Posted By Chase Lambin
November 22, 2008 -

Former Mets minor leaguer and NYFS favorite Chase Lambin just returned from a one week tryout in Japan for Bobby Valentine's Chiba Lotte Marines. The Great Lambino has consented to let NYFS publish his journal of the experience, the tryout and the journey. It's a great look into the life of a baseball player, the Japanese baseball experience, and a couple of Mets fan favorites. NYFS will present Chase's journal in several segments over the next week. Here's part two:

Sunday November 2nd

I wake up at 6 a.m. and CANNOT get back to sleep. It might have something do with it being 4 p.m. back home! I get up, write some in my travel letter, and decide to wake Gary up to go explore our neighborhood and maybe find a place to eat breakfast. We start walkin in a random direction hoping we find the town square we ate at last night. We stumble into a bakery and ask if they serve breakfast. The girl freaks out, waves her hands, and runs into the back. I think they get flustered when they don’t know what we are saying. She comes back out and we act out the universal eating motion, she must have thought we were motioning to eat her children, because she ran away again. Damnit! By the grace of god, a man inside the café says, "can I help you?" Oh great, someone who speaks English! He was very nice and asks what we were doing in Makuhari. We informed him we were with the Chiba Marines and he freaks out too. These people are too funny.

The man kindly asks if he can take us to a coffee shop that serves breakfast. We adamantly say yes. We follow him and get to know him a little better. His name is Kobyashi (like the hotdog eater). He takes us thru a beautiful park and on to the train station (which is where all the restaurants are). We end up in a really cool little coffee shop with good pictures of food for me to point at. The service was like a five star restaurant! These people take great pride in whatever they do, and are extremely respectful. I get a Crouqe Monsieur with a coffee and it was delicious. We chat with Kobyashi, asking him tons of questions about his country and his language. He was so informative and kind. We wrap up breakfast and head back home as he points out the movie theater, the convention center, and all the other buildings around town. He lets us ride his little bike, which made for a pretty funny photo op (everyone rides bikes).

We cross thru the park again and decide to check out the "Kids Castle." A sweet little playground for kids with bike ramps, zip lines, and massive jungle gyms. Everybody in the park is playin catch, they LOVE baseball. Kobyashi tells the kids we play for the Marines and they of course freak out. We take pictures with all the kids and I say the one word I’ve learned so far, "arigato", which means "thank you". We head back to the apartment and part ways with Kobyashi after exchanging cell phone numbers and email information. What a great guy!

Now for the one downfall of Japan. Like I said before, the bathrooms are in a community building across the street, and I really had to go. I walk into the bathroom and get really confused. There is a hole in the ground with some porcelain around it, and that’s it! "What? No toilet to sit on?" The most technologically advanced country in the world, and I have to squat like a bear in the woods. You gotta be shittin me! (no pun intended). Not only is it VERY uncomfortable, but it has the potential to be a VERY messy experience. I’ll save you the graphic details. Lets just say, it’s a good thing I’m a good athlete.

Since we have the day off, we want to go see the sites of Japan. We call Go and ask him to take us to Tokyo. We jump on a train and head West for about 30 minutes and we are smack dab in the middle of Tokyo. After hopping on a few subway cars we arrive at some major square which I still don’t know the name of. (Our interpreter Go, is good at interpreting and nothing else, he is a lousy tour guide) We start walkin and Go keeps asking us where we want to go. Gary says, "ummmm, believe it or not dude, we’ve never F---in been here." We aimlessly wander around taking in all the huge jumbo-tron advertisements, the MOBS of people and the overall vibe of the city. It’s a lot like New York City. Lots of hustle and bustle, tons of retail stores and restaurants. The thing that stood out the most for me were the people. Fashion must be very important to them, because out of the 1 million people I saw, not ONE was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt.

Every girl wore a dress or skirt, and every guy wore a suit or some kind of designer outfit. And not ONE fat person! It was really amazing. The people watchin was off the charts. So we inform Go we would like to eat some local grub. We walk and walk and walk, until I say, "Go, I’m freakin starving!" He says, "Where would you like to eat?" ARGHHH...your killin me Go! We somehow end up at a MEXICAN restaurant and I have a Quesadilla! What’s wrong with this picture? After eating we buy a couple souvenirs for our loved ones and start headin back to the train station.  While on the train I start fading. The jet lag is starting to catch up to me and I cant wait to get back to the apartment. I crash as soon as we get back, around 7:30 p.m. I slept thru dinner and woke up at midnight, wide-awake. Luckily, I get back to sleep a couple hours later and sleep till 8:30 the next morning.

Monday November 3rd

So I receive a call in the morning from Go saying my paper work hasn’t been processed by MLB and the NPB (Nippon Professional Baseball), therefore I can't practice with the team. ARGGHHH! My status check has to go thru the Marlins, MLB, the NPB, and all kind of other people before I’m cleared to practice. So Gary heads to the park while I’m left to twiddle my thumbs. I decide to check out my neighborhood and grab a bite to eat. I walk in a different direction than usual and end up on the main street of the residential area of Makuhari. I stumble onto a little café, perfect! It obviously has an automated door (just like everything else), so I patiently stand in front of it waiting for it to open. Nothing! I stand there looking inside until a local came by and waved his hand in front of the sensor on the side of the door. What happened to push and pull doors? I finally get in and take a seat at the counter. They too have great pictures and I order eggs, sausage, toast with Jam, and a coffee. It was perfectly wonderful with impeccable service as always. I cannot get over how much attention these people have for detail.

After breakfast I decide to stroll down the main street. I’ve never wished for Sara to be with me more than while I was walkin down that street. She would have LOVED it. Everything is within walking distance. Super cool restaurants, boutiques, barbershops, ice cream parlors, florists, toy stores, banks, post offices, produce stands, grocery stores, everything a small town would have, but every one was immaculate. I love seeing the culture thru the prism of a local and not a tourist. No one was trying to sell me anything, and no one paid any attention to me. Everybody just goes about their business.

I picked up a few more gifts for the fam and was headin back to the apartment when I stumbled onto a sandlot baseball game. I watched for a minute and took a few pics of the little kids playing baseball with so much joy. I couldn’t help but jump in and take a few hacks. I kindly ask if I can join them and inform them I am with the Marines. They get REALLY excited and this one little girl about 7 says to me in the cutest little voice, "Hello, my name is Aria, it is so nice to meet you, what is your name?" I tell her my name is Chase and that she speaks wonderful English. I tell them I am from Texas. She and her father look at me funny so I squat down and draw the sate of Texas in the dirt. There eyes light up, "AHHH TEXAS! United State!" How cool, the outline of Texas is recognized in Japan! So I dig in at the plate and crush a tennis ball about 200 feet and the kids go bonkers.

All the kids in the park come running over to shake my hand and say hello. I hit a few more balls and run the bases while the little guys try to tag me out. It was pure joy for all of us. It makes me appreciate what I do, and why I work so hard at it. Just as I’m about to take my last swing I receive a call from Go. "Bobby wants you here at the park." I say good-bye and "arigato", and start walkin to the stadium.

After arriving at the park, I am shown the locker room and told to get dressed and join the team outside since they have already started stretching and warming up. I get ready in a hurry and run out to the field ready to rock. As soon as I get out there, some front office guy says I can’t practice because of the paper work situation. Bobby comes over to figure out what’s going on and DOES NOT want to hear what this guy has to say. He is flat out pissed, and tells him where to shove it. I’m just standin there wonderin what the heck is going on. Long story short, I have to go back inside and change back into my street clothes and watch practice. Which I did, but at least I got to stand around with Bobby and talk baseball while the team ran thru their drills. Bobby told me I would get to take some swings and field some groundballs once the team was off the field.

Once the team started to wrap up practice I head BACK in and change again. I do a quick stretch on my own and it’s my turn. Bobby says, "Jump in there and take some swings!" By "some", he must have meant 500! I hit and hit and hit while 30 coaches, players, and front office personnel watched me. No pressure! I could barely breath from all the swings and he says, "Go take a few grounders at SS." By "a few", he must have meant 100! I felt really good at Short, and was firing the ball across the infield with what little energy, wind, and strength I had left. For all of you who have never takin groundballs by yourself, it’s pretty darn tiring. So I’m doin my best not to show I’m winded and Bobby says, "Go take a couple grounders at third base." By "a couple", well, you get the picture. My mind was feeling great, but my legs and lungs where not on the same page! I was battling to keep my feet moving and my throws strong.

After taking a couple more dozen at third I’m starting to feel dizzy. Bobby says, "Go take a couple out in Left Field." I’m starting to panic! These guys are gonna have to kill me before I say I’m tired, and I think they have a pretty good chance in succeeding. At one point I gave myself about a 50/50 chance of blacking out. I do not recommend catching fly balls with little stars and dots floating around in front of your face. Bobby finally calls off the dogs after I run down 30 or 40 fly balls in the gap and down the line. Of all the baseball I have played, I have never been more gassed on a baseball field in my life! It was 100% balls out for damn near an hour. I did my best and hope they take into consideration that I’m not a Kenyan, and that I had a smile on my face most of the time.

After practice we grub in the cafeteria (great food by the way) and me, Gary and Go head home. While walking home with Go I mention how miserable it is to use the restrooms in Japan. I ask how they get used to squatting every time to go number 2. He starts dying laughing! He was just joking with me and never thought I would actually believe him! "You son of a bitch Go!" He got me good. Once we get home I found our toilet in a little hidden room. This thing looked like something out of a Star Trek movie. It had an arm coming off the side of it with 10-15 buttons in Japanese writing. How can a toilet do 15 different things? It kinda scared me and took me till the end of the week to build up the nerve to see what the buttons did. More on that later.

While I’m examining the toilet, Gary checks his email and sees a message from Kobyashi (our friend from the first morning).  He politely asks if he and his family could take us out to dinner. We call him and tell him we would love to. We meet him and his family at 7 p.m. by the train station. His wife and daughter are just as nice as he is, and both speak good English. His daughter is actually an English major (she has studied abroad in the UK and has an English accent, pretty funny). They take us to a Korean BBQ restaurant. Doesn’t sound very good. Boy was I wrong! It was a super cool little Asian restaurant were you have your own little room, you take off your shoes and sit down at this little table. In the middle of the table is a little circular grill where you cook your own food! Kobyashi orders for us and out comes a motorcade of meats, vegetables, rice and soups. It was a collage of meats from various parts of the cow that were served raw in little bite size strips. You just place the desired meat in the middle and flip it over whenever you want. The meat was accompanied by an Asian BBQ sauce that tasted more like soy sauce then the BBQ sauce we are accustomed to back home.

Kobyashi and his family started laughing when I was literally moaning out loud because the food was so good. The beef melted in your mouth. We cooked the vegetables too, carrots, onions, zucchini’s, and some other veggies I’m not familiar with. But they were all delicious. We ate and ate until our bellies where about to pop. We finished the meal off with some green tea ice cream, what an amazing meal! The only thing better then the meal was the company. Kobyashi and his family are amazing people. They ask the most thoughtful questions.

I told them all about Texas and explained how hunting works. They were blown away. I showed them pictures from my cell phone. They couldn’t believe it. Japan doesn’t have guns in any form (only the military has firearms.) So you can imagine their mouths hangin open as I explained "putting food on the table" Texas style!

They helped us with more Japanese words and wanted to hear all about our families and fiancés (Gary got engaged this summer also). We chatted for hours and damn near closed the restaurant down. Gary and I thanked the Kobyashi’s, said goodnight, and crashed as soon as we got home. What a great night!

- Chase In Japan: Part 1