BHHH2 Hash Trash Run 1346 Pasar Ponggang

Inky Pinky Parlez Vous?

Apparently there are not enough religious observances in the Balinese and Indonesian calendars that I’m supposed to remember, plus birthdays, anniversaries, Mother’s and Father’s, Valentine’s Days etc. that I run the risk of perhaps even bodily harm or worse delivered by a certain  member of my immediate family, lest I forget.

There are Saint’s Days, Easter, Labour, the Queen’s bloody birthday (2 of them depending which Aust. state you’re in) and of course the biggies: Christmas, New Year, Easter, Eid Ul Fitri (which admittedly overlap with the Indonesian calendar hols above but I’ll mention them anyway because I’m a grumpy old fart). A friggin’ vast litany of special days: Anzac, Australia,  Foundation Days, Guy Fawkes Day,

July 4^th, Mustache Day, Thanksgiving and believe it or not Canadian Thanksgiving even for those of you adhering to a Seppo or Honorary Seppo persuasion.

I was however completely sucker punched by one last Saturday, which I knew already was Kuningan, but wait for it, it was also: Poppy Day! I was momentarily stupefied by this revelation from a somewhat unbelieving Night Jar and just could not assign any significance at all to it. I mentally scratched my bonce as he brandished a container of paper poppies at me, “does it have something to do with breast cancer, testicular complaints, red dresses?” I thought bubbled and possibly uttered. He was flabbergasted at my abysmal ignorance “Armistice Day!” (“you idiot” was the subtext).

Ah well, you can’t recall ‘em all. I have particularly severe lapses into apathy when it comes to remembrances that feature

European politicians and aristocrats cocking things up to the extent that guns, bombs, tanks, death etc. are involved on large scales. Ahem, so having kept that successfully to myself, let us to the run get.

Allez Allez was last Saturday’s Hare and he pulled off a coup de etat (pronounced ‘koo dee tat’, which rhymes with ‘hat’) no it’s not and doesn’t. It was a great run, incredible (pronounced “incroyaberl”) yes it is, scenery, sweeping valley views (pronounced “vue panoramique sur la vallee”) and which featured extremely strenuous exertions up and down those very vue panoramiques. These close-to-perpendicular topographic episodes were chest clutchingly, lung explodingly arduous for me, at least. Perhaps this reflects my advancing years (“Ya think?” I hear you all jeer, waving your private parts). Nevertheless, I enjoyed this run immensely and much appreciated the fact that A. A. blurted around on his “moto” (pronounced “moto”) to various points on the trail he considered susceptible to disappearing papier due to rain and shepherded us on – very considerate/prevenant/utile (utile?) of him. Let me just say right here and now that Allez Allez is quite the etant humain and cannot possibly be from Paris, or if he is he certainly was not a waiter, taxi driver, shop keeper or gendarme there.

There were a couple of papier/marquage problems however one of which particularly perplexed a certain Cane Rat who remarked in the following circle that he heretofore had no idea that French arrows had no arrowheads on them. This glaring omission at a crucial turning point bushwhacked quite a few of my post-run interviewees and may have indeed been responsible for Wooden Eye’s after dark saturated reappearance from the jungle. I do seem to remember having a few “bon mots” (choice words) myself at the nude arrow’s juncture. Never mind, this was more than atoned for by the several colossal (“colossal”) bamboo stands that A. A. included for our etonnement et amusement. I can’t make up my mind about quotation marks for those last French words, ok? It’s too hard.

There wasn’t really much of a circle to speak of last week due to the fact that it was pissing down (“pisser vers le bas” they’re ba-ack) raining and despite the presence of more than one covered structure that could have easily accommodated a circle, the beer truck was parked nowhere near them. As one sopping Hasher remarked “the words ‘piss up’ and ‘brewery’ spring to mind”.

Night Jar gave it his all with a rousing version of

“I don’t want to join The Army” (“I’d rather live in England, in merry, merry England and fornicate me fahkin’ life away, gord blimey.”) For “fahkin” see “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge” or “Fornication Under the Consent of the King” in your handy dandy E.B. This ditty was particularly apropos for Poppy Day and would have summed up my attitude to the “Great” war had I been around at the time. However, I wasn’t and I’ll never know. We were pretty much rained off after that, then the German shelling started again…

On on,

J.B.