One Sunday morning early in my stay in Paris I set out for the flea markets and Montmartre (19th-century artists' neighborhood) for a bit of browsing and just got knocked over by a few too many people (shopkeepers, waiters, random strangers) wanting to know where I was born, and hollered at by a few too many guys on the street: "Eh, mademoiselle la chinoise!". After a waiter comped me a glass of champagne (you have the story in a postcard), I was left fuming that between the strange cross of gender disparity, my being a customer at the cafe, and multi-second delay in language I was kind of at a disadvantage in this game. Sort of a general, second-wave-feminist fume, and too frazzled to sit there any longer I beat a swift retreat for home.

And so I went in search of safe space, on the ultimate field where a couple of Paris teams practice, often together, in a giant park on the outskirts of the city. I'd looked them up back home but forgotten about them until my metro ride home that day. They're loosely mixed teams but have a handful of women playing with them. I played my balls out, I really did, half from happiness at running around outside again and half from relief that I could slap high-fives with all the players after a good point, and their questions to me were "How long have you been playing?", "Got the force?", and "Want to handle?"

This past weekend, my last weekend before coming home, I met the carpool at Gare de Lyon on Friday afternoon and we headed north in a teeny rental car for Copa Cabana in Nottingham, UK. It was as a good road trip should be, filled with sunshine and speed and good music and good company. We got into the town around 3 AM local time (an hour behind Paris), checked out the DJ in the tent for twenty minutes, and crawled into sleeping bags for our 9 o'clock games the next day.

The first game saw us play the #1 seed. It was the first time this group had played together due to the conglomeration of vets on vacation and pick-ups (and a little sleepy at that), so though we got it together in time to win the second half, it wasn't enough to pull out the game.

Europe ultimate, like Stateside ultimate, has its own set of post-game rituals. Everyone from both teams sits down in a big circle, and a rep from each talks over spirit issues if necessary and then gives a short speech about the match. This, from a guy on the opposing team in Game 1, is the origin of this post's title. This is followed by a short game from each side; Invalides' trademark was a race between two pairs made up of opposing team members who raced to eat a Nutella'd-up banana handless. First to eat, swallow, and whistle won. For what it's worth, I think this winds up being way more entertaining and friendly than the U.S. tradition of composing new, game-appropriate lyrics to a well-known song after each game.

We had three more games that day, all of which were won (yay!). This gave us a Sunday bye until noon, where we woke up lazy, unaccustomed to the blustery wind, and scheduled for some tough games given our Saturday success. Lost all three games, even struggling to get everyone focused enough to finish out the last one, and then showers and to a classic English feast at a nearby carvery: gammon, roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, vegetables, all piled up as high on a plate as one wanted and then absolutely doused in gravy. Every tournament should intermezzo with one of these. Slightly ridonkulous, but YUM.

Despite the mountain of food we finished in time to get Bruno back for the exhibition game at 10 PM, for which each team had been tasked with providing a player. Our team didn't have a single clearly denominated best, but as Bruno was one of the most entertaining to watch as he (1) had really pretty form (sorry, dude, not effeminate — just beautiful in a Michaelangelo-sculpture, I've-so-got-that one-hand-snag way, not unlike Gecko), (2) possessed a good sense of humour, and (3) happened to be there when the tournament director popped by to request our nomination, off he went to unanimous support. The game wasn't so much exhibition (though there were of course some pretty spectacular plays) as exhibitionist, but a good time was had heckling and cheering, and bed came not long after for me as it was freezing and the party was a little dead.

The next morning was brighter and warmer and calmer, all good signs. Most importantly, we came out wanting to give a little kick to the old self-confidence button after flopping so hard sur le queue the previous day, and eked out all three games in a row to finish 7th out of 30.

Finishing my stay in Paris with this tournament was odd and lovely, foreign and grounding, a strangely suitable send-off to my month-and-a-half away. I'm back in Edison now for a few days before continent-crossing and work-beginning next week and the four croissants amandes I snuck back over customs for my family are all gone. Sadly bemoaning the dearth of butter in American food already. Sigh. More later; for now, over and out.

Launch Flickr album Invalides à Copa Cabana >