This Indonesian man runs a mobile library from the back of his horse...

What do you need to start a library? Ask most municipal governments, and the answer will involve some combination of money, a spare building and loads of books. (In fact, a more likely answer is: "No, you can't have a library, we shut down the old one. Don't you remember?")

Not so for Ridwan Sururi, a horse caretaker (yes, really) in a small Indonesian village. In January, he decided to build a wooden box for the back of his horse, load it with books donated by friends, and visit local schools three days a week to distribute them. Here he is now, with his library-horse, Luna, and daughter, Indriani:

Ridwan and his family live in Serang, a village on Java, Indonesia's most populous island. Unlike the island's western coast (home to the urban sprawl of Greater Jakarta and two other large cities) the village is rural, and 65 per cent of its 1,500 households are farmers.

 On the day these photos were taken, Ridwan was visiting Miftahul Huda Islamic elementary school. Here he is with some of the children there, looking a bit like a book-bearing cowboy: More + photos...

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