P2H3 Run # 861 - Phlegm’s Island Romp

Run date: 15/6/08

Hares: Phlegm & protege (sorry, didn’t get ya name)

Run report: Ikea

What to say about this Hash? Well…let’s say the quality was variable.

The On On at the start? Terrible. Off the boat and lost immediately, then a single-file battle with head-high sword grass. The On-In at the end? A confusing and painful schmozzle. By contrast, the middle section was unspeakable: the marking system was eccentric and the FRBs barely got out of a jog, and when they did they fell into holes or got stung by wasps.

But somehow Hare Phlegm polished what seemed like a turd of a run into a gold nugget. An A to B run on an island is no easy feat. It requires the boat to find both the start and the finish, which it did with no apparent trouble. And in the absence of a Religious Advisor, the Hare took it upon himself to deliver the fairest hashing weather for several months — nice and cool, good cloud cover, no downpour. Sweeeet.

So after the long slow cruise down the Mekong past a number of those floating ‘cough’ restaurants (’cream with a stream?’ ‘ho with the flow?’) and McMansions toppling hilariously into the river, the pack was landed on the island. Have we been here before? Blitzkrieg says we have, so probably we have. Phlegm then explains the trail with an evil grin on his face. ‘No half way’, he smirks, ’sometimes there is No Way At All. Take drinks with you’. Meh heh heh hehhh.

From the start the trail simply plowed through every patch of sharp dense bush that the Hare could find. Here we experienced untouched Cambodia, unspoilt by tourism or any human at all: who else would go here except for snakes and Hashers? We should take machetes next time. The trail was generally a single file plod, which kept the pack close and led to strange happenings - such as Fester leading the way and calling the On Ons. After a while of this we mercifully broke out onto farmland and skirted - very slowly, since the trail darted off at all angles and was frequently invisible - a lake and crawled through banana plantations.

Our numerous American virgins were certainly enjoying themselves, whooping it up like it was spring break at Cancun with every check and hold (’Oh Yeah!, Hollllllding, Yeah BABY!’) (they didn’t get nude though). The calls of ‘On Three’, ‘On Four’ etc, from one of them showed that maybe the pre-hash instructions weren’t all that clear. Back on the trail, our Finnish dude in tracksuit pants also demonstrated how NOT to do a check - just wave your head briefly at one of the possible paths and call ‘checking’, then follow another runner a different way. Hashers, some tips: remember that on a Phlegm run if you can see a mark from a check it will be a false trail every time. Also, towards the end of a run he will get lazy and just give up marking the false trails.

We made it down to the other side of the island. The run along the beach was probably the most pleasant and picturesque part of the trip. All hoped that it would be a simple effort from here to make it back to the beer. All were wrong. The trail left the beach and headed back into the scrub. Really thick scrub this time. About here Hashtrash watched FRB Herring Choker fall down a hole as if he had been shot. A bit further on, rounding a tree, he went down again — stung by wasps. ‘DRITSEK!’ he yelled (Asshole in Norwegian). Hashtrash went the other way round the tree. It turned out later that Wide Angle (welcome back) and some other hashers also fell victim to the wasps.

The final 100 metres saw hashers thrashing about in every direction and toiling like Sisyphus against the unyielding jungle. It was agony knowing the beer was near but being unable to reach it. When Hashtrash made it to the clifftop finish the Hare was already on his second Anchor. Hashers dribbled in with stories of hardship and Little Boy came much later, having toured the villages on the way.

A hasty circle was convened by stand-in GM and RA STD with assistance from stand-in beer girl Ambassador’s Orifice. Virgins took down downs and the run was declared ‘awesome’. Punishments were handed out for wildlife abuse (wasps), technology abuse, fashion crimes (Just Add Beer’s long socks) and ‘being British’ (is this still going on?? sickening).

It was a very late arrival back at the docks and the beer ran out on the way. What’s up with that, Hash Beer?? Of the hi-jinks at the ON ON ON I have no idea but it was allegedly in the vicinity of the riverfront.

ON ON

EDIT: I should have said: a very memorable and strangely enjoyable run. Well hared. Still think you should have been iced though…

‘Dr Fester, I presume…”