I don’t mean to imply that the reason I became a Yakult Swallows fan is the half-deserted stadium. I’d feel sorry for the team if I said something like that. The poor Yakult Swallows. And poor Jingu Stadium. I mean, the section where the visiting team’s fans sit always seems to fill up faster than the Yakult Swallows fans’ section. You could search the entire world and I doubt you’d find another baseball stadium where that’s the case.
So why did I become a fan of that team, anyway? What long and winding path led me to become a longtime supporter of the Swallows? What sort of galaxy did I cross to make that fleeting, dim star—the one that’s the hardest to locate in the night sky—my own lucky star? It’s kind of a long story, but under the circumstances maybe I should touch on it. Who knows, but it might end up being a kind of concise autobiography.
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I was born in Kyoto, but we soon moved to the Kansai-Kobe area, where I lived till I was eighteen, first in Shukugawa, and then in Ashiya. When I was free, I’d ride my bike, or sometimes take the Hanshin railway line, to see a game at Koshien Stadium, the home of the Hanshin Tigers. I was, as an elementary school student, naturally a member of the Hanshin Tigers Fan Club. (You got bullied at school if you weren’t.) I don’t care what anyone says, Koshien is the most beautiful stadium in all of Japan. Back when I was a boy, I’d rush to the stadium with my ticket in hand, pass through the ivy-covered entrance, and hurry up the dimly lit concrete stairs. And when the natural grass of the outfield leapt into view, and that brilliant ocean of green spread out before me, my little heart beat loudly with excitement, for all the world as if a group of lively dwarves were bungee-jumping inside my tiny ribs.
On the field, there is a story line about to be played out, amid the full array of cheers and signs and cries of anger ready and waiting: the players warming up, their uniforms still sparkling clean, the happy reverberation of the pure-white ball striking the sweet spot of the bat as the players field fungoes, the determined shouts of the hawkers selling beer, the fresh new scoreboard before the game begins. Yes, that’s how—without any room for doubt whatsoever—that’s how baseball, and going to the stadium, has become an integral part of me.
So at eighteen when I left the Kansai-Kobe area to go to college in Tokyo I decided, like it was the most natural thing, to go to Jingu Stadium and root for the Sankei Atoms. This was the closest stadium to where I was living, so I could root for the home team—which to me was the very best way of enjoying watching baseball. Though strictly speaking, Korakuen Stadium, the home of the Tokyo Giants back then, was a bit closer to my apartment…but there was no way I was going there. I mean, there are certain ethical standards you have to maintain.
This was in 1968. The Folk Crusaders had a big hit then with “I Only Live Twice,” it was the year Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were assassinated, and there were student demonstrations on Anti-War Day that occupied Shinjuku station. Lining up all these events makes it sound like ancient history, but, at any rate, that was the year I decided, “Okay, I’m going to be a Sankei Atoms fan from now on.” Prompted by something—fate, my astrological sign, blood type, prophecy, or a spell. If you have a chart of historical chronology I’d like you to write the following, in small letters in one corner: 1968. This was the year that Haruki Murakami became a Sankei Atoms fan.
I’m ready to swear this before every god in the world, but at the time, the Sankei Atoms had totally hit rock bottom. They didn’t have a single star player, the entire team was obviously barely scraping along, and there were hardly any fans at the stadium, except for when they played the Giants. To use an antiquated Japanese term, “the black cuckoo was calling”—meaning the place was deserted. The thought often struck me back then that the team mascot shouldn’t be the anime character Astro Boy (Iron-arm Atom, in the original) but instead should be a black cuckoo. Though what exactly that kind of cuckoo looked like, I couldn’t tell you.
This was the age when the Tokyo Giants—under their manager, Tetsuharu Kawakami—ruled. Their home ground, Korakuen Stadium, was always sold out. Their corporate owner, the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper group, used game tickets as a major sales strategy, and worked hard to increase newspaper sales. The Giants sluggers Sadaharu Oh and Shigeo Nagashima were national heroes. I passed by kids on the street who proudly wore their Giants baseball caps. But a kid wearing a Sankei Atoms cap was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps those brave few who did were seen stealthily slinking down back alleyways, furtively weaving their way under the eaves. My gosh—where is there any justice left in the world?
But whenever I had free time (and back then I was free most of the time), I’d walk over to Jingu Stadium and silently root for the Sankei Atoms by myself. They lost much more often than they won (probably losing about two-thirds of their games), but I was still young. As long as I could stretch out on the grass past the outfield, have some beers, and watch the game, occasionally gazing aimlessly up at the sky, I was pretty happy. I’d enjoy it when the team won the odd game, and when they lost, I’d console myself with the thought that it’s important in life to get used to losing. They didn’t have bleachers in the outfield then, just
