I came to Korea in March 2010 to work on an engineering and construction project. The plant is built now and Thursday 2nd May was my last day at work. It’s possible that my next job might be in Korea too, but in the way that things work in my industry I won’t know for a while.
In the meantime Jen and I decided to hang on in Korea for a week or two and take the opportunity to fill our days with reserve team baseball in the middle of nowhere. It’s what you’d all do given the chance. Right?
Hanwha Eagles play their Futures League games at the Seosan Baseball Training Centre. Or at least some of them. I watched their first team play a pre-season friendly at Cheongju a couple of years ago and I’m fairly sure that they use that stadium now and again too.
We took a de-luxe bus from Seoul Central City terminal. For those of a statistical mind, it left at 10.20am, covered the 127km in an hour and fifty minutes and cost 10,800 won. From Seosan bus terminal we took a cab to the baseball centre. The taxi driver knew straightaway where we wanted to go once Hanwha Eagles were mentioned. I think a mime of swinging a baseball bat might just have been enough.
There are hills all around.
The players were on the field stretching when we arrived. A few of them shouted “Hello” and “How are you?”. We just needed “You are handsome gentleman!” to complete the set.
There were thirty people or so watching, I didn’t see any WAGs which is unusual at these games, there were a couple of families but it was mainly single blokes. Whenever a ball went into the stand, whoever caught it would keep it. That’s a long-standing tradition at the proper KBO games, but at this level it’s generally tossed back.
Seosan Baseball Training Centre.
Both teams rattled through their innings quickly, but by the end of the fifth it was still 0-0 with starting pitchers Lee Seok Jae and Song Chang Hyun having given up just the two hits apiece at that stage.
SK broke the deadlock in the seventh when with the bases loaded a hit to mid-field allowed two of them to get home.
The scoreboard.
We left them to it shortly after that as we had to catch a bus to go and do some hiking. On the way out we were given a ball of our own by one of the players who wasn‘t taking part. I’m a bit old for that sort of thing so passed it on to a small kid on the subway the next day.
Another two runs were scored after we left with SK eventually winning 3-1.
Trail of the Lion King 
May 11, 2013 at 9:31 pm |
would you get another job soon please, trying to keep up with this rash of posts is bloody tricky for the rest of us non shirkers
May 12, 2013 at 10:21 pm |
They are mercifully short these days so that’s a help. I’d recommend just lookin at the photos. Anyway, I was at my last football game yesterday, backlog of four more posts to write and that’s the lot. It’s looking like South Africa next.
May 18, 2013 at 10:04 am |
That’s the place they live behind bars and only the ignorant idiots from Teesside wander off to the pub. I think I’ll give you a few months to suss it before nipping over for a visit.
May 21, 2013 at 8:01 pm |
I’ll have a dozen more Blesbok heads by then,