Béisbol

Last Saturday I traveled to Santiago with five other people, mainly to take in a Dominican league baseball game. The Dominican league lasts from November to February and constists of six teams. The closest to us is Las Ágilas del Cibao, which play about two hours away from us in Santiago, the second largest city in the country. We left late Saturday morning on a Caribe Tours bus (quite comfortable actually) which got us to Santiago in the early afternoon. We found our hostel pretty easily (due to my amazing leadership skills) and then spent a while relaxing and just getting settled. After a bite to eat in the neighborhood it was time to make our way to Estadio Cibao. The stadium was a little ways away so we had to take some form of transportation to get there. After getting off the gua gua (a public bus, but not what you are used to seeing) at the wrong place we eventually found a taxi that took us right to the stadium. This misstep, of course, had nothing to do with my leadership, but can only be blamed on the other members of my group. Anyway, we got there right about the 7:30 game time and were immediately bombarded by scalpers. Since I don´t even like scalping in the US if I don´t have to, I suggested we play it safe and buy from the ticket booth. The scalpers claimed we would only find bad tickets at the booth, but I thought to myself, "self, this stadium only holds 15,000 people, how bad can the worst tickets be?" So we got the 120 pesos ($4) tickets from the ticket booth and ended up on the first baseline about twenty rows up. Not too bad. Perhaps the greatest thing about the game was when we entered the stadium we were immediately handed free cups of rum from a woman in some sort of skimpy cat suit type of costume. It was baffling to say the least. The play on the field was also pretty decent and the home team won 6-5, so it was a good atmosphere for us nonpartisans just looking to have a good time. Among the players were some lesser known current Major Leaguers, as well as former Major Leaguer and Tacoma Tiger Luis Polonia, and Felix Fermin who was managing Las Ágilas. All in all, it was a great experience and definitely something I´d like to do again if I have another opportunity.






Jen, Me, Anthony at the game














Julie, Estelle, Jen, and Anthony

Luis Polonia

Julie and Rebecca on the bus, being uncooperative as I was trying to take a picture