travesty

４０歳以上のラガーマンで構成されるカナダのラグビーチームが、昨年、震災で来日できなかった「借り」を返しにやってきたという記事がDaily Yomiuriにありました。
The Twilighter Rugby Club, a member of the Pacific Northwest Over 40 Rugby Union, had just completed plans for a tour of Japan--its third since 1986--when the earthquake struck. "We had paid the final installment on March 10," said Andrew Harvey.
With 48 players and wives to consider, the club reluctantly canceled the tour. "The main cause of concern was the nuclear issue," said Nick Oliver. "We started getting calls and the numbers started to drop and it simply wasn't viable to carry on."
But rather than abandon their friends in Japan completly, four members of the club--Steve Baron, Jack Beardmore, Harvey and Oliver--decided to carry on with the tour as scheduled.
A year on, the Twilighters and friends are back in Japan, with 31 players and 17 wives sampling the delights of Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, Hiroshima and Fukuoka.
It's all a far cry from last year.
"We arrived on March 30 and there were about 50 people on the flight," said Harvey, who along with Oliver and Baron, has made the return trip. "Jack basically told us we had to come. He had been on tour here 12 times and said it would be a real travesty if we didn't come and show our support to our friends here."
Spurred on by Baron, the quartet put together a vast array of memorabilia, some of which was auctioned off before flying out, and some of which they brought with them.
"I think we raised well over 250,000 yen," said Baron in between games at last weekend's Tokyo Sevens at Chichibunomiya Stadium.
Like Oliver and Harvey, Baron admitted his family were not too happy about him coming so soon after the disaster. But he felt it was a trip he had to make.
"We wanted to show people our thoughts and prayers were behind them and at the same time raise some money and awareness as to what was going on," he explained.
The players fulfilled the Twilighters fixture list with the help of local players--with the exception of games in Tokyo that were canceled as a result of the blackouts. And the welcome they received was unlike anything they had experienced.
"I have been all over the world and that was the best tour I have been on," Oliver said. Harvey said the local players had been unbelievable hosts, despite the problems their country was experiencing.
"They were so happy that they had a distraction from the hardships they were enduring," he said.
Not surprisingly, when other members of the club heard of the reception the four had received, plans were put in place to tour this year.
The tourists arrived on March 27 adorned in tour uniforms bearing the year 2011.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/sports/T120405003047.htm

travestyは会話ではよく聞く表現ですが、日本語にはなりにくい言葉です。辞書にある訳例を見ますと、「こっけい化、戯画化、拙劣な模倣、こじつけ、茶化したもじり 」などわかるようでわからない感じです。
travestyはフランス語の「変装する」を語源に持ち、その語義は、"an extremely bad example of something; especially one that is very unfair and morally wrong and has the opposite result to the one it should have"（LDOCE）です。つまり「本来もっているものを出し切ってなく、その結果、正反対の結果を招く」という意味となります。「ここでやらなきゃ, まぬけだよ/お笑いさ」や「本物ではない」あたりの訳になるのでしょうか。（UG）