The Old Ba' Game

The harsh winters prevent trees and most other plants from growing on the islands, but Kirkwall continues to lure newcomers by offering a rare portal into history. The town has shunned chain restaurants, stoplights and stop signs. Crime is rare, and the unemployment rate is lower than 1 percent. Many of the islands' greatest relics -- 5,000-year-old burial grounds, Viking graffiti marks -- remain unlocked and unguarded. A half-dozen sunken battleships from World War I and World War II fill the harbor, casting shadows across the water when the tide ebbs.

Past and present smudge together in Kirkwall, and never more so than on this Christmas day. As the giant clock on St. Magnus Cathedral neared 1 p.m., hundreds of spectators gathered along the cobblestone main street. Two hundred Uppies strutted down the street from the north; 115 Doonies approached from the south. They met in front of the church and glared at each other like opposing street gangs. Then the church bell chimed to signal 1 p.m., and the ba' descended into the pack.

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The ba' traveled less than 100 yards in the game's first hour, with Uppies and Doonies pushing in opposite directions to create a near standstill. The only significant movement came once every five minutes or so, when spectators climbed over the pile and pulled unconscious players -- first William Thomson, then a half-dozen others -- out to safety. Participants stopped moving altogether for 30 seconds early in the game to allow paramedics to strap one man onto a stretcher.

Players always have expected to return home with bite marks, gashes, bruised hands and black eyes, but the rate of serious injuries has doubled in recent games. Kirkwall's population has grown by more than 1,000 in the last decade, and the size of the ba' scrum -- and the pressure at its center -- has correspondingly metastasized. New players unfamiliar with the game's tradition of picking up fallen athletes are now just as likely to trample them, veterans said.

"Some of these young boys take 'by any means necessary' a bit too far," Smith said. "Used to be we'd beat each other for a while but never throw that final punch. Now, they'd kill you if they had to. We've got too many players and too many people crowding around to watch. It's almost too big."

Instead of trying to push the expanded scrum toward a goal with sheer force, Uppie and Doonie leaders now rely on strategy and trickery to move the ba'. As the deadlock continued on Christmas, Smith climbed a wall for an aerial view of the action. He spotted the ba' in the center of the scrum, held by two Doonies. With a succession of winks and hand movements, Smith instructed the Doonies to surreptitiously hand the ba' backward, from one teammate to the next, in the opposite direction of their goal. When the ba' finally reached the last Doonie, the player sprinted off. He made it four blocks toward the water before a dozen Uppies caught him.

Spectators -- and most players -- almost never know who holds the ba', and that mystery increases the frenzy. It's not unusual for a lesser player to participate in five or six ba's without ever seeing the namesake of the game, much less touching it. The ba' spends considerable time hidden under players' shirts, and participants rarely throw or kick it. Rather, the team in possession typically hands the ba' around discreetly, like a stolen jewel.

As the sun faded on Christmas, three Uppies left the scrum and climbed onto the slanted roof of an Indian restaurant. Two of them grabbed the third Uppie's ankles and dangled him from the roof, so that he was suspended upside down over the scrum. A teammate on the ground handed up the ba', and the Uppie pulled himself back onto the roof.

"Ba's up there, boys," Smith yelled, pointing frantically at the roof. "Come on! Get him."

A pack of Doonies hurriedly climbed above the Indian restaurant, where one player's foot broke through the shingled roof. He pulled himself back onto solid ground, caught up to the ba' holder and tackled him. Two Doonies kicked the ba' loose and threw it back into the scrum, but an Uppie caught the ba' and eventually sprinted away amid the chaos. He made it within a few blocks of the Uppie goal before the rest of the pack caught up.

Fifteen minutes later, at about 5 p.m., 200 Uppies shoved the remainder of the way to their goal and pressed the ba' against the wall for victory. As dictated by tradition, a handful of experienced Uppies stood at the wall and continued to fight over the ba', a process that determines the game's individual winner. Ian Gorn, 36, eventually emerged with the ba', and teammates hoisted him onto their shoulders. They carried him in the direction of a local pub, where Gorn gulped down a beer. Then he walked to his downtown apartment, where, as the ba's individual winner, it was his responsibility to host an immediate, all-night party for all 300 sweat-soaked ba' participants.

Gorn hugged his wife as he walked in his front door and grabbed another beer from the hundreds stacked on his dining room table, donated to the winner by a local grocery store. He set the ba' down for display on a counter in his living room. His two sons, ages 7 and 12, reached up to grab it. Then they fell onto the floor in a tussle for possession.