Outings For Cowgirls and Cowboys

We have a lot of horses here in Lesotho. I thought it would make a good subject for a hands-on study and the children seemed to agree.

After some preliminary research on the children’s part (I love you school library), I took them to the Agricultural College for a field trip. My plan was to have them study horses in three different contexts of Basotho life: agriculture, law enforcement and recreation. My research was to scout out three appropriate field trip sites so one day the school bus driver took me to the Agricultural College and the Police Training College to set things up. (The third and impending field trip is to a pony riding center).

At the Agricultural College I was informed that they have no horses. How silly of me. Agricultural College have horses? This is Lesotho and that would make too much sense. As I was leaving disappointedly, the receptionist told me to check “livestock.” After further questioning, I deduced that there is an adjacent property to the Agricultural College that is in fact part of the Agricultural College, yet . . . See where I’m going here? Lesotho. Logic. Mutually exclusive.

I went to “Livestock.” I proposed the trip. They said, “We have one horse and camels.” I said, “Really? One horse? And camels?” I left. In the car the school bus driver who was chauffeuring me on these inquiries told me that the Agricultural College does have horses (plural) but that they are kept far away in a village. He said this place mainly does veterinary services. Vet! U turn! We went back. I asked if the vet would be able to talk to us. I was told to write a formal application on notebook paper with an official school stamp. The purpose of this piece of paper was to fill up a folder where it would be forgotten about to limit any possibility that the vet might be expecting us.

So began the first field trip of the academic year. I stared the indignant vet in the eye, told her my “application” was approved and between my steady, annoyed teacher gaze and the hopeful horse-loving eyes of the children, she agreed to talk to them about horse health.

My children asked great questions. Dr. Vet clearly is not used to talking to three-year-olds. Rebecca asked, “What happens if a horse falls down?” Dr. Vet said, “

What do you mean?” What do you mean what does she mean? She wants to know what happens when a horse falls down! I repeated Rebecca’s question, and somehow coming from an adult, she was able to respond. She started talking about plaster casts. Charlie raised his hand and said, “What if the horse needs four casts?” Dr. Vet said drew her finger across her throat. “We kill it.” (I’m all for honest answers, but could we tone down the gestures please?) Then Sean, with bodily functions perpetually on the brain asked, “Where does the horse pee and poo?” Dr. Vet and the animal caretaker stared blankly at each other until the caretaker pointed to a spot on the ground and said, “here.” He paused turned his head and pointed to another spot on the ground, “and here.” He continued scouting out droppings and urine puddles, “And here, and here, here, here, here. . .here. EVERYWHERE.” Sean was delighted.

Carefully watching where we stepped, we boarded the bus.

Take II. The Police Training College. At least they were expecting us here. We were assigned an officer and taken immediately to where they keep the horses. They let us into the paddock, locked the gate, and the officer disappeared into the stable. 28 horses bounded down the ramp into the paddock. I felt about a half dozen small hands reaching for mine. “Don’t worry I told them, they won’t come over here.” But they did, the officer nowhere in sight and the horses sniffing and nuzzling the children, nudging them with their noses and releasing their bladders much to Sean’s delight.

Not everyone was as pleased as Sean. About half of my 21 students immediately burst into tears and ran screaming to the gate, rattling the locked chains in hysteria. The rest of the children were all over the horses and loving it. I was trying to lure the criers back, even as the biggest horse of all breathed its hot sour breath in my face before chewing on my skirt. I was freaked out myself, but managed to lure all but two children back to the horses, including Tlotliso, who buried his snotty face in my hair and said, “I’m never coming back here again.” The horses are very well trained so the children were able to freely explore and when the officer reappeared he answered their questions with ease. We were up to our shins in mud and manure, which I consider a plus (for a preschool field trip, not in general). We gathered in the empty stable and learned among other horse facts, how to make bedding for a horse. It involves dried manure so Sean was of course ecstatic to learn about the process.

Then my scholarly little preschoolers scouted out places to sit and sketched their new equine friends with crayons. We finally said goodbye and thanked the officer with a rousing rendition of Yankee Doodle. He was perplexed but appreciative and really, who wouldn’t be?