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Run No:- |
1123 |
Date:- 27 September 2004 |
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Location:- |
Baan Suan restaurant |
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Hare:- |
Cengis "Disgusting" Ertuna and Mike "Mr Happy" Belew |
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Scribe:- |
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Me a writer, joins the pack with the eccentric Hash House Harriers in Bangkok.
The names have been changed (and so has the text) to protect the innocent, Okay yeah?
It was like one of those surreal spy exchange scenes you used to see in The Avengers. Stormin' Norman was where he said he would be, which was a relief because I felt self-conscious walking into a strange bar on Silom Soi4 in my running kit in search of someone whose real name I never knew.
The barmaids looked at my legs and smiled enigmatically before nodding towards a knot of others who were dressed - or undressed - in a wide variety of sportswear.
Stormin' Norman, a wiry chap, shook my hand and introduced me to his companions: Fat Controller, Sharron Davies (an Irishman), Vroom Vroom, Blue Vein, Cowpat and Throw Up (the only woman).
This extraordinary scenario was confirmation that I had found the Hash House Harriers, members of a worldwide association whose informal, eccentric attitude to jogging has earned them the tag of a drinking club with a running problem.
With the introductions over, Stormin' Norman ushered us into the wild and windy night, where he gave us a quick briefing that included the worrying phrase: "The first rule of hashing is that there are no rules."
Then, with a shout of "on, on", we were off, jogging up the lane into the misty evening, the route picked out by flickering torch beams. I had little idea of what lay ahead, except that we were the hounds following a trail left by a hare - Stormin' Norman, a retired lecturer.
He had been out earlier that day with a bag of flour and a stick of chalk to mark a route through the Kent countryside that, as he vaguely put it, would take us about an hour and a half to complete.
"Could be more, could be less. Depends on the pack," he said as we jogged along. "It also depends on how many false trails I left."
From the front of the pack came the cry "on, on" and by the light of my torch, its battery fading fast, I glimpsed a blob of flour on the Tarmac. Apparently three in a short space meant we were on the right track, although they could be followed by a T-shaped mark, denoting a dead end.
After 100 yards or so came the cry "on check" where there was a circle drawn on the road. This was a checkpoint from which more than one possible route led. The front-runners, expecting false trails, had already bolted up two footpaths leading into the darkness, allowing the slower hounds to reach the checkpoint and get their breath back.
This is the attraction of the non-competitive ethos of hashing - the pack stays together because the routes are designed to give fitter runners as much exercise as they want while sniffing out the real trail, allowing the less fleet of foot, such as me, the chance to catch up.
Then came cries of "on back, on back" from the darkness. The lead hounds had discovered they were on false trails and there was a flicker of a grin on Stormin' Norman's face as the bobbing lights returned towards us.
The atmosphere could best be summed up as public school meets public house, which, as I learned from Throw Up, a 42-year-old mother of three, was much as it was in 1938 when expat Albert Gispert, G to his friends, started an informal running club in Kuala Lumpur. He named it after the Hash House, the nickname that the British community gave the Selangor Club, which was renowned for its lacklustre food.
The founders vowed: "To promote physical fitness among our members; to get rid of weekend hangovers; to acquire a good thirst and to satisfy it in beer; to persuade the older members that they are not as old as they feel." These words apply as much to the pastime now as they did then.
G's hashing days were cut short in February 1942, when he was killed defending Singapore with the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. But his idea lived on and flourished in British communities all over the world.
There are now almost 2,000 active hashes in more than 180 countries, including about 390 in the United States, where the Americans have taken to it with their usual enthusiasm for the bizarre including their bizarre taste for that near water ‘Budwieser’ (however, thankfully, not many hashes drink that piss).
Beer was on the agenda for our panting posse as soon as we reached the end of Stormin' Norman's trail at the doors of Baan Suan Arms. I hadn't got my breath back before half-pint enamel mugs of beer were handed to the hashers, who stood in a circle around the Fat Controller, a railway engineer and master of ceremonies.
This was the "on, down", a ceremony that takes place at the end of every hash. The Fat Controller's task was to single out hashers and exaggerate their misdeeds for the entertainment of everyone else. The victim then had to stand in the centre of the circle and drain his mug of beer while the others sang a drinking song. Everyone was called to account - being a journalist was crime enough for me to be made an example of.
It was strange to be standing in a Nonthaburi country lane on a blustery Bangkok evening, knowing that the eccentric camaraderie espoused by the Empire builders was still being toasted in so many different places.
***
On Monday 27 September we had 20 Harriers, 4 Harriettes, 1 new boot and 0 visitors, total = 25. Returners included nobody.
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