Hashers not Trashers: keeping the trails clean around the world

One thing that you will notice about being a part of the Hash House Harriers is that we take great care to make sure that we never litter and we always leave our trails in better shape than we found them in. As I have mentioned before, a great deal of the time we are trespassing wherever we run, so we don't want to piss people off by also being irresponsible and rude by doing something like leaving garbage behind. We never leave anything behind other than the remnants of a block of ice from time to time.

Unfortunately for a lot of other folks that use the areas that we run in, they don't seem to share our sentiment of not leaving garbage behind. Most of the trails that we go on here and really most other places in the world are covered with garbage and most of it is plastic, as you would expect.

Thankfully, our disdain for this sort of behavior leads us to take on additional duties outside of the Hash and years ago the "Hashers not Trashers" notions was started and has expanded around the globe.

These aren't always events, sometimes it is just a group of people that between Hash events will "train" a bit around just where they live by going on walks and picking up the garbage that they see around just their own neighborhoods. I think that every little bit counts. Some Hashers have "adopted" certain streets and they go around in a group and clean something like a mile of road.

That's great that they do this, but I can't help but feel a little bit like the government is taking advantage of free labor.

Other people who are a bit more active and also are Hash members will go the extra step and clean areas that are a little more difficult to access

I feel as though it is important for people to live like this because I think most of us can agree that nature is a lot more enjoyable if there isn't garbage all over the place. There is also the problem of some of this garbage killing wildlife and well, that's never good.

The Hash House Harriers are still a group of silly people who are mostly adults that refuse to grow up, but that doesn't mean that we don't care about our surroundings. Here in Chiang Mai we regularly organize Hash runs that aren't so much runs as they are a competition to see who can return to the camp with the largest bag of garbage. I think that when we are trespassing on some land that the owners probably appreciate the fact that 25 strangely-dressed foreigners are trodding through their land cleaning the place up.

Much of our efforts as far as this is concerned is because of the fact that we want the communities that we operate in to accept us and also realize that we aren't just a bunch of foul-mouthed beer guzzlers with silly clothes. We are actually for the most part responsible members of society that just want to have some fun. If we can help out the environment at the same time, I suppose this is just an added bonus.

So if you care about the environment and also want to stay in shape, this is just another reason to seek out the Hash House Harriers chapter nearest you and see if you can get involved! You are welcome to join us in Chiang Mai anytime and membership is not required! See our schedule HERE if you are interested.