HHH

Long before returning to live in Thailand, I’d been told to check out the local chapter of the Hash House Harriers. I thought of it a non-competitive group of sports-minded people who like mixing entertainment and exercise. Their self-description is a “drinking club with a running problem.”

Until three days ago, I’d never joined them on their Saturday afternoon outings, mostly because soccer has taken up enough of my weekend free time. But over the years here, running has become increasingly important to me, so I e-mailed the contact listed on the website last week. He was planning to drive out to the starting point for that week’s run. We arranged to meet up.

“You look too fit to be a hasher,” he said when I got in the car. I admit I was surprised to see a number of beer bellies when we joined the others. My presence also seemed to bring down the average age considerably. But thanks to a clever system for making sure everyone starts and finishes around the same time (a “hare” goes out ahead and marks a trail, complete with several false lefts and rights, causing the front runners to cover much more mileage than the folks at the back), fitness and age don’t really matter much.

What does really matter to this group isn’t entirely clear to me yet. At first glance, the brand of humor and the post-run beverage of choice would be right at home in most college fraternities. But as my website contact pointed out while we drove, everyone takes something different from the group. For me the fun came in spending an hour or so following back alleys and cutting through forests that otherwise I would never have seen. The hasher’s Thailand is not the tourist’s Thailand. My first hash won’t be my last.