RUGBY

Rugby is the big sport here. The World Cup of Rugby was sponsored this year by France and several of the matches were played here in Bordeaux. The people here are crazy for rugby. Whenever there was a game, the whole area near the stadium was completely saturated with fans. They dress up in their team colors, paint their faces, etc.

They even paint the trams with the favorite team colors.

When the Irish played, there was more green than at a Mormon potluck (everyone always brings green Jello to those). There were a lot of top hats – one guy even had a bright red beard to go with his green outfit. They even have special hamburgers at McDonald’s for the top teams. They are pretty good.

The parking here is always bad, but when the Rugby games were on they took every parking spot in the whole south side of town. They park on the sidewalks, in front of garage doors, any place that a car could possibly fit or be forced to fit. One night we were going home to the Defranchis and could not find a parking place anywhere near their apartment. We ended up having to park in a grocery store parking lot, take two trams and walk about 7 blocks to get back home.

Badge of the French rugby team with the traditional rooster symbol.

Another night, we went by the stadium on our way home after a match and there were bottles piled up about knee high on all the sidewalks around the stadium. They are big fans here, but evidently they are big pigs also. Remarkably, by the next morning on our way to church, it was completely cleaned up.