sent by Jack Levi
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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 | A summer house immortalised by Bernard de Zogheb when Agami was still the province of mosquitoes and intrepid campers (above), and as it is today (down)
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SUMMER 1798: BONAPARTE COMES TO TOWN. On 2 July, Bonaparte and his armies landed by night on the shores of the small fishing village of Dekheila near Mex, approximately 30km northwest of Alexandria. E M Forster recounts that the inhabitants of the town awoke to the vision of the normally empty sea, covered with an immense fleet of 300 vessels anchored opposite the Isle of the Marabout: Geziret Al-Murabit, where a local holy man is buried in a tomb decorated with votive images of ships. One may surmise that the invaders had more important things on their mind than the contemplation of the scenery. There is, therefore, no record indicating that they were struck by the bay's incredible beauty.
For the best part of 100 years thereafter, the area's notoriety lay in its strategic military and naval value. Michael Reimer mentions that a "report in 1877 summarised the outcome of the pashas' efforts, when it commented that the coast from Agami to Abu Qir was heavily garrisoned and equipped with modern artillery." Again, during the bombing of Alexandria in 1882, the British fleet was stationed off the Agami coast in front of the Isle of the Marabout.
Sailing from Alexandria to the port of Dekheila in 1915, Forster mentions Fort Agame (or the Persian Fort, which may have given Agami its name) at the Western tip of the port as a strategic point in the naval attacks on the city. He also alludes to the "superb bathing possibilities", and warns that sailing from Alexandria to the fort is easy, but the return voyage can be tricky at night when the wind abates.
SUMMER 1942: A SECLUDED PLAYGROUND. The war was raging in Europe, but in Alexandria, British officers on leave were "discovering" E M Forster's beach. Like him, they were awed by the unique beauty of the secluded surroundings. Agami soon became a household name among the British forces stationed in Egypt, and was considered the ideal spot to spend a quiet day, picnicking on the beach and swimming in the turquoise waters. Boats loaded with young pleasure seekers left from the port of Anfoushi on weekends, heading for the bay which was still inaccessible by land at the time.
 The house where Montgomery is said to have planned the battle of Al-Alamein... |
 ... and Abdel-Halim Hafez's modest bungalow
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In those days, apart from its difficult access, the proximity of Alexandria's slaughter-house and the foul-smelling tanneries situated in Mex hindered Agami's development as a bathing place. "Furthermore," says Nabih Berzi, a veteran Agamiste, "the animals' carcasses thrown in the sea, right off the coast, attracted sharks, making swimming a dangerous enterprise."
Agami, he says, was especially popular in the '40s, not for its beach but for its shooting: hunters came in from Europe for the season with their retinues. A few small white stone lodges, crowned with thatched roofs, were constructed to accommodate the hunting parties. These were mainly interested in shooting turtle-doves and quails.
So was Major Bianchi, a Maltese living in Egypt and an officer in the British Army, whose name was to become intimately linked with the area. It is also said, according to Berzi, that Montgomery drew the plans of the battle of Al-Alamein in one of the lodges.
SUMMER 1945: MODEST BEGINNINGS. At the end of the war, Major Bianchi, who already occupied one of the most spacious and best equipped hunting lodges (according to Berzi, he was also the first and, for a long time, the only Agami dweller to have a swimming pool), was given a few choice feddans on the sea front as a reward for services rendered to the British. He began planning a small summer resort, soon to be known as Agami Bianchi.
A few bumpy roads were roughly traced through dunes covered with fig trees. A wooden barrier, which had to be raised and lowered by hand, marked the beginning of the major's property. A path wound its way to a cluster of chalets facing the beach: a couple of dozen minimal one-storey constructions of white stone, built on one third of each 500 or 650 square metre plot, with material purchased locally for a pittance.
The chalets were quickly snatched up by Bianchi's close friends, who by the beginning of the '50s had formed an exclusive little community, overseen by his son Vivian. A typical house in the new resort featured a large veranda facing the sea, two small bedrooms, a living area with a tiny recess for the Primus stove, a shower and a toilet. There was no electricity or running water. A hand pump, operated by the Bedouins hired as house servants, produced an acrid-smelling greyish trickle of water, unfit for consumption.
A volleyball area was set out nearby to provide a diversion for sports lovers tired of swimming or playing racquetball on the beach. The volleyball game soon became the most popular venue of the day, with Agamistes of all ages drifting towards the small enclosure after their siesta, to play or simply watch. The cosmopolitan Alexandrian socialites who had hastened to rent the Bianchi beach villas as soon as they became available found peace and quiet removed from city life, yet close enough to keep an eye on their businesses.
The place became fashionable. It was now necessary to protect it from the intrusion of Cairene Philistines who, looking for cheaper deals, made arrangements with the Bedouins. A wall went up to separate the Bianchistes from the ordinary Agamistes. Just a nuance, really, but a sure way to establish who was who.
Since the war, and before the advent of the Bianchi era, the local population had already been renting makeshift wooden cabins, usually for the day or sometimes, to the more fearless, overnight. Now, they found in Bianchi's houses a model which they could, and did, emulate -- right outside the boundaries of the Maltese major's "settlement". Little houses rose from the sand in no time, and were rented out for less than one hundred pounds a year, but the vast expanses of dunes still appeared deserted, and peace and privacy remained the undeniable privilege of all Agami dwellers.
Bianchi, however, had not been the first to develop the area. A few years before him, Paul Bless, a Swiss entrepreneur living in Egypt, had created a small "city" on the beach nearer to Alexandria. Bless's stone houses, oddly imbued with a vague similarity to the dwellings of his native country, were large and slightly top-heavy, featuring tiled or thatched roofs.
While the Bianchi chalets were only surrounded by the ubiquitous fig bushes and wild vegetation, Bless boasted tidy alleys lined with filaos trees. These may have been a poor imitation of a pine forest, but they offered the advantage of providing much-needed shade, a balm for eyes dazzled by the blinding, relentless sun.
In small gardens, a few flowers, lovingly tended by housewives with green thumbs, did their best to survive in a soil stubbornly hostile to decorative plants; these patches only added to the area's suburban character.
Both Bianchi and Bless had a private beach, its use exclusively reserved to the chalet dwellers and their guests. Though Bless was considered slightly less fashionable than Bianchi, the inhabitants' way of life did not differ.
It was back to basics all the way and, while the "purists" bent on spending the entire summer in their Agami abodes were tapping the Dekheila market and poorly equipped grocers for milk, a few vegetables and other necessities, the less adventurous organised their weekends from the city, cooking for days in advance and arriving with hampers full of roast chicken, hard-boiled eggs, stuffed vine leaves and petits fours which had to be devoured quickly, before they spoiled in the heat. Jerrycans of potable water and blocks of ice for the coolers were picked up on the way, together with supplies of candles, matches and petrol for the kerosene lamps.
At sunset, the aroma of citronella floated in the air: it was applied copiously to ward off the attacks of mosquitoes as large as butterflies. The evening silence was broken every now and then by the angry exclamation of a card or backgammon player who had just lost a game, followed by the winner's gleeful burst of laughter; but soon, the buzz of insects in search of fresh prey, a few notes from a lonely guitar and the sound of the waves gently splashing on the sand would be the only sounds heralding the beginning of the long peaceful night.
JULY 1956: BELLES DE NUIT. The grand opening of the Agami Palace, built on a plot of land belonging to the Bitash family and grandly described as a "Hotel-Casino under Swiss management", was reported at length in the press. It put Agami at once on stylish Alexandrians' night-time circuit. For a decade, its Saturday night open-air dances were the most popular event of the Egyptian summer season.
Summing up the vacation months in Alexandria, an article published in Images magazine on 20 September 1958 hailed Agami as a choice Mediterranean resort and abundantly praised the "amply justified reputation of its beaches, which attract and retain the true aficionados of life by the sea." A harbinger of things to come, the article stated: "Agami's possibilities are immense... [It] is larger than Miami Beach, more luminous than Copacabana, more temperate than Deauville, more dazzling than Juan-les-Pins."
By this time, however, Agami's title to fame was based not only on its natural beauty, but also on its reputation for attracting a steady colourful fashion parade of the country's most attractive girls. In the seclusion of its beaches, young damsels were actively encouraged to wear the scantiest apparel with no risk of offending or being offended. The real show took place on weekends, however, at the Agami Palace which, though it never managed to acquire any significant stars, witnessed fierce weekly fights for a table -- or a seat -- at its packed open-air night club.
On a typical summer Saturday, by six in the afternoon, endless lines of cars loaded with Cairene youngsters were making their way towards Agami by the desert road, eventually joining other, equally long, lines coming from Alexandria. A painted wooden gate marked the entrance to the Palace; the Bedouin guards eagerly pointed drivers in the right direction. After a rather long and hazardous spin through the dunes, having stopped several times to help fellow motorists stuck in the sand, one was finally treated to the spectacle of small boys and girls in their best galabiyas running excitedly back and forth to lead the cars to random parking spaces which were "theirs" for the night. Disembarking in the sand, one trekked, often barefoot, in the general direction of the music.
Meanwhile, the fortunate maidens who were spending the summer in Agami's chalets had to hurry to take advantage of the last hours of daylight; having tried on and discarded a succession of different outfits, they would sigh with relief as they found the "right" one and sat down to apply their makeup before nightfall. Failing to meet the deadline resulted in raccoon eyes (eyeliner applied by candlelight) and Bobo the Clown cheeks (blusher brushed on by night). Sitting in the dark, hoping that their perfume would keep the mosquitoes away, they would wait patiently for their dates to arrive.
Now they, too, were joining the crowds, gingerly picking their way across the expanses of silky sand on which the lights from dozens of torches danced a mad Tarantella.
The election of Miss Agami which crowned the invariably successful season was always a memorable event, attended by crowds of Cairene and Alexandrian youngsters, the lucky winner assured of at least 12 months of utter glory. Many a budding model, aspiring actress and future beauty queen saw her career launched on the dance floor of the Palace after a critical jury found her the year's fairest bathing beauty.
SUMMER 1964: SUSPENDED IN TIME. Nationalisation had already wrought havoc among the Agamistes when the Agami Housing and Construction Company took over the Bless, Bianchi and Bitash "developments". Few members of the old guard had stayed on to defend the quaint way of life.
Running water and electricity were introduced in preparation for the incredible building boom that was to follow. Without adequate infrastructure or proper planning, apartment complexes, commercial buildings and princely villas were furiously constructed, while the dunes which had previously only yielded delicious figs were levelled to accommodate the foundations of high-rise buildings.
Busloads of holidaymakers roamed the beaches on weekends. Here and there, unpleasant incidents were reported; but, while these were soon forgotten, the new society that was taking Agami by storm felt the pressing need to protect itself behind high walls. Within less than a decade, rents had soared so much that the area was beginning to attract experienced developers.
The previously almost deserted dunes of Agami Bitash, above Bianchi, was earmarked as the area most worthy of the rich and the famous. This is where they began building their "compounds" and large residences. The rather modest stone villas which had been the secluded summer palaces of the preceding generation were becoming a thing of the past, though many new owners, giving in to nostalgia, endeavoured to artfully restore or extend the original constructions.
In the rush to acquire land from the Company or from the Bedouins -- the de facto owners of this precious strip of desert, large parts of which still belong to absentee families -- the developers did not worry enough about infrastructure, roads or boundaries. Tightly packed clusters of often substandard constructions faced each other across narrow, winding paths on which a murderous traffic of luxurious cars and dune buggies driven by reckless youngsters hurtled day and night, making an afternoon walk a risky proposition at best.
Fences were now needed to afford a modicum of privacy to the owners of new villas, whose next-door neighbours would otherwise have been treated to a full display of their most intimate moments, beside being a party to all their conversations. Voices rang out loudly, while state-of-the-art stereos vied to advertise the eclectic musical tastes of their owners. Satellite dishes dotted the horizon. "More and bigger is always better" seemed to be the motto of the new generation of Agamistes that arrived in droves, accompanied by a fleet of four-wheel-drives packed with indispensable paraphernalia and servants. Trucks delivered imported fixtures and fittings.
Air conditioners hummed away day and night. Restaurants started home delivery services. Houses had to be extended several times to compete in size with those of the always more ambitious newcomers. Well-stocked food markets, exclusive boutiques and antique shops opened to cater to the tastes of a demanding clientele, fashionable restaurants and nightclubs rivaled to attract an elite whose only concern was to party constantly and rather extravagantly. A boisterous social life was soon to erase forever memories of quiet walks on the beach at sunset or the unsophisticated Saturday nights at the now derelict Agami Palace.
Dancing the nights away: Agami's jeunesse dorée in 1958 |
 "Donkey-rides have their own charm," reported Images in September 1958; "young ladies on vacation enjoy them tremendously"
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 "The prettiest girls meet in Agami," the magazine continued, "far from Alexandria's indiscreet stares."
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SUMMER 1998: FROM CAMPING GROUNDS TO GATED COMMUNITIES. The Dunes is a small compound designed by architect Hussein Shahin. The buildings, though subtly different from each other, share the same style. Here, elegance is subdued. The only extravagance is the luxuriance of the lovingly cared-for vegetation. There are flowers everywhere. The bougainvillea, ablaze with colour at this time of year, hang from roofs and creep around walls, providing a natural curtain.
In the exquisitely decorated living room of her villa, overlooking a small pool set among the shrubbery, Mona is discussing with the compound's gardeners the details of the new rockery area for the clubhouse. The inhabitants of the compound have their own board of directors, in charge of maintenance. The responsibility for planting the gardens and keeping them blooming has been assigned to Mona, who has been fulfilling these duties painstakingly for the past two years. The results are astounding. No one would suspect that, less than ten years ago, this land was a desert. "The compound was once called the Dunes," she says, "because, in the original plan, Shahin had made provisions for desert vegetation. Now we can hardly keep the name."
Mona and her husband are staunch supporters of the resort's new face. They cite hundreds of houses to prove that today's Agamistes are every bit as concerned with ecology as their predecessors. A tour of Agami with them is a convincing experience, and should be dubbed the greening of the desert. Furthermore, good taste and care for the environment are certainly not in short supply among their acquaintances.
"I don't want people maligning Agami," says Mona, who has been coming to the resort almost every summer since she was a teenager. "Some people say we have corrupted the spirit of the place. I don't agree. We are no longer campers, but consider that the teenage campers of the old days have grown into adults with more financial capabilities. We have more comfort here than we had twenty years ago, but this is the natural consequence of development. Should we give up water and electricity to feel that we are communing with nature? This is ridiculous."
She is prepared to admit, of course, that there are abuses, that speculators have sent the prices of property rocketing; but it is not the rule, she says. "Of course, Agami gives the appearance of extreme affluence, but isn't this happening all over Egypt? One now finds gated communities all over the world, and Agami, like Mansouriya, Qattamiya, and the Northern Coast, to say nothing of the Red Sea and Sinai, are developing along the same lines. Why single out this particular area? There is all this talk about the bad behaviour of some youngsters, but I am sure this particular bunch would not be doing any better if they stayed in Cairo. Only here, with everyone's eyes trained on Agami, it becomes more obvious. None of the kids I know are genuinely evil. This is not to say that there aren't the odd ones who, the moment they are on holidays, feel that they have to let off steam and get into trouble. It is a crying shame, however, that a minority has managed to give a bad name to the place."
Her niece, Dina, on the other hand, feels there is a sort of malaise among the young generation. She recently spent an evening at Heavens, the new nightclub which has replaced the Agami Palace. "I hated it," she says. "It was like being a fish in an aquarium. All these people dancing inside, while the Bedouin children, their faces stuck to the glass, watched us. I tried to see us with their eyes. I had to leave at once."
Many residents compare Agami to Maadi. In what way is it really different? What goes on here is no more, nor less, than what goes on in any residential suburb of Cairo or Alexandria. For some reason, Agami dwellers complain, normal behaviour acquires an aura of scandal just because it happens here.
Interior of Dunes architect Hussein Shahin's house. Rustic simplicity is no longer the rule
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Others who may be suffering from "Agami malaise" do not know how to turn back the clock. Come June, they are back with their large cars and their many servants to open their luxurious villas, get the beach chairs out in the garden and clean their pools in preparation for a new season of fun in the sun. Soon the beach, thick with rows of colourful umbrellas, will have to contend with flocks of swimmers. "The beach is so crowded nowadays that it makes sense to have private swimming pools," says one of the residents. "One has to step over millions of bodies to get to the sea, which in any case is not particularly safe. There have been so many accidents already."
Raouf Mishriqi, a vocal critic of the fate which has befallen the beloved summer resort of his youth, does yearn for the days of the water pumps. He calls Agami the most expensive slum in Egypt.
Taking the desert road from Cairo to the Northern Coast, a quick visit to the relatively newer extensions of the "original" Agami -- 6 October, Shatt Al-Nakhil and Hannoville, among others -- one is emphatically reminded of his words. There, separated by narrow passages doing their best to act as streets, thousands of unfinished four-storey red brick apartment buildings are teeming with holidaymakers.
 Agamistes with passion for plants: where once there was desert, exotic shrubs and majestic palms flourish |
 Hussein Shahin
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The atmosphere of urban informal settlements has been reproduced: children engage in fierce games of football while women hang the washing on narrow balconies overlooking the alley and men spend the day in make-shift cafés, puffing away at their shishas, lackadaisically observing the street vendors and their vegetable carts vying for space with large four-wheel-drives bumping along, luxury cars parked tightly against the walls and huge tourist buses perilously negotiating unnaturally sharp turns.
The scene does seem set for the creation of new slums. The question, however, is whether the inhabitants will let it happen. Are high walls and exclusive private beaches the only solution? Agami could yet become a summer resort able to accommodate difference while preserving some elements of the old life. A few residents with the right ideas and a better understanding of the surroundings: these are all it takes to reverse the tide, and bridge the gap.
Photos: Randa Shaath
Sources:
E M Forster: Alexandrie, Odyssées, 1990 Michael J.
Reimer: Colonial Bridgehead, Government and Society in Alexandria 1807-1882, The American University in Cairo Press, 1997
