Looking right into the horse's mouth

I had to film a horse dentist paying his annual visit to a group of around twenty horses. The Dentist was called Mark, and from the very beginning it seemed he had too much information in his head. He had to share it. We would naturally ask him questions about the process so that I could film it efficiently, and he went into detail about how the best schools in Britain still don't properly prepare students for equine dentistry since the studies are too theoretical. He was sorry to admit the best schools are in the USA where all the courses are concentrated on vocational training.

Anyway, as we went along from stable to stable, a large assistant would hold the horse's ear and lean into it's shoulder to secure it's position, pinning the giant animal against the wall. Mark would pull out a pair of metal braces and secure them around the horse's mouth so that it couldn't bite down. Then he'd roll his sleeve and feel his way in with his arm, almost reaching up to his shoulder! He told us that the animal's back teeth were too sharp and then got out a long thin metal file and place it all the way in the mouth. Then he's start filing away at all the back line of teeth, it was incredible! After filming for half an hour, and a very detailed lesson in what teeth to look out for, he said to the director "Would you like to try?". So she rolled up her sleeve and I watched her entire arm dissappear up the horses mouth. When she took it out her arm was full of saliva! Yuck! Then he asked me and I thought, well, if I don't do it I'll regret missing the opportunity. So I did. When my hand was all the way up there I was scared I'd choke him, but Mark told us that you can't choke a horse! What was even scarier was that this horse was particularly moody, and quite aggressive at the best of times, so to have an entire film crew shove their arms up his gob can't have been very pleasant! When we left him on his own he turned his back on us all and lifted his front hooves up in a slow sulky way.

In the evening I phoned Rosario all proud at having experienced something new. To which she couldn't stop laughing! When I said I didn't want to pass up on the opportunity she said if she was offered 'the opportunity' she would have told him to get lost! So we laughed, then I stopped to try and tell her what else I'd been up to, but she was still laughing. I said if you carry on laughing I'll hang up. The last I heard of her was her rising gaffaw as she couldn't even hold the phone to her ear.