Bali Hash House Harriers 2

Still Dead!

Even more Breaking News! Again! The Dodo, the Moa, the Tasmanian tiger (Thylacinus Cynocephalus - an important one being an Australian extinction, like Swan Lager and Emu bitter) and several hundred species of Dinosaur are still extinct as I write! And… you’re now up to date. More incisive up-to-the-minute headline reportage at eleven, but for now: I’m afraid our beloved Grand Master Night Jar’s condition has worsened if anything over the past week. Night Jar, if you are reading this, sadly the prognosis is not good. You’ll never play the violin again because according to a certain web site, you remain deceased. To quote wwwtravelfish.org/sight_profile/Indonesia/bali/bali/ubud/3173: “Sumadi has been leading bird watching walks around Ubud along with (now sadly passed) Brit Victor Mason for the last 17 years”. So the old Stradivarius will have to remain in its case for now, we are deeply sorry. But look on the bright side: no more bills, staff wages, disappointingly less than chilled beer at quite a few restaurants and warungs of all our acquaintances (some of which are run by people who should know better), not many concerns at all really. So, take it easy, well about as easy as it gets we guess, and get some rest (In Peace). Glory, glory, hallejulah! And now we return you to the studio for… I hesitate to call it “sport”, this week’s Hash Trash. Jim, over to you.

Hi Chuck, who the f..k is Jim? Oh. Sorry Heidi, is that your moustache? Where were we? Over to me, Chuck and yes, it is. Okay, okay, enough playing silly buggars or the fool (my two favourite instruments) and dashing off on my favourite steed, Tangent. Last Saturday’s run at none other than Pura Dalem Apuan just up the road from the Zoo I thought at first was quite the new and different approach to this area, but I was later assured by very old hands indeed that the course we ran on Saturday was HHH2’s actual inaugural run some time in great antiquity (when dinosaurs roamed the earth and Night Jar had not yet become extinct). We usually head out turning left from the site past the Pura wantilan opposite, left again filing through a gang between two cement walls then out into the padis and have done, ad ho hummium, a kajillion or so times.

This time we turned right, then left and down through quite dense jungle to a rocky river. It was immediately and impressively novel enough to move me to remark to nobody in particular, other than me, while splashing happily along in a multi green jungle canopied stream: “why in the name of a politically correct, nondenominational, multicultural, indigenous, female deity haven’t we done it this way for such a long bloody time, you very old hands indeed, you? Huh? Why?” I sometimes wish these V.O.H.I.s would dispense their wisdom to Hares who are about to set a run; surely these things are not vigilantly guarded secrets of Hash State that elder Hares need the encouragement of increasingly powerful electrical charges to the gonads before imparting.

It was way more interesting than the usual Apuan run and had everything from scenic and spreading views atop elevated valley-side trails to mildly difficult inclines, padis stretching to palm fringed forested areas and mountains beyond. The paper was perhaps a little thin on the ground from time to time, the garbage present but bearable, but there were also plenty of good checks and not a lot of kampong or asphalt. Altogether a fine effort from Hare Celik Nok.

I have only one minor complaint which was entirely my own fault. I had purchased from a $2.00 shop in Jalan Arab in Singapore last week several pairs of shorty-short sports socks (a bargain!) that when I put on before the Hash I discovered were apparently made for perhaps babies, dogs or large cats with different sized and shaped feet or paws and which, as tight as they were, managed to fill up with about 5 kg each of nice rich river silt. They had all the weave density of cyclone wire. I mention this is case you thought the U.S. electoral process and cable news channels had the monopoly on idiots.

The circle this week actually contained the missing-for-three-years presence of Virtual Erection (International Man of Mystery) who has been, he tells us, “driving trucks in England”. I find this tale pretty suspicious as there are no trucks in England, only lorries. So where HAS he been and is he transporting loads of illicit Viagra in these so-called “trucks” in so-called “England”. Hmpf. He did however add to the general lunacy and unhingedness of the circle, which last week made Bedlam look like a meeting of the Rotary Club, with a series of newly acquired “English” jokes that he probably smuggled into Bali in a boogie board bag. Anyhow, it was good to see him again. It would be good to see Night Jar again as well if he can pull off a resurrection. You never know, he’s done it before.

Let’s hope that a newly arisen Grand Master, or at least his mortal remains, might join us next week at Banjar Gahgah.

See you there,
On on,
J.B.