Visiting KUWAITIn October of 2005 Nicole Sachs and I went on our first trip to Kuwait. Of course we had seen some photographs of the beautiful Egyptian Arabians, that came to Kuwait from famous farms throughout the world, carefully selected by their new owners to establish their breeding programmes.

It is always a pity to see another good horse leave Europe but it is a real pleasure to see these valuable horses here in Kuwait in such enthusiastic and at the same time very capable hands.

As soon as everything was arranged for our trip, we couldn’t wait to go and finally see the horses in flesh, some of which we still knew from their time in Europe, when they were younger.

I was also eager to meet the breeders to talk with them and find out about their ideas, plans and “breeding philosophies”. It is always interesting to hear about other breeders’ opinions, if they have done so much research and own horses of highest quality, as the Kuwaitis do.

I was delighted to find out how well a group of Kuwaiti breeders, who share the love for the Egyptian horse, work together, preserving and improving this breed or simply enjoying their horses, presenting them to friends and visitors.

They meet regularly at the farm of Mr. Mohammed Al Marzook to discuss their ideas and plans concerning the horses or to sit together and watch videos, they bring home from their trips to breeders in other countries.

This is certainly something breeders in other countries can learn from. Although we came to Kuwait during the time of Ramadan, they took their time to show us their farms and horses and to spoil us with tasty food and beverages. We were overwhelmed with so much friendliness. We visited seven farms:

“The Kuwait Horse Center”

“Ajmal Stud” owned by Mr. Mohammed Al Marzook

“Al Jazira”, owned by Mr. Talal Al Mehri

“El Adiyat”, owned by Mr. Mahmoud Al Zubaid

“Rayat Al-Sharg”, owned by Mr. Alaa Al-Roomi and Mr. Talal Al-Nisf

“Al Safinat Farm”, owned by Mr. Khaled Ben Shokr

“Ezzain Arabians”, owned by Mr. Usamah Alkazemi

Most of the farms are located in Wafra, near the Saudi-Arabian border, an hour from Kuwait City.

Mr. Talal Al Mehri is planning to move his horses there, soon. We saw the horses by night, so we could not use our cameras. Only at Kuwait Horse Center and Ajmal Stud, we had the chance to take a few pictures.

Nicole described some of the farms and horses in her article. Hopefully the plans to organize a presentation of the Egyptian breeding programmes of Kuwait, showing mare and sire families, will be realized in the near future. This should be an event, I would not want to miss. It would be a great chance for everybody to get a good impression of the high standard of Egyptian horse breeding in Kuwait.

I would like to thank the Kuwaiti breeders for presenting their beautiful horses to us and making us feel so welcome. Many thanks also to Mr. Klaus Beste for spending many hours with us every day, showing us around and visiting the Kuwaiti breeders, sometimes until late at night.

We had a wonderful time!

Christina Krumm(Tameri Egyptian Arabians)