And the BIG EQUINE NEWS!!!
The imminent arrival of the magnificent Maobi, a high-spirited black stallion from the Circle Hippique in Bamako. Maobi is owned by a Swiss lady who did proper dressage on him. She has kindly offered to sell him to me because she is leaving the country and she doesn’t want to leave him in the Bamako stables- she prefers him to retire to the countryside. Maobi is a very posh horse, and he will be quite wasted on me who will only take him hacking- we will take our little promenades to the ancient burial grounds of Djenne- Djeno towards sunset on most nights, and sometimes we will join Max and the carriage on a picnic outing to Diabolo or Sirimo; i.e. the things I did with my beloved Napoleon. Will Maobi want to mix with such country bumpkins as us? We will have to wait and see: Erika, the Swiss owner, is arriving with him in a horse transport from Bamako at the end of the month. She will stay for a few days to settle him in. We will go to the Bani crossing together with Max and the carriage, we will swim with the two horses in the lovely fast running stream which joins the Bani from Djenné at this time of the year. The horses will frolick together on the sandy shore, and who knows? Perhaps the elegant metropolitan Maobi will take to our rustic pastoral pleasures, as enjoyed yesterday by Birgit Max and myself?