if you want to ucfirst for utf8 try this one:

<?php
function ucfirst_utf8($stri){
 if($stri{0}>="\xc3")
     return (($stri{1}>="\xa0")?
     ($stri{0}.chr(ord($stri{1})-32)):
     ($stri{0}.$stri{1})).substr($stri,2);
 else return ucfirst($stri);
}
?>

It is quick, not language (but utf8) dependend and does not use any mb-functions such as mb_ucfirst.