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Okay ya'll, this will probably be not so long of a con report,
as I was only there for half of a day. I first heard of this con a
week before it was to take place, while I was waiting for the air-
conditioner in my truck to get fixed. (It has been dead for a
good year and a half at least, Im used to no air conditioning
because I work in the sun in the summer, and my dorm also has
no a/c, and so anyway, after a lot of procrastinating, I finally got
it fixed.) Where was I now...? Oh yes- waiting for my truck to
have the a/c fixed, and my constant companion Frank and I
went looking around in the local comic shop to see if anything
new or interesting had popped up (it hadnt, of course.
Typical.). Anyway, not to digress, Frank called my attention to
Ye ol AnimeFEST flyer. It sounded *really* interesting...
unfortunately school started in something like 2 days, which
would plant me firmly 192 miles away from the con. (Is it just
me, or is this con report starting to sound like a really bad
drama/soap opera? On prime time TV tonight: AnimeFEST
Con Report - The movie: The story of a poor college student
and his struggle to cross 192 miles of the East Texas Desert in
time to find a friend and to travel another 58 miles the next day
to Dallas to go to AnimeFEST 2001. Run time 42 min, rated
TV-BS for explicit levels of unadulterated schlock.)) Anyway,
before anyone reading this storms off in complete disgust, Ill
speed things along up to the con. 1) Frank couldnt go to the
con. 2) I called another friend, Bryan, who also likes anime, and
he said he could go. 3) I drove home the next weekend Friday,
to go to the con Saturday, and we left for the con to get there
about 2 in the afternoon. Ok, so we get to the con, and find a
close parking space which in retrospect, is quite astonishing
really, that we didnt have to pay and park in the parking garage.
(you know, wouldnt it be really funny if all of you read through
this entire thing wanting to know about animefest, and instead I
give so many other inane details about stuff not quite pertaining
to what actually went on at it? No? *I* think it would be
funny...at least until Herr Editor called and wanted to have a
"few words" with me. *shudder*) Ok, so anyway, we go into
the hotel, and the con is on the second floor. (the first floor
ceiling goes all the way up to the top of the second floor, and the
second floor has a balcony, where you can look down on part
of the first floor. There was a wedding reception on the first
floor, right where you could look down on them from the
balcony. (This has given me some nice ideas about my wedding.
I want it held someplace like this one, where there just happens
to "coincidentally" be a con of some sort. And if the groom just
also happens to "coincidentally" disappear for the majority of it,
oh well... Besides, weddings/wedding receptions are like 95%
for the bride anyway, so who will even notice if the groom goes
AWOL?) (Also, Ive come to the conclusion that the music at a
wedding reception sucks. I want hard rock and heavy metal at
mine.) (Why do I have this unexplainable feeling that none of the
above will slide, no matter how convincingly I present my
arguments, or try to sneak around her back?) So anyway, we
go upstairs and find the registration desk. Registration for a
Saturday only pass was $30, I believe. (it included a Boa
concert ticket). On the plus side, we got these really nice
thingies that go around ones neck and each has a clip on the
end with which to attach your con badge. Thus endowed with
our passes, we made a B-Line for the Dealers Room. The
dealers room was to die for. We spent probably 4 to 5 hours
in it, and we were still finding new things to drool over. There
was, of course, lots of anime, new and used tapes and DVDs to
buy. There was lots of anime related paraphernalia: music
soundtracks, comic books, normal books, posters, wall scrolls,
action figures, toys, trading cards, etc. There were also lots of
Japanese imports: pop music, manga, Japanese versions of
video games and the like, Japanese clothing, magazines, etc.
One vendor was selling original Japanese anime on DVD,
completely in Japanese, for region 2 DVD players. (I just
happen to have a region 0 dvd player, which plays dvds from all
regions). I was sorely tempted to get one or two of those,
except that I can't read, speak, or understand Japanese, and
also they were $60 a pop. I set myself a $100 limit, including
the registration price, and amazingly, I stuck to it. (Bryan set
himself a $150 limit, and I do believe he exceeded it.) Overall, I
left the con with 2 posters in Japanese from Sorcerous Stabber
Orphen, 1 Japanese Anime magazine which I can't read but it
has nice pictures and looks cool if I casually leave it laying about
the room, a set of postcards from Kareshi Kanojo No Jiyo, and
the original release Boa CD. (Boa is a British band that first
became popular in Japan because one of their songs was used
as the opening song for a popular series, Serial Experiments
Lain. The CD is Japanese release, and is about half in Japanese,
and half in English.) There was one Kenshin wall scroll that was
REALLY nice, but Bryan found it first, and of course they only
had one of them. Bryan also bought some miscellaneous anime,
a postcard set, the wall scroll, and a few Chinese movie DVDs.
I came darn close to buying some anime on DVD, I just didnt
for some reason... guess I didnt really feel I needed it. After
several hours in the dealers room, we left to go check out some
of the other events. There was a panel on making [anime]
costumes on a Wal-Mart budget that we missed because we
were drooling in dealers room. There was another panel that
sounded particularly amusing about "People needed for Anime
Hell." It was to begin around 10 oclock after the Boa concert.
We also went and checked out the Anime rooms. Most cons
have 1 room devoted specifically to showing anime 24 hours a
day for the length of the con. This con had 3 anime
THEATERS, devoted to anime 24 hours a day. They had Big
Screens and Surround Sound. Most of it was stuff we had
never heard of, although some of it looked fairly entertaining. In
no particular order, we wandered around some, perused the
dealers room some more, etc, and finally left to go get food.
Before I talk about food though, Id like to mention the
costumes while Im thinking about it. Most were of the Sailor
Moon variety (*shudder*), there were a few miscellaneous ones
I couldnt place, a person dressed up like Kenshin, and a girl
dressed up as Vash the Stampede from Trigun. On the whole
though, the costumes were very nice looking and well done
(even the Sailor Moon ones, though it pains me to admit
anything related to Sailor Moon being good). Ok, back to food.
We left the hotel in search of food, and went aimlessly
wandering around Dallas. We finally found where the
restaurants were and decided on Thai food. (Almost went for
Japanese, but neither of us had had Thai, and we wanted to try
it) We went in, and ordered food, etc, yadda yadda yadda,
(youve eaten before, you know how these things work). I
ordered a spicy dish, got a 3 out of 5, and it wasnt that spicy,
so next time I shall try a 4. Bryan was a wuss, and ordered a 2.
Thus fed, we went back to the con to go wait in line for Boa
concert. Its a good thing we started waiting about 40 min early,
cause the line was already waaaay long. Of course they started
late. At one point I wanted to see how long the line was, and
had to walk across half the hotel. The line was probably 200-
300 yards long. Thats a lot of people. Eventually they started
letting people in. Everyone was acting like a sheep and
following the person in front of them, even though they were
saying that there were still seats up near the front. Bryan and I
got 8th row seats, and could have had 3rd row, but we wisely decided that
sitting directly in front of the speakers might not be the wisest course of rectitude. The
concert was late in starting because of a power problem. All of Boas amps were European, which means
they run on 220 volts (I think) and we run on 120 volts (dont quote me on this), and they
were having a problem of a distinct lack of the power converter things. Anyway, finally
it started, they were short by one member, their keyboard player had disappeared and they didnt
know where he was. As far as things go, it was a neat concert. (Mind you Ive only been
to one other concert, which was seeing Roger Waters of Pink Floyd summer before last, so now Ive
seen a really old British band, and a really young one, which Im sure has left me with some
twisted ideas about what goes on at a concert.) Anyway, it was a good concert, we got an encore
out of them, and during the concert they were giving out free band photos and CD singles. (I
got a photo, Bryan got a photo and a CD). We were going to go to the Anime Hell panel, but we
were both feeling really tired and so decided to call it a night. The wedding reception was
still going... I wonder what they thought of the rock concert going on above their heads. Anyway,
we left, and on the way back home got thoroughly lost (Dallas Highways SUCK!) We were going
west, and next thing we knew we were going east, and we were on the same road. It was
really confusing. Also Bryan chose this time to inform me that he hadnt gassed up the car in
a while, and we were running low. Eventually we did make it home, where I shambled off to
bed and passed out. On the whole, it was a really good con, and I look forward to going
back next year.
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