Why the French Kiss a Village Waitress's Behind (8 photos)
If you’ve ever been on a seaside vacation, chances are a resort entertainer invited you to play a game of boules on the beach. It’s an easy-to-learn game: toss your metal ball as close as possible to the target marker while knocking your opponent’s balls out of the way. But this pastime isn't just a holiday diversion. The French consider it a national sport, and they call it pétanque.
Whenever someone suffers a total blowout defeat, seasoned players love to drop the phrase: “Kiss Fanny” (Embrasser Fanny). The origin of this saying is quite colorful, portraying the titular Fanny as a delightfully cheeky character. 
Fanny was a young woman working as a waitress at a village café in eastern France. One day, while watching the local men play pétanque, she playfully announced that anyone who lost with a score of 0 to 13 (failing to score a single point throughout the entire match) would get to kiss her on the cheek. 
As luck would have it, the village mayor ended up being shut out without a single point. He wasn't particularly well-liked, and Fanny despised him outright, especially since he had been blatantly making unwanted passes at her. Thinking on her feet, the waitress turned around, hitched up her skirt, and offered him a different set of cheeks to kiss. The mayor didn't dare refuse. 
All of this took place around 1870. News of Fanny’s stunt spread fast across the countryside, and the tradition of humiliating the loser by making them kiss a bare rear end quickly became a beloved ritual. 
Naturally, Fanny couldn't tour the entire country to bare her behind for every unlucky player, nor could every town find a local woman willing to play along. Quick-witted entrepreneurs stepped in and began manufacturing terracotta figurines of Fanny. You can still buy one today—for instance, by visiting La Boule Bleue in Marseille, a historic shop catering to pétanque enthusiasts. 
Alongside the figurines, postcards depicting Fanny were printed in massive quantities for the ritual (coincidentally, in American English, “fanny” means precisely that: a backside). Word has it that these postcards even outsold typical pin-ups. 
