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Hashing in Cyprus
Cyprus was in the forefront of the hashing explosion, and there have been active hashes here since 1967.
Dhekelia H3 was founded in January 1967, just beating Sydney to it as the first hash outside Malaysia/Singapore. The then Deputy commander British Forces in Cyprus, Gris Davies Scourfield, was approached by one of his junior officers (believed to be Ray Thornton) and asked if it would be possible to set up a hash at Dhekelia. Gris replied that not only was it possible, but that he would run in it and be the first On Pres! Six months later he was transferred to Episkopi (the other British base \par in Cyprus) where he started Epi Hash. Both hashes continue to run to this day, although Dhekelia are getting a bit thin on the ground and are running with packs of about 15. Epi thrives, though and on a big run can turn out 70+. They have acquired several runners from the British retired community in the area, something which Dhekelia have not been able to do. Dhekelia do have one of the oldest/most continuously running hashers with them in the person of Gero Choporian, a Armenian t-shirt maker who has run with the hash pretty well from its inception. Unfortunately, they have no records of the early years. Epi also have their own veterans, foremost among which is Jack Blocki, who has recently celebrated 1000 runs with the same hash at the age of 75.
Polygon H3 was set up in the third, (and much smaller) British base in Cyprus, Agios Nicolaous by a pair of hashers who were pissed off by the idea of not being able to take their wives or girlfriends hashing. Why Polygon? The base at Ay Nik is roughly shaped like a polygon! Poly celebrated their 800th run in January 1997. They are an open and family hash, but like other hashes of military origins, find their numbers shrinking as the British forces in Cyprus shrink slowly.
Larnaca and Amathus were set up within two weeks of each other, quite independently with Larnaca beating Amathus to it by a short head in late May, 1987. Larnaca H3 were first based in a pub called the Railway, which has since closed down. Their initial mainstays were a bunch of telecom/software engineers who were based here. Their current senior veteran is George Whiteman, founder of Little Sai Wan and Scarborough H3s and now retired here. After the software project closed down George carried Larnaca pretty well on his shoulders for some years until they built up a community of their own. They are a very family oriented hash (clean names, #1 on Flying Boogers Hash Scale) but continue to thrive and regularly muster 40+. They are in the practice of regrouping at every check, which makes for slowish runs.
Nicosia started up a year later in 1988, founded by Duncan Kirby among others, and have the largest number of Cypriots running with them (about 50%). They are a hard running hash with the usual dip. corps contingent found in any capital city hash. They run Tuesday nights. All details can be found on their webpage (see Hash Contacts below ). \par \par The terrain in Cyprus is basically Mediterranean scrub with small hills and valleys. Temperature ranges from about 12 f 16 C and wet/windy in January/February, up to 38 C and bakingly hot in August.
Lastly but not leastly Cyprus newest hash is Kition which is a Wedneday evening town run.
Click on the Hash Names to reach their home pages.