Downtown club thirsting to run
marissa luck - May 1st, 2008Run, socialize, checkpoint, drink and repeat. This is a standard routine for the Hash House Harriers (HHH), an international group of social, non-competitive running.
After the last run on April 26, Flagstaff watched as endless streams of people rushed past, screaming and smiling, wearing ridiculous outfits.
HHH began in Malaysia in 1938, when British colonials attempted to cure their hangovers by following a trail through the jungle, and occasionally drinking a beer or two as an aid.
However, at the beginning of September 2007, Robbie Greene and Andrew Schwartz helped bring HHH to Flagstaff by holding monthly runs.
The first Hash consisted of 25 people, but now has grown to more than 100. Each run has two Hares, who choose checkpoints. The runners, also known as the Hounds, meet at a location where the Hares take off and set a trail of flour. The Hounds wait about fifteen minutes and then run after the Hares, trying to find the trail of flour. When the Hounds have reached a checkpoint, drinks wait for them. They repeat this until the end, where a dance party follows.
“There is also the unavoidable scenario in every hash where the pack of runners must cross a busy street,” said Greene, a senior geography and human experience major. “At this point, traffic generally comes to a halt, and motorists display a mix of emotions, mostly confusion and amusement. I like to think that we encourage all those motorists stuck in a ‘Hash-jam’ to stop driving around wasting gas and enjoy the beautiful outdoors in Flagstaff. This is a town to be experienced on foot.”
On April 26 runners experienced a special Hash, where two runs took place and both teams, the Village People and the Zombie Disco, dressed and competed in a race. Founders of the Flagstaff HHH, Greene and Schwartz, took it upon themselves to pump up the Hounds with a friendly competition with a hidden agenda.
“It’s really about world peace,” Schwartz said. “Any separate things like this are only to have more fun. We’re trying not to be exclusive to anyone; we try to welcome everyone.”
However, there are many rules and traditions in the HHH community, yet they still unite while being fair. According to Schwartz, other out-of-state HHHs used to segregate hashes between the sexes.
“We refuse to be sexist or overly masculine about things,” Schwartz said. “We are an equal opportunity Hare assigner and we do not constrict ourselves to tradition.”
HHH further encourages runners to embrace world peace and their individualism. Flagstaff residents can see runners in costumes for a particular theme.
“Hash House Harrier time is a time where everybody has a chance to dress up however they want without having the criticism and pressure of fitting into the modern society’s prototypical style of dress,” said Kimber Griesser, a freshman environmental science major.
Commonly themed according to holidays, runners enjoy making a scene with their crazy outfits.
“If you’re going to run willy-nilly through Flagstaff with a pack of runners making lots of noise, you might as well complete the scene with absurd outfits,” Greene said.
HHH partakes in helping the Flagstaff community as well. By either joining together to help pick up trash around Flagstaff or turning off their lights for a half-hour more on Earth Hour, HHH tries to raise awareness as well.
Out of respect, any hasher who has run enough events or has done something sufficiently goofy is given a nickname, called a hash name, which will then become their proper title while running. Schwartz and Greene, being the founders of the Flagstaff Hash, have been named Mama Baba and Fondling Father.
“Thanks to Mama Baba and Fondling Father, Hash House Harriers is reborn in Flagstaff,” Griesser said. “Their pride and effort is admired by all and will remain a legend for years to come.”