Cairo – warning: dance and costume discussion ahead!

When I first visited Cairo back in 2005, it was pretty overwhelming. Now a slightly more seasoned traveller, I took things a little more slowly and without having to keep to the schedule of a tour group.

For the thirteen years since I was last in Egypt, I’ve been kicking myself that I was on a bit of a break from dancing at the time I visited, so I hadn’t taken advantage of the bellydancing shenanigan opportunities. This time, travelling with my dancing buddy J, I was determined to do all the things I hadn’t last time: seeing shows, taking dance classes, visiting costume designers and basically doing my best to single-handedly bolster the economy with my shopping exploits.

To make this aim easier to attain, we decided to stay at Yasmina’s Dancers’ B&B, at her apartment in Giza. The view of the Pyramids was astonishing, and the apartment is lovely. When staying here, you also have gorgeous home cooking from the cook, and advice and arrangements on classes and costumes.

We started our first day at a horrendous hour, each of us arriving at Cairo airport between 4 and 5 am. We were transferred to the apartment, where we were able to arrange a horse-riding session in the desert, after a quick breakfast.

Although we set out early, it was past 10am by the time we mounted our horses and rode out, making it quite warm. The horses were feeling the heat, and while we very much enjoyed the trip out past the Pyramids, we felt sorry for the horses. The stables we had been guided to certainly had better-fed animals than some, but there were many we passed whose horses were little more than skin and bone. We were glad we’d had a recommendation for a stable who took more care of their livestock.

Dance classes were a big part of the first couple of days, as we had classes booked with Nesrin Bahaa, Mohamed Salah, and Aida Nour.

Nesrin’s lesson took place across town, and we looked at style, steps and combinations in Haggala, Nubian and Mawashahat styles of dance. Nesrin is an amazing teacher: kind, generous with feedback and information, and incredibly graceful. We both took away a lot from her class, and hope to be able to learn from her again in the future.

Mohamed took our second class, which Yasmina organised with us at the dance studio in her B&B. His class was focused on street shaabi, a style which combines elements of modern dancing like hip-hop, along with more traditionally Egyptian moves. The result is sharp, exciting and very athletic! We were all three of us exhausted by the end of the lesson, but had so much fun.

Aida Nour was our third dance teacher, and J and I were both very eager to learn from her as she has such a wonderful tradition in dance. This class was also organised by Yasmina at the B&B studio, and Aida taught us a saucy shaabi choreography which was really fun and cute. It felt like the class only went for moments, we had such a great time.

As well as taking dance classes, we saw some shows, including Sahar Samara at the Nile Ritz-Carlton. We also went along with S to see another dancer we didn’t know the name of on the Maxim cruise. The dancer that night was supposed to be Camelia, but she was sick, so we weren’t sure who took her place.

Of course, we also had to go costume shopping. On a recommendation from M, we visited Mamdouh Morise, who has an atelier relatively close (in Cairo terms) to the B&B. He was very sweet – helpful and friendly but not pushy in the slightest. We started out after a chat and a tea, by looking at some of his costumes, then rummaged through the fabric rooms to work out what sorts of things we liked. Then we decided on a costume design using the fabrics we’d picked out. How exciting! The costumes were ready for trying three days later, and the last-minute alterations were done while we waited.

Mamdouh used to design wedding dresses before moving into bellydance costuming, and his designs have a lot of bling-factor. He uses a lot of hotfix crystals, 3d flower appliques and sewn beading to create his ornate designs, and high-quality fabrics are allowed to shine.

Our next costumer stop was the fabulous Hanan Mahmoud, who has a workshop across town. She is absolutely gorgeous, both in appearance and personality, making us feel very welcome. Her workrooms were filled with literally piles of costumes in various states of progress, fabric and trims. We explored her fabric storerooms and tried on some outfits before deciding on what to order. They will be ready to pick up next week.

Our third atelier was the legendary Eman Zaki, who S brought us along to see. Eman was very gracious and she quickly sketched out a design for me, after I said I was looking for an Oriental dress in red. It will be in fire-engine red draped swoops of mesh with red and old gold floral appliqués and a laced-up back. Because of her dance background and extensive experience, Eman’s designs are flattering, easy to dance in and comfortable. So far I’ve been back for one fitting and will be able to pick it up next week. Eman’s sister Hoda also came in to say hello while we were there, which was lovely – two costuming greats in the same room!

We also stopped in to see Amira of Pharaonics to collect costumes I and some of the girls back home had ordered. It was so lovely to finally meet Amira after corresponding for years about our favourite things – costumes!

With all this to-ing and fro-ing, we wouldn’t have managed as well without Omar, our driver recommended by Yasmina. He rang places to work out where they were, waited for us, and even better, introduced us to Shaabi FM, a repository of lots of excellent music.