Day 690 (Monday) 29^th April 2019

During yesterday’s fun and games I couldn’t remember the significance of kissing Fanny’s bottom at the end of a game of boules so I looked it up again..

The Art of Kissing Fanny

There’s a curious expression used in Provence by pétanque players. “Embrasser Fanny” or to “kiss Fanny”, is a small recompense for making a fool of oneself to put it simply. But where does this mischievous phrase originate from?

Fanny was a waitress at a local café in the Savoie region or Lyon– no one seems to agree. Watching the men playing pétanque (or boules) one day, she declared that she would allow any man who lost 13-0 in pétanque, to kiss her on the cheek.

As it happened, it the mayor of the local village was the one to embarrassingly not obtain a single point during his game. Fanny wasn’t fond of the mayor because of an earlier discretion. A woman’s scorn? Instead of offering her cheek, she offered quite a different cheek indeed.

The mayor embraced the challenge (I don’t doubt willingly) and kissed Fanny’s bottom. And one can imagine, that in 1870 this went down as quite a treat.

Thus, a rule was created where any player losing without obtaining a single point had to kiss the rather large bottom of Mademoiselle Fanny. This was a great humiliation, as well as a reward depending, of course, on the fanny at hand.

In Provence, local pétanque clubs embraced this tradition with fervour. Specially made rugs were even kept to kneel on for such an occasion. Postcards depicting Fanny, not quite a glamorous as a Parisian Pin-Up, were distributed throughout France.

Not surprisingly however, pétanque players found there was a considerable lack of women who were willing to play along with their tradition and show the loser their bottoms. So companies started making Fanny statuettes made from clay. Every pétanque club now has their own statue of Fanny’s glorious bottom. You can still buy these statues at the original boule-maker, La Boule Bleue in Marseille. Fanny is still a common name in France and French people often have no idea of the meaning of fanny in English. It signifies either le derrière (behind) or d’avant (from before) depending if you’re British or North American. A coincidence made to kiss it, a bell is often rung as everyone laughs, for optimum embarrassment.

This is Villefranche Petanque club’s Fanny

We were expecting new guests in the apartment in Cactus Roc (that’s the name of the building) and he sent me an email around lunchtime saying they would be here between 4pm and 6pm so I asked him to be a bit more precise and at 3.45 he sent another email saying they would arrive at 4.30, he could have given us a bit more time! We took Kisbee and did some finishing touches to the place and took some photos.

This is the living room  - not too shabby eh?

This is their shared pool

The garden/eating area off the kitchen, which is really quaint

And this is the terrace – wow!

and these are the views

and this is their neighbour’s house

As wonderful as the view is I wouldn’t want to live up there because it’s too far from everything. The Ukrainian couple arrived with their son and they were very pleasant and had stayed here before so the check-in was very quick and we were soon back on Kisbee going down the hill.

We arranged to meet James, Sue and Kay for dinner in what used to be called La Belle Epoch but is now called Le Bistro du Coin (the bistro corner) and on the way there it was great to see how quickly the leaves are growing back on the trees in the park.

 

All over Villefranche at the moment there is a lot of painting and fixing up going on ready for the season and I loved these colours.

James, Sue and Kay were already there when we arrived and so were Kevin and Angie who had been out for a big birthday lunch for Kevin. They had a drink with us to celebrate Kay’s birthday before going home. We sat on the terrace enjoying the last of the evening sunshine before moving inside to eat and this was the menu, which was beautifully explained to us in Franglais by Serge, the manager.

Huw had tandoori chicken with black rice

 I had a massive plate of homemade pasta with Parma ham

Sue and Kay both had cod but served with different sauces

and James won the prettiest meal of the evening award with his octopus

We all thoroughly enjoyed the food, the wine, the excellent service and had a great last night, which was nicely rounded off with two free limoncellos each from Serge. There were a lot of hugs as we said goodbye to them but I’m absolutely sure that we’ll see them again in the not too distant future.