Baseball!

So this last weekend I spent some time in Fukuoka City. I live so close, but I rarely venture over to our city next door. This weekend, however, about 30 or 40 JETs got together for an AJET even; we went to see Fukuoka's baseball team, the Softbank Hawks, play in the Fukuoka Dome Stadium. Going to a baseball game in Japan was something I had wanted to do last time I was here, but never got the chance to. Leah and I were the only two Kitakyushu JETs going, so we met at Kokura and hopped on the Sonic train for the 45 minute ride to Fukuoka. We met some friends on the subway and met everyone else at the stadium. I didn't know a lot of the other JETs since we came from all over the prefecture. We all quickly made friends, grabbed a beer and some popcorn, and watched the cheerleaders and mascots dance before the game started.

We were sitting near the away teams', the Seibu Lions, cheering section by the outfield. The game started off very poorly for the Hawks. The Lions scored three runs in the first two innings and the Hawks were still at zero. The game continued poorly for the Hawks and us JETs talked though much of the game. The crowds at times were more fun to watch, every player had their own little song that the crowd sang when they came up to bat. People also had small plastic bats that they clapped together in different rhythms. Seeing a whole stadium doing a synchronized cheer was pretty cool. There were also bracelets you could buy that looked like clear watches. The "watch" face would light up different colors based on what was happening in the game and so when a big play happened, for example if we scored a run, all of a sudden the whole stadium would start flashing colors from these bracelets. At the beginning of the seventh inning, though, the cheering was by far the best. Everyone in the stadium had a really long balloon and blew them after the sixth inning. Instead of tying the ends of the balloons, everyone just held onto them. Just before the Hawks went to bat their song started playing and everyone let the balloons go flying into the air. Pretty much everyone in the stadium had sent out a balloon and it was really amazing to watch.

Some people were going to a nijikai (second party) after the game at a nearby beer garden. The game was running long and not looking good for the Hawks and it was getting close to the reservation time, so many of the JETs left at the begging of the eighth inning. The score was 5 for the Lions and 3 for the Hawks. The Lions scored again in the top of the eighth. I stayed at the game with about a quarter of the JETs. I was with my friend David, who had been to four other Softbank Hawks games and said he had yet to see them win. I was still hopeful. It was my first Japanese baseball game after all, I wanted my team to win! We did manage to tie in the bottom of the ninth and the game went into extra innings. I was so excited I bought a Softbank Hawks hat and some more popcorn and went back to cheer with the few JETs still there. The Lions were up first and didn't get any runs. The Hawks had two outs, but managed to get a run and we won! Everyone went crazy! It was so much fun! (Clearly we won because I bought that hat.)

After the game there was a ceremony for a retiring player. It was very nice, some team mates sang to him, he got a whole bunch of flowers, and he walked around the stands while people threw streamers. The real reason we stayed, though, was because if the Hawks win they light fireworks in the dome. There were strings that came down from the ceiling with the fireworks on the end and seeing fireworks inside of a dome was very surprising, but very fun to watch.

After the game I went out for ramen and gyoza with David. He was leaving that night with some friends, but let me stay in his apartment because there was a Fukuoka Board Gaming meet up the next morning and I didn't want to go back to Kitakyushu just to return to Fukuoka in the morning. Not only can that be expensive because of the long train ride, but I would have had to get up really early. I played board games for twelve hours the next day before going back to Kitakyushu and just for my mom, my pieces made friendship circles.

All in all it was an amazing weekend! I can't wait to go to another game and spend more some more time in Fukuoka!