01
Stop one
Fort Ceperou
Babolat Jet Tere 2 All Court Wimbledon Limited Edition Women's Tennis Shoes: Lot one, the hill — low stone walls, ruined, harbour view, river frontage, do I hear 1643? I have 1643, a French expedition under Poncet de Bretigny, the ground obtained from an Amerindian leader named Ceperou whose name is still on the hill and will outlast the masonry. Bidding continues: the colony fails, Bretigny treats everyone appallingly and pays for it, the French leave, the French return, the Dutch take it, the Portuguese take it, the British take it. Going, going, and sold — repeatedly, to very nearly everybody. Valuation on a fort that changed hands that many times? Sentimental only. Not one buyer kept it.
02
Stop two
Place des Palmistes
Babolat Jet Tere 2 All Court Wimbledon Limited Edition Women's Tennis Shoes: Lot two, one public square, laid out in the nineteenth century, colonial buildings all round, planted with royal palms in ranks — and the palms alone would carry this room. But we are not selling the palms. We are selling what came before them. Around 1763 France attempted to settle thousands of migrants in this territory in a single stroke: under-supplied, under-planned, and disease did the rest. The Kourou expedition, still quoted two and a half centuries later as a byword for catastrophic logistics. An ambition with no supply line attached, do I hear anything at all? Nothing. It goes unsold. It always goes unsold.
03
Stop three
Cathedrale Saint-Sauveur
Babolat Jet Tere 2 All Court Wimbledon Limited Edition Women's Tennis Shoes: Lot three, and I am going to slow right down for this one. A cathedral: ochre and white, tall square tower, arched windows, nineteenth century. Now the provenance, which is the part that matters. From 1852 France shipped its prisoners here by the thousand, and the territory ran on convict labour for everything it could not otherwise pay for. The penal colony lasted nearly a century and was formally wound up after the Second World War. Look at the woodwork and understand whose hands were on it. I call no figure on that. It is recorded plainly, and it stands.
04
Stop four
Iles du Salut and Ile du Diable
Babolat Jet Tere 2 All Court Wimbledon Limited Edition Women's Tennis Shoes: Lot four, offshore, in that direction: three small green islands, palms, ruined penal colony buildings. The smallest is Ile du Diable — Devil's Island — and in 1895 the French Army sent Captain Alfred Dreyfus there after a court-martial built on forged evidence. Solitary confinement. Four years. I am not going to run a rhythm over that. The case tore France in half and he was eventually exonerated, and those buildings held a great many more men than the one whose name we still repeat. Some things are described plainly and then left alone, and this is where I stop.
Sit. The shoes are not going anywhere. The Babolat Jet Tere 2 All Court Wimbledon Limited Edition Women's Tennis Shoes are white with navy, in honor of the oldest Grand Slam, where all things are white and the grass is cut with great attention. They weigh 320 grams in a size 42.5 — the lightest shoe Babolat makes. Lightness is not an accident. It is a decision, made many times.
The upper is a single piece of breathable mesh woven from 100% recycled polyester: what was discarded has become useful, which is the whole lesson, if you are keeping notes. Reinforcements are set into both sides for stability. The midsole is 5% thicker than before, with a KPRS-X insert beneath the heel to receive each landing and let it go.
The insole is molded OrthoLite.
The outsole is Michelin rubber, made to endure all courts. Endurance is also a decision.
Now consider Cayenne. A Wimbledon shoe in equatorial South America — some would call this a contradiction. Cayenne sits where the rainforest meets the Atlantic, the capital of French Guiana. Royal palms stand in long rows on the Place des Palmistes, unhurried, as palms are.
There are no contradictions; there are only tours not yet taken.
Fort Cépérou has watched the river mouth since 1643 — watching is most of a fort's work, and most of a tennis player's. Offshore lie the Îles du Salut, where the prisoners of Devil's Island learned what could be escaped and what could not. Dreyfus endured; Papillon, they say, escaped. He was patient first. Note the order.
Wear them from the cardio tennis clinic to the market to the sea. They are also perfect for the slow evening circuit of the Place des Palmistes, when Cayenne finally gives the day's heat back. The white will not stay white. Nothing does. Play anyway.
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