MIYAZAKI -- Kyushu, what a boulevard of broken sweat.
Rain, rain, rain all weekend, but when the sun came back out Sunday afternoon, the sticky air dared anyone who had felt the showers not even two hours before to prove it had been pouring almost nonstop since Saturday. So much for relief from the humidity.
Heavy rains nearly turned the All-Star Break into the All-Star broken, but the skies finally closed shortly after lunchtime (was it the third or fourth bowl of tonkatsu ramen?), giving waterlogged fans, hotel-bound journalists and cooped-up players alike hope that Sun Marine Stadium would see some baseball before the Giants come back in February.
And sure enough, it worked out.
No doubt the humidity and the raging waters throughout Miyazaki Prefecture shook up some of the locals, but even for the guy who showed up with a Yomiuri Giants hat underneath his Hanshin Tiger ears -- a victim of fashion, if not of flooding -- it definitely was time for some ball.
Taiko drummers, the World Baseball Classic championship trophy and a Marshall amplifier sitting on Sun Marine's all-grass infield seemed to indicate that Miyazaki finally was ready to party, Sanyo All-Star Series style.
The afternoon celebration, a turtle sundae to the dull scones of Jingu Stadium's pregame scene at Friday's All-Star opener, rolled on, with a bizarre, bilingual a capella group taking the stage after the drummers finished their show.
And as the humidity climbed, making the air expand even faster than the crowd, writers began to take refuge in the air-conditioned press box, while fans worked out the cheapo plastic fans NPB's Sanyo Girls distributed.
The field was in delicate shape, getting worked over by groundskeepers even as performers rehearsed for their pregame performance. Thank heavens the game was being played in Miyazaki, instead of on the all-dirt infields at Koshien or Hiroshima. With that much rain, the only thing happening on those fields this weekend would have been mud wrestling.
Players hopped buses for a nearby indoor facility to take batting practice, and fans started filling out Sun Marine's 30,000 seats, jockeying for position when the All-Stars did return.
But through it all, there was Kyushu: chilly in the winter, oppressive in the summer and wet in a thunderstorm. Home of the Hawks, who rule the island's passionate baseball fans, but down the coast in Miyazaki, Harry the Hawk didn't get any more love from the fans than Hoshey the BayStar or any of the other mascots circulating among the crowd.
And when players bussed back to Sun Marine, the fans had a final bout of cheering before settling in for a night everyone who had spent the previous day and a half under roofs and umbrellas deserved: a dry night, a warm night, a Kyushu night.
But more importantly, a night of baseball.