Baseball in Taiwan

As you can see went to the baseball game last night in Kaohsiung (Thurday, May 14th) with eight of my European students (we had the makings of our own team and were featured on the large television screen a couple of times, most likely because we were the only Caucasians there plus my students are very good looking.) For most of them it was their first time at a ball game and it was quite an experience. I spent most of my time explaining the rules of our national pastime, which are not easy to understand, particularly the first time. But we did have time to down a couple of beers (legal drinking age here is 18) and eat a corn dog on a stick, along with some caramel flavored popcorn and ice cream. Game time for the three-hour +, 2-1 (Kaohsiung lost), well played game was 6:30 so we got home via the subway at a very reasonable hour.


Some impressions:

*great seats on the first base side (home team side) for about $9.00.

*game very well played; no errors, two home runs.

*players very talented but not quite as big as players in US.

*not a very big crowd; attendance not announced.

*didn't have a seven inning stretch.

*field immaculately manicured; foul lines 309', center field 400'; seats about 15,000. (see picture)

*three major differences: teams corporately sponsored for advertisement purposes, but less ads than at US ball fields

*and each team had a co-ed cheer leading squad accompanied by drums, trumpets, and sticks to beat (see pictures); most of the fans had these plastic sticks and beat them enthusiastically in time to drums while cheering their heads off; each cheering squad and fans were most courteous to each other, unlike Yankee-Boston fans. (Some of my students really got into it and cheered right along, just like my wife would do if she were here.)

*and the vendors walking around the stadium selling beer were all young, scantly dressed, cute-as-a-button women.

*a thoroughly enjoyable evening.

Played tennis and swam in the ocean again this morning (Friday) at 6:00. The human backboards wore me out in the humidity and 83 degree temperature, but we manged to eke out a 6-6 tie. Again, the evidence is that the elderly Taiwanese are all going to outlive us all. This is an exercising nation. On the way down to the courts there were small groups stretching and practicing tai chi; another 100+ were swimming in the ocean; another 20 were playing tennis, two of which I found out were 82 and 80; another 50 were walking the track and/or doing calisthenics; and another 40 were doing laps in the Olympic size college pool. And all before 8 A.M.

After doing laundry this morning (yes, I didn't get soap bubbles all over the floor) and practicing my Chinese, I am spending the rest of the day catching up on my University of Maine-Darling Center consulting responsibilities. They have created a cool website to help science students and teachers thinks more like ocean scientists do using an educational tool called concept mapping and real time streaming data from the ocean. (http://cosee.umaine.edu/cfuser/index.cfm)As the outside evaluator, I am helping them conceptualize the accompanying training and the effect of the project. I am enjoying interviewing the scientist long distance and trying to find out the scientists' perceptions, along with the perceptions of the users of the website and training. We are constantly trying to improve our product. The annual report to NSF for this three year project is due the week before I get back, so it will be interesting to see how we do writing this continents apart.

Until next time.