Meditate with Petanque (Boules) & Video((Petanque,Video))

This post made me chuckle - 5 Fun Facts about Petanque.

My tip - head for the south of France, join in game after a few pastis - it is great fun then!

Fact 1: A Buddhist monk has published a book, L'esprit de la pétanque, advocating the game as an aid to meditation. Maître Kaisen - who was born Alain Krystaszek to a family of Polish immigrants in northern France and now lives in the Dordogne - has practised the game for over 30 years and still plays once a week.

His slim, 95-page volume maintains that similar qualities are required for pétanque and for Buddhist prayer, such as an ability to focus entirely on the game and to ignore outside distractions.

"For me, pétanque is more than a game, more than sport and more than a contest," Maitre Kaisen says. "It is a fabulous opportunity to develop exceptional human qualities and to allow the player to communicate better with the world and, above all, with himself."

Fact 2: The big story of recent years is how pétanque - a game that dates back over three millennia - suddenly got swank and boules became cool. In May 2010, after the Chanel Cruise show in Saint Tropez, Karl Lagerfeld hosted a starry pétanque tournament for Vanessa Paradis and Diane Kruger and other beautiful people.

Chanel created boules sets engraved with its insignia for the occasion and Louis Vuitton has also produced a limited edition set of boules (made, unusually, of canvas) in a soft leather case for £1,500.

France's biggest boules manufacturer, Obut, launched a new line in avant-garde tattooed steel boules aimed at teenagers (somewhat counter-productively, they do not conform to competition standards)

To read the other 3 facts - you know you want to read these! : Pétanque: Five Fun Facts

Video: How to Play Petanque

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