October 2013 | By: The Scrutable Scribe
Religiously Unadvised
For the last couple of weeks we have had a very nice chap from Whykickamoocow on the island of Rotary Hoe in New Zealand join us in the Hashmobile and on the run. The week before last he spoke and sounded like just Sam Neill, on the way up to Bukit Jati and I thought to myself "This gent doesn't have a traceable accent at all!" (For a Kiwi). Last Saturday however was a Dufferent kittle of fush altogether. Garth, let's call him Garth, okay then, let's not, was a bit more relaxed and, well, you can take the boy out of the land of the long white flattened vowel…
This week our guest warmed to a couple of subjects, one being his new tropical fush tink (fish tank) and its contents (some kind of Wrisse, beautiful rids and yillows) and after a while, rugby and rugby tickling. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not taking the puss, our cuzzie brews across the Tasman are the most decent, honourable, upstanding, friendly folk on the planet in my humble opinion, but the accent (icksunt) never fails to amaze and fascinate. How did their vowels mutate so unrecognisably? Nobody does it better, and if gitting there is half the fun, thin we hid a cricker of a trup to Sobongan.
Actually, the trip was about as circuitous as the vowel movements. For reasons that I won't understand if I live a reincarnation or two here, there were truck jams and general snarls from Tohpati to the Banyan tree turnoff on Jalan Raya Mengwi which were complicated by road construction on the way to Mambal and detours there and at the tempat wisata at Alun thingamajig temple on the lake whatsit bizzo deal that you can't seem to get to any more by car.
We finally gained the beer truck under our very, very favourite, favourite Banyan tree with just enough time to pay and head down those well-trodden cement steps to the river crossing so familiar you know every rock by name: "Hey Plymouth, how you goin'?", "Hudson, nice to see ya." "G' day, Hard, how are ya?" Surprise, surprise though, after that there was a newly discovered, not to mention newly beaten path through a kind of extended Halyconia patch that was colourfully novel. That didn't last though and all too soon we were back in familiar territory, not (as the caste of Seinfeld said) that there's anything wrong with that, noooo, no no, noooo. Okay, we all know this run pretty well, in fact we could do it in a coma, half pissed, on barbiturates, and we could probably do it in a post - breathing situation, but that doesn't stop it from being a damned enjoyable semi challenging outing in a lovely setting. Certainly, my breath was coming in short pants, so to speak, from time to time, and it was very green (not my breath or my pants). Okey dokee?
For more reasons that I don't understand, the circle last week was deafening and nobody, absolutely nobody, including me, would shut up despite repeated ice warnings from Labia, red faced bellowing from Jangle Balls etc. Also, there wasn't a Religious Adviser to be seen within possibly several thousand leagues from Sobongan. Wooden Eye, Disco Wanker, Grand Master Night Jar, whatever we've done to upset or repel you (it would take a bit of upsetting and repelling) we grovel in apoplectic mortification and also say pretty please with vegemite on it, come back. We'll buy you a beer, okay, you bastards. No, stop, we didn't mean it, pleeeeeeeeeeze. We're doing our best under the circumcisions, Labia wielded a mighty hymen removing tree sized beer bush and J. Balls sang odes to Rolf Harris's newly discovered predilections (other than marsupials) but we need guidance reverend brothers, we need a priestly hand. Actually, let's not go too far with that, let's just say we're looking forward to your return.
Perhaps you will deign to visit us this week at Margarana, when strange bedfellows German shepherd and Muddy Man pool their satay sauces for Oktoberfest.
We should be so lucky.
On on.
