Take Me Out to the Ball Game

This past Thursday night we had an opportunity to attend our first ever Japanese baseball game.  Just getting tickets was an adventure.  To say the least, the Japanese love their baseball and the Hiroshima Carp are no exception, especially since they were division champions last year.  They are almost completely sold out for the entire season.  No tickets of any kind were available on weekends (Saturday was our interest).  The reserved seat weekday tickets were limited to the visitor "demonstration" section.  These seats were in the upper deck on the 3rd base side, in the outfield.  They actually had their own entrance once you were inside the stadium.  Because this was the visitor section, no Carp colors (red) and NO Carp paraphernalia was allowed, AT ALL!  We saw one fan (an American) come in with a Carp baseball cap on, and very quickly security was there telling him to remove and put the hat away or be escorted out.

The "demonstration" section was interesting, to say the least.  There we had giant Yokohama Baystars flags, a small "band" with two trumpets, drums, and a guy with a whistle.  Whenever the Yokohama Baystars were up to bat, there was non-stop singing (several different cheer/fight songs), orchestrated cheering and generally making a lot of coordinated noise.  As soon at the last batter was out, the cheering stopped and the demonstration section for the Carp started up.  It was all very respectful.

YOKOHAMA BAYSTAR DEMONSTRATION SECTION (BLUE)

 HIROSHIMA CARP DEMONSTRATION SECTION (RED)

The quality of the baseball was good, but it didn't seem as good as American Major League baseball.  It seemed more on the level of AA ball in the States.  It was good fun!  The Baystars won 5-3.

This was the first time I have seen someone eat French fries using chop sticks, and beer was sold by a cute girl with a keg on her back.  Interesting...

On the way home, we had fun with trains. We took the train from Hiroshima Station to Iwakuni Station, which was about an hour and 20 minutes.  We then had to wait in Iwakuni Station for about 35 minutes for the connecting train to Minami Iwakuni Station where our car was parked,  A train pulled up on the proper track so we assumed that this was the train we needed.  We got on and after about 10 minutes, the doors closed and the train started moving.  Unfortunately if was going in the wrong directions.  It was headed back to Hiroshima.  Not to panic, we got off at the first stop (Waki Station), crossed over the tracks and got on the next train headed back.  It arrived just in time for us to cross the platform and now get on the correct train to Minami Iwakuni.  In all, no harm, no foul, we just got to wait for our connecting train in another train riding around, instead of waiting on the train platform.