The gentlemen hashers of Chiang Mai gathered for their inaugural run – the founders day run for a new chapter of hashing in Chiang Mai. It was great to be back out on trail amongst a friendly positive vibe. I don’t want to dwell on the fracture that led to this moment, as the focus should be on the enjoyable evening and the positives moving forward, and after all any “male” with an email address is probably still suffering from bleeding ears caused by the petty childishness of certain email exchanges. When wannabe despots or dictators are determined to be divisive to the point of destruction, divorce can cure the dolorousness. Alliteration – awesome – moving on.
I got to the cremation place by the disco shelter a bit early – perhaps excited to be hashing again, but mostly not wanting to go back to my office after class. The signage was slightly off, and I stumbled upon a circle check – useful inside information for later! Shrek showed up just after I’d moved his sign and one by one more cars started appearing with hashers eagerly stumbling out. A collective BYO appeared to extend to “Bring Your Own Hasher” – at least for Titty Smoker who had rounded up a collection. Sheepy was the last to appear as Shrek sent us off out the entrance and left to an immediate circle check that none of us had spotted on the drive in.
Straight away we were foxed! The entrance to the disco shelter was pretty overgrown, so everyone went straight past to the circle, and we spent some time hunting around some guys garden with his dogs. Someone was insistent it was the Disco Shelter, but there certainly weren’t any disco’s going on there! Finally I found it with SS who had clearly been told where to go by the hare after he’d got changed. A few early checks with the hare being kind to us on the water crossings – one of the bridges even had metal rails to hold on to! This is gentlemanly hashing if you ask me!
It’s been a while since I’ve been here, but there are certain limits and routes that were predictable (particularly knowing where a circle would be later in the run). Nonetheless there was a decent recycling of the lead up front and the checks kept us together. Piggy and I got ahead at one point, and as we past a trail that headed up the hill Piggy launched into a discussion about how nice it would be to go up that hill and get the blood going. I scarcely had time to reply when we hit the FT and had to go back and up the hill. Cartoon wanted to go even higher up the hill and missed the trail as it cut along the edge of the hill and before long Emma Royde and I were heading back down the hill. This time I did have enough time to tell Emma to expect an FT moments before we saw it. From here we scrambled a little into a ravine – it brought back memories from a long time ago – this time the hare had tried to cut in some steps to help us scramble out and I led the way past some savage dogs around the corner to see the wide grin of the hare sat with some welcomed cold beverages.
There was a circle check at the beer stop, but this time I was 100% sure which way to go, as I knew there was a circle just around the corner. I made as if to check that way while some supped a beer. After confirming my knowledge I walked back to the drinkers and let Cartoon check in the wrong direction for a bit before the group set off on the 2nd half. The next check was the brutal one – which is strange as I had driven here in my car, and I absolutely remember the trail the hare used, and I even checked near there first, but ended up checking wrong. I had a hunch that it had to be up the hill given where the beerstop was, so even though I was reluctant, I did a huge loop around. Huge is not an understatement – when I intercepted trail I must have been 500m++ above them up the hill. I heard that Shrek had to tell the rest where to go. But now I was on trail, ahead… alone… I did hear some calls from behind as I got to the top of the hill, but luckily for me there was no check as the trail turned and went back down again – a nice quick decent down the trail that back in February we escorted the ambulance men on to rescue a stranded hasher. This time there was no holding back – hit the road and back along to the A.
A really enjoyable bit of exercise, followed by a nice chilled out circle. Hashing really is quite simple – a run / some exercise, followed by a beer and some banter. The formula was achieved and the CGH3 is born. OnOn and see you next week! Perhaps we could do without the Danish paint remover to drink?