Lt. George Vicary Tells of Trip to Bou-Saada
Bainbridge News & Republican, February 17, 1944
Lt. George H. Vicary, Base Censor Staff, serving with the Armed Forces in Africa, and former English instructor in the Bainbridge Central High School, tells in a most interesting descriptive way, the pleasure he encountered on an eight-day vacation he had been granted, in a letter to his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Charles L. Vicary, of Skaneateles. Following is the letter date, Dec. 22, 1943, contributed by Mrs. F.J. Casey, of Bainbridge:
Dear Mother and Dad,
Well, here's a letter to tell you of my eight days' vacation. It really came true after all. At 8 o'clock Saturday morning, Dec. 11th, a group of us left in three army cars for a desert oasis called Bou-Saada. In our bunch were two other lieutenants from my office, a Red Cross girl, a nurse, a couple of WAC's, and various and sundry other officers ranging up to a major. It was a rather rainy and cloudy morning with the sun breaking through occasionally. A short time after leaving the city we began to climb up and up into the heart of a high mountain range which we must cross to reach the desert. These mountains are not like the Adirondacks in that they have almost no trees--only a few scrubby small evergreens. Yet, though barren at close range, they are beautiful at a distance, because the rocks, grass tufts and rocky mantle blend into beautiful colors changing from blue to purple as the sun and clouds varied. It was a sort of a combination of Spring and Fall, the valleys being very green with the Fall rains, while higher up the trees were losing their leaves and the air had the cold snap of Autumn.
The road was full of hair-pin turns, because the steep grade necessitated spiraling round and round. We drove for miles and miles always up until we reached the half-way mark and began the long descent toward the desert. We stopped once in a little malled mountain town half way to our destination. There in a surprisingly clean little café we had coffee and warmed up a little before resuming our journey.
When we reached the outskirts of the desert the country flattened out and changed from the mountain range. Instead of the mountains there were isolated mountains -- rocky flat-topped hills standing by themselves on the plain. In the flat land there was either gravelly, grass tufted land, or vast expanse of sand and great sand dunes such as you have seen in the movies. Gone was the greenness of the mountain valleys for it rains seldom in the desert and no green things can grow unless it be in an oasis where some stream bubbling forth from the ground nourishes palm trees, green grass and rich earth.
Such a spot was the oasis of Bou-Saada, a patch of live green, growing things in the drab tan of the parched plain. Bou-Saada is a city of some 40,000 people--people clustered there because of the presence of water and fertile land. I say 40,000 people--yet the city looks no larger than a village like Skaneateles. The Arabs are jam packed into mud houses and an unbelievable number of them can live in a very small space.
The cars drew up in front of the hotel in which we were to stay--a very modern, fine hotel used extensively before the war by tourists making a Mediterranean cruise. Their ships would stop for a few days at a large port and the passengers would make an excursion by bus to Bou-Saada to see the desert, the Arabs, the camels, and all the things so strange to us.
We were just in time for lunch and went to the dining room where we had a delicious meal, marked notably by the large juicy steak worthy of your finest. That evening we again had steak, but for the rest of the week, while the food was good, it didn't compare with that first day.
I might mention that this hotel is now taken over by the Army as a rest camp for officers. My room was a very nice one--large with great French casement window, twin beds, a wash bowl but no bath. About every other room has a bath tub. The bureau, beds, tables and chairs were very nice looking -- something life stained pine. The view from my windows was varied and magnificent. In one direction was the garden -- great palm trees and cactus plants. Beyond lay the village of other large stucco hotels like mine. Off in the distance stretched the rolling sands and the lonely isolated mountains and messas.
Most cheerful room in the hotel was the lounge -- one side all windows facing the colorful garden in the rear. Here were great comfortable chairs, a fireplace in which huge logs burned all day and evening. there were magazines and books to read, a ping pong table. We spent much time there. After lunch and dinner in the dining room, we would all adjourn to the lounge where we had demitasse before the cheerful fire.
Sunday, our first full day at Bou-Saada, we spent a lot of time seeing the sights of the town. Everywhere we went, hordes of Arab children pursued us asking for "shewing gum" and bon bons (candy). We saw the Arab men making shoes, boots, knives, bracelets, and rings in their little dimly-lit shops. They do very fine work in these things, but suffer now from lack of materials so that their jewelry is of cheap metal. We peeped into Arab homes where women were cooking over an open fire (like a camp fire with the smoke issuing through a hole in the roof). One thing that I saw them cook was a kind of bread which they made in a big iron frying pan and which looked like an oversized pancake. Other women were knitting socks and making rugs. They eat, sleep, and live all in one room. Their beds are either of crude boards or merely a pile of blankets on the dirt floor.
Another thing we saw a great deal of was the open air market where the Arabs buy and sell--oranges, radishes, wool, skins, wood, livestock, etc. Most of their purchases are packed on little donkeys and then the Arab sits on top of the load. Heavy loads like great sacks of grain are transported on camels, a very common sight there. How the Arabs and their animals look you can best tell by the post cards I am sending. I couldn't talk with many of them because the desert Arabs don't know French, only their native tongue, which sounds like a person with a hard cold clearing his throat.
There are some dancing girls in Bou-Saada known as Ouled Nails who are world famous for their dance. Of course no one could go to this place and not see them. Accordingly we all went to see a performance which took place in a room in their home. In our crowd were two Red Cross girls so the performance was a bit more restrained than it might otherwise have been. The music for the dance consisted of a skin drum and a horn which produced very weird and unlovely music. I must say that I hardly think the dance of the Ouled Nails deserves its great reputation. It is rather unvaried and reflects a lack of artistic sense. It is chiefly remarkable for the amazing display of stomach muscle control--beats anything you ever saw in burlesque. Once seen it is interesting, but once is enough.
Monday morning I did the thing which I most chiefly came to Bou-Saada for. I went riding on the grand horses of the Spahi (Arab) cavalry who are stationed there. To give you an idea what these horses and the Spahis look like I am enclosing a picture cut from Collier's. The scene of the clipping is not Bou-Saada, but the horses and riders are like those there. The horses are all either white or dapple gray with long mane and tail. They are fast, never tire, and can scramble over rocks and climb as sure-footedly as mountain goats. After that I rode every morning at 8:30 sometimes out among the sand dunes, once up a river bed where I saw a flour mill powered by a giant waterwheel.
Oh, there are so many things I could tell you, I could write all night. One other thing--I visited an Arab school. Here the little Arab boys were sitting on the dirt floor of a dark, low-ceilinged room learning by heart the sacred words of the Koran (Arab Bible). They have slates on which is written the passages to be memorized and they all read out loud at the same time but not together, so you can imagine what a terrific racket they make and wonder how they can ever memorize anything that way. If a student is good and learns his lesson quickly, the Arab school master inscribes a pretty picture on his slate and the kid is granted a couple days vacation. Thus there is an incentive to learn fast and well. It takes the average student five or six years to memorize the whole Koran. Many of the Arab children are very cute and bright and pick up English much faster than their parents.
This in general covers about everything I did for eight days. Now I am back at work well rested and happy. every effort was made at the Hotel for our comfort even until breakfast in bed.
I hope you, Mother and Dad, enjoy the pictures I am sending in another envelope and can visualize by them some of the strange scenes and people it has been my fortunate opportunity to view. At Uncle Sam's expense I am getting an education I otherwise would never have been able to afford, so you see there is some good in this enforced absence from my loved ones and beloved Skaneateles.
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