Riders of a Lost Art

A planned 12,000 mile horseback ride is consuming the efforts and energies of an Anglo-American Muslim couple living in horse country America: Kentucky.

CuChullaine and Basha O’Reilly, also known as Asadullah and Syyeda Aesha Khan, plan to follow the broad band of grass known as the “equestrian equator,” located north of the celestial equator. Their journey will start at the Eiffel Tower, pass through Germany, Austria, Hungary, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and northwest Siberia. They will then fly to North America to travel the breadth of Canada and then fly back to Scotland, pass through southern England, and end their ride at the Eiffel Tower.

They plan to use the same horses throughout the two-year journey. Instead of extra pack horses, a support vehicle will carry electronic equipment and food for the animals. In addition to conducting their equestrian-related business over the Internet, they will chart a GPS map of their journey and collect hair samples from all breeds of horses that they encounter to create an international genetic registry of horses.

Founding members of the exclusive Long Riders Guild (www.thelongridersguild.com), anyone who has traveled more than 1,000 miles on horseback qualifies for membership. Aesha will ride her Russian stallion Count Pompeii, while Asadullah will ride his gelding Pasha, which he purchased from the Pakistani army's famous Sargohda (Mona) Remount Depot before setting off on his last long-ride trip. Asadullah, explaining the "Syyeda" in his wife's name, says that Basha is descended from King Edward II of England who, in turn [it is claimed], was descended from the Prophet (salla Allahu 'alayhi wa sallam) through his daughter Fatima. "Thus, this European-born Long Rider represents a part of the Islamic heritage which has been overlooked by historians," he adds.

Asadullah in front of the ruler's palace in Chitral during his last equestrian journey, an 1,100 mile circular ride from Peshawar, north to Chitral, east to Gilgit, south to Rawalpindi and then west back to Peshawar, the "Paris of the Pathans", completed in 1989, that journey remains the longest equestrian journey undertaken in Pakistan's history.

An inherent love of horses and a keen sense of adventure took Asadullah, then in his early twenties, to Afghanistan in the late 1970s. He rode all over the country and, when the Soviet Union invaded in 1979, returned to America to study journalism. Accepting an offer from Boston University to teach journalism to the Afghan mujahideen, he ended up in Peshawar. In that city, a cross between Casablanca and Dodge City, he came across what he calls "the swirling cocktail of turbaned freedom fighters, tightlipped foreign mercenaries, naïve foreign aid workers, cruel Pathan warlords, and more spies than ever lurked in Berlin."

During his two year sojourn, he made forays into the remote tribal areas of Pakistan's wild western frontier where honor, deceit, hospitality, and religion rule side by side. From the back of a horse, he peered into the secretive underworld of prostitution, drugs, and guns and came face to face with death several times. Upon his return to America, he wrote "Khyber Knights" (Long Riders' Guild Press: 2001) to take readers on an extraordinary – and a largely on horseback – adventure from fabled bazaars to the remote mountainous region of northern Pakistan, not to mention an involuntary side trip to the notorious Rawalpindi jail in which he languished on trumped-up charges of narcotics possession.

Once you accompany Asadullah on his true-life adventures you will be compelled to stay with him until he dismounts at the end of the story.

All of this would have been enough for an ordinary soul, but not for the restless and idealistic Asadullah, who went on to create the Long Riders' Guild and started the Long Riders' Press. This publishing house has published in excess of two hundred travel-related books, including reprints of old classical and forgotten equestrian travel books. The Khans are seeking support for the Long Riders' Guild Academic Foundation (www.lrgaf.orgf/donate.htm ) - an open-source website for academic articles of an equine nature, equine-related news stories, rare equine theses, and equine-related commentary and investigations.

The World Ride is the first expedition endorsed by the LRGAF's Equestrian Exploration Division. Its Equine DNA Database (LRGAF-EDD), Asadullah explains, seeks to construct the world's first complete equine genetic library. This is also the first project undertaken by the LRGAF's Research Division, which offers a horse-related information revolution without borders.

(Left) Aesha Khan traveled to the Toledo Islamic Center to declare her faith.

(Right) Aesha Khan and her Russian Stallion, Count Pompeii.

Five years ago, Asadullah met his match in the person of Basha, an elegant lady of Russian-French-German ancestry. A horsewoman since the age of three, she is a long-distance equestrian in her own right, having traveled 2,500 miles on horseback in 1995 from Volgograd to London. She later rode all 1,500 miles of the infamous Outlaw Trail from Mexico to Wyoming. After a short electronic romance, they wed five years ago in London.

One of the fundamental goals of their world ride, according to these two converts to Islam, is to draw attention to the philosophy of sulah-e-kul (peace and goodness toward all) espoused by Mughal Emperor Jalaluddin Muhammad Akbar (1542-1605; ruled 1556-1605). The Khans believe that by riding virtuously one can impact the communities and societies one passes through. This is borne out by history and also by their personal experiences. It is, in essence, a deliberate promotion of the unity of humanity between individuals and nations. These mounted messengers of peace are open-minded toward the rich cultural and religious traditions they expect to encounter on their ride.

In an era where long-distance horse travel has become a thing of the past and where horse and person meet only at horse races or equestrian competitions, this unusual couple is bringing this time-honored and tested (but now largely lost) pastime to the public consciousness ... and they are doing it with the purity of heart and purpose.

Dr. S. Amjad Hussain is professor emeritus of surgery at the University of Toledo (Ohio) and an op-ed columnist for the "Toledo Blade." This piece is adapted from the original account published in the "Blade" on 24 Aug. 2009.

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