Day One

Day One’s activities started pretty early in the morning. Our main objective right then and there was to get to the Hyatt for early check in, get our stuff into the Hotel, and get to opening ceremonies by way of the ticket booth to pick up Hotel tickets. We arrived at our destination in very short order; I was rather surprised that traffic wasn’t so bad, since it was a work day during the early morning rush hour. First thing we did was unload our unprotected stuff we tossed into the back of my truck and anything that might possibly get ripped off or melted; everything else could wait ‘til later. Checking in didn’t take long at all either…overall, we were kicking some ass in this department. Too bad that didn’t last.

Loading up my camera gear we got to the ticket booth to find that the Hotel ticket line was nonexistent; however the premium ticket line was both large and as slow as it was last night. Having paid our time dues in the ticket line last night paid off, as we practically just walked up and got our hotel tickets with almost no wait. For myself, it was the SKIN concert; I wasn’t willing to brave moshing with the fangirls to get premium tickets…regardless of the fact I DO enjoy Gackt’s singing. One of the biggest problems of all previous Anime Expos was the fact that you’d have to wait in line for tickets during the convention proper. We thought for sure we’d dodged that f’n bullet this year, and for the most part we did. However, one has to remember…it’s not that one bullet with your name on it you have to worry about; it’s the few million more on it labeled, ‘To Whom It May Concern.’

We had some time to kill at this point. So I snapped a few pictures like this wonderful Suiseiseki. With such a lovely outfit, I expected her to show up at the Rozen Maiden gathering that occurred a couple of days later, but unfortunately this is the last time I saw this particular cosplayer.

I would like to mention a little episode that continues to bug me when I think about it. While walking up and down the line to take pictures, I stumbled across two rather cute girls dressed in EGL fashion. They didn’t speak a word of English…even so, I managed to get across that I wanted to take their picture and they were more than happy it seemed to have me do so. No problems so far, but then I handed out my card and tried to explain to them they could see and ask for larger versions of these pics later on (as the website was located on the card). Apparently there was some sort of mistranslation or miscommunication because one of their friends, quite rudely I might add (trust me, the tone of voice left no doubt as to the intentions of the speaker), told me, “Don’t do that again.” It was rather obvious this girl had only the barest minimum of understanding of English, if that, but even so…that was highly uncalled for. Still, I know how miscommunication can happen when you’re not quite sure what the other person is saying, so I’m not exactly seething with sith-like hatred about it, but I truly dislike the idea that something I said or did could have been taken THAT far out of context. Either that or perhaps that girl was just being a little bitch that day, I dunno. In the end, it doesn’t matter; it’s not like we’re likely to meet again or even remember this incident.

The line for the opening ceremonies was outside this year, and stretched well into the parking lot. This year AX had secured the arena for most of its main events; this turned out to be both a great blessing and a terrible terrible curse. One of the strangest situations we discovered was that every single main event taking place inside the arena was ticketed. Let me reiterate: EVERY SINGLE MAIN EVENT! The only exception to this was closing ceremonies. Opening ceremonies, on the other hand, was ticketed. As became the norm for this convention, AX staffers just walked up and down the line and handed us tickets. Later they’d be handing out tickets to main events all over the convention. If you wanted to see a main event this year, there was nothing stopping you…there was always plenty of seating. It’s just if you wanted REALLY GOOD seating, you were pretty well screwed unless you got premium or hotel tickets.

Opening Ceremonies was short and sweet. My new tripod worked beautifully and I had an excellent seat to film from. I really miss that for the past couple years, no one has come out and done any singing for us during opening ceremonies…it makes everything seem so plain without them. Still, there is a lot to be said about a short Opening Ceremonies…more time to do what you want at the convention.

Upon exiting the main arena area, we discovered one of the largest most damning problems that plagued this convention every single step of the way. Staff Pro was, by far, the singularly most fucked up thing about this convention. Staff Pro was the convention center staffing agency that anyone who uses the convention center is forced to use, and is doubly worse if you have the arena as they are granted far broader powers. I’ll let Mayhem elaborate more about certain aspects of Staff Pro specifically, since he’s been in the security industry, but let’s just say, these people were some of the stupidest down right meanest mouth breathing ASSHOLES I’d ever seen in my life, I shit you not. In this instance specifically they were directing people out, but not letting people cross through the arena hallway. This means that if you wanted to get back to the hotels or to the other side of the convention area, you had to walk half a mile or more around the arena or around the other half of the convention center, just to get back to the hotels or the dealer’s hall.

We chose to head around the convention center and check out the line to the dealer’s hall while we were at it. Another problem with this place is the lack of places to go to the bathroom. Or should I say not so much a lack as inconveniently placed in reference to lines and redirection of traffic. This resulted in myself walking up to the door of the building where many of the panels, as well as the entrance to the dealer’s hall, were to be held and asking the lady in uniform if I could go in and use the bathroom. Of course the answer was no…the blocking of any sort of foot traffic was to be the norm of this convention. I would also like to point out this lady in particular looked like they found a some career homeless old lady, pulled her right off the street, suck her in a uniform and just told her to say no to whoever asked her…well anything; teeth rotting out of her mouth, atrocious personal hygene, and all.

Okay, sure…minor inconvenience. Just had to walk about another quarter of a mile to the Hotel. We were headed there anyway to drop some of my camera gear off, but I’ll be damned if it didn’t seem further all things considered. As we walked we got a real chuckle out of how long the dealer’s hall line was. It actually started moving as we went along side it, to the great relief of those in line. One small problem: the line cut right across the traffic way between this part of the convention center and the hotel. With the way they had it roped off, one would have to walk all the way back and around the bottom of the raised area of the meeting halls, which is a helluva walk, especially after what we just did. Worse still, the line was not stopping, and didn’t look like it was going to stop any time soon. Asking the AX line attendant when he was going to stop the line so traffic could cross met first with a blank stare, then after it took about ten seconds to process, a rather dull, “No, go back.”

Yeah. Right. Sure. This sort of behavior got the fire department called, I heard. Regardless Mayhem simply asked our budding genius just how far he was supposed to walk to get back to his hotel and get his medication for his diabetes. To which that guy understandably turned white (a neat trick for a guy of his complexion) and went, “You didn’t tell me that!” Mayhem’s simple reply, as I’m rolling my eyes was, “I shouldn’t have had to.” He was right on that…seriously; some common sense goes a long fucking way. We should not have had to tell a guy to stop the line occasionally for through traffic. Finally, we got across the line and into the hotel to drop the camera gear off, and get whatever miscellaneous gear was left behind in the vehicles into the room as well.

Getting to this one location was like a scavenger hunt location finder in your average Dragon Warrior RPG. Finally, however, it was time to begin the con in earnest. For me, that means strapping on my camera and taking many pictures. First things first, however: I was going to go and grab a gift for the SKIN band, and drop it off at Renaissance Hotel at a predesignated point specified in the convention manual. Given that this was the first time many of them had performed here in the States, I wound up doing something I’d been threatening to do for Gackt since Literary Eagle first made me listen to his music. I walked over the Barnes & Nobles across the street and picked up a copy of the Blue Man Group’s concert DVD and took that to the drop off point, heh. I hope they all enjoyed it. Then it was off to take pictures in earnest.

First stop was through the artists alley section…if you could get through it. Here I found a rather odd item and one really cute Sasami showcasing and selling her art.

The line for the dealer’s hall had finally ceased to exist which enabled free access to anyone who wanted in immediately. I really didn’t have much of a list this year: an eight inch black Mokona, a slime from Dragon Warrior (Quest), maybe a Predaking box set or a couple of Soundwaves if they were cheap enough. Didn’t get a one of them, and I despair of getting any to be honest. I DID see a Dragon Warrior Slime Knight, but I wasn’t planning on grabbing him ‘til the end of the con and his price went down from the $50 they were charging for him. This turned out to be a bad idea, since the next time I went by that booth, maybe an hour later, it was gone.

As I was departing that booth for the first time, however, I noted a Haruhi cosplayer that looked extremely familiar, but I could not place her. The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya cosplay was a bit of a staple for this convention since all three of the female VAs were here this year, so she certainly wasn’t anything special in that regard. I also saw she was walking with what looked to be an AX security type escort…the kind they hand out to guests of honor when they go from one place to another. I didn’t really think much of it at the time; I mean, I see those guys every so often doing all sorts of things, like eating, shopping, or hanging out with some other people, that have nothing to do with any official capacity of Anime Expo. As I was going by the entrance to see about exiting the dealer’s hall (which turned out to be fruitless…they really needed more than one way out of this place) I saw her again with a Mikuru and a Nagato cosplayer and decided to stop and grab a pic myself.

I’m rather glad I did. It should have clued me on the way there seemed to be more than the norm of people who wanted to get their pictures taken WITH these young ladies. I didn’t realize, until after I snapped a shot, who they were. This was the ASOS Dan Brigade, and that particular Haruhi was Patricia Ja Lee. My geek license was officially revoked at that moment, and wasn’t returned until Comic Con when I paid a massive amount of money of a Sailor Saturn UFO catcher doll. In any event, there they were, pretty as you please, just hanging out in the dealer’s hall, getting their pictures taken, and seeming to have a lot of fun. They weren’t being mobbed, I didn’t see any AX gorillas running around, everyone who was there was being very courteous and giving them and everyone else lots of space. Everyone that I saw there got a turn to take a pic and/or get their picture taken with these girls. Of all the things in this convention, that ranked pretty f’n high on the kick ass ‘o meter. I was actually filled with something akin to pride at the behavior of everyone present.

Still, it was time to head up to the line for the SKIN concert, which should have been about to start seating. And what a line it was. It wrapped upon itself several times in front of the Arena at large, before winding its way nearly a half a mile into the parking lot bending around, and then back towards the Arena. Quite a number of these people had been here for hours in the hot sun already…little did they know they were going to be waiting even longer.

A few pics were taken in line before meeting up with a couple of friends who were already there, and we were quickly joined by Mayhem bringing some drinks. That’s when we discovered no cameras of any sort were to be allowed inside the Arena, nor any drinks, food, props, or bags (though I could be mistaken on the bags part). At an anime convention. Well, the camera thing we could all understand to an extent, though my personal opinion on that is if you’re at a convention like this, you forfeit all right to whatever you could possibly think you were protecting by being in such a public venue. Still, that’s not my call…yet. Found out later that entire camera thing was a miscommunication; they DID allow cameras just not VIDEO cameras…yes, I know what you’d be thinking at this point. Most cameras now adays have a video function; you’ll likely see the videos of those that did get their cameras past security on Youtube. Apparently there’s supposed to be a DVD later…we’ll see on that.

Mayhem had no interest in this band, so he gathered up all our camera gear to take back to the hotel room and departed. That’s when the reality of the situation set in that we were about an hour into seating and the line hadn’t moved, and we were going to cook. In fact, the line didn’t start to move ‘til another hour was up and it wasn’t until maybe two and half hours later that we finally got inside. I’m surprised that we weren’t carting people out of line in stretchers, it was so hot. I was pretty toasted myself at this point, being a white, slightly balding, Nordic bastard, and I know Gensao got himself a pretty decent tan there.

The concert didn’t wind up starting ‘til about three or four hours past the point it SHOULD have started. I’ll leave the details of that to the SKIN concert report I’ll do, but they still should have let people inside long before this; if only to keep them out of the heat. There are some rumors as to why this happened, but if a couple are true, I think Gackt, Miyavi, Ju Ken, Yoshiki, and Suigizo may be firing their manager in short order. Still, what can I say, but that the concert rocked? It was f’n awesome for the first concert appearance in the States by many of these guys…though perhaps a little too short. Several hours outside and 40 minutes of music, 2 songs of which they repeated? C’mon guys…that’s pretty weak. Momoi did that impromptu AFTER AX Idol without breaking a sweat.

I walked out of the concert not being able to hear anything for awhile. Gensao and myself were talking to each other at a rather high volume on our way out the door. Immediately we had to get in line for the AMV contest…problem is, with the lateness and schedule the way things were, not to mention what happened at the end of the concert, we were going to be waiting in line for awhile, and none of us had eaten.

With about eight or more people starving to death, we sent out a hunting party comprised of myself, Mayhem, and Navaash. Our first destination was Islands…which had about an hour wait even to order take out. Next destination was either of the pizza joints next to it…same there. Our only option was a bit of a walk to area next to the waterfront and getting some takeout there. We settled on a gourmet pizza place and just got hamburgers there for everyone. It took about an hour to get them all, but it was far better than waiting an hour to order anywhere else. Regardless, we had to get back in a hurry as there was no telling when that line was going to start moving. This was easier said than done, considering ol’ Mayhem had beaten his knee to death sometime earlier. Still, we managed to walk the mile or more back in pretty decent time…though during the walk we got the call we dreaded: “The line is moving.”

Hilariously enough, we got there with enough time to disseminate the food, and actually eat it. Though, several guys eating a warp speed in a moving line was something to see. Did I mention that there were no cameras aloud in the Arena again? For the AMVs? I’m thinking this was yet another miscommunication, seeing as how every single person there could go to AMV.org and grab copies of whatever they wanted at higher quality than what we were about to see on the screen.

We all got seated, though our group got broken up a bit due to the fact they handed out tickets to the audience in haphazard fashion. Tickets were assigned seating…for whatever reason only God probably knows. I mean, seriously, these tickets were ‘free’ for lack of a better term, why bother with worrying about what seats they pointed to? Ah well, it didn’t matter in any event. You see, of all the fucked up things that could possibly happen, what occurred next was so far into the fucked up range that it bordered on, if not crossed into, outright incompetence. The director of the AMVs gets up on stage, and informs us that someone got into his bag, and lifted the DVDs for all but one of the categories, so we’d only get to see one category, and of course, not be able to vote on anything. Now, I’m not going to call this guy a liar, outright. There seems to be some evidence backing up his story that there has been some…malcontent concerning the AMVs at the con for a few years in whatever passes for the higher ups in the SPJA. However, I’m also going to point out with the fact that the fucking AMVs not starting until fucking 11 pm, we had no time whatsoever to watch the entire show regardless. If Anime Expo wasn’t out of the Arena by midnight, they’d have to start paying Staff Pro double time, which could run into the high five figure mark. Either way, we just weren’t seeing it until Sunday, about 9:00 am at the theatre where they used to show these things. Still, if it was just a matter of you didn’t have enough time, they should have had the fucking testicles, and walked outside RIGHT after the fucking concert and told people the shit was rescheduled (which they SHOULD have done regardless).

So we went through the AMV TV category…it was actually a pretty good line up. Not stellar, but this year was overall, a nice line up of AMVs, and this category was a pretty good indication of the entire selection we’d see later. A few of the AMV creators had some of their own DVDs on hand, which was good, since we had a few minutes we could kill after the AMV TV category was shown, and we were treated to some AMVs we’d never see on the big screen like this in normal context. A couple reruns, some mediocre ones, nothing major.

I can say at this point I was not in what you’d call the best of moods. It was a slow simmering anger that seemed to permeate a good portion of the convention attendees overall to one degree or another. Still, it had been on helluva day, and it was time to end it. I had so hoped we’d paid whatever karmic debt had to be paid to keep the convention from being a total wash this first day; I couldn’t imagine how much worse it could get. Skuld, it seems, just hit puberty and was having her first time of the month. How much worse was it going to get? I was about to find out…we all did the following day.