Well, I'll be honest. This was the first con I wasn't incredibly excited about. I had wanted to attend Anime North again this year, however my cousin's wedding was on that Saturday. In Georgia. Very much the opposite direction. So I knew early on that it was out. ;_; The other con in the summer was ColossalCon. Well, ok, there are/were others, but they would have been more expensive since we would have needed a hotel room, and Anime North is the only one (at this time, I will attend Otakon someday) I would be willing to do that for at the moment. So CCC4 it was. However, I had heard a lot of bad things about this con beforehand (very poorly run, bad experiences, etc) so I was kinda nervous. But, in the end, I'm glad I went. Sure, it's no AN, but we still had fun.
~ Our Cosplay ~
I think the main reason we had a good time was because of our cosplay. First of all, I was in a group of 3 at this con, me, my sis, and a friend of ours from school, Eric (our Luffy from Ohayocon). My sis and I dressed to match, but Eric wasn't too familiar with the series so he went as a Black Mage from the original Final Fantasy (which I finally have beaten!). My sis and I went as Sai and Hikaru from Hikaru no Go (and Eric would have made such a good Tsutsui...). We chose these costumes for a couple reasons. The first one kinda irks me a little... My sis had told me like a year ago that she wanted to go as Hikaru and Wizard from Angelic Layer. So we bought all the stuff. Well, after Ohayocon, she decided she didn't want to show off her "pudge" again, meaning Hikaru's skintight costume was out (and no, my sis does not have "pudge", you look at her as Nico Robin and tell me). So, since Angelic Layer was her idea, I let her pick the replacement too. There were a few characters she really wanted to cosplay as, but only a couple I really wanted to dress to match. The 2 at the top were Ukyo (Ranma 1/2) and Sai. Since I'd rather be Hikaru than a Ranma character, that's what we decided on. That and HnG never gets cosplayed enough. It needs more recognition! But we knew no one else would be there so we'd be individuals, ha ha.
And now looking back, I could not be more happy with our choice of costumes! They were both comfortable and a big hit. Seriously, we walk in on Saturday and we had like six people go "OMG!! It's Sai and Hikaru!" and then we had to pose for pictures. We got glomped a few times too (Sai mostly... Hikaru needs more love!). I was really sad though that my extentions never came in for my wig... I ended up having to use another wig (which I paid $20 bucks for! gah, I hate last minute... even though it's inevitable with me and cosplay). It didn't turn out as good as I'd hoped, but it wasn't horrible. I finally got my extensions after the con though, so the new wig is (for the most part) finished (I may touch it up just a bit as it's kinda poofy, lol). But yeah, lots of positive comments (and lots of pictures, though those will have a special section at the bottom). All of the pictures directly below (minus Black Mage by himself) were taken by other people at the con. Our camera really sucked....
~ Friday ~
Okay, so we get there on Friday. We were in no huge hurry since the first thing we wanted to do was at 2, but we ended up being a little late anyway. It was after 3 by the time we had signed in and checked out the schedule. The panel at 2, a cosplay panel, was supposed to last until 4 so we decided to check it out, but sadly it ended early and we only sat through about 5-10 minutes of it. However, the even sadder part was that there was nothing going on until 7... So we stopped by the dealer's room and then a local Drug Mart and picked up a few things including a deck of cards, ate some dinner, and then sat down to a rousing game of Go Fish, lol. We also played some Egyptian Rat Screw, which is always fun. Made a lot more entertaining by Eric who had never played and the fact that we were all pretty bad slappers, lol. So fun times were had, even if not really con related. When 7 came around, we went to the Cosplay Cosplus panel, which was hosted by people from a website of the same name. It basically is a site for plus size cosplayers, but the panel went over basic things to do when cosplaying that would flatter your body type, no matter what size you were. So it was pretty interesting. After that was the Peelander-Z concert. Yes, I know what you are all thinking, "Peelander-Z...?" Well, they are an American based (if I remember correctly) Japanese band with rock music and strange lyrics. We went simply because how could you not? We weren't expecting much, but actually, it was the highlight of the con! No seriously! They really knew how to work the crowd, so whether or not you knew or even liked their music, they were a lot of fun. Unfortunately our pictures didn't turn out (we had such a crappy camera...). ;_; But yeah... "How do you like your steak??" "MEDIUM RARE!!!!"
Although, the concert was really loud, so Eric didn't stick around. He went and waited in the video room because we had wanted to check out Beck (since I'd heard a lot of good things about it). When we went to join him, the first episode had already started, but we stuck around for the rest of what was shown (1-4). I do like the series and want to see more, but I'd have to say the best part is the opening theme song, lol. I had heard it before so I knew I liked it, but my sis and Eric hadn't. They had the chorus in their heads for the next 2 days! XD I laughed at them. But 5-8 were playing on Sat, only it was during the cosplay competition! That made me sad. We were still gonna try and make it, but it wasn't looking good. Well, after that we went back to my aunt and uncle's house (it was closer than our own) and got to work on our costumes (heh, yeah, they weren't done, well, Eric's was, but not the HnG ones). Let's just say I didn't get a lot of sleep and I had already been running on only 2 hours for Friday...
~ Saturday ~
Well, I won't go into the whole part of the day we spent finishing the costumes, but let's just say we ended up getting there around 1. Which was REALLY sad because 2 of the panels we wanted to go to were at 10 and 12. ;_; One was AMVs and the other was a Cosplay Wig panel. But, despite the fact that the panel I wanted to see the most was over, I quickly realized that all was not lost. Our group actually dressed up beforehand instead of in the con bathrooms like usual, so we showed up in costume. As I mentioned earlier, we got swarmed as soon as we walked in. ^_^;; It was kinda funny, actually. We'd never had such a good response to our costumes before, so it was nice to see that our hard work had paid off. So we walked around for a bit (Eric shuffling in his Black Mage costume, haha), peeked in at the J-pop panel (which looked like it was only some music videos sadly), and ate some of the ramen they were selling for our lunch. At this point, we attended Anime Millionaire (which I totally should have put my name in for because even though I wouldn't have been great, I still would have gotten more right than the people that did get picked (I was keeping track)). It was fun trying to get the answers right, but not terribly exciting. Good times, though. After that, there was a long break (because nothing cool was going on) until the Cosplay Contest. During this time, we were invited to a tea party (which is explained in further detail later on). Since it was such a fun part of the con, I decided to give it it's own little section, lol.
After, we got some dinner from Wendy's and stopped in to the Big Robot Panel since Eric was interested. My sis and I ended up leaving early to stand in line for the cosplay, though, since we aren't huge fans of that genre (though some of it was interesting). Eric ended up not going to the contest and watched Beck instead, but I'm glad we went. It wasn't very long since it was such a small con, but it was still enjoyable (and hey, it didn't go for too long, heh, which is always a plus). The announcers were good, and the skits were too. Well, out of 7, 3 were fun, the other 4 were, well, bad to ok, but 3 out of 7 ain't bad considering Anime North's contest had hundreds of entrants and only a handful of good ones. Our favorite was a One Piece skit (which ended up winning!). Zoro comes out and a recorded voice says, something like "Something-or-other, 50 beli." (beli = money in OP) Then Sanji comes out carrying meat and it says "Delicious meat used for consumption, otherwise known as food, 200 beli" Then Luffy comes out (oh, all three were girls, btw, and their costumes were great! they were from the Alabasta arc so they all had robes on) with his back to the audience. "Finding out the One Piece is really a bathing suit, priceless." And Luffy turns around, opens his robe and he/she is wearing a bathing suit. XD It ended with "There are some thing beli's can't buy, for everything else, there's Kaizoku Card." and they walked off stage. (kaizoku = pirate in Japanese) It was short and sweet, but very funny. Another good one was about two characters from an RPG that say they never get recognition (a mage and a theif). The one says that they should have been ninjas to which the other says "Hey, I heard about this really easy way to become an instant ninja! I was talking to these kids in the hall and they said all you have to do is put these on and you're a ninja!" So they turn around, put something on ther heads, and when they turn back they have the Naruto forehead protectors on. It was really funny because of their delivery and the fact that they seemed to be poking fun at the masses of Naruto cosplayers, lol. There was more to it, but that was the good part.
After, they had a really nice photo opportunity for anyone that hadn't gotten pictures on the entrants. So my sis and I went to go take some pictures of the people we had missed, but ended up posing ourselves. ^_^;; But yeah, we went back, watched the awards, went to pick up Eric who was still watching Beck, stayed to watch the opening theme song since it's just that great, and then went to wait for the dance to get set up. However, they took a LONG time to get it ready, so we ended up just leaving, which was kinda sad since I love stopping in at the dances, even if just for a few minutes, but we were REALLY tired. Also, there was a panel at 1 I wanted to go to, but obviously we weren't staying up that late. And so we went back, and I was asleep soon after my head hit the pillow.
~ Sunday ~
Well, I'll go into more detail as to why later, but for Sunday my sis and I switched costumes. We showed up and went to a Jeo-parody panel, which wasn't as much fun as the Millionaire because the questions were REALLY hard! Well, most of them. After that there was a slideshow of pics taken at the con, but it was pretty crappy. The pictures weren't all that interesting and the comments by the person sitting behind us just made them even worse. So we were gonna stick around for the closing ceremonies, but ended up just sticking around for some cards instead. So yeah, not a lot went on Sunday, which was really disappointing. But we got to waste the rest of our film on some silly pictures which was enjoyable, and I got my picture of Sai (which was me that day, though I had wanted to take one of my sis, but that's ok) staring at a fish in a fish bowl, lol. And so, the con experience came to an end. Fun, but could have been better.
Now for some random, yet fun, moments that made the con that much more interesting!
Tea Party ~ Well, as it was mentioned above, we attended a tea party on Saturday. But let's start at the beginning. I first saw a girl walking around in a really cool costume that morning, so I went to ask if I could take her picture. She told me that she had a friend with her so I told her I'd wait to get them both. My sis was talking to another cosplayer at the time, so when the other showed up, someone else got to them first. So I waited until he was done talking to them and had moved out of the way so I could take their picture (which was really cute with their little tea pots, lol - too bad it didn't come out >_<). We then went our separate ways, though I think they may have talked with us briefly before leaving. Later that day, while we were eating, the first one I saw came up to our table and said something, but all we heard was "tea". She pointed at something, gave a slight bow, and walked off. None of us had heard what she had said so we went about our business. Even later, Eric went to go get his Go board from the car and my sis and I stood at the doorway waiting for him. At this point, the other girl passes us and invites us to tea, pointing in the same direction the other girl had. She left and we were like "Ohhhhhhhh, that's what she said!" but we couldn't go yet because Eric was still in the car. Well, she passes us again (she was refilling her teapot), and tells us that they have free cookies, lol. We felt bad not stopping by, but, well, we had to wait for Eric, lol. So when he came back, we told him we were invited to tea so we went to check it out. The two of them had this really cute set up with hot water and tea bags, a little table, and some cookies all set out. The girl that had passed us twice was like "There they are!" and offered us some tea. Now, I'm not a tea fan, so I declined, but my sis and Eric had some. We chatted for a little bit about what a cool idea the tea party was, and that we were sorry we hadn't stopped by earlier because we didn't know what the other girl had said (to which the second went "Ha! Everybody understands me better!" and the first hung her head, lol). So we set up the Go board near there and took that time for a mini photoshoot. A lot of people were like "Can you really play?" and when we said no, they were like "Oh..." ^_^;; So we felt bad and didn't play for too long, but it was fun, regardless. The One Piece girls came over and their Zoro played for a bit against Eric. After that, we got a picture of the tea party (which DID turn out, thankfully), told them again what a cool idea it was, and went on with our day. We later found out that they were dolls from Rozen Maiden, btw, lol. (The picture of us playing Go was also not taken by us - ours pics, again, didn't turn out.)
"Groupies" ~ Haha, ok, not sure if I should call them that, but there was a group of three girls (one was dressed as Tohru from Fruits Basket on Sat) that saw us and went, "It's Sai! You guys are from Hikaru no Go!" and gave us hugs. The one girl wouldn't let go of Sai, lol. So we stopped and chatted for a bit, talking about random HnG stuff mostly. I think one also started talking to Eric about his Black Mage costume. So we said good-bye and left. Well, we ended up passing them several times that day, and if we were close enough, they'd give us hugs, and if not, they'd just wave and smile. The next day, we saw them again at the Jeo-parody panel, but when we started talking with the Tohru, my sis (who was now Hikaru) mentioned that we had switched and she kinda looked at us like "Huh....?" until her face finally lit up and she's like, "OMG, wow, I couldn't even tell! I had no idea!" It was pretty funny. So when her friends came over, she was like "Look! They switched costumes!" So we got hugs again, lol. And later when we were standing by the doors for some reason, we get tapped on the shoulder and it's them again, and Tohru is like "We're leaving, and we wanted to say good-bye." (to which her brother was like "Let's GO! I wanna leave!") So we got our hugs (one of the girls was like "And I can't forget the little magic guy!" so Eric got hugs too, lol) for the last time and said good-bye to our "fans". ^_^
Judges ~ As we were wandering around Sat morning, we ran into 2 different cosplay judges. The first was a lady who had been at the Cosplus panel. She really liked the Sai costume, asked if we were entering the competition, and then gave us a ribbon for Hall Cosplay when we said no. So yeah! I have an award winning cosplay! Well... me and my sis. ^_^;; Another guy we ran into about 5 minutes later asked if he could see my sis' costume up close. So she let him look at it and I was like "Not too close..." Heh, we had used scotch tape to keep parts from fraying. ^_^;;;;; So we mentioned all the aspects of the costume that were really ghetto, like the tape, the pizza boxes for the hat, and the nurse pants. He really seemed to like the cosplay though, so that was nice. My sis saw him later and asked his name, to which he was like, "Oh, I'm sorry, I'm so-and-so, one of the cosplay judges." Heh. So that was kind of amusing.
Sasuke... ~ Ahh, ok, now I shall explain why my sis and I switched costumes for Sat. First of all, I really like Sai's outfit, so I did want to be able to try it out myself. Secondly, I really wanted to cosplay again, but my sis wasn't so sure because of the wig. You see, we dyed Sai's wig to a darker purple because it was too bright when we bought it. However, because of that, it gets spots of purple where it lays on your face (because of the oils, it's hasn't ruined our fabric thankfully). And she didn't want to have to deal with that. So I suggested we switch. She eventually agreed, but kept telling me that she thought it was just because I was jealous. Ya see, everyone loved Sai! Everyone was like "It's Sai!" and would run up to her. Then they'd see me and go "Oh, and Hikaru." ^_^;; So... perhaps that was a slight part of it, but really, I did just want to wear the costume (and my wig!). So we switch. Well, wouldn't ya know it... We were taking some random pics (and posing for one or two others), when all of a sudden, this Sasuke cosplayer (female) comes right up to my sis, goes "Hikaru!", hugs her, and runs off. .......yeah. I love Sasuke, and I'm happy to know that someone loves Hikaru, but grrr... That is just my luck, ya know?
Well, I think there was something else I was gonna mention, but I can't think of it right now. Ah well, I guess that's it! Enjoy all of the cosplay photos! ^_^
And lastly, our own little photoshoot. As usual, beware poor picture quality. But some of them were too much fun not to put up. And keep in mind that since they were taken on Sat, we are not wearing the right costumes, lol.
