What’s with this weather, it’s doing my head in. So many people I know are suffering headaches and hay fever. Humidity and heat are draining, thank goodness for the tennis, can just flop when possible and watch other people running their little socks off. I hated tennis at school purely because the sports mistress wouldn’t allow me to wear sun glasses. I have a moderate light sensitivity, certainly when it comes to sunshine, and I was in pain every summer sports afternoons, got dreadful pain behind my eyes otherwise I might well have made it to centre court at Wimbledon!!! We’ll never know. There are still a couple of likely lads to follow next week, Alcaraz and Berrettini the most attractive. Clare Balding is doing a good and efficient job but she’s very forceful unlike the lovely Sue Barker who gently made her point.
This time last month Charlotte Moore was cantering through the wastelands of the Gobi Desert. Not many people can say that but this was no holiday it was a serious challenge to raise money for the children of Mongolia who desperately need support and kindness. This is provided by the Veloo Foundation which was set up by a couple who moved from Canada to Mongolia’s capital Ulaanbaatar and in the last ten years have established two kindergarten schools, education of young people, summer camps and a community library also creating a sewing centre for women. Every year Julie and Chelvan Veloo mount the Gobi Gallop and enthusiasts from all round the world pack a bag and pick a horse. Now that she’s back home in Crumlin Co. Antrim with her husband Nigel, Charlotte can look back at the madness she says took over when she decided to sign up, she can relax and appreciate what the last number of weeks entailed.
Growing up on a farm there were always horses around, pulling the plough, a pony to ride and no surprise she breeds her own Irish draught horses.
But this was different.
“Despite my life long love of horse riding and travelling to Mongolia a few days earlier in order to prepare for the start of the Gallop, it was tough going. I trained on my bicycle, walked for miles and hiked in the Mournes but the combination of raising every morning at 6.30 a.m., all day in a Mongolian type saddle and the extreme heat, my body didn’t react very well, back and legs felt the strain.” However, she didn’t give up and completed the 700 kilometres only occasionally resorting to hitching a ride in the support vehicle. “The vehicle was invaluable not only to help through painful times but also because there was a canopy which offered shelter from the sun, in fact at the height of the heat we resorted to lying right underneath the wagon!”
Child’s Play
The highlight of the trip came with an opportunity to visit the kindergartens and play with the children. “They were such happy pupils, dressed in vibrant colours and working an a classroom which was filled with fun and energy, such a contrast to the filthy rubbish piled outside the door where they spend time scratching though the dump to find anything that can be sold or used in some way to ease the stress of a nomadic life.”
She also visited local people who were making Gers, Mongolian for dwelling, light weight felt tents, round so energy can’t lurk in corners, easily assembled and disassembled so families can take them along as they move their cattle to the next pasture.
For every Ger sold the Foundation will donate another to a needy family. “One lady in our group, an Australian whose house was burnt down during the bush fires and was living in a container, bought a number to bring home, one for herself and the others for those who also lost their homes.
“When I applied for a place on the expedition I was interviewed and although Covid put the trip on hold for a while, last September I began fundraising for my travel costs, a participation fee and insurance amongst many other necessities. I was then required to raise at least £3500 for the work of the Foundation.
“We were given two small expedition boxes to carry a sleeping bag, pillow, clothing and riding gear, we had sleeping tents for overnight which were put up by our guides; there was also a doctor and a cook both so important when you are covering 450 miles on horseback in extreme climate lying as the Gobi does between Russia and China.” Her worst moments during June included the endless stamina required, sleeping on a thin mat on the ground and no flush toilet until arriving at a camp where the loo, she said, was a metal seat with no flush but an specular view!
There was another highlight.
“At the end of the challenge we were invited to a specular gala ball in the Ulaanbaatar Palace. Some of the women had dresses especially made by the workers in the sewing centre, I had a jacket made but in the end decided to ware a sparkly green dress which I smuggled into one of my boxes! It was a marvellous experience and now that I have seen how the children need our support I’ll keep fundraising for them and maybe go on the Gobi Gallop next year or on the other hand I might join the newly established Steel Horse Gallop and take a motorbike!”
More details at Veloo Foundation Charlotte’s GG Fundraising Page
It’s Simply Not Cricket
Back to sport. Last week there was a real upset at the heart of cricket, the Long Room which was a hive of disgruntled gentlemen reduced to blazing, belligerent male harridans.
Reports give reasons. “The scenes all stemmed from the controversial stumping of Jonny Bairstow, with wicketkeeper Alex Carey throwing the ball at the stumps as Bairstow walked out of his crease.
England felt the decision was harsh, assuming that the ball was dead. Tempers frayed in the aftermath, with Bairstow very unhappy as he left the pitch, with several other players seen arguing before the teams left the field of play for lunch.”
It’s Simply Not Cricket
About 30 years ago I met a senior government minister’s son who was with his father at a reception in Hillsborough Castle. We got talking and the young man told me he was researching misconduct in professional cricket. I was dubious, surely cricket was whiter than white? In my family it was all everyone thought of during the summer, my job was to keep my dad’s pads pristine white by sponging on Blanko. In later years I decided to join in and played for Ulster Ladies team based at Cliftonville Cricket Club. I wasn’t any good but the crack was great – facing school boy teams and gentlemen’s elevens and then at interprovincial level we played Yorkshire Ladies. That was the end, two dropped catches and my brothers slow handicapping me burst the bubble. And now we hear that there has been shameful discrimination and very unpleasant goings on the English cricket pitch, especially attitudes towards women. When I was involved in general women were only good for making sandwiches and baking cakes for the ‘afters’ but players were grateful and polite. However, international women’s cricket is becoming more and more popular and I am quite sure they will not tolerate the men looking down on their talents.
