Horses and roads

["Maryanne Stroud Gabbani" <gabbani@starnet.com.eg>]

Just yesterday a group of us were saddling up some horses and about ready to
go for a ride in the desert about dusk. I was on a mare that I've ridden
many times and considered buying, my buddy Morad was on a young mare that
he's been training, Hortense (a French girl living at the stables) had her
French trotter...size of a truck, and another friend, Ashraf on a young
nervous mare. The son of the stable owner was going to ride with us on
Nimbus on a pony line. We were all about ready when four horses galloped
past the stables on the way to the blacktop country road near us. We
recognised them as two mares and their two yr old offspring from Morad's
uncle's place just next door. One filly, Zolfa, is expert at taking the
paddock gate right off the hinges and she'd done just that. Morad took off
on Noura and I whipped Radwan (the son) off Nimbus to go after the horses.
One really good thing about the Egyptian countryside is that Muslims don't
drink, Thank God. Nim is an experienced emergency mare and was great about
blocking the mares to turn them into the dirt road to their farm, where
Hortense herded them home with Cisbeo. The youngsters were harder but by
then we had about a thousand local kids blocking the road and they ran into
a neighbour's dirt courtyard and were caught. Luckily no injuries, except
the tongue-lashing the boy who forgot to tie the paddock gate got. But it
could have been much worse. On our way back from the desert we had to walk
about 50 meters along the road in the dark and some moron in a bus came
zooming by, honking as he got just even with the horses. They all just
looked at him...had enough excitement. But if he'd come by when the young
ones were on the road it would have been a different story. I agree with Tom
about horses and roads. Even here where horses comprise about 25% of the
rural traffic, we have problems sometimes. During the summer we ride a lot
at night but usually stick to the paths around the farms or the desert.
Riding isn't fun when you have to worry too much.

Worst casualty of the night was Radwan's ride. Nim was so hyped up by
getting to go out and do something important that I decided that he could
practice riding while cooling her off in the paddock. She can really get
going for such an old broad.

Maryanne Stroud Gabbani
Cairo, Egypt
gabbani@starnet.com.eg