Chers Amis,
It’s been another interesting year, however, anybody who
attended our end-of-year Coupe d’Antibes would have thought that everything was
perfectly normal. We fielded five teams
for the play-off which saw me and the other members of L’Equipe eliminated very
early in the piece. After a gruelling
set of closely run matches Kerry, Mareta and Brigitte (Très Belle) faced off
against Lilias, Mike and Jessica (Les Jolies – obviously Mike’s choice of a
team name) emerged victorious and were presented with the Coupe d’Antibes and
the obligatory bottles of bubbly.
Runners-up, Très Belle, were very sporting and shared their winnings of
boxes of chocolates with the rest of us after lunch. It was a lovely day which finished up, as
usual, with wine, good food and the company of good friends and reminded us of
why we all belong to the Alliance.
We were finally able to have a much-delayed dinner together
at Club Sapphire and hold our AGM on 9 December followed by the French film
‘Antoinette dans les Cévennes’. The AGM
was a brief affair with almost all of the committee from last year being
re-elected to their roles for the coming year.
The notable exception, of course, was Clive Roberts who, after seven
years of service on the committee has decided he needs a rest, which comes as a
surprise to none of us. Clive has always
been one of the prime movers of our pétanque games and kept them going even
when Covid had shut down everything else.
He has also been editor of La Mouette and our resident French film
selector and projectionist. We greatly appreciate the energy and enthusiasm
with which Clive pitched in to do whatever tasks needed doing in the
organisation of our Alliance and we wish him well for the future.
Best wishes
Rob McCombie
