Anime Crossroads Writeup

[rax]

Doing this now because otherwise I never will, here are some thoughts about the small anime con I just attended:

• Got asked early on by someone not in costume at all "Are you a furry?" I said "Uh, yeah" expecting a negative response and he said "Oh thank god I thought I was the only one, I keep seeing people in animal costumes who aren't furries." It sparked a conversation, which was pretty amusing. (I spent Friday and Sunday as a fox, and Saturday in full catgirl regalia including spots painted on my arms. [0])
• Watched two anime that were new to me: Ouran High School Host Club (want to see the rest now; the first two episodes were better than I had expected from what I had heard about it, although still kinda eye-rolly in places) and Hetalia Axis Powers (I walked out in the middle, I do not understand why anyone watches this show. OK that's unnecessarily harsh it made me laugh a couple of times. I do not understand why it is the Next Big Thing).
• Was encouraged to run a cat ear making workshop; am not sure I will be in town next year (it's moving to December 16-18, what the hell?) but apparently that would get me in for free which would be pretty cool, and I could teach people to make cat ears, which would also be pretty cool. So maybe? Definitely, while the cosplayers are amazing, this con had lower standards for animal ears than Anthrocon does. I would feel lame sauce bringing my homemade ears to Anthrocon, they would have been fine here.
• The best part for me was the "Iron Lolita" event, where teams of three (I got teamed up with two strangers, who it turned out were award-winning cosplayers with way more costuming experience than me) had an hour to make an Elegant Gothic Lolita dress (google that if you don't know what I mean) out of duct tape, newspaper, garbage bags, and balloons... in an hour. We came in third on largely arbitrary judging, but everyone made awesome dresses and so the placing didn't really matter other than meaning I got a DVD and some stickers. When I get photos I will post them, our dress turned out amazing!
• I got to play a bunch of go. Go go go go go go. I miss go. And chess. *nostalgia*
• The pokemon event was fun but kinda disappointing --- rather than being a huge pile of people trading and battling, it was mostly "let's all talk about Black and White and ask questions that would have been answered if people had been reading the LJ pokemon community or serebii or really anything" [1] and a trivia contest (I came in second, I won some keychains, whee!). This was not unfun because dude we talked about pokemon for two hours even my friends who like Pokemon won't let me do that with them. But I only got one battle and only got a couple of trades; although my pokedex is now at, like, 435? 436? So that's pretty amazing. Getting there!!! If it had been on Saturday instead of the last event of the con, I could have found the other serious people and met up with them later in the con. I suggested that to them for next year and they agreed --- scheduling was tight this year I guess, and something has to be last, after all.
• Found a remarkably good sushi place like a mile from the con; other than that, ate trail mix. SO MUCH TRAIL MIX. This time I brought trail mix without Goji berries and my life was not pain!
• Various people were providing maid service (mostly of things I couldn't eat) in a little lounge area, and trying to get into service/character with it, and most people were not obliging them. I hope I made a couple of them happy by (a) being able to put on formal roles and request and thank them for things properly and (b) tipping them, visibly, in such a way as to encourage others to do so as well. Certainly the smile on one of their faces when I thanked her for rice crackers in an elaborate way made me happy.
• For most people at the con who I got into major conversations with, anime seemed to be one of the main driving things in their lives, an organizing principle. I used to be more into it, but even when I was, it was never the top in my constellation of interests, and it shows in how many shows I just have not even heard of. This is neither good nor bad [2] it's just sort of a thing --- and of course, it may just seem that way because of course they want to talk mostly about anime at an anime convention, duh. Furry cons don't seem to work the same way though, I dunno.
• I got a bunch of reading done, although this week is still gonna be a little painful homework-wise. Relatedly, I think I'm done here. :)

[0] This fits pretty well with how I've been feeling lately when I check my speciesometer: "mostly kinda foxy but in a half-assed way, sometimes I AM A CAT YOU WILL TREAT ME AS SUCH." In case you, for some reason, care.

[1] ...on the basis of knowing more about (some subsets of) pokemon than the people at the pokemon panel I declare myself a serious pokemon dork and am unsure how I feel about this. That was not what I meant at all when I bought that game.

[2]  Well, it's good for me because I don't care about anime that much and if I did treat it that way I would not be happy with how I organized my life. And it's bad, or at least inconvenient, for me when I watch cosplay skits and I'm like "I don't know who any of those people are except Vulpix. Wait, I think that clown is in one of Skuld's icons or something. That probably means he's from One Piece, since he's not Sherlock Holmes."

Comments

[hao]

Got asked early on by someone not in costume at all "Are you a furry?" I said "Uh, yeah" expecting a negative response and he said "Oh thank god I thought I was the only one, I keep seeing people in animal costumes who aren't furries."
Lol, for some reason this is cute. I was expecting something negative too, before I got to the end of the sentence.

I don't get Hetalia's appeal either. I really don't. Even if everyone's in it to slash, they all look exactly the same. I don't get Ouran either, but that's probably because I hate harem/reverse harems and anime that take place in schools.

[picklish]

If you enjoyed the beginning of Ouran, it's totally worth watching all the way through. There are plenty of eye-rolls to be had, but it's a lot of fun.

[tixagon]

For most people at the con who I got into major conversations with, anime seemed to be one of the main driving things in their lives, an organizing principle. [snip] Furry cons don't seem to work the same way though, I dunno.

I think this could be explained fairly easily: For most of the folks I've met in furry, the furry subculture isn't a hobby, but rather a state of being; a lifestyle. A world separate from, but connected to our own. Furry Conventions are as much of a hobby to us as Burning Man is to hippies.

Anime has such a large world of media from which their fandom has spawned. Primarily, folks who attend Anime conventions are doing so because they are totally into a number of animes. There's a lifestyle for some, but that's not the primary focus of the convention.

I'm not explaining this as well as I had hoped to, partially because I am up past my bedtime, and just ate a huge plate of Indian. Soo.. sleepyy...

So uh, in conclusion, I feel that furries are people who sometimes wish they weren't, and anime nerds are people who get caught up in entrancing stories from a culture that interests lots of folks by itself.

[damerell]

Oh, god, not Ouran. All else aside, the scenario with the rich kids at the posh school patronising the kids who aren't from wealthy backgrounds - I got enough of that when I was 11, thanks - but beyond that it's just so crushingly obvious. A bit of genderplay can't save it.

ETA: I don't mind it so much if she wreaks revenge on the posh kids a la Hana Yori Dango...

[weirdquark]

I do not understand why it is the Next Big Thing

Oh, that's easy. It's because it's kind of funny* and is full of pretty boys that you can slash with each other.

*Which is why we watch it. It's also kind of interesting to look at all of the stereotypes about each country, and how it keeps having things that are historically accurate.

[tiamat360.livejournal.com]

New animes

Ouran is in fact a really fun show, and I also do not understand the obsession with Hetalia. You should definitely keep trying to watch Ouran.

[mmsword.livejournal.com]

Ugh. Hetalia. Otakon was full of it and I just can not stand it. Thankfully I could rely on its events to be huge draws and thus anything scheduled ACROSS from Hetalia was sure to be not as crowded, even if it was a fairly hot ticket item. Good time to hit the Dealer's room too.

[bossgoji.livejournal.com]

Hetalia is basically a series that makes light of one of the most horrific events in human history for the sake of racist humor and cheap, pointless yaoi. I seriously want to beat the shit out of people who can watch it with no irony whatsoever, shit is sickening.

[kelkyag]

Iron Lolita pictures are a must.

Properly appreciating the help and expressing it is difficult, and ~nobody in the US is taught that as an early skillset.

[cyborg-kitty100.livejournal.com]

anime seemed to be one of the main driving things in their lives, an organizing principle. I used to be more into it, but even when I was, it was never the top in my constellation of interests, and it shows in how many shows I just have not even heard of. This is neither good nor bad [2] it's just sort of a thing --- and of course, it may just seem that way because of course they want to talk mostly about anime at an anime convention, duh. Furry cons don't seem to work the same way though, I dunno.

So.... at furry cons people there are often not involved with furry at the level that it is a central organizing principle of their life?
Cuz that's kind of a relief.

Fan cons are generally intimidating because you worry that people are more than just interested in said topic, that it indeed is their prinicple interest. And yeah, it's hard to relate to that.



And I so challenge you to a game of go. Maybe 2.

And we demand pics.

[paxed.livejournal.com]

Hetalia. Ugh, no thanks. I prefer the "Scandinavia and the World (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ScandinaviaAndTheWorld)" comic strips by Humon.