36 hours in transit, Idaho to Kuala Lumpur (KL). From temperate spring weather to the tropics. Malaysia is around 4degrees latitude... that's pretty close to the equator. The warm humid air envelopes one here. Green, lush.

Dr. Nik met me at the airport, driving his son's 1986 Mercedes because he needed a trunk big enough for all my stuff, saddle, etc. A few electrical problems with the car convinced him that he didn't want to chance the drive into the city, so we took a little detour (all the car windows open to the hot steamy tropical air, since the AC seemed to reap havoc with the delicate electrical system) to his home where he could swap it for his wife's car (also an old Mercedes but a little more predictable). Nice older neighborhood, stucco houses, red tile roofs, high ceilings (no AC but big ceiling fans), tropical trees, vines, jungly yards, different from any other place I've been. I haven't seen enough of the country, or the city yet to form an impression - it seems a little modern, a little jungle, a little rich, a lot poor (but less so than neighboring Indonesia), a little funky, seems very friendly so far.

Malaysia - roughly the size of New Mexico - made up of penisular Malaysia (south of Thailand) and the northern half of the island of Borneo - was a British Colony for over a century, a melting pot of cultures and religions, with a large population of Indian and Chinese people (the primary commerce channels). Malaysia was occupied by Japan during WWII, and became a Federated nation in 1957. A conglomeration of 11 Sultanates and two non-sultanate states, with an elected parliamentary government. (Singapore was originally part of the new nation, but eventually withdrew as a soveriegn state). Malaysia is still a fairly new country. A focus on technology export gave rapid growth to the young nation, but also left it reeling from the IT (information technology) bust that hit the rest of the world at the turn of the century. They lost momentum, but are making a comeback. Host to the tallest building in the world (Dr. Nik says this is thanks to an ambitious Prime Minister with grandiose ideas).

There is still a ruling monarchy here (though primarily figure head)- composed of the 11 Sultans (Chieftans). They take turns at leadership though, rotating through each Sultanate in 5 year cycles. I'm getting the impression that the Malaysians are a very peaceful civilized people, w/o the attitudes of aggression and possessiveness that seem to dominate the Western world. The native language is Malay, though English is common, as are Chinese dialects and Indian. Malay is a fairly obscure languange on the global scale, spoken only in this tropical land of Indonesia and Malaysia.

And in the typical, crazy way of this most unusual Equestrian sport, one of the Sultans has decided that he likes it, and so Endurance in Malaysia is now off and running. Dr. Nik said there probably aren't more than 30 purebred Arabians in the entire country (they'll all be here for this event!) - so they have a ways to go. With the heat, the smaller horses are preferred, ruling out the thoroughbreds and criollos (many horses imported from Argentina here).

So logically, people need to start looking towards breeding Arabians here now. As Dr. Nik was driving me to his house to swap cars, he was filling me in on the status of the sport here, telling me about the Sultan and his new interest, about the need for more Arabians. As the hot humid air was blasting through the car from the open windows, he said 'by the way, last night we formed the Arabian Horse Society of Malaysia. We had our first meeting.'

Malaysia, Endurance, Arabians... (rain forest, orangutans, tigers, and orchids) - why not? Actually the burning question in my mind has been 'Why'?? Dr. Nik was one of the first here to discover the sport. An article on Patrick Swayze, Arabian horses, and Endurance inspired him. He bought a horse, started learning to ride. A quirk of timing, 6 months later the tiny Nation of Malaysia was invited by UAE - Dubai- to field a team of Endurance Riders to the 1998 World Endurance Championship (a fluke of having the right Malaysian (wealthy businessman involved in developing Malaysia) in the right place (Dubai)at the right time (riding the wave of Dubai's goal of making Endurance a global, Olympic, sport).

Six months into his riding career Dr. Nik set the 1998 WEC as his goal and started training his ex-race track thoroughbred. He read books on marathon runners for information. Five other equestrians joined in the goal (I don't know their stories yet). They had to qualify for the WEC, Dr. Jim Bryant came over from UAE to help them learn and prepare the horses, they converted a thoughbred race track into a 120km CEI** course to qualify their horses (120 times around the track?) and joined the rest of the world in Dubai. Dr. Nik made it through the first loop ("I was pretty excited, went a little fast"). One of the horses, an Argentine Criollo actually finished the 160 km course. No looking back for Malaysia.

We're off to a press conference for the ride in a few hours, the big news is that Abu Dhabi is sending over a contigent of riders and support. Short notice decision, no time to bring their own horses so they'll be riding local Arabians. I think Sh Hazza is riding the 160km, the others will ride the 80km event.

So - here we go! This is going to be interesting. I'm a little worried about personally being able to tolerate the heat. I spent the last few days in Idaho dressed in extra layers of clothing trying to acclimate :) But a new culture, a new land, new things to see and experience - from horseback nonetheless! I love it.

And I love the food :) I've always had a weakness for Indonsian food and here it is!! Yesterday afternoon Neena, from Edaran (the IT firm sponoring the ride) came to the hotel to welcome me. She took Dinah and I (Dinah Rojek is here, on a crazy impulse, to serve as an FEI official - Ground Jury - for the organizing committee) out for something to eat. The top floor of the old original mall (huge old building) in KL was converted to a food court, and a few little shops. Huge room, open ceilings, table and chairs bunched around, dark, smoky and spicy air, menus on sprawling hand-painted boards over the counters - dozens of little shops selling Indonesian(Malaysian) food specialties - words that I can't pronounce, flavors I can't forget ! Neena picked some of her favorite dishes. Dinah and I ordered tea to drink (this half of the court was catered to the Muslims - no pork, no alchohol, the other side of the huge room had Indian food - including pork and various beers). The tea was very different - thick rust colored, sweet - the same stuff that Madiya ordered in Dubai - Chai? I liked it, Dinah wasn't too sure.

Up since 3am local time, woke up the attendant in the internet room at the hotel at 5am (24 hour service, no reason not to nap under the counter though). I noticed a Starbucks outside the mall last night, maybe a little coffee is in order.

later -

Steph

May 20, preparations

Pronounced 'Mal ay ZEE a' .The language and names elude me, can't seem to remember them, strange sounds, different rhythm of speech, phonetics are different. Food is great! Dr. Nik took me to a 'real' Malaysian restaurant last night, wow. Such flavors, sweet peanut sauces, an incredible dish from northern Malaysia (coconut, peanut, lime?, spicy and exotic). Fun talking to Nik about the sport, and about the Ridecamp characters that he's come to know from afar (Bob Morris, Heidi, Truman, Howard, Dr. Susan). Believe it or not, much of the Endurance world is following Ridecamp - learning, laughing, cringing, biting tongues, wishing they could meet all of you.

I was up early again this morning (5:30 - but making progress). Breakfast with Dinah, now I'm sitting at the Internet station in the hotel lobby, country western music playing, Garth Brooks singing... feels like home :)

Dinah is 'working' today. She left with the other Ground Jury members after breakfast, stopping at the Federation office (Equestrian Association Malaysia) and then heading out to the ride site to set stuff up, get ready.

Yesterday was a press conference, to welcome Sh. Hazza and Sh. Khalid and a few others from W'rsan stable that hope to participate. Very gracious and welcome, many thanks for the opportunity, thanks for coming, etc etc. Lots of cameras, TV station, W'rsan brought their own TV crew too. Not too many questions from the press (Nik said their own press has no idea what the sport is even about - no clue what questions to ask!). One fellow eventually stood up and asked a long questions, in Arabic, to Sh. Hazza - the words 'World Endurance Championship' , 'Gold Medal', 'Drug test', recognizable in the carefully framed question. A long answer from Sh. Hazza, (I was very impressed by his composure), and some brief English translations of his answer - not touching on the actual issues, guilty or not, but the strong message that Sh. Hazza wished to convey was that the UAE stables do not condone the usage of performance enhancing substances, in any way, never never never. Very composed, politically correct response. I suspect this young man will eventually hold some important positions in the UAE. He had a very 'royal' demeanor about him.

We went out to ar-Raudah Equestrian Center after the conference, to look at the horses, figure the place out, meet the other ride organizers. Interesting drive out, through the city outskirts, narrow bumpy roads once we got off the freeway. Houses, fruit stands, reminded me of a cross between Brazil and Egypt... We have a 'driver' - to escort us to and fro, whatever we need. A part-time law enforcement worker, part-time driver, and equine veterinarian by training, though he doesn't practice. He has ridden, but not endurance yet. Maybe, who knows? he said. Nice fellow, has a 6 month old boy 'I'm very lucky'.

The al W'rsan contingent was out there too, selecting horses for the ride. Since Abu Dhabi had sent news that they were coming, and would ride leased horses, the OC has been scrambling to find horses for the foreign riders. Several were flown over from the island (Borneo) - the only other Arabians to be found. We were there to take a look and select our mounts. This group of horses was on the thin side, and a little worn out. Short notice, no time to properly prepare and screen them, not too promising.

The al W'rsan folks picked out what they thought would be the best horse for Sh. Hazza - a big rangy bay - on the thin side (though they say that only thin horses can perform here in the heat) - but a decent ride record, and he had a good frame, deep chest, decent legs and feet. I picked the second best horse, a (thin) (a little worn out) gray stallion - legs and feet were ok, but I wasn't thrilled with his condition. Had a low resting pulse, good record but his teeth and eye betrayed his lack of youth and vigor. I saddled him up, and took him out for a test ride. Felt pretty lame right from the start, disappointment was settling in since I hadn't seen any other horses that looked like promising rides, and this fellow was it. I rode by the al W'rsan group down on the pavement, they were checking out their big bay and a few others. Smile and shrug. Impressive (my mount) warmed out of the initial lameness as we rode up the track, but still at this point I was figuring this (our test drive) might be the only riding I did here, or maybe if he vetted through I'd get a single loop. But, like everything else in life, disappointment is relative - when weighed against the reality that I was HERE, in MALAYSIA, with horses, endurance - I just couldn't bring myself to any level of self pity. Good lord, even a 1/2 mile jaunt up a jungle lane on a lame horse was more than I might have hoped for at another time.

We trotted the poor beast over and over, the owner was sure he was fine (her vet had said so), the lameness was subtle, couldn't be seen on the gravel, but could be heard on the pavement, and seen more clearly when he slowed from the trot into the walk. Marcello (Brazilian vet working for al W'rsan stable) came over and helped me evaluate Impressive. Sore suspensory, old fracture above the pastern on the L front, old tendon injury scar tissue, sort of sore in many places. "He might be able to start".

Not worth it. Poor thing, ready for retirement I think, or at least some rest. Pretty decent stallion, maybe time to breed him. Lilah (one of the Malaysian riders who went to Jerez) was very kind and helpful, she was sympathetic to my lack of desire to start a less that perfect horse. Maybe the owner has some other horses (not qualified or prepared for a 160km) that I could do an 80km ride with? Great idea, we could ride together (Lilah has a lovely gray Arab that she loves dearly and is bringing on slowly). Sounds like a plan, I made arrangements to look at the other horses the next morning. Wouldn't be so bad.

That night at dinner Dr. Nik told me that he made arrangements for another horse for me for the 160km. Shu'aib