It’s the bottom of the eighth inning. The Lotte Giants cheerleaders run out with pompoms raised, but the crowd doesn’t need a cue. Twenty thousand baseball fans are already on their feet, fists pumping the air, ready to sing in unison, “Busan seagull! Busan seagull! Deep down have you really forgotten me? Where are you now? Have you forgotten what I look like?”
Unlike, say, the Red Sox’s “Sweet Caroline,” Busan’s baseball anthem is a melancholy song written to a seagull — yet it’s also a declaration of loyalty to one of Korea’s most beloved teams. Nicknamed “The Seagulls” after Busan’s city bird, the Lotte Giants were the first club in Korea’s professional league to draw more than a million fans in a single season. Even with a modest record — only two series championships in decades of competition — Giants supporters pack Busan’s Sajik Stadium for nearly every game.
Young couples, families and groups of colleagues wearing orange-and-white jerseys rise to their feet for every chant, singing as if the outcome of the game depends on them. Beyond the main seagull anthem, the fan culture includes two more seagull-themed songs, “Sea Bird” and “Come Back to Busan Harbor.” Each player also gets a personalized walk-up song when stepping up to bat. Between bites of fried chicken and sips of soju, fans make DIY pompoms from newspaper strips and tie inflated orange shopping bags around each other’s heads.
They sing, “I am a white sea bird who has lost its mate,” but the mood in the stands is anything but sorrowful. The ritual blends nostalgia and humor, creating an atmosphere that turns every game into a celebration of community and local identity. For many residents of Busan, attending a Giants game is as much about belonging as it is about baseball: the songs, the homemade props and the shared chants reinforce a sense of place and continuity.
That sense of belonging extends beyond the stadium. Merchants around Busan sell team colors and makeshift fan gear, street vendors hawk game-day snacks, and groups gather before and after matches to share stories and predictions. The players, too, feed off this energy—each cheer and chant is a reminder that they represent more than a roster; they represent a city.
Although the Giants may not dominate the standings, their fan culture is an object lesson in how sports fandom can forge identity. The seagull songs—melancholic, playful and earnest all at once—capture a complicated affection: pride mixed with longing, rivalry blended with camaraderie. In Busan, baseball is both performance and ritual, a weekly event where memory, music and community meet under the stadium lights.