About the Hash

What is the Hash ?

The Hash House Harriers (abbreviated to HHH, H3, or referred to simply as hashing ) is an International group of non-competitive social running clubs. An event organised by a club is known as a hash with participants calling themselves hashers.

Bodrum H3 History

Bodrum Hash House Harriers is the youngest Hash in Turkey.  Back in 2007, several ex-Turkey Hashers discovered that they had made their homes on the Bodrum Peninsula and that a new chapter of the Hash House Harriers was definitely in order.  After a visit to Fethiye Hash House Harriers for their 3rd Birthday Hash, a trial hash was laid in Gümüşlük on 1st October 2008, and attended by 17 intrepid hashers including visitors from Fethiye, Istanbul, and Hanover Hashes and an inquiry from a passing Bahrein Hasher – who was later to join our ranks.  

Subsequent to that, the Bodrum Hash was formally founded by three ex-Istanbul Hashers with help from several other ex-Turkey Hashers.  The Inaugural event was held over the weekend of 6th and 8th March 2009 and attended by 88 Hashers (and 64 of these from Fethiye House Harriers alone).

Currently the average pack size is around 20 to 25 and this increases to around 40 to 50 during the summer months.  Runs are on every other Sunday starting promptly at 2pm most of the year and 5pm in June to September.  Runs average around 7 to 9km with short cuts for walkers.  As many of the hashers here are retired, walkers outnumber runners, but only just!

As with other Hashes around the world, we hash in every weather condition going (well most of us do!).  Having said that, the weather in Bodrum is very kind to us (and our RA), and has been declared by the World Health Organisation as the healthiest climate in the Mediterranean.  Anyone is welcome to join us and there is a contact form on this website for all and every enquiry, together with a page listing our future runs.  Maybe we’ll see you here sometime.

ON-ON

Bodrum Hash House Harriers

Hash History

Hashing originated in December 1938 in Kuala Lumpur, then in the Federated Malay States (now Malaysia), when a group of British colonial officers and expatriates began meeting on Monday evenings to run, in a fashion patterned after the traditional British Paper Chase or "Hare and Hounds", to rid themselves of the excesses of the previous weekend. The original members included, Albert Stephen (A.S.) Ignatius "G" Gispert, Cecil Lee, Frederick "Horse" Thomson, Ronald "Torch" Bennett and John Woodrow.

After meeting for some months, they were informed by the Registrar of Societies that as a "group," they would require a Constitution and an official name. A. S. Gispert suggested the name "Hash House Harriers" after the Selangor Club Annex, where the men were billeted, known as the "Hash House" for its notoriously monotonous food. Apart from the excitement of chasing the hare and finding the trail, harriers reaching the end of the trail would be rewarded with beer, ginger beer and cigarettes.

The Constitution of the Hash House Harriers is recorded on a club registration card dated 1950:

·         - To promote physical fitness among our members

·         - To get rid of weekend hangovers

·         - To acquire a good thirst and to satisfy it in beer

·         - To persuade the older members that they are not as old as they feel

Hashing died out during World War II after the invasion of Malaya, but was re-started after the war by most of the original group, minus A. S. Gispert, who was killed on 11 February 1942 in the Japanese invasion of Singapore, an event commemorated by many chapters by an annual Gispert Memorial Run.

Apart from a "one-off" chapter formed on the Italian Riviera by Gus Mackie, growth of Hashing remained small until 1962, when Ian Cumming founded a chapter in Singapore. The idea then spread through the Far East, Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, and North America, booming in popularity during the mid-1970s.

At present, there are almost two thousand chapters in all parts of the world, with members distributing newsletters, directories, and magazines and organizing regional and world Hashing events.