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AnimeNEXT 2007
July 6 - 8
Day One
Kitty Tomoyo
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Friday morning was spent doing all the things you do to get ready for a con: eat breakfast, wash your face, brush your teeth, drive yourself crazy trying to put violet colored contacts into your eyes, you know the drill. I never get a hotel for AnimeNEXT, and I'm not a big fan of changing in convention center bathrooms, and really, the Kitty Tomoyo dress wasn't *that* obviously a costume, it just has little wings on the back for flair! So I wore my costume on the bus ride to the Queens Center Mall to meet Skye, where we caught the subway to Port Authority, where we caught the bus to the convention center. |
Andrea as Aeris Gainsborough |
As usual, Skye and I had our moments of panic going, "Is this the right bus? We're going to get lost! We're going to be late!" that was, of course, unfounded, and we saw the usual throngs of cosplayers as soon as we got near to the convention center. As usual, the line for registering at the con was INSANELY shorter than the line to pick up your badge if you preregistered. Skye left to go change into her costume (not sharing either my aversion of convention center bathrooms nor my acceptance of weird looks on the subway; plus her costume was more eye-catching) and Louis found me while I waited in line. He's lucky; he puts on a coat and a wig and he's Vash. (Of course, he's unlucky in that that coat and that wig make it about 500 degrees hotter for him. Poor man.) |
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The best Death Note group I saw all weekend. |
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Our main event for the day was making sure we met up with Tony K for our photoshoot at three o'clock. We did, and it went wonderfully, although Skye and I got bitten up (for me, even through a pair of stockings!) by the mosquitos that apparently LIVE to bite cosplayers in the--grass. But between the flower beds, the rather large lawn, and the stairs, we got some lovely photos. |
Chris as Fireball Luigi |
The shoot itself was a blast, Tony's a good sport who never minded when I ran off right after the shutter clicked so I could go greet whichever friend had just walked by. Skye was a good sport for putting up with Louis continually repositioning himself so he could have the best view of...her...possible. Louis was a good sport for not killing me after I stole his Vash gun, snuck up behind him, and pulled the trigger...only to have the damn thing fall apart in my hands! The look on my face must've been priceless. (Luckily--for me--it's fixable.) |
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Carrie as Tohru from Fruits Basket |
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Most of the rest of the day was spent taking a tour through the Dealer's Room, which produced my one major gripe of the con: apparently, you were not allowed to bring any kind of bag, other than your "freebie" bag they gave you with your badge, into the Dealer's Room. Nor was there any sort of bag check, and they swore that there hadn't been a bag check last year, although neither my, Skye's, nor Louis's memory confirmed this. So basically, if you had any kind of bookbag or purse, you were S.O.L. We "solved" this by Louis graciously giving up his first turn through the Dealer's Room so he could sit outside and watch our bags, as Skye was only coming for the one day anyway. |
DJ Ranma S as Time Jump Shikamaru Nara |
Actually, I should go on a bit about that. Skye brought up a very good point: I'm willing to bet a fair amount of people, maybe not the majority but still a good amount, come to AnimeNEXT for the day. Which means that, without a hotel room to leave their things in, they would have no other bag check, and then would be faced with the choice of either leaving their bag unattended--which I can't see anyone doing--or missing out on the Dealer's Room entirely...which might be their main reason for going. Especially if they didn't find out they couldn't get into their main reason for attending until AFTER they had bought their non-refundable badge. |
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The gorgeous Sheli-chan! |
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Skye, herself, goes to AnimeNEXT for two sole reasons: an opportunity to wear the ridiculous outfits I buy her (heh), and to shop for anime-related fluff in the dealer's room. And it's not that hard to find anime-related fluff online. The last day of the con, I actually went to the talk-back session, and asked them about this decision, and the lady running the session seemed to think that this No-Bags policy would be enforced at every anime convention in 2007. I can't speak for any of the ones I didn't go to, but I can tell you that this was not the case at Otakon, a mere two weeks later.
But, whatever. Moving on. |
Axel and Roxas from Kingdom Hearts II. |
We made a few more rounds, making sure to find Oshidori, since our costumes were the lovely work of her lovely hands, and I wanted to make sure she got to see them in person, and ended up knocking off early, because we would be seeing Transformers in theaters for the first time that summer. So all in all we only spent a few hours at the con, but it was a good beginning.
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The ladies LOVE Vash. |
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