No kidding. But the logic seemed to be that I wanted something exotic and that allowed me to go as far away from New York as possible, even if it was just for a few months. Kind of ironic given that I spent a great deal of time learning both French and Italian around that age in my actual life.
Ha. My dad grew up going to games at Yankee stadium. though it was obviously the original. Baseball is a huge thing on his side of the family.