Northern New Territories Hash

Run 1578

Wednesday, April 24, 2013
7.30pm
Gili Gulu, Po Yick Street, Tai Po Market
Hare: Tangerine Dream

Next hare: Luk Sup Gow, May 1 – public holiday day run
The hareline

Run 1577
A Bridge Too Far

Once again the crappy weather moved in for Wednesday night, this time One Eyed Jack’s run at Mui Tsz Lam. The pre-run deluge meant that OEJ had to go off after the start to re-mark bits of it. As the mosquitoes noshed us in the ungodly humidity of a sopping sitting-out area, Eunuch, Stingray, Mango Groove, Dingaling and Gunpowder Plod – the hard core – were dealt the rather alarming briefing, delivered in OEJ’s sonorous border brogue: “The stream might be a bit swollen. And when you come down off the ridge, turn right. Don’t carry on or you’ll break your neck.” The only alarmed person there was Paul, a formidable runner of yore who had come along to see his buddy Golden Balls, but cited the dubious claim that he’d just given blood as reason not to run. Golden Balls himself had an equally dubious claim, something about a shard of fibreglass lodged in the ball of his foot – and so the Febrile Five set off into the murk.

Soon they came to the stream. Eunuch did his Eunuch thing and just waded in up to his waist. The stepping stones were invisible in the churning maelstrom. Mango tried to jump across and fell in, but the nimble Dingaling managed to get across relatively unscathed. Plod and Stingray stood on the banks, a strange drone of nasal Estuary combined with a sort of huffing and bristling emanating from them before they as one turned around and went for a road run in Ma On Shan, antennae quivering.

Eunuch climbed the hill closely pursued by the grunting hippo of Luton but after they crested it the expected move by the finest downhill merchant in hashdom failed to materialise as Eunuch strode out on the ankle-breaking glissade to finish a few minutes clear. Dingaling, no downhill slouch himself, eventually reeled in Mango on the 2km run-in along Mui Tsz Lam Road. Those three, back around the 70-minute mark, got back several minutes before the road runners.

At the finish, Golden Balls had been joined by Luk Sup Gow in scoffing all the runners’ snacks. The beer esky was suspiciously lightweight. Paul, under attack from mosquitoes who wanted his immaculate Canadian blood, had long gone. We will never, ever see him again.

There was the usual riotous insult-trading and beer-throwing. And then everyone went home like the good boys they are.