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The Cosmopolitan Hotel
By Juergen Stryjak
If the tourist walks through Cairo's downtown he will be
astonished that there are plenty of old houses, office and
apartment buildings, beautiful but silent relics of the past,
which give him the feeling not of Cairo, but of being suddenly
transported to a strange worn-out copy of Paris from the turn of
the century one hundred years ago. To him, the buildings seem to
speak. The tourist has the feeling they want to tell him their
story, but the heavy dust on their facades muffles their voices,
and the rest of their whisper is drowned out by the infernal
traffic noise.
 For
decades this heritage was in danger of being lost. Due to a lack
of money, or the landlord's will, it only seemed to be a question
of time before the last of these witnesses became silent forever,
disappearing behind giant neon lights, replaced by colorless,
shiny new buildings. This danger isn't over, but there are hopeful
signs that at least a part of this heritage can be preserved. The
Café Riche is such a sign, and in a different way the restaurant
La Bodega in Zamalek, too – where ever individual passionate
enthusiasts are at work with much love and energy. Another sign is
the so-called Golden Triangle quarter around the stock exchange,
the Cairo Bourse. In the middle of this area we find the
Cosmopolitan Hotel.
The more than 100-year-old Cairo Bourse area, located between
Qasr Al-Nil Street, Sherif Street and Sabri Abu Alam Street, was
renovated recently. Facades were brightly painted; the streets and
small squares were transformed into a large pedestrian mall
without car traffic, sporting lovely lampposts, trees, little
gardens – inviting for a relaxing walk in the middle of the
noisy metropolis, in an area which is certainly one of the reasons
to call Egypt's capital the Paris on the Nile.
The Cosmopolitan Hotel, ordered from Swiss-born hotel manager
Charles Albert Baehler and built by the Italian Alphonse Sasso,
was inaugurated 1928 as the Metropolitan Hotel. For Baehler, the
hotel was his last gift to Cairo's townscape, after creating some
of the most beautiful hotels, apartment and office buildings,
mansions and shopping colonnades in the city, as well as the
Winter Palace in the Upper-Egyptian town of Luxor. Some experts
even consider Baehler as being the founder of new Zamalek, that
posh district located on the Nile island in the middle of the
town. An excellent example of his influence to Cairo's face can be
found there on the northern side of the 26th of July
Street, early Baehler houses, left to the corner Al-Maahad Al-Swissri
Street. Today these buildings host the pizzeria Maison Thomas and
the newly opened restaurant La Bodega.
 Like
many of the buildings in the Golden Triangle district around the
Cairo Bourse, the Cosmopolitan Hotel looks like a beautiful
casket. Its playful belle époche architecture with its rounded
corners, arcade-like balconies, pillars and stucco work turn it
into a perfect starting point for exploring the fin de siècle
neighborhood. The once famous Cairo Bourse, merged with the
Alexandria Stock Exchange decades ago, is only two minutes walking
distance away. Until its closure in 1961, it was rated among the
top five stock exchanges worldwide. Now it is open to the market
again, but still waits to become as important in the financial
world as in the past.
The Cosmopolitan Hotel offers clean and air-conditioned single
and double bedrooms as well as six suites, all of them simple but
stylishly furnished and equipped with private bath, telephone and
TV. It hosts a restaurant, a cafeteria, a business center, the
King's Bar and the patisserie Le Moulin.
Cosmopolitan Hotel. 1, Ibn Taalab Street, Downtown, Cairo.
Telephone: 3923-956, -663 and -845. Fax: 3933531. Single room $
42, double room $ 54, triple room $ 67 – including breakfast and
taxes. |
