Last night we flew into Auckland and in less than one day I'm convinced the whole town has a serious drinking problem. Admittedly it was a Saturday night but how was I to know that the NRL Rugby Nines, a two day knock out rugby league competition was in full swing?!
So there we were, innocently strolling down the main drag of Auckland and we're hit with an avalanche of a very peculiar brand of kiwi enthusiasm loosely centred around the game of rugby but mostly centred around beer. Lots of it. Oh, and strange costumes. Everywhere we looked the streets were full of howling, swaying, weaving and hollering men and...err...ladies dressed in a variety of themed costumes that ranged from the traditional pirate and policemen get up to gangs of 'escaped prisoners', cartoon characters and superheroes. And I do mean gangs, apparently it's not the kiwi way to individually dress up, here you get together a group of friends, and all dress up in exactly the same costume to go out drinking...I've heard of wearing team colours but this really takes the concept to a whole new level.
Apparently you can also add speed to your fun by throwing in a tuk-tuk style bicycle for two, piling all six of your drunken pirate friends into the back seat and shouting mush to to poor driver-pedaler whilst singing a rousing chorus of...well something musical but ultimately incoherent and loud. Looked liked fun and honestly, 10/10 for enthusiasm, just not talent.
I'm not sure what it all had to do with the rugby league comp but its the only link I can conceive of. Unless (shudder), this is just a normal Saturday night and the costume hiring business is about to start franchising and get listed on the NZ stock exchange.
So write it up to Saturday night madness, I thought. Wrong. Sunday morning and the place is in full swing. Again. At 9am. Pubs are open, jugs of beer are going round and I'm watching in quiet bemusement as a troop of ladies in Hannibal Lector masks stagger by looking for the hair of the dog. This is what the end-of-days must look like with beer thrown in. I think I've now seen it all until a man dressed as a mushroom limps by on crutches. He's accompanied by a walking banana but I doubt this one would get within 10m of Playschool's doors. Must've been a good night and now they're making me hungry. Mmm...breakfast.
So what does this all have to do with ultra-running? I'm not sure but I had to share the surreal experience. Or maybe its just an example of how one person's madness is another's pleasure, which pretty much sums up the world of ultra running to those who do it, and those who watch in befuddled bemusement at the sheer idiocy of people who run (or in my case run-walk-stagger) 100km for fun. And pay for the privilege. Now you'll have to excuse me as I have to go find a mushroom suit to run my 100km race in this coming Saturday. After all, when in Rome...
So there we were, innocently strolling down the main drag of Auckland and we're hit with an avalanche of a very peculiar brand of kiwi enthusiasm loosely centred around the game of rugby but mostly centred around beer. Lots of it. Oh, and strange costumes. Everywhere we looked the streets were full of howling, swaying, weaving and hollering men and...err...ladies dressed in a variety of themed costumes that ranged from the traditional pirate and policemen get up to gangs of 'escaped prisoners', cartoon characters and superheroes. And I do mean gangs, apparently it's not the kiwi way to individually dress up, here you get together a group of friends, and all dress up in exactly the same costume to go out drinking...I've heard of wearing team colours but this really takes the concept to a whole new level.
Apparently you can also add speed to your fun by throwing in a tuk-tuk style bicycle for two, piling all six of your drunken pirate friends into the back seat and shouting mush to to poor driver-pedaler whilst singing a rousing chorus of...well something musical but ultimately incoherent and loud. Looked liked fun and honestly, 10/10 for enthusiasm, just not talent.
I'm not sure what it all had to do with the rugby league comp but its the only link I can conceive of. Unless (shudder), this is just a normal Saturday night and the costume hiring business is about to start franchising and get listed on the NZ stock exchange.
So write it up to Saturday night madness, I thought. Wrong. Sunday morning and the place is in full swing. Again. At 9am. Pubs are open, jugs of beer are going round and I'm watching in quiet bemusement as a troop of ladies in Hannibal Lector masks stagger by looking for the hair of the dog. This is what the end-of-days must look like with beer thrown in. I think I've now seen it all until a man dressed as a mushroom limps by on crutches. He's accompanied by a walking banana but I doubt this one would get within 10m of Playschool's doors. Must've been a good night and now they're making me hungry. Mmm...breakfast.
So what does this all have to do with ultra-running? I'm not sure but I had to share the surreal experience. Or maybe its just an example of how one person's madness is another's pleasure, which pretty much sums up the world of ultra running to those who do it, and those who watch in befuddled bemusement at the sheer idiocy of people who run (or in my case run-walk-stagger) 100km for fun. And pay for the privilege. Now you'll have to excuse me as I have to go find a mushroom suit to run my 100km race in this coming Saturday. After all, when in Rome...
0 comments:
Post a Comment