Juba Hash

What’s there to do on a weekend in Juba? Quite a lot actually, as it turns out. I haven’t developed much of a weekend pattern yet – but the one thing that does tend to stay pretty regular is Hash on Saturday evenings. (For those of you who’ve never heard of Hash before: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hash_House_Harriers) Although I’d never been to one, I had heard of Hash before coming to Juba, but I still didn’t really know what to expect when I joined a group of my coworkers for the weekly walk/run on my 4th day in Juba. Looking back on it, that first Hash was actually a bit of a mess … the trail wasn’t very clearly marked (and being a newbie I didn’t really know what I was supposed to be following anyway) and we almost lost one of my coworkers … but I’d still had enough fun to know I’d be coming back for the next one. A couple of weeks after that first Hash, I found myself “haring” (i.e. setting) the running trail (the GM must have somehow known that I hardly ever say no when he volunteered me for the job). I had, at least, had the foresight to name a condition when agreeing – that a veteran hasher co-hare with me. And that’s how, one Saturday about a month after arriving in Juba, I found myself scattering flour on the roads of Juba in the company of a true Hash veteran – a kind, older man who’d done his fair share of Hashing during his 40+ years of working in Africa. And that’s also how, after we’d finished setting the trail, I found myself nursing a water at the bar with my co-hare and the walking hare (who was also a couple decades my senior). Both men were what you might call “bush men” – Westerners who’d been living and working in the African for most of their lives – and to their credit, they did try to include me in the conversation when we first sat down. We had quite a bit of time to kill before the other Hashers started showing up though, and soon enough the conversation turned to (for them) more interesting subjects: namely, generators and cars and all things mechanical (and how much better they were back when …) As I started to zone out, all I could think to myself was “man, Dad & Grandpa would love these guys!” :-D

This past weekend, I found myself haring again – this time on my own volition and with a co-hare who’s a friend. We’d offered to both host and hare the Hash, so my friend and I had been exploring trail options all week during our lunch hour. We were pretty pleased with what we ended up with … it started by running through the “river” (really, more of a refuse pit) by the office, then wound through town and past houses of excited kids who came out to give us all high fives. After that, a right turn along the road past the goat market and a left turn through what turned out to be a cow market (it hadn’t been there during the week, but in retrospect that does explain all the manure). A little farther down the way, the path opened up and led right to a scenic view of the Nile River, complete with carwash (literally, the cars had been driven into the river and were being given a scrub down) and bathing kids. After that, we wove around behind the Juba Stadium, ran back along the road for a bit, and then through a labyrinth of tukuls and huts before approaching our starting point from the opposite direction. All in all, a solid trail. The only downsides: my co-hare woke up with a crick in her neck that kept her from turning it to the left and my stomach decided to time its revolt against whatever I’d eaten the night before such that it coincided with the run … but still, fun was had by most (if not all)!