Go Go Swallows!!!

---

After a 4 hour nap to recover somewhat from the Mt. Fuji climb, we headed to Jingu Stadium to watch the Tokyo Yokult Swallows play the Yokohama Bay Stars in my first Japanese baseball experience. The Swallows are not the only Tokyo team. The other is the Tokyo Giants who are a lot more popular. If you know you're NBA teams a good comparison would be between the L.A. Lakers and L.A. Clippers. The Giants would be the Lakers and the Swallows would be the Clippers. Regardless, I had a great time.

The fans are extremely enthusiastic, but a little more reserved where we were sitting. We had great seats along the 3rd base line and were lucky enough to have a few "superfans" sitting near us who would lead a cheer in between innings and batters. They would blow a whistle, wave big flags, and had a special clap that took me a while to get down. My sister thought they were given free/discount seats for leading these cheers.

The rowdiest fans were in the outfield. There was a visitors section in left field and a lot of Swallows supporters in right field. They would only cheer loudly when their team was up to bat, but man would they cheer. They had horns, huge flags waving, and it seemed like they had a different song that they sang for each batter. I loved it.

Some other interesting observations:

1. They had a fence that was about 10 feet high all along the 1st and 3rd base lines to protect against foul balls. If there was a foul ball there were workers that blew whistles loudly to alert people.

2. Ever thought of having a warm bowl of noodle soup at a baseball game? You could do it here.

3. If you want a beer from the tap you don't have to go out to the concession stand. There were beer vendors who carried a small keg of beer in a backpack. These were more expensive, though.

4. The Security people wear uniforms that make them look like Girl Scouts. Real intimidating.

5. When someone from the home team hits a home run, one of the mascots meets them at home plate with a stuffed animal to give.

Unfortunately, the Swallows lost. It was my fault according to Maureen and Stephen since they had never seen the Swallows lose. Oh well. I feel that way any time I go to see the White Sox play the Twins at the Metrodome.

---