In the Spotlight - Japan
Hazukashii
In the Spotlight – Japan
By Ed “Hazukashii” Howell
17 Nov 2023
Japan is a wonderfully diverse island nation in the Western Pacific Ocean. It has no physical borders with other nations, but does have maritime borders with Russia, China, Korea (N&S), and Taiwan. It consists of four main islands (Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu), and numerous smaller islands, including the Ryukyu Islands that stretch all the way south to Taiwan, and the capital city is Tokyo.
The islands of Japan have been inhabited for nearly 40 thousand years, but there seems to be little recorded history before the first century AD, and that is from the Chinese “Book of Han.” We know that several dynasties have ruled Japan, and like other parts of the world, life was simple and warriors ruled the day. In the late 1800s and into the early 1900s, Japan’s rule was expanding throughout the Western Pacific (Far East) until the end of WWII, and that history is well recorded. After the war, Japan was occupied by international military powers from 1945-1952. Since then, a new Japan has emerged that gives more power to the people and new freedoms. Some of those new freedoms included the joy or running, and with that came the arrival of the Hash House Harriers.
The first hash club in Japan was the Tokyo H3, founded by Patrick 'Dunafew' Donoghue on 14 Jun 1976, who had previously hashed in Hong Kong. The HHH was in full expansion mode by the mid-70s, and Japan ranks as the 30th country to have a hash club. It would be less than two years before Dunafew moved on to Kobe and founded the Kobe H3 on 9 Jan 1978. Further to the south, the small island of Okinawa would be the next attempt to start a hash club, when William D. 'Jock' Trader came over from Taiwan. His first attempt was the Naha H3 on 10 Apr 1979, but that club could not get a proper foothold. His second attempt 16 Feb 1980 proved successful when he founded the Okinawa H3. This was my mother hash from back in 1984, and I have written extensively about its formation.
Hash clubs would continue to pop up in major cities throughout Japan, including Iwakuni, Misawa, Nagoya, Hiroshima, Kyoto, Osaka, Sasebo, and Ibaraki. Hashing became so popular that multiple clubs starting emerging in some of these cities, especially around military bases and taking on names unique to Japan (e.g. the Samurai H3, Kamikaze H3, and Sumo H3). There was even a mobile hash club based on the USS Blue Ridge that was founded on 21 Mar 1981. In all, there are 47 hash clubs listed in the HHH Genealogy, and as many as 20 are still active. Further information on these clubs can be found on the regional hash page.
I have had the pleasure of running nearly 400 hash trails in Japan while living in Okinawa and Tokyo, and can tell you that the public transportation system in most of the major cities is amazing. Trails often start at a train station, so there is no need to drive. While most of the weekday hash clubs run in the city, the greater Tokyo metropolis has a train system that offers access to over 1500 sq/kms of amazing trails, and they are explored every weekend by the Samurai and Sumo Hash clubs.
Japan has also been a key crossroads for hashers to go forth and start new hash clubs around the world. As many as 70 descendants are recorded from Japan based hash clubs, in far off countries including the US, Italy, South Korea, Iraq, Switzerland, and Portugal. If you get the chance to visit this amazing country, make sure to set aside plenty of time to join one or more of the many available hash clubs.
For many more articles like this on the history of hashing, check out . . . http://gotothehash.net/history/inthespotlight.html