Bali Hash House Harriers 2

“Happy No Ear”

It was at a location not very far from last Saturday’s run site that we welcomed the Grand Master back from his medical travails in the U.K., during which one of his hearing aids i.e. an ear, went missing and a brand new latex one was attached. This was just a few short ears ago (don’t ask me how many ears because I can’t for the life of me remember, time flies when you’re in a coma). Alert fellow Hashers pointed this historic location out to me as we ran past it last Saturday in Sabah. It was also on or around a New Ear’s run I believe that the much missed Magnifico Maestro was returned to us (alas, not exactly in one piece) and as I was reminded of this touching incident, memories flooded back.

Wooden Eye, Hash Master at the time, invited all those with fake ears into the circle, and as Night Jar proceeded to its center, he was surprised to find himself flanked by Dancing Queen on his right and Virtual Erection on his left, both sporting some kind of false black and grey striped animal ear that flopped over at the top and covered an ear each. Night Jar however remained puzzled and bemused, as standing between them he was unable to see neither the furry appendage on Dancing Queen’s right ear nor the one on Virtual Erection’s left. It was only after the down-down was the jape revealed to him. His changing expression as realization dawned was priceless. Of course he took it in characteristically good stride, but epithets along the lines of “you f…ing w…ers” and other endearments were flung around liberally if I recall correctly.

But it is to the present, as Yoda and my German and Austrian fiends would say, that look we must. Or at least to the more recent past. Many New Ear’s greetings were exchanged standing around in a steaming hot, ocean-side, cow poop adorned paddock looking out to the imposing sight of islands Nusa Penida and Lembongan pre-run on Saturday’s Sabah BHHH2 (TWO!). In Hash Master Labia’s absence, Hare Pearl Necklace advised the direction in which we should all perambulate away at our chosen speeds (piss off). We were only moments out trudging through sticky black sand along the rubbish strewn beach when the paper disappeared without a trace. Well, not so much disappeared but was unable to be identified amongst all the other garbage on the beach. Hashers were flung into confusion and groups forked off (correct spelling) in several different directions.

In fact I saw only the group, off with which I had forked (impeccable spelling and grammar) for most of the rest of the run, that is until long runners Organ Grinder and Ballderdash finally caught up with us just before the big dam (goddam, that’s a big dam), and before the split. This was totally out of character for these two as they both usually run like mother….ers, so they must have been as lost as mother….ers (sorry, I’m reading Miles Davis’s autobiography). They didn’t want to talk about it, understandably. There was quite a bit of jungle canopy and tree shade on this run, surprisingly, as it was so close to crowded areas along the Prof. Doc. I.B.M. Rd, and mercifully because it was so Miles Davis hot. Also naturally, I had elected to not wear a Charlie “Bird” Parker hat and as a result my face was as burnt, red and overheated as a “Dizzy” Gillespie. What a stupid Thelonious Monk I am.

There were some pretty good moments on this run though: some nice padi and corn sections were ferreted out, and there was a pleasantly cool river interlude featuring an arrestingly antique-looking and quite large waterside stone statue and temple. I’d go so far as to say that this was probably the best run, I anyway, have ever had in Sabah. So thanks to our estimable Hares P. Necklace and the now ridiculously inevitable M. Man.

Back at the Ranch, the day’s end was gearing up for a golden yellow sunset show with rosy accents at that pleasantly balmy time of evening by a cobalt sea when you thank Providence and The Fates (good name for a rock band) grasping an amber bevvo (a better one) that you’re nowhere near a cold place; well not a really cold place such as perhaps Canberra, Minsk, Foggy Bottom, Winterpeg or Uxbridge. No. No less a figure than the G.M. himself mustered us into a sloppy facsimile of a turtle, “Form a turtle!”, he cried, but I may have misheard, and the fun and games began. One of the first features on the Night Jar agenda was shriving on ice some unsuspecting and smiling Euro - innocent member of the female persuasion, seemingly in order to simulate masturbation in shooting distance, perhaps a millimeter from her shocked and horrified face. The poor thing seemed not only bewildered by the shriving song but quite terrorized by the proximity of his gesticulations. Ah well, live and learn.

Dancing Queen took over procedures and a naming session for a fellow Swede ended in “Horny Helmet” and an Aussie croupier in “Crap Dealer’’. Pity about the Rod Stewart impersonator who it turned out already had a Hash name but for whom some of us had “Rod in Hand” ready and waiting. Why do these simple things amuse one so? I don’t know, they’re the same things we did last Saturday and will do next Saturday. It’s got something to do with arrested development, I think (duh). The usual good time was had by all, which is better than a poke up the Khyber Pass with a burnt satay skewer.

On on,

J.B.