙂
I mention in ensuing post that Simon passed this year Do not know if you met Lianne who often visited with him. Wonder if any of you recall playing video games on one of the residents laptops which was pretty rudimentary but state of the art then We used to be up in his room til wee hours of the morning
That’s so funny wasn’t everybody up till the we hours of the morning if they weren’t teaching English the next day.. I didn’t smoke or drink but I just love the food there downstairs and I was traveling around Cairo with different people as I came over from Tel Aviv on a bus and thought I would go for a day trip or whatever it was they’ve done and never Returned until three months later as I was hoping to do the diving course in the sinai but I got such bad pneumonia I was told if I went down I would not come back up again so that ended that anyway I still went off down to the sinai and I stayed there for a long time and made loads of friends with the Bedouin children and their parents he was always give me these lumps of fresh hash and I never knew what to do with it because I didn’t do drugs or alcohol as they said I just would get high on the air. I used to be sitting on the beach in Duhab with laps of fresh hash under my top lip and if anyone was lucky to walk past me and give me a smile I would ask them if they wanted and pass it on to them put to enjoy
Hiya Rob! I’m Andy, formerly of Andy & Lisa. I lived at the Oxford from ’84 til I got arrested in that lift and deported in early ’87.
Or it could’ve been ’88!
Hiya Andy!
Its been years. Hope life has been good to you in the years since Cairo and the Oxford. Wild times! Would love to hear from you. Still in touch with Lisa?
Email me: Gulfalan67@gmail.com
RIP Mustafa, so sad to hear of your passing. I will have a 7-Up in your honour. You always liked a chat, and to share a joke. Something I never told you is that everywhere we went in Egypt after meeting you was that “Mustafa” became a title we bestowed upon the Chai man, or more affectionately and importantly as we thought of you, as the second in command!
Yours, Luke and Bruce (who you always gave a private room with a double to – we never knew why)
Just saw previous post and realize I should mention that Simon Harvey passed away last month. He was a regular at the Oxford during its heyday and anyone who went through in the 80s and 90s probably crossed paths with him at some point. We met at the cafe in Tahrir Sq and he showed me the workings of Cairo. His businesses partner got me work teaching where i met my now ex. Simon knew the least expensive places to get the best meal, told me the tap water was fine to drink and 100 other things that helped me thrive in the year I spent in Cairo. He was there when I arrived and when I departed and came to the US every year for last decade. If anyone remembers him please message me. The phone will never again ring late Sunday morning without me thinking it is him on he other end.
Hi David
I knew Simon from his Oxford days, a man of great ingenuity and character who looked like a bearded Biker, but was a kind and gentle soul. Great West Country accent I recall. So sorry to hear of his passing. We shared many a Stella.
Alan,
Sorry but missed your reply until now We also must have crssed paths as I woukd stay at Oxford in between times when school i was working at IBI woukd not have a pkace for me to live I was also there in 1990 just before heading to Greece I had an open ended ticket Simon tried to sell for return to US Eventually he just gave it to someone whomwent to airport and did not return so it may have worked I recall many days sitting in the lounge-one long argument about religion with Angus. We are still dealing with Simon’s loss as we remined good friends and he came to the US every summer
So funny to read about Pension Oxford! I was there With my friend Robin from UK. (I’m Danish) from February-May 89. I remember a quite tough young woman named Sandy, Think she was from Australia. She knew everybody and everything… I remember a grafitti at the entrance “don’t let the bedbugs bite” (they did!) but most of all I remember a young blonde guy from US or Canada called David. He was stuck, had a bad relation to family back home, and tried to sell his passport to be able to go back to his kibbutz family in Israel. Somehow normal borders and fine lines got crossed over so easy at that place. David and I kept two lost kittens at the pension. Anyway, he got caught by the police when he tried to sell the passport, and send to prison. The embassy could do nothing, and we had to leave Egypt. Small chance but does anyone remember him?
I may actually have a picture of David if it is sane person We went to the camel market along with Johan and Fionna who were traveling on to Europe My email is bolejaja@gmail.com If you message me I shall try and find it and email copy. I do not know what happened to him after I left Cairo. I did connect with Johan and Fiona in Athens after Egypt
Hello Julie
Yes I remember him (and I think you). I remember the kittens being carried in a hat!
Just to explain to anybody reading this, I spent two periods at the Oxford, first during 1987, and later 1989- 1993 ( yup, several years!) Wild times.
This is strange. I am writing a book at the moment and I was mentioning something about Cairo in it and remembered the Oxford. I was there for several months in around 1986 with a guy called Tim. We were making a documentary about the Moulids and staying at the place coz cheap, even though we had sponsorship from BBC. Yeh I remember the bathroom filthy shit everywhere. We got ill bad runs and sickness, also ringworm, I think caught from the cats in our room. I was mixing with the Sufi people to make the documentary. I remember an American woman who was living there for years and had become sufi. I can’t remember her name. I remember the hotel boy called Khalled. He became a good friend of mine. I had a row with Tim and moved into another room with a guy called Simon. Khalled got arrested and wrongly accused of something and I went to the police station and persuaded them to let him out. He was Syrian. His only ambition in life was to get a passport and get to America. I would love to know what happened to him. Does anybody remember him? He worked in the hotel. He was about 20 years old then. He and I travelled around Sinai together and got regularly stopped by police because he was Syrian without passport, but because I had British passport they woulld let us go. I was eating opium at the Oxford. We used to put it in yogurt to hide taste. I remember people living there that forged letters to do with air tickets of something. Made a living like that. The film we made went on to be used in British universities for oriental studies.
Hiya Kathy
yeah I recall Tim the film maker. I can’t remember his second name off the Top of my head , but can remember him really well. He told me about the Moulids thing, and a couple of years later I took him around the City of the Dead and translated for him on a subsequent project he was doing there. Through that project I met some really nice people and actually moved out of the Oxford for a while to join them.
I think you’re refering to Tara (the American woman at the Oxford).
Last I saw of Khaled was about 1989. he stopped working at the Oxford and no idea where he went. Can’t remember asking Bendali about him, but probably must have.
Yeah, opium was cheap and good. Airline tickets was one line of business , some people worked on travellers checks, but what I did for a while was bank currency exchange receipts (to enable people to extend their tourist visas , you had to change $150 a month to renew).
Not sure about Tim but Simon was probably Simon Harvey who passed away unexpectedly this year. We met in Talaat Harb in 198 and remained friends all these years. His Facebook page still should be up. The pics of Kenya were from trip he took to see my wife and I some years ago.
Hi David,
I stayed in Oktober/November 1990 with my brother Alex in the Oxford. I left in middle of November back to Munich/ Germany, my brother stays a little bit longer. My brother was then arrested in Cairo in the jail, and send back to Germany. With us stayed also Jens, a other German guy. At this time there live, maybe it was Simon and a other English teacher (I think he was Scottish) in the Oxford. Sorry, I can’t remember the names. Sad to hear, that Simon passed away.
Maybe we meet us in the Oxford.
Best wishes and Greets from munich
Christian,
at this time all called me chris
Sry for my bad english
Hello Chris,
Your English is far superior to my German despite 4 years of class in High School. We would not have crossed paths as I left I think in August 1990. Simon was still there, though and the Scottish teacher was probably Angus. I believe there was a German woman there who was an artist but cannot recall her name though we went to lunch a few times. Thanks for response.
And the cats were something special too, I remember. They had folded tails. A lodger whispered to me that the proprietor was a gangster and I do remember the services of Aida, who one day showed up with a black eye.
I remember Aida I stayed at the Oxford I’ve got really ill even get out of there I got pneumonia by the shower water going in my ear mixing I knew I was really ill had a pharmacist treating me who studied at Oxford University at that time he was a really nice old man like I’m just about now lol woman sorry. I used to have juice from the shop downstairs and go to Fefella restaurant. Cairo was hard work but I loved it. I had an Israeli guy looking after me Akiva I actually stayed in his room while he was there then he got arrested also for something to do with copying bank notes or something or someone planted something in his room I think it was. The nice stating his room for a bit and then shared a bit in the other room with about eight other people for stop I met a guy there who was Brazilian. He was sleeping in the bed next to me I think. Brazilian Jewish. He was very kg about being a Jew and he had no money I remember giving him money to get back to Brazil well help him anyway he was a bit short. We stayed in touch for a while
I believe I might have hung out there after he left. There was a guy trying to get out as he awaited trial. We believe he eventually managed it. This was in 1990 and he pulled out a laptop with video games on it. He only trusted a few if us and asked us not to mention it to others as we were up all hours of the night playing. If anyone knows what happened to the couple Johann Vanderkoph and Fiona Bradshaw please let me know. They left Oxford a few weeks before thrn girlfriend and I departed Cairo and waited for us in Athens to set us up. That time seems so illusory now
Stayed there in 1983 while waiting for a Sudan visa. Dripping with atmosphere and much else. Mustafa was one cool dude saying aiiiwaaa in his low voice. Does anyone who stayed there in the 1980s remember a British fellow who smuggled Bedford trucks down to Uganda and points south (trying to think of the guy’s first name for some writing I’m doing). He didn’t want to wait a month for the visa so he got someone in Cairo to make him one. Then he’d just stamp himself rather than wait a month like the rest of us. I remember the bathtub the smells and the bugs. But I still smile anytime I think of that place. Does anyone know what year the place closed? I see now there’s something called the Gardenia which may occupy the same place.
Dear Richard, I enjoyed your post as a fellow Oxford pension alumni. I went to Sudan three times. I found getting the Sudan visa in Cairo pretty easy. One time I travelled by “public” lorries from Bangui, Central African Republic through Sudan to Egypt. The Sudanese people were wonderful to me a lone traveller. I live in Melbourne, Australia and am a poet. Every good wish in your life. pbakowski54@gmail.com You’ll find me on Facebook also. Stay safe.
hi pete, i am an author and poet too. Check me out on Amazon (Cally Starforth Hill) Have written tons of poetry and quite a few songs over the years. Live in Devon now, South West of England.
Yeh , thanks Alan I remember Tara now. She was a Sufi. I loved the way of life of the Sufi people. Khaled surname was Solleh. The Simon I was referring to I am pretty sure was never involved in motorbikes. He had ginger hair. I had a massive row with Tim and moved into his room next door. He, Khallled and I left for the Sinaii together after Khaled got released. Tim went down separately. We had a break from filming. Too stoned on opium most of time and I got crushed outside a mosque and the camera lens got smashed, I got taken to the police station for my own protection but thought I had been arrested. It took weeks to get a new lens coz we had to wait for it to come from Japan. Yeh I remember going to the City of the Dead and interviewing people there.
I just came across this thread and it brings back a lot of memories.
I stayed in the Oxford in the latter part of 1988, I remember the dodgy lift and sometimes racing it from the ground floor to the lobby for no particular reason. Bendali? and Mustafa making cups of tea. I fondly remember Simon, and I remember him telling me about a new invention that could send pictures down a phone line (fax machine) and I thought he was pulling my leg. I remember him setting out to find old British bike to send back to the UK, and his (empty) cans of brown ale that one of his UK friends had sent him (when they were full)
I watched the 1988 Olympics in the lobby, on a black and white tv with a broken horizontal hold. Drinking Stella which cost more per bottle than a nights accommodation.
Shower ‘surfing’ – the showers were bath tubs on wooden slats not affixed to anything; when you moved in the shower, the whole thing rocked.
Cats weeing on my mattress and then complaining to Mustafa, who either just turned it over or swapped it with another belonging to an another unsuspecting guest. The chicken bones in the corridor for the cats, the feeling of dread when you felt the need to pass wind – it was always safer in the bathroom 🙂
I was also an extra on a couple of movies in return for a KFC and a couple of Egyptian pounds, one by a swimming pool near Giza and another in a night club somewhere, along with a big blond Finnish woman who thought she was the bee’s knees. (nobody else shared the same opinion)
I once read about the Oxford in the book “Lets Go Egypt & Israel” sometime around 1990, recommending a visit just for a beer and to watch the residents, which made me burst out laughing in the bookshop (Ironically in Oxford) as I membered all the visitors coming for a beer and then disappearing.
But I mostly remember it being a meeting place for kindred spirits from many nations, sharing life stories.
It’s a miracle any of us survived any length of time in there.
The blond Finnish woman, whose name escapes me coz it was ’88, was a fine Actress, as she may or may not have told me repeatedly, and I disagree with your opinion of her 😉
We’re you there when we tried to leave her at the KFC on the way back from filming?
There was a lot more space in the minibus without her ego in there!
I’m sure I have a picture of her somewhere, taken on the film set.
My apologies if I was wrong about her, if she told you she was a fine actress, who am I to disagree.
The blond young lady Finnish actress’ name was Maria (it just came to me)
The Oxford pension was a magical place. I remember the lift. I wanted anyone’s got any photographs I don’t think I have it doesn’t look like you can put them up here either
Wow!!! I’m wrapped to have come across this thread.
I stayed there for a couple of months in 1981 waiting for my Sudan visa.
I think – from vague memory – it was on the sixth Floor; can anyone tell me the actual street address; definitely remember the lift, it often would be stuck between floors and one had to climb up and out, a bit of a worry if it restarted at the same time!!
I met some guys at the Oxford who had sussed out somehow where in the medina back streets a quasi illegal clandestine hash market operated. Remember going and scoring the choicest blocks of oozing Afgan and Lebanese.
What was interesting at the Pension was how the people running it (were they the owners??) turned a blind eye to all the dope smoking.
From memory they were a Greek family (one of the last in Cairo). One got the feeling that maybe the Pension had once been their private sumptious residence, and that they had somehow fallen on hard times and that the property was all they had left.
I distinctly remember that they had a grandmother (or maybe even older ) skin and bones, whose ‘abode’ was in one of the corridors; a row of rickety wooden chairs, padded with bundles of old newspapers as a mattress – she would be sleeping most of the day in full view of the coming and goings of the residents.
The pension was a great place to meet folks who were either starting or finishing their Africa trips. Most days I would be stoned, drinking some chai and waking to the calls to pray; which I found in my out of it state, so beautiful and poetic!!
Recalling as if it was just yesterday, I met at the Oxford one of the most handsome guys I have ever come across, he was Jewish English early twenties, blue eyes and dark hair. Other than spending a whole day smoking joint after joint with him, nothing more eventuated as he was leaving that night to fly back to London.
Eventually my visa came through and it was time to move on. Caught the train to Aswan and waited a couple of days for the ferry to Wadi Hafa. We had just passed the international border that cuts invisibly across the lake when the news came over the radio that President Sadat had been asassinated!!!
James, the Oxford was at 32 Talaat Harb and your memory is correct, it was up on the sixth floor.
Can anyone please share as to when and why the Oxford closed? In a previous post a fire was mentioned????
What replaced it; has anyone been to the address recently; I googled mention of the Gardenia . If it is the replacement, from the pics on the website it got renovated to death!!!
Does anybody perchance have photos that they’d like to share?
I have photos James but I will have to find and scan in. They are in old albums. However here is a link to clip of the film I helped Tim make at the time. Unfortunately I have lost all the video I had myself because during a clear out when I moved a few years ago I think I accidentally threw the video away thinking it was something else, so really pissed off about that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ca9NU0jL5o
I’ve left some here of the interior and the direct surroundings.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/YMBggY3kR6CU4vNv6
Great pics, thank you!
Sicko
Great pictures. Thanks for sharing. Brings back memories! Haven’t seen my own pics in years. Nice to be able to reconnect with others from that time on this page. Shame there isn’t an Oxford Pensione website or Facebook page to share memories…
These are different times. Many today would hardly believe the stories on this page!
S
Dear Andy, I remember you and Lisa distinctly. I was impressed by you learning Arabic and escaping Northern (?) England. As a fraternal gift I’d like to mail you a most recent book of my poems. I’ve now been writing poems for 38 years. My email is pbakowski54@gmail.com If you are comfortable with it, please send me an email with your relevant postal address. You and Lisa were a lovely couple. Every good wish. Stay safe. I’m also on Facebook. Peter Bakowski
Hi Peter, I stayed there a few months in mid 1980s while helping Tim Coleman make a film about moulids and Sufism. I remember buying one of your fake student passes and I am pretty sure it worked to get me a cheap flight but my memory is not that great. I ended up travelling round Sinai with Khaled, the guy who did odd jobs around the place. His uncle offered us a camel and a business to get married. I declined, but he was a great friend and I would love to find him.
Dear Cally, My fake “confirmation of university attendance letters” weren’t too successful as some of the individual letters on the typewriter weren’t aligned. One of the bureaucrats at Cairo University which issued the student passes pointed out that no real educational institution would have such a wonky typewriter and he waved me away. My forgery career lasted about two weeks. Anyway it was all part of the shambolic fun of being in Cairo and at the Pension Oxford. I was an extra in an Egyptian movie for one day – my silent role was to carry a suitcase through an automatic sliding door. I waited for my walk on “role” for hours and really it was a tedious experience.
Such a joy to find this post and the responses to it. I was there in the cold winter of ’91 and windstorms that stole the sky and blew debris of the rooftops occasionally killing people.
I returned to the Cairo many times that year and the Pension Oxford was often where I ended up.. & yes I was an extra in a movie, used my passport to buy duty-free Johnny Walker – woke up to; people having sex in my room, sitting next to the toilet after drinking a bottle Smirboff.
As I was 20/21 I was at home in the general filth but still have a visceral recall of the stench of the elevator shaft. I seem to recall being initially led there by a scouser after a night of drinking cheap Romanian vodke at the airport – don’t ask.. my cultural sensitivities were poorly developed. Walking through a market where the sweet meats were extracted from cow skulls a machete came down as I was walked past and a small part of brain landed just below my eye.. The Pension Oxford was a short walk ahead. In typing this, memories came flooding back of the smell of the streets and the 3rd city I was to know.
I was hoping that somebody with a better memory of mine could recall the Sudanese “concierge” tall and thin who would greet me with kindness, share spliffs from his rooftop shack and refuse my money when we went to the cinema (a subtitled version of Predator). This in 1991 – I am thinking maybe it is Musa? I owe him debt of gratitude that as a young man I scarcely understood. If anybody has a way to contact him, please comment below. Thanks all for sharing your memories. I remember the filth, the poverty & characters that no longer seem possible – those times were golden.
If I recall the name was Mustapha but i may be wrong. If you were there in 91 i missed you by a year. I am finishing short essay partially about time in the Oxford
Yes, his name was Mustapha.
Yes, he was called Mustapha. A very fine fellow, nothing phased him.
This an excerpt from a story I am writing about traveling through Africa. The beginning of the story starts in the North and ends in the South Africa. !982 and 1983. I stayed at the Oxford Pension Hostal 4 times over two months. The cast of characters coming through there gave me many stories. I wrote some of them here. I hope you like this slice of Cairo life from those early years of golden adventure travel years in Africa. It would be very hard for anyone to retrace my steps there now because of the increased danger in some of the places I travelled through. Christopher Dwyer. 2021 Detroit.
There was an “out of order” sign taped to the elevator, so we walked up six flights of steps with our backpacks to The Oxford Pension Hotel. Originally, it was a four star hotel built by the French circa 1910. More recently during WWII, it was a British officer’s club, with a restaurant and bar. In the busy reception room, the walls were stained yellow/grey from years of cigarette smoke and grime. High ceiling fans and peeling paint were illuminated by two bare light bulbs, hanging by their wires. Grey dust and cultivated decay confirmed the Oxford’s no frills reputation. It was perhaps the cheapest hotel in Cairo, attracting worldly characters, mainly backpackers heading to, or coming from Sudan. It was a natural choice for us at $1/night/bed. We put our packs down and got in line to meet the affable Mr. Pantelis. He was Greek and ran the Oxford with his two sisters.
With his gaunt face and thinning grey hair, he examined my passport from behind the reception counter. Looking down over his glasses and with a cigarette in his lips, he exuberantly named me “Mr. Raaay-gan!” referring to the current U.S. President. He called my brother Mr. Bush and laughed at Ian when he didn’t know who the president of Australia was.
We were in a large dormitory room, with10 foot ceilings and 12 single beds. A fine layer of dust covered everything. The walls were adorned with names and bits of graffiti. One message in English, warned of bedbugs. From our cement balcony oasis, we looked down on the street scenes of mid-day Cairo, drinking large bottles of Egyptian Stella Beer.
The next day we applied for Sudanese visas. Many of our Oxford brethren were in some stage of that same process. With a twinge of envy, we watched the lucky few depart Cairo after receiving their visas, heading for the southern border. A common story among us detailed the painfully slow bureaucracy that had been refined by the Sudanese embassy staff in Cairo. We all agreed that the consular staff considered our visa applications unimportant. They were the masters of delay, and if you showed the slightest bit of anger or frustration during this process to any of the staff, your chances of being denied a visa increased exponentially. Three weeks seemed to be the average time that people waited. Many of the parties at the Oxford were to celebrate the day when people received their visas, and their departure from Cairo.
We were tourists that first week, visiting The Egyptian Museum twice, exploring the Pyramids. Next to the three largest pyramids are three smaller pyramids. We waited until the guards were out of site and started to climb the largest of them. When we were near the top, one of the guards started yelling at us to come down. We cheerfully waved back as they beckoned to us. They were screaming and waving their arms for us to come down. We shook our heads and waved back at them to come up. We had a clear view of the Sahara to our west. The stand-off lasted twenty minutes, until we came down. At the bottom they all hand their hands out demanding baksheesh. We infuriated them by putting our hands out and demanding baksheesh from them. We walked away, they didn’t follow us.
The Egyptian soldiers delighted in molesting female tourists inside the pyramids. Their game was to come down the long and narrow staircase inside the pyramid and cop a feel of western women as they ascended. We saw this happen in front of us. When a group of soldiers was coming down you heard the women yelling at these groups of soldiers that were grabbing their tits and ass, giggling at the thrill.
The art of killing time became more desperate and the weeks passed slowly. Mentally, we were still on European time, having yet to learn that our ideas concerning schedules needed to adapt to our new latitudes and the vagaries of being on “Africa-time”. This wisdom eluded us in Cairo. The longer we stayed, the harder the waiting became, compounding our desire to leave.
Ian was not heading south. He was flying to New York. We gave him our home address and told him he could stay with our parents. My mother got a call from him in December and he took the bus down to Atlantic City and showed up in the middle of a blizzard and stayed for a few days at our house near the beach. We never heard from him again.
A room-mate from the Oxford offered to take me with him to buy hash. He told that the two mile trip into the slums at night was risky. “Alright I’ll bring you, but I do all the talking when we get there.” he said with a British accent. Fulvio was from Italy and had made this hash-run before, always at night. My brother came along as well. Most of the way was on broad streets, and up-hill. At the Citadel of Salah el-Din, we turned right and followed the high fortress walls down a dark muddy street into the Bazar of Khan el Khalili. All of the stalls were closed and Fulvio silently guided us through the warren of side streets to an old three story wooden building.
There was a cow’s scull with horns and blue lightbulbs in its eye sockets, hanging over the front door. Fulvio knocked and was greeted by a suspicious doorman, who looked us up and down for a long moment before letting us inside a small room with a balcony and upstairs rooms. Eight men were inside, some with turbans, all wearing sandals and Jellabiyas. The boss was blind in one eye and the left side of his face had a burn scar. A few minutes passed and Fulvio was summoned toward the counter. There were two types for sale and how much did he want? Fulvio chose the more expensive option and showed his money. All eyes were on us as the first transaction was made. I wanted to make my own deal, buying the same amount as Fulvio, but choosing the cheaper option. I paid him and we left. This is when I anticipated we might have problems. Fulvio took point again, leading us through the maze of dark alleys. “Wait a minute.” I said to Fulvio. I found a place to stop so we could sample the hash. I put a small amount on a pin and burned it and then put it under my nose. It didn’t smell like hash. It wasn’t real. “Let me see yours.”. Fulvio handed his chunk to me and I bit a small piece and chewed it. It tasted real. I burned a little on the pin. It was real. What had happened? I bought the cheap stuff. I needed to get my money back or exchange my chunk of shit for real hash. Fulvio looked worried. “Are you coming with me”? Fulvio reluctantly followed me, back through the muddy alleys. I put my knife up the sleeve of my jacket. Back at the blue eyed cow’s scull, I knocked and the door opened. The door-man welcomed us with the same doubting leer. We went back in and without waiting I held out my chunk of shit and said “This isn’t real, I want the other hash.”. Ali didn’t argue and said OK to an exchange but I would have to pay the extra money. I had bought the fake stuff they sell to the tourists. It looks like hash but is made of something else. That’s why it’s so much cheaper. We had not been ripped-off, I had just made the wrong choice. Exchange completed, we left. A block away I tested it again. The sweet smell of blond Lebanese hash was confirmed. I smiled at Fulvio, and he smiled back as I passed the burning chunk under his nose. “Let’s get out of here”.
Back at the Citadel wall, we made a right and then a left, and headed down hill past the Alabaster Mosque. That evening at the Oxford, Fulvio told the story about how he thought we were in for a fight, only to discover that there was no problem, and that his connection sold me what he thought I wanted, and exchanged the fake stuff for real hash when we brought it back. Mustafa the night porter floated in and out of our room and sold many glasses of his sweet tea with milk for 30 piasters . He was happy and business was good.
Fulvio was a charming character and he stood out in a crowd; full of information and ideas about scams to make money. He had lived in London for years and spoke cockney accented English, as well as Italian, Spanish and a little Arabic. He stood about 5’7”, slim, balding and 27 years old. He knew about Cairo’s secrets.
That evening he detailed some of the shady deals that he had already done in London and Rome and Cairo. He was holding court with his tutorial in the art of money scams. The first lesson was so simple that it seemed obvious to all. Report your traveler’s checks stolen, and then cash them on the black market at an inflated exchange rate. Fulvio admitted to doing this three times in Cairo, to three different banks, for $2400 total.
The second story detailed bringing a quantity of hash out to the southern tip of the Sinai, camping on the beach for free, and selling it by the gram for three or four times what he paid, to MFO soldiers stationed at Sharm el Shek. He traded for beer, food, booze, and a complete set of newly issued desert fatigues with insignias and corporal’s stripes. The beach parties at night on the shores of Naama Bay were fueled by soldiers supplying cases of beer and snacks to the few tourists camping there, in exchange for stuff the soldiers wanted. Fulvio became very popular during his short stay.
Until recently, the beach area at Sharm el Shek was a popular Israeli tou up all the buildings and facilities lining the beach here, underscoring their resentment of giving up Sinai.
Part 2 of story
Back at the Oxford, one of our room-mates, a Greek girl named Virgina, was acting strangely. It was noon and we were in the hallway outside our room, when we saw Virgina being restrained in a chair after having attempted to jump off our balcony. She was having a psychotic episode and needed to be restrained or she would try and jump again. The staff at the Oxford was in a panic. They had called the police, but no help had arrived. I knew Virgina as a room-mate, so I was asked to try and calm her down. She was delusional and didn’t respond to anything I said. She was talking to somebody that wasn’t there and had urinated in her seat. When the police arrived, they hand cuffed her. She was biting and screaming as they strapped her down on a gurney. Only one cop spoke English and he insisted that I help them deal with Virgina by coming with them to the hospital. It was more of a demand and I reluctantly agreed as they phoned HQ. A few minutes later the same cop told me that I will have to wait at the hospital with Virgina, until they figure out what is wrong with her. I was about to protest and instead I said I was going to get my coat. I grabbed Billy, and snuck out of the Oxford. We walked down the six flights of steps and past the waiting police cars and ambulance, and then disappeared. We passed a trolley station and saw a rare sight; a bar. We decided to hide here for the afternoon. It was a strange place and only served one thing, brandy. You couldn’t order a drink by the glass, you had to buy a bottle. The waiter brought a pint of Metaxa Greek brandy, two glasses of water and a small plate of olives and feta cheese. We celebrated our escape and wondered where Virgina was now. We laughed and toasted at how angry the police must be with us. The brandy went to our heads and soon we were drunk. The second bottle arrived with the same plate of food and an old drunk that wanted to share our bottle. “Hubba Hubba Hubba!’ he said as he pointed at the bottle. He was the first rummy we had seen in Egypt, so rather than shoo him off, we encouraged him to perform his trick that we had seen him do for the other patrons. He would balance a broomstick by the handle on his flattened nose and then dance around in a circle, repeating “Huba Hubba Hubba”. It looked like he had been punched in the face a few times and had no cartilage in his nose. We paid him with a small amount of brandy, and then had trouble getting rid of him.
When we returned to the Oxford, drunk, Mr. Pandelis looked at us like we owed him money. He demanded to know where we went when he needed us. I didn’t try to explain and plainly told him I was not responsible for Virgina, and if he cared so much, why wasn’t he down at the hospital with her?
It turns out she was American, not Greek and the Embassy had sent someone over to collect her things. They wanted to talk to me and left a phone number. I called the embassy the next day and we had a long chat. The American consular officer was polite and trying to be helpful. Virgina had been taken to a psychiatric hospital that he described as a mid-evil dungeon. He suggested that we come by and see him. We met the Counsel General, who appreciated us helping him understand more about Virgina. He told us about other Americans that had also been jerked around by the Sudanese Embassy and wished he had been able to warn us about them. After examining our passports he offered to replace them with new ones. We accepted his offer. He would give us back our old passports that now would only be valid for travel to Israel and South Africa. We would have two passports, but only one was good for the whole world.
In the lobby of the Oxford, I bumped into an old friend from Margate, NJ. Chris Gilmore was working on his next book , THE BAD ROOM, and had picked the Oxford for the same reasons we did. He planned on staying for a few weeks to get some work done and then flying to Kenya for Christmas. I told him I had a surprise for him and fetched my brother. We had a grand reunion and planned to celebrate Thanksgiving (the next day) at the Nile Hilton. That night, Chris held court in our room where we had a small party. He pulled out his Tarot Cards and read everyone’s fortune. He was about ten years older than us, tall and thin and had long blonde/grey hair. He was a great story teller and an ex-Marine and Margate lifeguard. There was plenty to smoke and the old man Mustafa shuffled in and out, serving us hot sweet tea.
We stayed up late and listened to the stories of travelers who had just returned from Sudan. Their tales about riding on the top of a train for days and the privations they had suffered, painted a bleak picture of traveling through Sudan. It was bitter-sweet to listen to them because I knew that I would be flying over those adventures, and that I would have to make do by listening to other people’s stories about the Wadi-Halfa ferry, and the Dinka tribesmen, and The Khartoum Express.
Dear Chris, Great two part story. I went to Sudan three times and loved it. Memorable hospitality, handsome people and awe-inspiring desert. I found Cairo and the pension Oxford like a sit-com. I remember buying a heavy secondhand Remington typewriter off two Greek guys whose office was in a flooded basement. They were working amongst their office supplies in their underpants – unfazed. Typical Cairo. I went out to Siwa oasis and regret that I didn’t go to Libya or Yemen at the time – mid-1980’s. I wrote a poem about Cairo and one about a beggar in Alexandria. 2022 represents my 40th year of writing poems. I hope your own writing is going well. pbakowski54@gmail.com
Hi Alan, yeah those were wild times indeed! I changed my name, got a new passport (legally!) and went back to Cairo in ’89. Couldn”t stay at the Oxford, obviously, so did at TEFL course at a language school in Mohandiseen and taught there for three years. I left Egypt in ’92 and have never been back. I teach now in the UK. Lisa’s in Germany, she lived in northern India in the 90s and had three kids with a Tibetan. We’ve remained good friends and I’ve visited them often, hope to go over there again as soon as covid allows!
Stayed at the Oxford several times in the 80s. I took the chance and the movie job, 25 pounds and free meals a day (sandwich filled with chicken guts) was fine for me. They carried us to a military camp with a gym and a boxing ring.
They were shooting a scene with an egyptian and an american Boxer. Clued raw meat to the egyptian boxers face. But hey, he won.
At the Oxford i borrowed a lady from England my orange pullover with turquoise leopard pattern. She was going to Dahab but i never met her again but left a note at the Oxford.
I still remember the guy bringing tea in the morning “Mr Kai Kai Kai! Chai Chai Chai Chai
Stayed there several times and remember the siamese cats.
They chopped their tails of cause they always wandered around outside at the 6d floor. And of course never used the elevator. Met two girls from norway and we climbed up and stayed at the top of the big pyramid over night.
Coming down the next morning askari were already waiting for us. We cursed them in different languages, persuading not to speak english, so they let us go. Egypt. Love it.
Hey Andy!
Great to hear from you after so long. So pleased you stuck with the teaching and even more so you have kept in touch with Lisa. Thats quite an achievement -and a great connection with the past.
Kai,
I think I remember you. (Or perhaps it was another Kai?) Yeah I remember the need for fast talking after spending nights on top of Cheops Pyramid! Wild times!
Oh, my – what a blast from the past!
I was there for a month, on and off, back in 1983 (I think) with a Canadian girl called Heidi Berry – with us having both escaped from a kibbutz for two weeks and ending up spending x3 months in Egypt, a month at the Oxford Pension. I was a naive 19 year old.
We shared a dormitory room with a long term resident teaching English and I remember well the creaky lift and the old man saying “ayweh, ayweh”.
Ironically, some forty years on, I am revisiting Egypt and tomorrow head to Cairo. I googled “Oxford Pension Talat Haarb Street” to see if it still exists and stumbled across this gem of an article.
Heidi – if you stumble across the article (as I have done) and remember our time in Egypt, do get in touch
So yesterday – Friday evening (25th February) – I took a walk down Talaat Harb Street to No 32, the site of the Oxford Pension.
To be honest, I did not initially recognise Talaat Harb Street from my memories of 1993 – ie it’s now chockablock with brightly lit shiny clothes shops. However, look up above the shiny shops and there the old dilapidated apartment buildings remain.
I took some pictures of the old Oxford Pension site, now home to Gardenia Hotel (and other businesses). If anyone can tell me how to do so, I’m happy to upload yesterday’s pictures of 32 Talaat Harb Street.
A group of us had been working the summer in Crete, afterwards we travelled to Piraeus, Athens, Cyprus, Haifa, Tel Aviv & took the bus from Eilat to Tahir Square. We arrived early evening & it was getting dark. The year was 1991. I had spoken to a guy on the trip who “recommended” the Oxford Pension, so we headed there. The lift was scarily shambolic, but I remember two friendly Sudanese guys at reception. All four of us shared a room with the cockroaches, scent of cat’s urine and bed bugs. Idiotically, I remember I washed my white T-shirt and hung it over the window ledge to dry. The years of filth on the ledge stuck to the shirt & it was never white again.
On the first night, I was awoken by my mate screeching; standing bolt upright on his bed. He claimed a rat had run over him when he was sleeping. He wanted to check out. I thought he lacked character.
We ended up travelling to Abu Simbel, then back up to Dahab to chill out. Fond memories and the experience at the Oxford Pension stood me in good stead for my later travels.
Thanks for your post. I certainly remember clean-cut American girls arriving at the dimly-lit reception desk of the Oxford Pension and horrified, doing a U-turn. The longer you stayed at the Pension Oxford the better a room you got. I stayed for a month once.
I remember I braved having a bath and used an old T-shirt as the bath plug. Yes, the lift/elevator was rickety. All part of the experience. The nearby Roma Hotel seemed bland, sterile and yuppy compared to the legendary Oxford Pension.
When leaving Cairo girlfriend and I actually got student IDs we used to get less expensive flight to Athens. I believe i learned of this while staying at The Oxford. Over 30 years later girlfriend is now ex. Our son has milk crate of pictures and i am certain her ID is mixed in with the photographs
Dear David,
I was lucky enough to get the Alexandria to Heraklion, Crete ferry which doesn’t run/exist anymore. I also went by ferry to Aqaba, Jordan – Amman was FREEZING (in January).
Long gone the days of student flights for half price. I was about 28 when in the Pension Oxford. Now I’m 67 in Melbourne, Australia. Where are you these days, if I may ask? Every good wish, Peter
Just asking this now. I was counting on getting email notifications about replies but they are unreliable. I was 26-27 when there. I’m 60 this year as my doctor reminded me last week. I’m in Western Mass now and part time in Kenya until second wife passed unexpectedly going on 5 years ago.
I was there during Ramadan 1987. I was 18. My memory is horrible. Maybe I stayed there for a week. It was a character building experience. It made me able to live in a cold house with no running water later in my life without freaking out too much. I remember counting the big bites on my body. I believe I counted around 60. One blew up to the size of a ping pong ball. Spider bite. Someone got me stoned. I remember freaking Turkish coffee. I actually refused to use the bathroom for the first few days and ended up having to go to the pharmacy. I’ve been in worse bathrooms since. I remember drinking Turkish coffee. An absolutely giant rat that I could see on the back ally on the concrete below. It wasn’t a cat. There was a woman with a deep hue of red dyed hair saying she kind of went crazy and ran into the desert naked. It seems like a dream.
We, that is myself and my Dutch girlfriend Marijke, stayed at the Oxford Pension for around 6 weeks on and off in July & August 1982. I think Christopher H Dwyer is the only person who could have been there at the same time, if he started his trip South in 1982. The only post to pre-date our stay looks to be from James Nagy. I have to say, the descriptions and anecdotes really boost the memories. Here’s what we can recall. Sicko, thanks for the super photos. Just like it was! I’ll scan a couple and upload them myself soon.
They swept the floor every day. The building was built such that there was an internal square at ground floor level. Every day they opened the emergency exits and swept the dead cockroaches, discarded food and indeed all rubbish onto the metal emergency staircases; see one of Sicko’s photos. As it built up on the steel structures, it would then fall off onto the internal courtyard below. It had been happening for years and had piled so high that if you’d had a ground floor office, it would have been dark to natural light on the courtyard side at that level, due to the accumulated rubbish.
I recall the rickety lift. We avoided it at first, but the heat and laziness made us accept the risk. It failed to stop at the ground floor and would ground out on the foundation concrete with a jarring bump, leaving a foot or more step up to the doorway out. You could play a game. By opening the internal door at the right time, you could stop the lift manually (and smoothly) and with skill level with the floor at the exit.
The bath was actually black with grime, but with a white patch beneath the shower worn from the movement of people’s feet.
If you went to the toilet at night and turned on the light, the cockroaches would freeze, so you had to kick them off the porcelain before doing your business. There were no Western style seats.
I recall two guys from Northern Ireland (like me) who, like many of the guests were waiting for Sudanese Visas. Sorry, I can’t recall their names. They had bet a school teacher they would travel overland to Uganda, so the Nile South was their route. They were accompanied by a Canadian, I think his name might have been Martin, but I’m not sure.
One evening this older German guy was praising the pleasures of desert hiking. The Irish guys seemed quite interested. The next day Marijke and I set off for a few days in Luxor. When we returned, the Irish guys and their Canadian companion were nowhere to be seen. They returned a day or two later having spent some time lost in the desert. Their meagre water rations didn’t last long and the dehydration and craziness that went with it had quickly set in. I think Bedouins had come across them and moved them to safety, but it was a bit touch and go!
I think one also caught dysentery, so more dehydrated craziness followed. A visit to the chemists and a forcible stabbing with a mega syringe of antibiotics seemed to do the trick.
We hadn’t planned to stay more than two weeks in Egypt, but our dodgy bucket shop ticket with Egypt Air provided only one flight per week to Bombay, our onwards destination. These were all booked up weeks in advance, so we had to find something to do.
There was a German girl there at the time. I think her name might have been Regina. She introduced Marijke to Mr Sheeta. He was the president of the Egyptian Chess Federation. So we were employed to carry out the administrative tasks of entering the Egyptian chess team in the World Chess Championships of 1982, to be held in Lucerne, Switzerland. We didn’t do much. Just filled in a few forms and wrote a letter or two in English. However, Mr Sheeta was a good host and we were well entertained by way of a few decent meals at hotel restaurants. We were also paid $150, which seemed like a fortune, especially since we were living on $5 per day each. A bed in the Oxford was just 1$ per night.
A long time resident was Leigh (could’ve been Lee or Leah). She was an English home counties type, whose natural primness seemed to contrast with the superlative squalor of the place. She was teaching English at a nearby school and was being paid in Egyptian Pounds. So, hanging about the place, I took to doing a little money changing. Leigh wanted hard currencies to take away with her, but other longer term residents wanted Egyptian currency for their daily activities. It all worked rather well.
Leigh suggested we could also teach English and we did go along for an interview, but they wanted you to sign up for several months and we had other plans. So, we got another job painting papyruses. They gave us the paints, papyrus etc., and a sample picture. So we churned out pictures of Nefertiti etc. I’ve always laughed at the thought of tourists buying ‘real’ Egyptian papyruses, painted by us. We did five each and earned another $100!
Warm greetings to all the many guests of the Oxford Pension with whom we share such a unique and intense common experience.
Keith & Maryke Reilly