In Old Cairene Society
Some of my happiest years were spent at the Small Arms Training School. My life until then had all seemed to pass me by in an uncontrollable blur. Somehow I’d wandered far across the desert, thousands of miles from a little village in Ireland, and had slotted comfortably into a new life with the people of Egypt. The Second World War was all but over now. Hitler’s grand plans had turned to dust in a Berlin bunker, and his surviving deputies had been rounded up to face trial. The world breathed a sigh of relief, but for us, life in Egypt went on in much the same way as it always had done.
It was around this time when I made friends with a group of British Overseas Airways Corporation pilots, who were a grand set of chaps. After work we’d meet in the coolness of the evenings and sit on the veranda of a bar called the Amphitryon, opposite the Heliopolis House Hotel, where we’d drink and make merry. From there we’d go to my club where we could drink until the cows came home, although my pals always laid off the alcohol the day before they took to the air again.
One evening at the Amphitryon, we were introduced to four charming English girls. They were serving with the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force and had only recently arrived in Egypt. The loveliest of the girls was called Marjorie Ragsdell. Soft brown locks framed her fair complexion and her smile was intoxicating. I’d been hit by Cupid’s arrow. I made sure I got to sit next to this beautiful lady throughout the rest of the evening, and conversation flowed as freely as our drinks. I learned she was a humble farmer’s daughter from a place called Long Sutton in Lincolnshire, the boundaries of which she’d never set foot beyond before the outbreak of war. Her father, George, had lost an arm in 1916 during the Battle of the Somme. Frustrated he couldn’t return to the front line in the Second World War, he expressed his disappointment that his own two sons were just children, and too young to fight in his stead.
‘I’ll go, Father,’ said Marjorie, the middle of five daughters; and with that, she packed her bags and went straight to Lincoln to enlist, without a backwards glance.
Egypt, February 1946: Paddy Rochford and Marjorie Ragsdell.
I felt so elated that night, I forgot to count my drinks and remember little more about the evening, except for squeezing into a crowded taxi when it was time to go home. I was so intoxicated I got a little friendlier with Marjorie than I should have. The next thing I knew, I found myself lying flat on my back on the road to Heliopolis, watching the taxi speed away.
I’d fallen in love with Marjorie at first sight, though as I picked myself up and dusted my jacket, I doubted the feeling was mutual. Aside from being some years older than she was, she’d clearly not taken kindly to the taxi incident and was equally unimpressed by the fact I’d let myself get into such a drunken state. She refused my subsequent requests for further dates, but fortunately my pal from the BOAC had begun courting Marjorie’s best friend, and after persuading her that I was actually a jolly decent chap, despite first impressions, she agreed to meet me again.
As a foursome we went to all the best places in Cairo, and enjoyed many happy evenings together. I went to Zizinia to collect my suit of civilian clothes, so any ‘out of bounds’ notices became null and void; and after several months of walking out together, Marjorie and I became engaged. Everything was going well, until the tide inevitably began to change.
Cairo, 1946: Number Eight Company, GHQ. Paddy can be seen on the front row, fourth from the left.
It was a bright morning in 1945 when I was told my work with the Egyptian Army had come to an end. The British Military Mission had begun its slow withdrawal from Egypt and I was appointed to Number Eight Company, GHQ, as company sergeant major with immediate effect. It was with much regret I returned to the Small Arms School for the final time to gather my personal belongings and say farewell to Colonel Khalifa and all the other friends I’d made.
My new company was some 800 men strong, comprising warrant officers class I and II, staff sergeants, corporals and men. Almost everyone had been given a clerical position at the various departments that came under GHQ, and I was to oversee operations. I was taken aback at the size of the job I’d been given, but I knuckled down to pull the company around, as per the instructions of the commandant. Things were so busy for me that I was forced to put any ideas of marriage on the back burner for the time being. This didn’t go down too well with my bride-to-be, but I had no other option.
Despite my initial dismay, I soon began to enjoy my new work, and the only bother I had was typing, which I could only do one finger at a time. As soon as I was settled in and began to get on top of things, I applied for leave to get married. To my surprise, I was granted permission to have twenty-eight days of leave all in one go, so Marjorie and I began planning our big day.
The anti-British groups were now well and truly stirring up the dust and it wasn’t even safe to walk down the road anymore. Troops had been shot dead in the streets and curfews were on. We were fed up with being confined to barracks, listening to the bombs and bullets thumping and whining all around us. It was just as if the war had never ended.
Orders had gone out that no vehicles were to be out in the streets, and every morning our clerks had to be marched to work across the Qasr el-Nil Bridge, which crossed the river Nile. At about 9.00 am, just as everybody had arrived at GHQ, rebel guns opened up and swollen mobs of rag-clad Egyptians began scurrying along the streets. My company managed to reach the gates of our camp and halt a crowd of barefoot boys just before they caused any damage. They soon cleared off back into town when they saw us with weapons in our hands, and they no doubt helped with the looting that always followed these disturbances.
The sound of shooting carried on until noon that day, then started again after the sun went down. Rumours started circulating about what had been happening in the city, such as the ransacking of Cairo’s beautiful cathedral. We also heard the shocking tale of two British vehicles that had been sent out against orders by some silly officer, and had run smack into the yelling crowds outside Qasr el-Nil Barracks. The crowd smashed the windows of the trucks and pulled the drivers out. They killed one and were in the act of ripping the other to pieces when a young sergeant, standing at the barrack gates, shouted orders at his men.
‘Fix bayonets! Charge!’
They charged. No doubt there were many sore Egyptian bottoms that day.
Heliopolis was out of bounds that evening, so my BOAC pal and I had to sneak into town dressed as air force officers. Side by side we entered the Sporting Club and ordered our drinks. The bar was full of the usual Egyptian members, including Nasser and his family, and one Abdel Latif Boghdadi, a rich young man who owned many villages in Egypt. He was a wing commander in the Royal Egyptian Air Force, and a leading figure in the Free Officers’ Movement.
Nobody spoke to us as we sipped our beers. We suspected everyone had been talking about the day’s happenings prior to our arrival, and were probably not too pleased by the forceful retaliation of the British. The young wing commander soon began gloating about the damage inflicted upon the city’s cathedral. On and on he went, until I could take no more.
‘This atrocity seems to have pleased you, Abdel,’ I remarked.
‘Aiwa!’ he cried, raising his glass in the air. Others followed suit, and the celebratory atmosphere sickened me.
‘Now look here,’ I said, walking over to face him. ‘What would you be saying if the boot was on the other foot? What if our chaps had ransacked one of your mosques?’
‘I would kill the dogs!’ he retorted, his eyes flashing with fury at the mere suggestion.
I looked at him and felt nothing but disgust. How could somebody with so much power be so blinkered and hypocritical?
‘Huh!’ I said. ‘You don’t even have the will to swat a fly from your coat. You’d leave that to your servant.’
Boghdadi simply laughed at me and offered to buy me a drink, but the hour was getting late and I had to be back at Kubri Camp by midnight. Taxis and trams weren’t running, so he offered to drive me back in his motorcar. I reluctantly accepted.
‘But be careful I don’t push you in the Nile on the way,’ I added.
He didn’t end up in the river that evening. Instead I woke the mess caterer when we arrived back at camp and bought my chauffeur a drink to show there were no hard feelings.
Over the next few months we were so busy at GHQ keeping Cairo under control that the time flew by, and the date of my wedding was upon us before I knew it. Marjorie and I had been invited to spend our honeymoon at the Shakour family’s villa, but I was so rushed off my feet I had my doubts if we’d even get to Alexandria at all.
I’d arranged to have the ceremony in the beautiful basilica cathedral in Heliopolis on 27 April 1946. Marjorie was to spend the night before at the house of some friends, whilst I stayed with my pal from the BOAC. We had a rare bachelor’s night, and I was first up the following morning.
The war had only just ended and everything was still rationed, so we’d planned to marry in uniform as we didn’t have enough coupons to buy a wedding dress. Luck, however, was on our side. Marjorie and her three bridesmaids had gone to see a travelling show a few weeks earlier, and as they were involved in amateur dramatics themselves, they were invited backstage to meet the cast and crew. It was there they met a lady whose daughter had recently got married, and she kindly said that if her dress was the right size, then Marjorie could borrow it. It fitted like a glove. The bridesmaids were given the loan of three beautiful costumes that were being used in the show, complete with matching bonnets.
My bride looked radiant when she arrived at the church in her white lace gown. She had flowers in her hair that I’d been allowed to pick from King Farouk’s garden.
Little had changed since the end of the war so it was impossible for our family and friends from back home to attend. It was particularly upsetting for Marjorie not to have her father by her side to walk her down the aisle, but I’m certain he would have been brimming with as much pride as I was.
After a glorious reception, we set off to Cairo Station with a couple of old boots dangling from the back of the car. Abdel Moneim Ragheb Bey, the first friend I’d made at the club, had arranged a private train carriage for us, and we travelled to Alexandria in style. During the long journey, with my wife asleep on my shoulder, I closed my eyes and allowed my thoughts to drift back over the past few months. Much had happened, and my mind was full of all the recent events.
My father had by now passed away. He’d died the year before, back home in Chapelizod. I’d never had the opportunity to say goodbye, but I’m convinced he came to me to say ‘cheerio, son’. On the morning he died, I’d opened my eyes and I swear I saw him standing at the foot of my bed, watching me with that serene look on his face. He vanished after I’d blinked, but I knew I hadn’t imagined him. Later that day a telegram came through from Mother, informing me he’d tripped and fallen in the road some days earlier. He’d been taken to hospital but the fall had been too much of a shock, and his old heart had given way during the early hours that morning. Father was a gallant old soldier and it was a comfort to know he’d lived to see Britain, the country he’d loved and served so faithfully, emerge victorious. That in itself would have been enough to send him happily on his journey to the Pearly Gates.
Cairo, 27 April 1946: Paddy and Marjorie’s wedding
I opened my eyes to find the sun was streaming in through the window of our carriage. The open country was flashing past our window and I noticed we were drawing close to Alexandria. I began to smell the pungent air and knew we were nearing Sidi Gaber Station, our stop. The old thrill of excitement I’d so often felt when alighting here, especially on my leaves from fighting in the desert, assailed me again.
Dashing forward to meet us as we stepped onto the platform came dear Yvonne, whom I loved as a sister, and faithful Joseph, who was like a brother. With much hugging and kissing we took our seats in the back of their car and headed to their beautiful house surrounded by palm trees, which I’d grown to love as my home from home. Standing at the door was Aunt Vanda and Uncle Charles. Their faces were full of warmth, and they loved Marjorie as soon as they saw her. After we’d unpacked and dined, we sat down together to have a long chat over refreshing drinks.
We were up and away bright and early next morning. The family owned a private beach cabin, so we spent the day bathing in the beautiful blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea and lazing on the soft, golden sands. We enjoyed our happy holiday to the full, and allowed our cares and burdens to ebb away with the waves. Marjorie came to love Alexandria and its friendly people just as I did. Unfortunately there were a few riots every now and again, but we escaped them by staying up in Zizinia, well out of harm’s way.
All too soon our honeymoon was at an end, and the morning when we had to part and return to our respective units was a wrench. Marjorie was soon to be discharged now she was married, though as yet we had nowhere to live together. I reported for duty with Number Eight Company and was told the long-expected news that the British Army was scheduled to evacuate the Nile Delta and relocate to a new base at Fâyid. This was still many months away yet, so I tried to put it to the back of my mind. Until then, I was surplus to requirements, and was being reposted to the Egyptian Army and to my old job. This cheered me up no end, and the best part of it was that a flat in Heliopolis, where Marjorie and I could live, was being thrown in. Things couldn’t have worked out any better.
Alexandria, May 1946: Marjorie Rochford relaxing on her honeymoon.
I duly reported back to Mission HQ and was pleased to see so many old faces. The Egyptian liaison officer, Major Shaheen, who was married to a Turkish princess, gave me a generous welcome, though he warned me that things weren’t quite as I’d left them at the Small Arms School. Colonel Khalifa had gone and his replacement, I was told, was a complete arsehole. Unfortunately there was nothing the Mission could do about him, for he was well in at the top and couldn’t be moved. Before returning to the school, however, there were some clerical duties I had to perform, so I was given a temporary desk at Mission HQ.
My wife and I moved into our lovely flat, and I found to my surprise that Abdel Moneim Ragheb Bey had arranged a ‘welcome home’ party for us at the Helmia Palace, a popular nightclub in Cairo, where we enjoyed a delicious dinner and watched the cabaret until early in the morning. We were introduced to a famous Egyptian singer called Mohammed Abdel Wahab, who was performing that evening. The Egyptians called him ‘Abdel Crosby’, and although I couldn’t understand all the lyrics, he had a magnificent voice. He even taught me two Arabic love songs so I could serenade Marjorie, though I can’t say she was terribly impressed.
We had some practical jokers at the Military Mission and one chap in particular had a strange sense of humour. He’d been out on a binge one evening and was walking home through the marketplace. Clasped tightly in his hands was a bag of eggs, which he intended to cook for a late night supper. On his way, he espied a sleeping native reclining in a chair outside one of the many coffee bars.
In the mood for a spot of ‘fun’, the soldier yelled at the top of his voice: ‘Masaa el-kheer!’ which meant ‘good evening’.
The previously slumbering man lifted his head with a start, and as he did so, the poor chap received the contents of the soldier’s bag all over his face. With egg yolk dripping from his beard, the Egyptian rose to his feet and drew the longest knife from beneath his robes. He set off at top speed with an almighty roar, in hot pursuit of the now fleeing soldier.
Regrettably, this incident hadn’t been enough to appease his mischievous spirit. Still feeling full of beans as he was undressing for bed, he woke his room-mate by sprinkling a bag full of insecticide powder all over him. With much sneezing, the unfortunate man leapt out of bed and lunged himself at the practical joker. In the commotion that followed, a mattress was thrown out of the window and it landed on the veranda of the flat below. The flat in question was occupied by an important Egyptian gentleman, who at the time was entertaining some VIPs. Clad in nothing but an army shirt and in his bare feet, the practical joker went to retrieve it. He must have looked a fright to the poor young serving girl who opened the door to him, for she fainted in shock. The semi-naked fool proceeded to march straight into the room, uninvited, and with a sweeping gesture to the horrified guests, he collected the mattress from the veranda and marched back to the flat from whence he’d come.
Thankfully for Marjorie and I, we lived a few floors up from this idiot so didn’t have much to do with him. Our flat was small but pleasant. We had a little balcony outside our kitchen window that overlooked the open-air cinema. Sitting rapt in the evening light could often be spotted hundreds of male natives enjoying the latest Arabic film.
One of our chaps from a neighbouring balcony thought it would be funny one day to roar out: ‘Hassan?’
A great roar came back: ‘Aiwa effendi?’ (Yes, sir?) Hassan was a very popular name, bestowed upon almost every other baby boy.
One day, when the sun was hot and sensible people were having a siesta, a crowd of locals had gathered in the baking streets outside my office to watch some fire-eaters entertaining the people. Looking out of my window with some friends, we saw two young bints swinging lighted torches around their heads, whilst a wallad was lying on a bed of nails. A little further up the street, an Egyptian was putting his animals through their paces. Some monkeys were dancing and a goat was standing on a raised platform balancing a stool on its head. Still further up, another wallad was turning the handle of a street barrel organ and the jangled notes were grinding out The Heliopolis Blues.
The practical joker colleague of mine placed a coin, a ten-piastre piece, on a portable cooking range and lifted it off with a button stick as it became white hot.
‘Here comes a buckshee!’ he called to the crowd below, and with a grin that could sour milk, he dropped the coin out of the window.
One of the entertainers, grateful for the tip, roared back: ‘Shukran jazeelan!’ (Many thanks.)
The young boy caught the coin in his outstretched palm, and screamed in pain as the hot metal blistered his skin. In a blind rage, out came his enormous knife and he was just about to fly up the stairs to my office when he was stopped in his tracks by an almighty thunder flash that smacked down into the narrow street. Black smoke filled the road from one end to the other, and when it cleared the street was completely empty. All that could be seen was the tail of a goat disappearing around the corner.
The police called round at our offices later that day, as it had been claimed that a live grenade had been thrown from one of the windows of our building. Everyone denied any knowledge of this, and in the end the whole sticky situation was resolved. The police had a sense of humour and they left our office building laughing their heads off, clutching a small gift in their hands.
We were truly living in a corrupt society where almost anyone could get away with anything. Dud money, for instance, was to be found all over the country and silver coins were a nightmare. In the army, the paying-out officer always had a slab of marble in front of his table on which he’d drop each piece. If it had a clear ring then all was well. If the ring was dull, he took it back to the bank, where they were happy to change it.
Street beggars of every age were found in their thousands, and they all had a hard luck story to tell. They roamed the streets with hands that couldn’t be stilled, and they’d have the contents of a pocket out in a thrice without the wearer being any the wiser. Fountain pens, watches and wallets were the most sought after items. Outside the churches on Sunday mornings the beggars would crouch, with blood-stained bandages around their limbs and stumps held aloft, along with all the other horrors that could be thought up to win sympathy. The ones who made me angry were the women with babies held to their breasts.
‘Buckshees, effendi. An English soldier gave me this baby and left me.’
This perpetual appeal irked me to my core. Everybody knew the babies had been hired. No respectable soldier would get himself mixed up with that sort of business; and even if he did, the girl’s own people would have had her stoned to death instead of leaving her to beg on the streets, so I knew it couldn’t have been true.
During my time in Egypt, a man was caught and arrested for putting children out into the streets to steal, and then, like Fagin’s boys from the Charles Dickens novel, they’d hand their ill-gotten spoils to their master. During the subsequent trial it was found that this man had run a school where teaching the art of stealing was the only lesson. Among the many methods of instruction, the child had to frisk a dummy covered in collectables and small silver bells. If the bells rang, the child had failed.
In a desperate effort to deter any would-be lawbreakers, the local police started putting it around that they could solve any crime. There was, however, a spate of larceny that had them worried for a long time. Wallet after wallet went missing day after day, but the police couldn’t work out who was doing it or where the items were going. All the usual suspects were ruled out. The months went by and still these crimes went unsolved.
One morning the police apprehended an old man for some petty offence or other, and they brought him into the police headquarters to await trial. The man begged that he be allowed to keep his pet monkey with him in the cells. After a long, heart-bleeding story about how he and the monkey were like father and son, the police gave in. The old chap was in possession of an old fiddle and was asked to play some music in return. As he was doing this, his monkey began going around everybody in the room with a hat, holding it up for alms and saluting at the same time. This had the policemen in stitches, and they all put their hands into their pockets and dropped a few coins into the hat. Suddenly, one of the police officers spotted the monkey stealing a wallet from another man’s pocket and the whole story began to unfold. The elusive crack thief had been caught in the act, and at police HQ, no less. The man was sentenced to years behind bars and the monkey was shot, as he was old and there was little hope of teaching him the rights from wrongs.
After the First World War, drug trafficking and consumption in Egypt became widespread. Hashish was the most common substance, it being smoked by as many as 90 per cent of the native population, who’d all been raised on it. This caused such concern to the authorities that they called in the services of an expert. He became world famous and was known as Lewa (Police General) Thomas Wentworth Russell Pasha. This officer performed wonders in this country and despised the drug pedlar with a passion. Many were the tales of vast quantities being discovered, and it was learned that the most common method of drug smuggling was to sew the drugs inside the stomachs of camels, donkeys and horses. The suppliers would then cross the frontiers of Egypt, undetected, with their deadly loads. Great fortunes were made from this despicable trade. Lewa Russell Pasha had some job ahead of him, but there was no doubt he was getting results.
A senior Egyptian police officer, albeit a small-minded one, invited me many times to join him and his friends at hashish parties that were held at a place known as the City of the Dead, where inside and out of these desolate houses were the graves of late Egyptians. This was the haunting ground of drug addicts, crooks and a whole host of other miscreants. I wasn’t in the slightest bit interested in joining in, but there would have been no use reporting the fellow, as much as I wanted to, as his father was a high-ranking official in Egypt who could have had me chucked out of the country in a heartbeat.
Cocaine, the most deadly of drugs, was beyond the slender resources of the average Egyptian native. It was a more common sight to see people smoking their hookah pipes. In fact, it was hard to miss them as they sat, trance-like, in the kerbside cafés. It was said this substance conjured up fitful imaginations in the mind of the smoker, and the drug was grown mostly in the poorest regions of Syria, Lebanon and Turkey, countries that depended on its revenue.
If caught, it was instant jail for a drug offender. Those of us who knew Egyptian jails understood to what lengths the crooks would resort to avoid detection. I’ve witnessed these poor fellows screaming and foaming at the mouth during strip searches before being dragged to their cells, thrashed all the way by a black-uniformed policeman, who most likely had a stash of the deadly drug secreted somewhere about his person for his own use. In those days rhino whips were issued to the Egyptian police, who’d lash out at anything that moved. This was just another part of daily life in Egypt, and one I detested with all my heart and soul.
I once took the opportunity of expressing my concerns to King Farouk during a small arms meeting on the Abbassia Ranges. We spoke about the fact that so few of the Egyptian soldiers were good rifle shots, and I told the king it was because of the way they were treated. They had no education and were cursed at and shouted at all day long. This crushed their spirits and destroyed their self-confidence. Much to everybody’s surprise, King Farouk actually took note. He abolished flogging in the Armed Forces and took the rhino whips away from the police.
Despite these little changes, illegal substances were slowly sapping the life out of the people of Egypt, and are still doing so to this day. I feel it will take a long time, plenty of patience, and perhaps a miracle or two, before the war on drugs is finally won.