Tigers

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::: Last week I went to a Hanshin Tigers baseball game with Yoko, Megumi and a dozen other church members. This is an annual outing. This year, instead of attending the Tigers-Giants (Yomiuri) game, the equivalent of which in the US would be a Yankees-Red Sox game in late fall with playoff implications, The Tigers beat the Sendai Rakuten by four runs.

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Sorry the picture is blurry: it was taken by a drunk man, one of many at the ballgame. Tigers fans have a notorious reputation for drunken, obnoxious behavior. Some kind of trance is placed on the unassuming, quiet fans walking into the stadium. To get a sense of the rabid energy of Tigers fans, imagine the most spirited seventh-inning stretch. That's how it was like EVERY inning throughout the ENTIRE game. Each Tiger player has a chant, sung passionately by fans during that player's at-bat. I don't know who works harder during the game: the players or the fans.

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I liked the Akahoshi ramen. Akahoshi is a star player for the Tigers. His name means "red star". In his ramen, a couple star-shaped radishes float in the soup.

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