Adventure With a Mission

"Single file," Arvin shouts. Single file becomes helter-skelter as our horses take their own routes: around trees, past silver thorn bushes, across sand honeycombed with slanting rodent holes. Parrots squawk and scatter at our approach.

I've never galloped so far in my life. I'm up in my stirrups now, saving my back. Finally I remember to breathe.

A sudden turn in the lane ahead, lean left, avoid that rock -- phew! I am red-faced when we pull to a stop at the top of a dune. This is what they call trotting?

I can hear my heart pounding in my chest. The desert absorbs sound. It is so quiet my body becomes noisy.

Three hours, five miles and one sunset later, we reenter Dundlod, guided by a full orange moon. Villagers hurry out of houses to see our brigade pass. "Hello, hello," we say. They smile shyly and say "Goodbye." I wonder if that's how the Beatles song got written.

Back at the fort, a wood fire is blazing in a pit. Someone offers a tray of hot, spicy papadum. Homemade garlic soup is served and then an array of curries in silver dishes, and buttery nan hot off the coals. The meal ends with an ambrosial sweet and chai.

The Mission

Remember, you are in India, and time flows differently, Souri tells us as the fire burns down. Over the next two weeks, we must be flexible and ready to adapt. This ride is not mere travel but also a journey, unscripted beyond its fixed dates for medical clinics, school visits and goat distributions. It will be what we make it. Each of us must find the ride we have already in us.

We will be joined at tomorrow's clinic by a team of doctors and dentists from Jaipur and a troupe of actors to perform an interactive AIDS-awareness skit. We will not run out of medicine, but the villagers might think we will run out. There might be some crowding. We must try to embrace the confusion.

"So, who wants to get up at dawn and help pack the Red Cross caravan?" Several eager hands wave.

We hear music from the town and are told that a Hindu wedding is underway. "Does anyone want to go?" Souri offers. Several people nod. Souri rises. "I'll just go see what I can arrange."

My room smells of marigolds. I crawl under a thick duvet, fall asleep and dream of horses.

The next morning we set up the makings of a mobile clinic at Goyenka Hospital, the first of three medical clinics on this ride. There is already a long line of patients when our doctors arrive. I have volunteered for the registration table and hastily enter patient information in a logbook, barely taking time to look up until my translator tells me that the next patient is 60. I stop to look. My counterpart in age looks 20 years older, wrinkled, with betel nut-stained teeth. She gives me a craggy smile. "Complaint?" She smiles and points at the red nubs of her decayed teeth.