When I was kid there were a lot of myths about Japanese Baseball that I later learned were not true, like the myth that they ran the based clockwise go give more advantage to right handers.  Not true.   

On this trip I wanted to experience Japanese Baseball.  I tried to get tickets to a Yokohama Bay Stars game but failed to negotiate the Japanese website using google translate.  (Later I learned you could get tickets on something called “Stub Hub”.  Living in Sitka I had no idea of what that meant.)  I was hoping to get tickets at the gate, but failing that, a person living in Yokohama told me that there was a big screen TV set up in the park outside the ballpark and we could experience the game in a “Fan Zone” somewhat the way overflow crowds are accommodated during World Cup and Euro championship football matches.

My iPhone told me the stadium was a 10-minute walk from the ship.  I allowed 30. 

The park outside the stadium is lovely, part is Japanese garden and part open field.

There are vendors with Yokohama Bay Stars merch and food. 

Thousands of people with Bay Star jerseys were streaming in, lots of young people and families.  The Bay Stars were in 4^th place, 8 games out near the end of the season so I was surprised that the place was so packed.  What I didn’t know was that in Japanese baseball the top three teams enter the League Championship Series and they were a half game out of third place.

The women who told me they were sold out, even standing room, (“Yokohama people love baseball” she said.) said I would enjoy experiencing the game on the big screen.  I told her we couldn’t find it.  She got someone else to take over her spot at the gate and walked me toward where she thought the screen should be.  She asked me where I was from.

“Alaska!”

“Oh, you must be a Mariner’s Fan.”

“Nope, the Mets, I worked as Shea for the TV crew 60 years ago.”

“I love Anchorage, I stayed at the Hilton.  Shopping trip. Fifth Avenue Mall, Nordstroms.”  (Which has since closed in Anchorage.)

When we got to the spot where the big screen TV was supposed to be, it wasn’t.  She went off to ask why and came back, bowing in apology.  “So sorry, only a summer thing, it’s fall now.”  I looked at my weather app. It was a half hour past sunset, 92 degrees (Feels like102^o), but, according to the Bay Stars, summer was over.

She apologized over and over but we could still experience some of the vibe.  Suzi and I sat in the park listening.  It was a continual soundtrack.  “Take me out to the Ballgame” in Japanese (Buy me some seaweed and squid today?), constant drumming, chants and singing.  Unlike European football, where it is the sound of a male chorus, here women’s voices cut through the crowd.  Unlike American crowds there was never a lull in the excitement during those first (scoreless) innings.  The only times the chants and songs were interrupted was when the crowd roared at some play.  

We stayed long enough to catch the flavor of the event.  The next morning, we learned the Bay Stars had won 9 to 6 and were in third place with only a few games to go.

We walked back toward the ship.  Sometime during this period Suzi’s fitness watch startled her by making celebratory noises, flashes and buzzes as she crossed the 10,000-step threshold.  I don’t think I would want a watch that did that.  My iPhone counted more than 14,000 steps but kept quiet about it.

This was a good signal that we should take a break, so we found a park bench halfway between the stadium and the ship. The temperature had fallen to about 87 degrees with a breeze off the bay.  We could still hear the chanting and singing in the distance.  It felt pleasant and I thought back to when I was a kid, on hot humid days in New Jersey, enjoying sitting out at night talking to neighbors, the sound of Red Barber calling a game in the distant background.  We felt such relief as the temperature dropped those 7 to 10 degrees, even though it was still in the 80s, such a relief on those summer nights before air conditioning.

Sounds from outside the ballpark.