INTERVIEW WITH SAMASEM
By Farhana (Pleasant Gehman)

Samasem has spent most of the past decade and a half as one of the Middle East's top Oriental dancers. She has toured four continents, as both a performer and instructor of Raqs Sharqi. Based in Cairo, she has been engaged for extended contracts at all the five star hotels and top nightclubs, as well as at countless weddings and private events for visiting dignitaries. Currently featured on the Al Soraya, the most palatial of the Nile's 'floating nightclubs,' Samasem's show incorporates everything from traditional, slow orchestrated pieces to modern Arabic pop. She slides easily from elegant classical pieces into playful folkloric numbers, like the ever-popular Malaya luff.

Samasem is a study in contrasts. With her cool Nordic beauty, chiseled features and a mass of thigh-length blonde hair (all her own, by the way!) onstage, she looks like an ethereal mermaid. Offstage, with her glasses on, her long tresses in a braid, she looks bookish and almost conservative, which belies her engaging manner and extremely hip sense of humor. Well traveled and fluent in many languages, Samasem is not just a dancer and instructor, she's also a producer. Her teaching CD of Arabic rhythms and drum-tracks has just been made available in the States through Turquoise International. She is about to release another CD, which mixes modern pieces composed specifically for her as well as three Om Kulthoum songs. She is also top-notch costumer, making all of her own to-die-for creations, which are so gorgeous many of her peers in Cairo have begged her to design for them as well.

But her first love is dancing, and it's more than evident in her performances. Her ear for Arabic music is uncanny, and her subtle isolations catch even the tiniest nuance. Sensuous and slow, she incorporates quick, percussive steps and hip-work seamlessly into the most 'gooey' of oriental movements.

In May and June of 2001, Samasem toured the States with her colleague Katia, teaching workshops and private lessons, and performing, including an extremely well received solo performance at Second International Conference On Middle Eastern Dance in Costa Mesa. We caught up with this remarkable woman over a pot of super-strong mint tea, in Hollywood.

DISCOVER BELLY DANCE: You grew up in Sweden, so how did you get into Oriental Dance? Were you already a professional dancer?
SAMASEM: Actually, no! I hadn't even really heard Arabic music. I'd hang out at reggae clubs, because I liked the music, and only ever danced for fun. But a lot of girls were getting interested in Oriental Dance in Sweden; in all of Scandinavia, it was very popular. Raqia Hassan came over to teach workshops and I studied with her. She was marvelous, really. Then I went to San Francisco, and studied with Jamila Salimpour. In 1981, I went to Egypt to study privately with Raqia; I was serious about this.

DBD: How did you start working in Cairo?
SAMASEM: It's a long story! By 1986, I got a job in London, dancing at a club called The Rendezvous. I worked there from 1986-87, and was contracted by an agent, an impresario, to dance abroad. I worked in India, went there three separate times, and then I danced in Sri Lanka, and Oman, which is where I first got my license to dance. I would take trips to Cairo, study with Raqia, go and see Nagwa Fouad, Fifi Abdou, Mona Said and Aida Nour perform. In 1988, I led a tour of twenty-two Scandinavian women to Egypt to study with Raqia and go to clubs to see dancers. In 1989, I met a French woman called Violetta; she got me contracts at the Safir in Dokki (a district of Cairo) as well as the Nile Hilton. From 1992-1995, I worked at nearly every cabaret in Cairo, as well as at Hotel Mena House, and at the Cairo Sheraton, just after Fifi Abdou left there.

DBD: You have been living and working in Cairo for a very long time now- how would you says the scene has changed? Ê
SAMASEM: Nowadays, most of the dance scene is based upon hierarchy and popularity among the dancers. This has always been true, but due to economics, there used to be many more venues. There still are a number of five star hotels and cabarets, but there is not very much money to be made with dance; people will not invest in putting a show into clubs. Paying a dancer enough money for her to put on a beautiful show with a full orchestra, singers, costume changes - this takes a lot of money. For your show to be perfect, you must have top musicians - you can't be cheap with that. You hire twenty five musicians and three of them can play! For a whole band, it can be very expensive. You must spend money on this, as well as pay yourself - it costs a lot. The range of pay is about from LE.300 to LE 850 ($100 - $285 US Dollars), and from this amount you must pay for everything. The clubs think: Why not just has a disco? It costs less! This is the attitude not just in Egypt, but everywhere. Before, in Cairo, customers would go out frequently; now, people still want to go out, but not every night. They can't afford it. You will still see major stars such as Dina, but maybe now she dances only on weekends or only if the club has many reservations that night.

DBD: And what about foreign women dancing in Cairo?
SAMASEM: (laughing) well, it's not like I have anything against foreigners! But with my own eyes, I have seen people who can't even walk come to Cairo and get jobs. Why? Because they need a girl to dance. Maybe the regular dancer was sick, or she got into an argument with the management, maybe she is willing to sleep with someone to get a job - who knows? It is sad, but in this way the dance is destroyed.

DBD: What are your plans for the future?
SAMASEM:I have just produced a CD of the music I use in my show- it's special arrangements of three Om Kulthoum songs, drum solo, some modern pieces. Turquoise International will distribute it. I am also planning another workshop tour back here to America in 2002.