"Descent to hell" : disembarkation in 19™ century Alexandria as a European experience of culture shock

Strona wydawcy: https://www.wuj.pl

One example of Egypt’s growing involvement with Europe in the 19,h century, apart from general Europeanization, was the arrival of many travellers and tourists enticed by the multiple attractions of the “Nile trip”. Such visits would begin in Alexandria, which became the foremost port in Egypt. The trip can be seen as a peculiar rite of passage as it follows a sequence of three stages (departure, travel, return) enfolded in ritualistic acts referring to death-and-rebirth symbolism. It is particularly clear in a sea voyage as ocean depths remind the traveller of death and landing represents return to life. Disembarkation in 19,h-century Alexandria is a good example of the rite of passage that arriving Europeans had to endure as they entered a cultural environment that was alien to them. The long wait for a sight of the African shore and of the city known from ancient history stimulated their imagination. Before they actually got there, they had to experience a series of dramatic “trials”. While still at sea, the ship was met by outlandish-looking emissaries from land: a Charon-like pilot and aweinspiring Quarantine Office officials. Nearer to shore, the ship was stormed by boat-bome tradesmen fighting over terrified passengers and their baggage. Once done with passport and customs clearance, they would run into ass drivers and porters. Forcefully seated on a donkey, a foreigner had to risk a gallopade along the narrow streets of a “Turkish” town. In the next few hours the traveller was subjected to more traumatic experiences, all conducted according to the rules of Arab culture he found incomprehensible. He neither understood nor accepted the wild gesticulation, the raised voices, the clamorous demands. Sensing them to be a continuous stream of aggression and unable to stand up to it, he felt painfully stripped of his dignity. A personal experience of the “rite of disembarkation” supported by advice from those familiar with Eastern ways enabled him, on the next day, to feel much more secure in the new milieu. Assimilating the rules of the local culture game, which, he soon discovered, allowed a foreigner to ride roughshod over the locals offering services, he set out, mounted on an ass, to get a glimpse of Alexandria. Reassured in his superiority, he went on to see more Egyptian sights in the same fashion. The experience of a stressful rite of passage at Alexandrian disembarkation set the style for visitors’ perceptions and interpretations of local culture.