Friday, August 24.
The first day of the Canadian National Anime Expo 2001! Two friends and I met up at the subway station to go to the convention...at 12:30. Keep in mind that the convention wasn't supposed to start until 4:00pm...so, *ahem* we were a little early *sheepish grin*. We went for lunch near Union Station in the St. Lawrence Market, which was a new experience already, since I'd never actually been inside there before ^^;. When we got to the convention (around 2:30) we found that there was already a massive line-up! I mean, at Anime North, there'd been a line-up for people getting tickets, but it hadn't been that long (and not that far in advance, either). Of course, we'd got there early to try and be one of the first 1000 people inside the con, so we could get a limited edition print.
I wore my white top, black skirt, pantyhose, black socks and hiking boots (complete with tinfoil armour plate) on the subway and brought the rest of it with me in a small backpack; I didn't want people on the subway to think I was a freak ^^;. I'm sure I looked odd with that piece of tinfoil on my boot, though. At the convention, while we were waiting in line, I assembled the rest of my gear. I hadn't told Yukito (Sioned) that I was coming in costume, so she was nicely surprised. I'm glad she knew who I was ^^;. While we were in line, someone actually asked me for my picture! That made the convention seem that much better (I'm afraid of how vain I must sound p-q) even though my expectations weren't that high. My friends both thought I'd done a good job, which also made me glad i put the effort into making one. I got a glimpse of a whole bunch of other people in costume as well, like an awesome costume one guy had on that consisted of branches and greenery highlighted by...kodamas!!! XD!!! There were also several other notable costumes, but I didn't take pictures at that point, since I didn't want to lose my place in line.
Anyway, we got our tickets (and our limited edition prints ^_^) and proceeded to enter...another line! This one was even larger (though by the time we'd got to the front of the ticket line, the line stretched quite a distance back). It was a line into the convention and eventually got moving (we were an hour early at that point, so it had been a very long wait), so we headed to the first show I wanted to see: "Gatchaman". Unfortunately, due to some technical difficulties, we eventually gave up and went to the Dealers' Room. I just about had a heart attack when I got off the escalator and saw the sheer size of it...but later foudn that it was a disappointment after all. It was horrendously organised, really, really crowded and filled with only a few stores specialising in anime. CNAnime happens at the same time as a comic book convention and a science fiction one, so all the dealers were in the same room. I did walk away with a free poster and letter opened...a really nice one to boot! ^_^ More people stopped to take a picture or two (two?! x.o!!!) of me, including an Aeris (whose friend joked that we were rivals) with a really cute flower basket and a girl who was in a costume I didn't recognise (though maybe from Mamotte Sh...I can't remember what it's called ^^;. She was really nice and I got a picture of her too, anyway! ^^;) who pointed out that a person my group couldn't figure out was actually Biggs! Heh heh, I'll have to take a picture of him tomorrow *mischievous grin*. Another costume to note was one worn by a rep from the Space Channel, who was dressed in a foam version of their logo (a big pyramid with a yellow triangle on front that had a spiral galazy in the centre and "SPACE" written at the bottom); he thought I was Lara Croft (LARA CROFT?!?!). I reget not taking more pictures, but I spent a lot of time in the Dealers' Room and didn't want to interrupt traffic.
We missed "Gatchaman", as mentioned before, but we also missed a showing of "Vampire Princess Miyu", since we lost track of time. For dinner, we at a...well, an alright Thai fast food place across the street (I think Yukito had the right idea when she suggested we go back to the hot dog truck, but...*sigh* alas, it was too late). We came back in time to see the premiere of "GateKeepers", which I wanted to see and dragged both Yukito and Bardiel along to even though they'd never heard of it. We all enjoyed it (at least, I think Bardiel enjoyed it, but it's hard to tell) and so, I guess I must have good intuition when it comes to anime (I admit that I hardly knew more about the series than they); lets see if it holds true tomorrow. I disassembled my costume, but while I was doing so one guy came by and said he'd been looking for a Tifa all day and now that he'd found me, I was already taking it apart. I told him I'd be back tomorrow and he agreed when he asked if he could take a picture of me then...can you imagine how flattered I was? I normally hate my picture being taken, but when nice people ask me and want to take my picture...it just makes me happy. Yeah, yeah, I'm not terribly eloquent, but you didn't come here to see my glorious prose, now did you? One person said my poses were good too ^^; I've been working on that, so I'm glad it paid off!
I hope tomorrow will turn out even better, even though Bardiel won't be there. Yukito and I are gonig to see more anime (we're determined) and I'm looking forward to seeing music videos and the masquerade! In fact...I'm even wondering if maybe I should enter it (you think...?).
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