Nanjing Hash March 24

Hello all,

This past Sunday I participated in my second HASH here in Nanjing.  I'm finding that I enjoy it very much and I look forward to the next one in April. 
This month we had almost 30 people walking around one of the largest parks in Nanjing - known to the locals as Zhongshan Mountain (or Purple Mountain).  This time we went off the trail quite a bit more and got thoroughly lost a few times.  But we eventually made it to the restaurant which is located on a part of the Nanjing City Wall and serves German/Western food.  We had a delicious buffet where I had my first sausages since arriving in China (the ones the Chinese eat look like toy hot dogs and not like real food at all). 
I took a few pictures, not as many as I probably normally would just because I was enjoying myself too much with the conversations and watching to make sure I didn't trip on the trail that I rarely thought to pull out my camera. 

Right after we got started, we had to cross a river

It wasn't too hard just surprising as we only started five minutes before this.

Let's go fly a kite!

Kite flying on a grey afternoon

A tree that from a distance looked real until you noticed mixed in with the branches were satellites.

Sycamore trees lining the road.

The Giant Lion of Nanjing

Nanjing's City Wall

Up on the wall making our way towards the restaurant.

When we reached the restaurant before we could eat we had to do something called "The Circle."  This is where we all stand in a semi-circle and listen as one of the Hashers makes people do "down-downs" (drinking a full glass of beer).  The reasons for these "down-downs" vary, there is always a Virgin Down-Down (anyone new to Hashing - me in February).  Mostly its punishments for ridiculous things.  Some of the punishments were that the runners of our group had not marked the trail properly, um men that stood in the circle with their hands in their pants pocket (pocket-billiards), people that "wet the trail" or go to the washroom (i did that this time so I had to do a down-down with about 8 other people so it wasn't bad).  Its really just an excuse to drink after walking for three hours so I didn't mind having to drink the beer for going to the washroom. 
Then we all settled in for a delicious dinner after a toast to the woman who was supposed to host next month's Hash but recently passed away. 

Next one is in a few short weeks on April 14 and I hope the weather will be warmer and the sky will be bluer.