PAPI TAMING THE WILD BEAST Pancho Negro 1979

My story of the day today is again about an occurrence in Peru sometime during the second year of my work there. At this time I was married to Daisy (Deysi in Peruvian). We had a company house in the married quarters of the Canadian Camp high up in the Andes Mountains. We stayed up at the worksite most weekends and many many times we would send a driver down to pick up some of, or all of, the family from Arequipa, Peru. During these periods we had lots of free time to adventure thru the Andes, show the family around, visit Huambo (the local village), explore, meet some of the locals and otherwise live an idyllic life.

One time while staying in camp by ourselves for the weekend, Desi was approached by a local farmer, that worked for the project during the week. He had a story about a horse from the village that was causing trouble with the girl horses and was going to be ate if a better solution couldn’t be found. Well Desi being the softhearted push over that she is convinced me that we should buy that horse and keep it as a pet in the camp. Good idea right?

Well her horse’s name was Pancho Negro (should have been el Diablo Negro) and from all appearances looked like a great horse. He was Black, except for his eyes which flashed red. So we have a new pet! Couldn’t have been a kitty or something could it? Well, ol Pancho apparently didn’t like people, at least not gringos. He also seems to have a particular dislike of uniforms. He tried to eat the camp guards every chance he got. Reach up and try to pet him and you risked losing an arm or being side kicked in the balsac.

He was unapproachable, and the less access he had to the local female horses the meaner he became. His reputation was growing and everyone gave him a wide berth. It seems like he spend a lot of the time just staring at us and daring someone to come close.

Enter Desi’s boss and our site manager, a Canadian from Ontario, who fancied himself a cowboy. One Saturday he donned his cowboy clothes and told us he was going to break that horse. We were all excited, finally that black devil was about to meet its master. Well, the cowboy got himself about 30’ of rope, tied one end onto Pancho’s mouth like a halter and coiled the remaining 25’ around his arm.  He vaulted up onto Pancho’s back.

This cowboy was a big boy, not very fat but about 6’3” tall. He was mounted on top of the horse’s back with his feet just barely off the ground. He had barely settled and was raising his arm up in a cowboy posture when Pancho jumped about 2 feet in the air, hit the ground and took off for freedom like a jet fuelled dragster. Meanwhile our hero was still about 6’ in the air. The rope uncoiled to its full length catching our cowboy about 3’ off the ground when it snapped tight. He made a complete flip in the air, landed on his back and was drug a few feet until the rope was pulled free of his grip. Pancho Negro was outta there. Desi’s boss got himself up. He was not hurt, except for his pride, but the look on his face kept everyone from even looking his way, let alone laughing. I like to have peed my pants.

So from this point on Pancho was given a wider berth. Many said he was the devil, evil, could not be fixed, etc. etc. Deysi truly thought he was “broken” and beyond repair. Fast forward a few weeks and Deysi’s dad arrives for a visit. We told him about this horse, it’s track record, history and reputation. He didn’t say much other than “asi es”.

The next morning we are outside in the camp. Papi is messing around and comes up with about a ten foot piece of rope and off he goes heading straight for Pancho Negro. I was yelling at Deysi to stop him before he got himself killed. To no avail. He walked up to that horse gave him a whack on the shoulder and stuck that rope into its mouth. He gave it one loop around the mouth pulled it tight and vaulted onto this horse’s back. Before Pancho could react, Papi pulled that rope hard left, spun that horse in a tight circle, pulled it hard right and spun it back the other way and gave it a sharp kick on both flanks. That horse bolted down the road, Papi astride and looking like he was taking a Sunday drive.

They reached the end of the road. He spun that horse around at full speed and came flying back to us. He got there, pulled hard on his rope and put Pancho into a four wheel slide and to an abrupt stop in front of us. All this in about two minutes. That horse stood there quivering and not moving an inch. Papi jumped down flipped me his rope and said to Deysi “there’s nothing wrong with that horse, it’s not broken, it’s fine”! He then walked off shaking his head. I come to find out that Deysi’s dad had ridden to his work in the Andes, as a policeman, for years with his only form of transport being a horse. To him Pancho was the same as a car is to us, just transportation.