Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

You've asked a bit of a complicated question. The winner  was most likely a family member but not so closely related...simply because that is a tiny country where anyone whose going to be involved in endurance is going to be pretty much of the same social class and thus probably related. So if the eventual winner pulled up a bit there was all sorts of pressure on him, everything from family pressure to political pressure. I don't think that it's so romantic as you paint actually....more a matter of knowing where the butter is. And whatever "warrior's ethic" might be imagined, for the most part the UAE tribes were traders, sailors and so on...not much equine there. As a matter of fact a plague pretty much wiped out what horses there were in the area in the 50's.  But in Arab culture, younger men don't push out older, less powerful don't overrule more powerful, and in what is basically a kingdom, you don't piss off the royal family...ever.

Thinking about movies, the horse/human relationship is probably more like some cowboy star who rides all over everywhere at a gallop and you never know the horse's name than it is like National Velvet.

Maryanne

On 9/16/07, Linda Marins <coldeye22@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Trying to compare the motivations of a member of a Middle
East royal house, where winning is inextricably tied up in
maintaining the warrior leader's prestige, honor, and respect
in the eyes of his subjects--proving his *right to rule* over them--
with the motivations of a middle class American woman who
loves her horse as a dear friend (if not a child) and who has
nothing to prove to anyone, except perhaps herself, well...
apples and oranges doesn't do the contrast justice.  More
like parallel universes with only superficial congruencies:
horses are involved; 100 miles is traversed; otherwise
incommensurate.

I don't know enough about Middle Eastern warrior leader
bushido to know whether it is important for it to be seen
that it was the *horse* that failed, not the rider--that the
leader was always willing to go on, to the very end, and
only failed because the horse--figuratively in this case--
"died underneath him."  If so, the implications are sobering.
Very few RO's.

Then again, European ideals of chivalry grew out of the
European nobility's contact with Islam first in Spain, and
then in the holy land during the Crusades.  Harun ar-Rashid,
Baybars, Sa`aladin.  Could either Maryanne or Dr. Nik recommend
English language readings or films that would better help me
understand what it is that a Middle Eastern male (commoner and
shayk and commoner vs. shayk) has "on the line" when they do an
endurance race?

If you want a rough approximation of the plural motivations
of what I would guess is 95% of the American women you'd
find in an endurance race/ride (whatever), just rent a copy of
"National Velvet."

Linda Mirams




=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net .
Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp
Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp

Ride Long and Ride Safe!!

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

-- 
Maryanne Stroud Gabbani
msgabbani@xxxxxxxxx

Egypt Face to Face
www.alsorat.com
Weblogs:
Living In Egypt
miloflamingo.blogspot.com
Cairo/Giza Daily Photo
cairogizadailyphoto.blogspot.com
Turn Right At The Sarcophagus
haramlik.blogspot.com
Photos of Egypt:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/livinginegypt/