Swing Batta Batta, Swiiiing!

When Erik was "visiting" our home this past weekend, we finally got to see a Japanese baseball game. This is likely our last spring here in Nippon, so definitely needed to cross this of our list! We hopped on the train to see the local Yohohama Baystars, up against the Chiba Mariners. The Baystars' mascot has a star for a head, which of course I found super endearing.

The rules are pretty much the same, although the playing field, strike zone, etc are scaled down just a little bit. The interesting thing is that the home team's crowd continually cheers while the home team is at bat. That's a little different since in the States, things are usually quiet so the 'roid runners can focus better.

Here is the crowd doing a cheer while Yoshimura (popular player) is at bat. Coincidentally, we just happened to catch his home run on film while we were actually just trying to film the crowd.

Overall the experience was a lot of fun - we got to drink beer and eat hot dogs and cheer with the local crowd. We even caught on enough to join in the cheers in Japanese, although this skill diminished over time with beer consumption (meanwhile, rate of enthusiasm increased exponentially!).



Another Japanese item checked off our list!