Happy to be home! It was a very interesting trip, Shanghai is absolutely fascinating. We were lucky to have Huang, our local colleague, show us 'old Shanghai' and 'new Shanghai'. At a local market I zoomed right in at little clay horses, replications of the army of Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China. He had an entire army (men and horses) recreated in Terracotta to be buried with him (210-209 BC) to protect him in his afterlife. Cool gifts for Judy and Lisa, and of course, myself!
After getting over jet lag and the seemingly never-ending flight home, I eagerly went to see the boys. They had the full 'Camp Judy' program (daily training), and Judy kept me posted by email. Remy, the little prodigy, did a couple of flying changes. Well, OK, the first one unintentional, but still: Go Remy! Saumur figured out that it's not a bad idea at all to carry himself. I (half-jokingly) sent Judy an email saying I should just continue traveling and both horses would be great, Remy hitting GP in no time!
Getting my wary body back into the swing of things was a bit of a challenge but better than I expected. Yesterday I 'butted in' JP's lesson, Judy giving me tips on Saumur while JP had his lesson. Saumur started out well, but then he tried the old trick again of laying on the bit: HALF-HALT and REMIND HIM HE HAS HIND LEGS. Argh - yes, I know!! From then on things went well, we had good medium trot and clean changes.
Today we discussed the choreography for the freestyle, as Karen had sent me a long list of questions to Saumur's strengths. I really have fun with this process.
Remy was a fun ride, as usual. Judy riding him definitely makes a huge impact, he moves now much better over his back. Sometimes, though, his 'hearing' (reaction to the aids) is a bit selective, as Judy puts it "he has a hoof in his ear", so "effective half-halts will improve his hearing!". Now I wonder how I can get effective half-halts into the 'American with the French accent' ... N'est ce pas, JP??
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