Acen 2009 Report! - Part 2
We got to the line maybe an hour or so before the door were supposed to open and there were already a bunch of people lined up. I spotted the first Roy with Breda in line and had previously decided that if I ran into them again before Saturday night, I would ask them to come to the MSA (Miniskirt Army, official fan club for voice actor Travis Willingham who plays Roy Mustang, among many other awesome parts) dinner I had organized for that evening. So I told them about the dinner and they said that they might come.
Paualene, Aryn, Anna, her mom and her sister all arrived probably 20 or so minutes after we did and so they had to be in a different part of the line than us. While we were waiting, a girl in another part of the line recognized me and asked if I was Riza last year. I said that I had been, and then she notified me that she was the Wrath that Aryn, Paulene and I spent some time with last year. I remembered that she had said she was part of the MSA, so I told her about the dinner and she gave me her phone number to remind her about it when the time got closer. Then I pointed out Paulene and Aryn, who were a few people in front of her and they started chatting.
The line took a really long time, partly because one of the bands that was supposed to play had to cancel. I think they had to get on a flight back to Japan or something. The IRT people kept reminding us that we couldn’t bring any bags or camera in with us, nor could we have our cell phones on, etc. Kind of confusingly the security wouldn’t allow Paulene to bring in her Usa-chan . Why they wouldn’t allow her to bring in a pink stuffed rabbit, I don’t get, unless they thought maybe she was hiding a camera inside or something? Anyhow, there was a man on staff who volunteered to stay outside the concert room and watch everyone’s bags while we were in there. That was cool of him.
Once the doors were finally opened we went and got good seats in the middle section, not sure how many rows back. Paulene, Aryn, Anna, and her sister were able to sit with us. There was a while where they were still setting things up before the concert started and while we waited they played a rather random assortment of music which a lot of people seemed to know the words too, but I didn’t know a lot of the songs. It was mostly Western rock music, I think. But some dance stuff too.
Finally, it was time for the first band - the Spoony Bards. This was their fifth anniversary and I felt proud that I had been there the year that they formed and first started playing in the lobby of the Hyatt together. I can’t remember what they opened with but I do remember it was awesome. They played a fantastic version of the song from the moon stage in the first Duck Tales game, a medley from Mario Kart games which they entitled “Rainbow Road”, I think there was a collection of songs from the Soul Caliber games, and there was also a song from one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles games. When they mentioned that it was their fifth anniversary they played a little of the victory fanfare from Final Fantasy games. Someone in the audience yelled out a proposal to Stephen Pool, one of the founding members, and he accepted. I was kinda sad that they didn’t play for longer, but what they did, as I said earlier, was really awesome. I was so happy to be sharing the concert with my brother after all these years of telling him about their music and a couple of times of having him on the phone listening in when I heard them playing in the lobby. He particularly loves video games and video game music, and since that’s primarily what they play I was so happy that he was there.
Next, there was another segment of random music playing while they set up for the next act. I think it was during this segment that the camera that projected the concert on to two large screens on either side of the stage, focused in on his guy cosplaying as Mario from the Mario Bros. games who was doing some awesome authentically seeming Mario style dancing. He even had a question mark block with him. It was hilarious.
The next part of the concert was performed by voice actor Mark Hildreth, who I vaguely knew from his work on X-Men: Evolution and Wolverine and the X-Men, but I don’t think I had actually heard him in any anime. He played keyboard as he sang, and he seemed like a nice guy, but I wasn’t that into his songs. I think I would have enjoyed it more if I had been more familiar with his work. But his songs were okay.
Nearing the end of his set I needed to run to the ladies room and on my way out I was stopped by the guy who was guarding the bags because he wanted a hug, which I gave him, and then this girl came up to me and she wanted a hug too, and then I ran into the Breda from earlier who had somehow gotten ahold of a Death Note Notebook.
I got back to the hotel and found that Paulene had joined my brother in line to meet Vic. I gave him his backpack and then realized that it was actually after 5PM so I was late for meeting the MSA dinner people. Breda found me and then we walked over to the rest of the group who were waiting in the area next to the coffee shop in the lobby of the Hyatt where I had told everyone to meet. Before we got to them I noticed that I had a missed call from Emma from the MSA on my phone and tried to get a hold of her, but wasn’t able to. She was there waiting with the rest of the group though. I apologized for being late and we decided to wait a little bit longer for other people who said that they would be coming. I gave Jessica a call, but she said that something had come up and she wasn’t going to be able to come to the dinner. I also tried texting and maybe calling another MSA member who had said she would be there, but no luck getting a hold of her either. In the meantime Roy had gone off to get the other Roy from the previous day.
I gave Paulene a quick call to tell her to tell my brother to turn on the cell phone he had with him. I also let them know that Emma and I thought that we would be back around 7PM and that’s when the MSA vs the Rangers games would start. Although I believe that Paulene was the only Ranger that we knew was coming. My brother wanted to be part of the games as well, and he’s not affiliated with either group, which was fine too.
Breda snuck off into the coffee shop/snack shop and came back with a little beanie plushie black and white dog for me to use as my Black Hayate, which I thought was sweet of him. He told me I would need to chase him around with it, which I promptly started to do.
We waited in the area near the coffee shop/snack shop for a little while longer, but nobody else showed up so we decided that we should probably head out to the Giordano’s. As we were heading out of the Hyatt the first Roy was doing a little filming introducing his fellow Amestrian Military people in a very Roy way. At this point our group consisted of me, Emma cosplaying as Greed!Ling, Emma’s friend cosplay’s as Ed, Emma’s friend’s boyfriend, another friend of Emma’s who was cosplaying as a random Amestrian Military person but we decided should be Sheksa, the first Roy, Hughes, Breda, Jean Havoc, and the other Roy.
I made my way to the front of our group since I was the one with the directions on how to get to Giordano’s. Emma and I discussed a little bit about the FMA manga, and a bit about Ouran cosplay. The first Roy and I also discussed the FMA manga and since we were both up to date on reading it, we talked about it in a way that wouldn’t give any spoilers to those who where there and hadn’t gotten that far yet. Various other topics came up as we walked and everyone seemed to be having a good time.
The walk to the Giordano’s was so much shorter than last year’s walk to the Denny’s which seemed to take forever. I think that Giordano’s may be the place to for us to have our Acen MSA dinners (or lunches) in the future as well.
As we approached the Giordano’s we passed a gas station from which a woman came running towards us. She saw us walking by and apparently is an FMA fan so she had to come over and ask for our picture. We all posed in the parking lot of the Giordano’s and then she walked a little longer with us to ask if we all made our costumes or bought them. I think that the military people all had bought our costumes. Then the woman headed back towards the gas station.
I told the group that I had tried to call and make a reservation at the Giordano’s for us but was told that they wouldn’t take reservations because “there’s going to be a big convention in the area that weekend” to which I responded, “I know, I’m part of that convention” but they still wouldn’t let me put in a reservation. There were ten of us all together (which ironically is the number of people I guesstimated might be there and was going to put in a reservation for) and within minutes they had put together a table for all of us, or rather a few tables put together with a couple extra chairs added on. Again, much better than at the Denny’s where we had to wait for quite some time and still weren’t able to be seated together. Of course we had more people at the Denny’s but still.
We decided to get a couple of large (or extra large?) pizzas to split - one stuffed and one thin crust, and some people ordered additional items too. Emma and I each took some pictures at the dinner - well, and a waitress took a group picture with my camera too.
During our dinner we had a fun time discussing FMA, the new Brotherhood series (and how Funimation better get the same voice actors back), how surprised we were that we actually got to see “Fullmetal Fantasy” (I think many of us had been at the concert that afternoon), various other anime and manga, ACen, and some other things.
When it got to be nearing to 7PM we got our bill, and thanks to there being so many of us, we each only had to pay about $2 for the delicious meal. So it was also a lot cheaper than last year’s trip to Denny’s.
Emma and her friends left the restaurant a little before 7PM to go back to their hotel in order to pick up the games Emma made for the MSA games. A little while after they left, I headed out with the two Roys, Hughes, Breda, and Havoc. In the three years that I’ve been cosplaying as her, I have never felt more like Riza than when I was walking back with this group. We had a good time talking about various things such as FMA, cosplay, and video games.
Along our way back we had some people waving or beeping at us from passing cars and there was a group of girls who started either filming us or taking out pictures as we walked. The first Roy asked if they wanted us to stop to pose for a picture, but they didn’t reply, so we kept on walking as they filmed us. Later, we had a couple of giggling fangirls following us, which was kind of strange, yet amusing.
As Emma asked me to, I gave her a call once we were nearly back to the Hyatt so that she could come over to meet us. There was definitely someone filming us from inside the building as we walked towards the door inside the Hyatt. Once inside, we were stopped by a couple of people, including a Momiji Sohma from Fruits Basket cosplayer, who wanted group photos of us. One of the people who asked us of a photo asked while I was on my cell phone talking to my little brother to let him know that we’d gotten back. I took a minute to put away my phone since Riza Hawkeye on a cell phone doesn’t really make sense.
We found an empty table in a semi-quiet area of the Hyatt, over where the fountain used to be, and thought that that would be a good place to play out MSA games. While we waited for the others to arrive we dragged some extra chairs over and looked through some of the advertising postcards and fliers that were on the table. One of the postcards was advertising an anime con/camping trip, which sounded a little strange to me, not to mention that the picture on the postcard looked like someone doing a flip over a campfire. Strange.
My brother and my friend Paulene arrived first and I introduced them to the group. Once Emma and her friend arrived we decided on which game to play. Emma brought FMA charades, FMA Uno (I think), FMA apples to apples, and I feel like there was another game that’s slipping my mind. FMA apples to apples won - that’s the main game we played at last year’s MSA VS the Rangers games, although we also played pin the automail on the Edward at ACen 2008. Not everyone knew how to play apples to apples, so Emma gave a brief description of the rules and so forth and then we got started playing. The game was fun and resulted in a lot of laughter and crazy matchups.
While we were playing I definitely saw some people taking out pictures, though I have yet to see any of those pictures online - aside from the ones that a few of us took. In the middle of our game this guy came up to our table and said something along the lines of “since we have the Amestrian military here, I have to ask, what’s your stance on the war with Ishbal?”or maybe he asked what our stance on the conflict with Ishbal was or something. We sort of sat there for a minute in silence and then the first Roy goes, “I’m awesome,” which cracked me up, and then the guy who stopped by our table walked away.
During the game I noticed someone on the other side of the room who appeared to be my friend Alexis, but I wasn’t totally sure. I got up to go see if it was her, but the L cosplayer went up the stairs. Then I asked my brother if he could go up there and see if it was her, and so he did. At this point the masquerade had let out and my friend Aryn joined us for a little bit, though she didn’t play. My brother had been gone for a while and I was a little worried, so I told the first Roy, who I was sitting next to, that I would be right back. I went up the stairs and looked around for my brother but didn’t find him. When I got off the escalator to go back downstairs this guy stopped me and asked for a hug, which I gave him, and then he said that he usually would ask Roy, but that I would do. That was kind of confusing. Anyhow, my brother andI got ahold of one another via cell phones and then met up back at the game at pretty much the same time.
FMA apples to apples wound up lasting the entire time we set aside for the MSA games. It resulted in a tie between Emma and Hughes and then my brother suggested a tie braking round, which Emma wound up winning.
Before we all went our own ways we took a couple of group pictures. After that some of the people in the group left right away , but I made sure to ask the Amestrian military guys who were still around for their email addresses so I could send them copies of the photos that I took, and so we could stay in touch.
Since my brother and I wanted to go to the Sunday morning worship service that Vic and Caitlin were running the next morning, and it was getting kinda late, we decided to head back to our hotel room. I feel like there was maybe another panel that started even earlier that we had wanted to attend also, but I don’t remember what it was.
The lobby was of course crazy crowded due to it being Saturday night and the masquerade being over, so it took a while to get to the doors. On the way I ran into my friends Kelly, Jennie, and Beth, got a picture of them and introduced them to my brother. My brother briefly talked with Jennie about Percy Jackson and then my brother and I headed outside. Once outside my brother alerted me to the fact that Aryn and Paulene were calling my name and were sitting on the curb eating something, so we went over there and talked with them for a little while longer. They were headed to cosplay karaoke after that. At this time my brother also pointed out of me that there was a cool Zell from FFVIII cosplayer walking by and so I went and got a picture.
On the way back to our hotel my brother took pictures of a Gohan and a Lulu that we passed along the way.
My brother and I caught each other up on what had been going on while I was at the MSA dinner.
I feel like it was that night, but maybe it was Friday, when from our hotel room we heard someone with a crazy laugh in the halls that sounded like Kefka from FFVI. Bizarre.
Before bed I quickly did a test run of how to put up my long hair to make it look short in the style of Tamaki so I’d know what to do in the morning. I was pleased with the results.
On Sunday morning I was crazy tired and kept wanting to go back to sleep for a few minutes. I also felt really sick to my stomach and couldn’t finish my whole bowl of cereal for some reason, until after I had taken another quick nap. After which I didn’t feel as sick.
I was under the impression that getting dressed and ready to cosplay as Tamaki would take a lot less time than it does to get ready to be Riza seeing as I wouldn’t have to deal with getting my bangs all sprayed/gelled/styled in her particular way, and I wouldn’t need to get the back of my hair spiky. However, I was wrong about that and we wound up leaving the hotel a lot later than we had intended.
As soon as we entered our hotel’s lobby these two girls who had been getting some breakfast over in the little food shop area stopped and were like “Tamaki!” and ran over to me for hugs. This kinda surprised me but it was cool. I also stopped at the front desk to check about getting a late check out.
We wound up getting to Vic and Caitlin’s Sunday worship service about half way through it. The room was pretty full of people and so my brother and I stayed at the very back of it. What we got to see of the service was really nice. I’m sorry that we didn’t get to be there for the whole thing of it. During part of the service Vic walked back by us and told us quietly that he was going to close the door, which he then did. That was kind of cool, especially since my brother hadn’t gotten to meet Vic before.
After the service we got a hold of Paulene who said that she was running a little late and that Aryn would be meeting up with us late because she wanted to sleep some more. We headed across the street to the Doubletree to get in line for the Vic Q&A that was going to start up pretty soon. Strangely, there was no identifiable end to the line, but rather a bunch of people kind of grouped together in the area outside the room where the panel was going to be. A staff member told us that the end of the line was somewhere in the middle of the room, which didn’t really make sense, but that’s where we went. When the doors to the room opened everyone went in n a way that seemed to disregard any line that there might have been.
Shortly after my brother and I got into seats, Paulene called me and I went outside to meet her. She literally was running (really fast!) from the convention center - where her hotel’s shuttle dropped her off) over to me. She complimented me on my cosplay and then I helped her tie her tie. Then we went into the panel where Vic was having people call their mothers as it was Mothers’ Day (he called his too). Vic invited those who wanted to, to sit up front on the floor, and so Paulene went up there.
Vic’s panel was lots of fun! He told us that he needed to keep his voice in good shape as he was going to be recording something on Tuesday and therefore he asked us to please not request any Broly impersonations. However, someone did later, asking him to impersonate what he thought Broly’s answering machine outgoing message would be, which was hilarious even though I’m not familiar with the character. He also talked about Ouran, a little about his character in D. Gray Man, FMA, his love of Star Trek and how he got to be part of the online series called New Voyages, and a variety of other things.
Pretty early on in the panel Paulene got called on and asked Vic to say something to Aryn on her video camera, explaining that Aryn overslept. Of course Vic agreed. He also asked us all to say “Hi Aryn!” which was sort of strange for me because unlike when voice actors at panels request the audience to say hi to so-and-so or to sing happy birthday to so-and-so, I’m actually good friends with Aryn.
Vic asked how many of us came to the concert the day before, and a lot of people had, but not everyone. He told us about how he had originally been planning on going to a con in Louisiana during that weekend, but then he found out that his friends from M.O.V.E. were going to attend ACen and he decided that he would come here instead because rarely does he ever get to see them. Apparently they had been wanting to do a collaboration for a while and somehow it was decided that they would do a variation on “Nothing I Won’t Give” and so M.O.V.E wrote the Japanese translation and then they decided to surprise everyone by performing it on Saturday. Vic said that he had the lyrics written out phonetically and taped to the stage, but you totally couldn’t tell that based on the performance. He then did a little bit of the chorus for us.
There was some talk about the rivalry between Vic and Travis and I think that it as in this panel that Vic said, “Travis is awesome!” Which, of course, I agree with completely, lol. But it was cool to hear Vic say that.
Vic had us vote for if we wanted the last part of he panel to be more Q&A or if we wanted to see a video. Watching a video won out. So then he wanted to know which we wanted to see - “Fullmetal Fantasy” or “The Ballad of Middle Tennessee”. Pretty much everyone wanted to see “Fullmetal Fantasy”. So then it was discovered that there wasn’t any cables to hook up the laptop/projector to the speakers, so one of the staff members went off to go get some. This was taking a really long time so much later in the panel Vic commented that we could have dug into the foundation of the building, refined the metal we found and made our own cables in the time that it was taking.
Once we were finally able to watch “Fullmetal Fantasy” I got my glasses out of my bag. I hadn’t worn them the first time we saw it as I don’t wear glasses as part of either of my current cosplays, but I wanted to be sure that I was able to take in every detail of the film this time around. There was a little girl cosplaying as Sakura from Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle who had some really adorably sweet comments to her parents during the film. The audience once again went crazy for it. I feel really lucky to have gotten to see it twice!
Vic announced that after the panel he was going to be doing autographs in the convention center. Although my brother and I weren’t going to get in line for the autographs, we headed back over there to meet up with Paulene and Aryn once again and they were in line to meet Vic.
On to the way to the autograph line I got stopped for a picture by someone for the first time as Tamaki. I think she was wearing an Ouran jacket too, but I’m not sure that she was cosplaying.
My brother and I also did a little shopping on the way to meet Paulene and Aryn. I found an adorable little figure of Toadette on the bike I like to use when I play as her in Mario Kart Wii, which made me happy.
When we found Paulene and Aryn Vic stood up on top of the chair at the autograph table and announced that he had some people with boxes of his CDs selling them for really cheap at either end of the line. He also waved at Paulene and me, probably because we were cosplaying as Ouran people. I forgot to mention that at his panel he was telling everyone that if they don’t like his CDs, since they’re such a cheap price, they are welcome to do other things with them like use them as coasters or turn them into ninja stars, lol.
Paulene handed me some money and asked me to go buy a CD for her, so then I walked to the end of the line and decided to buy her “Metafiction” because I knew that one had a few songs on it she already knew and liked a lot. On the way back to Paulen and Aryn, my brother stopped to take a picture of and chat with a Gau from FFVI cosplayer.
While they continued waiting in line Paulene and I posed for some pictures that Aryn and Anna were taking, and then later, once my brother rejoined us he took some pictures of us as well.
At first I found it kind of hard to switch the way I was acting from being Riza on Friday and Saturday, to being Tamaki who is such a different character. I kept having to remind myself to smile more often and think more Tamaki thoughts, but as the day went on I really did get into character, and actually, I’m probably more like Tamaki than I am like Riza. Probably. I also realized that subconsciously I had had made a connection between Tamaki and this friend of mine from high school, which I had never thought about before, but made a lot of sense once I started thinking about their similarities. This also helped me to work on getting into character.
My brother and I decided to do a little more shopping in the dealer’s room. I wanted to find something that had Tamaki on it to commemorate my first year cosplaying as him, and so I wound up buying a Ouran pencil board that the Funimation booth was selling. Sometime around then, my brother and I spotted someone cosplaying as Master Onion from Parappa and I got a picture with him, which turned out pretty cool.
I also found a duo of cosplayers who were dressed as Ryou Bakura and Yami Bakura from Yu-Gi-Oh! Which I thought was pretty awesome to see hem walking around together. When I asked them for a picture the Ryou Bakura apparently didn’t hear me, but the Yami Bakura did, so then she called to the other one like, “Hey! Ryou!” and she didn’t respond, and then Yami Bakura called to Ryou Bakura using her real name and then she responded.
As we were headed out of the dealer’s room my brother spotted a guy cosplaying as Ninten from Mother 1/Earthbound 0. Apparently hardly anyone had recognized him during the con, and a lot of people kept thinking that he was cosplaying as Ness from Mother 2/Earthbound. He was so happy that my brother did that he asked him for a hug, which I thought was sweet.
We needed to get back to our hotel to get our stuff together and check out of the hotel before 3PM - which was much better than the original check out time which I think was like noon. On the way back to our hotel my brother found someone cosplaying as a Colette and Lloyd from Tales of Symphonia. The Colette was holding a chocolate soft serve cone and my brother was a little disappointed that she handed it to someone to hold while he took their picture as he thought it would have been interesting to have a picture of them with her holding the ice cream cone.
Once we got back to our hotel we quickly had something to drink and I think we also may have had some chips or something, but am not sure. Then we got everything packed and so forth and since the con didn’t end until 4 and we needed to check out before then, my brother decided to carry our rather large duffle bag for the rest of the day. I’m not really sure how he managed that, but I thank him.
Throughout the day I kept trying to get a hold of Alexis and Beth, but that didn’t really work out. I didn’t reach Alexis, and Beth and I kept playing phone tag or calling one another at times when we had other things going on and it wouldn’t work out for us to meet up.
When we got back to the convention center my brother and I weren’t sure if they would let him in with the huge duffle bag, but thankfully they did. He went to one of the first shops that he’d bought something at at the con and exchanged a Sephiroith figure that he’d bought for a different styled one.
I can’t remember if it was then, or before we left to go back to our hotel, but we tried to find the booth where the Spoony Bards were and we wound up finding it, only to find two random guys who weren’t part of the band sitting there and eating their lunch, which was so strange. My brother saw M.O.V.E at their table and tried to point them out to me but for some reason I didn’t notice or wasn’t able to see them. Also, I found this cool shop that I hadn’t seen before where they had some Ouran and FMA stickers, so I bought some.
We contacted Paulene and found out that she, Aryn, Anna, and Anna’s sister were doing something over by the car show. It was almost time for the closing ceremonies to start and so we decided to wait for them near one of the entrance/exit areas of the dealers’ room. Paulene sprinted back and forth between us and the rest of the group a couple times. She really can run fast! One of the times she was over by us some girls who were sitting down against the wall in that area called us (Paulene and me) over to them. At first I wasn’t sure if maybe I knew them, but then it turned out that they wanted hugs from us.
Once Aryn, Anna, Anna’s sister, and Paulene had rejoined my brother and I, we went over to the Hyatt and arrived at the doors of Closing Ceremonies only to discover that it just ended and people were leaving. Apparently it ended half an hour early this year, which is kind of strange, I think. As people were walking out I heard “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond playing, which I found kind of ironic since my friend Caroline wasn’t able to make it this year.
My brother spotted the first Roy, Hughes, and Breda walking out of Closing Ceremonies together and encouraged me to go over and say hi to them. I kind of ran after them and I think it may have taken them a moment to recognize me since I was in a different cosplay. We chatted for a little while as I walked with them and then someone stopped me to ask for a picture. Paulene was letting me use the fake rose that she had with her and so I added that to my pose for the pictures. After that person left, Breda asked me if I’d add my number into his phone and I agreed. The first Roy said that he was glad that Breda was getting my contact info as his phone was totally out of power.
Just after I had entered my info into Breda’s phone, someone else came up to me and wanted a picture. I suggested that they wait a minute until Paulene could join me and we could pose together. They said sure and I motioned for Paulene to join us. We had some really fun poses for these photos involving Usa-chan, but strangely enogh, I haven’t seen them anywhere. We chatted with the lady who took the photos for a little bit since she had been to the Ouran fan panel, and we hadn’t, she told us a little bit about what it was like. Apparently it was designed to be like the Host Club, which sounds fun. In the meantime Roy, Breda, and Hughes had continued on their way, which I was a little sad about cause I would have liked to spent more time with them too, but I’m sure they had to check out of their hotel and so forth. I’m glad we got to exchange contact information though!
Paulene and Aryn had already checked out of their hotel and were waiting for Aryn’s mom to come and get them. My brother and I were waiting for our dad, and Anna and her sister were waiting for their mom. So, the six of us hung out in the area of the Hyatt outside the main ballroom. This involved my brother and I trying to get Usa-Chan back from Aryn and back to Paulene, multiple times, lol. Also at some point the fake rose wound up attached to my sleeve, which was kind of strange. There someone, an ACen attendant, who started playing on a beautiful piano down the hall - so my brother went and watched/listened to them for a while. I found myself feeling more and more in character during this period, which was fun.
I suggested we all go down to the arcade which was supposed to still be open, but after going downstairs we found that it too was closed.. When we went back up to the lobby there was someone playing their guitar and I wasn’t sure if maybe it was one of the Spony Bards at first. It wasn’t. .
Shortly after that Anna and her sister had to go, and then the rest of us decided to go across the street to the garden area and hang out there for a while. As we crossed the street a nearby car that had its windows rolled down was playing “Ready Steady Go” which was pretty awesome. That’s my favorite of the FMA openings.
There were some crazy blowing/swirling leaves in the garden area, and some falling petals from flowering trees. All of that seemed appropriate for happening at an anime con. We took a few pictures in the garden, and then I was feeling kind of cold so we headed back into the Hyatt. I was also feeling tired and in need of coffee, which my brother was able to supply thanks to the bottled frappuchinos that we brought along and happened to still have like one of. My brother also gave Paulene and Aryn bags of chips.
When we were back in the Hyatt we found a bench to sit on while we talked and so forth. Paulene and Aryn were giving me a hard time about my pink cell phone saying that it wasn’t very Tamaki like to have one in that color, lol I told them that I wasn’t sure if my dad would recognize that I had a totally different costume on than the one he knew I was going to wear. My dad has a tendency to not notice things like that. However, it wasn’t long until my dad did come to get us and he did notice that I had a different costume, which really surprised me.
Before my brother and I left, we all hugged and said goodbye to one another. Then Paulene and Aryn headed off to the area where they told Aryn’s mom they’d wait for her. I don’t think that they had to wait a whole lot longer.
It really helped a lot with the overall depressing feeling of the con on the last day, to have Paulene, Aryn, and my brother with me, and to be doing fun stuff with them even after the con was officially over. On the way home my dad asked me if I wanted to stop by this bar and grill near our house called Hawkeye’s and get another picture. We did this the first year I cosplayed as Riza Hawkeye, which was funny, but really didn’t make sense with me cosplaying as Tamaki Suoh. Plus, I really don’t think that Tamaki would ever go to bar and grill by choice.
Before I changed out of my costume that evening, I had my brother take some pictures of me being depressed in a corner “building hamster homes” and “planting mushrooms” ala Tamaki. I also had my brother take pictures of me examining our small jar of instant Nescafe which we bought on our most recent trip to Mistuswa, the Japanese shopping center in Arlington Heights, IL - specifically because it made us think of Ouran and I wanted to try some of it.
Like always, it was sad coming home and having ACen be over of this year. It always goes by much too quickly! I still say that it would be cool if the con lasted an extra day or two, like the Harry Potter conferences generally do (they tend to go for about four or five days), though even then those don’t seem to last long enough. But it would be difficult with the con taking place when a lot of people are still in school or in finals, so it would be unlikely that those people would be able to come for an extended weekend like hat. Oh well.
Anyhow, ACen, as usual, was awesome! It’s always so great to see my friends and to make new ones as well. And I am so glad that my brother was able to come, too! So much fun! :D
As an afterwards, I wanted to make note that although the Roys, Breda, Hughes, and Havoc that I wound up inviting to come along to the MSA dinner were not at the time members of the MSA (though were of course fans of Travis and Roy Mustang), I am proud to say that several of them let me know that they signed up after they got back to their houses.
Paualene, Aryn, Anna, her mom and her sister all arrived probably 20 or so minutes after we did and so they had to be in a different part of the line than us. While we were waiting, a girl in another part of the line recognized me and asked if I was Riza last year. I said that I had been, and then she notified me that she was the Wrath that Aryn, Paulene and I spent some time with last year. I remembered that she had said she was part of the MSA, so I told her about the dinner and she gave me her phone number to remind her about it when the time got closer. Then I pointed out Paulene and Aryn, who were a few people in front of her and they started chatting.
The line took a really long time, partly because one of the bands that was supposed to play had to cancel. I think they had to get on a flight back to Japan or something. The IRT people kept reminding us that we couldn’t bring any bags or camera in with us, nor could we have our cell phones on, etc. Kind of confusingly the security wouldn’t allow Paulene to bring in her Usa-chan . Why they wouldn’t allow her to bring in a pink stuffed rabbit, I don’t get, unless they thought maybe she was hiding a camera inside or something? Anyhow, there was a man on staff who volunteered to stay outside the concert room and watch everyone’s bags while we were in there. That was cool of him.
Once the doors were finally opened we went and got good seats in the middle section, not sure how many rows back. Paulene, Aryn, Anna, and her sister were able to sit with us. There was a while where they were still setting things up before the concert started and while we waited they played a rather random assortment of music which a lot of people seemed to know the words too, but I didn’t know a lot of the songs. It was mostly Western rock music, I think. But some dance stuff too.
Finally, it was time for the first band - the Spoony Bards. This was their fifth anniversary and I felt proud that I had been there the year that they formed and first started playing in the lobby of the Hyatt together. I can’t remember what they opened with but I do remember it was awesome. They played a fantastic version of the song from the moon stage in the first Duck Tales game, a medley from Mario Kart games which they entitled “Rainbow Road”, I think there was a collection of songs from the Soul Caliber games, and there was also a song from one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles games. When they mentioned that it was their fifth anniversary they played a little of the victory fanfare from Final Fantasy games. Someone in the audience yelled out a proposal to Stephen Pool, one of the founding members, and he accepted. I was kinda sad that they didn’t play for longer, but what they did, as I said earlier, was really awesome. I was so happy to be sharing the concert with my brother after all these years of telling him about their music and a couple of times of having him on the phone listening in when I heard them playing in the lobby. He particularly loves video games and video game music, and since that’s primarily what they play I was so happy that he was there.
Next, there was another segment of random music playing while they set up for the next act. I think it was during this segment that the camera that projected the concert on to two large screens on either side of the stage, focused in on his guy cosplaying as Mario from the Mario Bros. games who was doing some awesome authentically seeming Mario style dancing. He even had a question mark block with him. It was hilarious.
The next part of the concert was performed by voice actor Mark Hildreth, who I vaguely knew from his work on X-Men: Evolution and Wolverine and the X-Men, but I don’t think I had actually heard him in any anime. He played keyboard as he sang, and he seemed like a nice guy, but I wasn’t that into his songs. I think I would have enjoyed it more if I had been more familiar with his work. But his songs were okay.
Nearing the end of his set I needed to run to the ladies room and on my way out I was stopped by the guy who was guarding the bags because he wanted a hug, which I gave him, and then this girl came up to me and she wanted a hug too, and then I ran into the Breda from earlier who had somehow gotten ahold of a Death Note Notebook.
I got back to the hotel and found that Paulene had joined my brother in line to meet Vic. I gave him his backpack and then realized that it was actually after 5PM so I was late for meeting the MSA dinner people. Breda found me and then we walked over to the rest of the group who were waiting in the area next to the coffee shop in the lobby of the Hyatt where I had told everyone to meet. Before we got to them I noticed that I had a missed call from Emma from the MSA on my phone and tried to get a hold of her, but wasn’t able to. She was there waiting with the rest of the group though. I apologized for being late and we decided to wait a little bit longer for other people who said that they would be coming. I gave Jessica a call, but she said that something had come up and she wasn’t going to be able to come to the dinner. I also tried texting and maybe calling another MSA member who had said she would be there, but no luck getting a hold of her either. In the meantime Roy had gone off to get the other Roy from the previous day.
I gave Paulene a quick call to tell her to tell my brother to turn on the cell phone he had with him. I also let them know that Emma and I thought that we would be back around 7PM and that’s when the MSA vs the Rangers games would start. Although I believe that Paulene was the only Ranger that we knew was coming. My brother wanted to be part of the games as well, and he’s not affiliated with either group, which was fine too.
Breda snuck off into the coffee shop/snack shop and came back with a little beanie plushie black and white dog for me to use as my Black Hayate, which I thought was sweet of him. He told me I would need to chase him around with it, which I promptly started to do.
We waited in the area near the coffee shop/snack shop for a little while longer, but nobody else showed up so we decided that we should probably head out to the Giordano’s. As we were heading out of the Hyatt the first Roy was doing a little filming introducing his fellow Amestrian Military people in a very Roy way. At this point our group consisted of me, Emma cosplaying as Greed!Ling, Emma’s friend cosplay’s as Ed, Emma’s friend’s boyfriend, another friend of Emma’s who was cosplaying as a random Amestrian Military person but we decided should be Sheksa, the first Roy, Hughes, Breda, Jean Havoc, and the other Roy.
I made my way to the front of our group since I was the one with the directions on how to get to Giordano’s. Emma and I discussed a little bit about the FMA manga, and a bit about Ouran cosplay. The first Roy and I also discussed the FMA manga and since we were both up to date on reading it, we talked about it in a way that wouldn’t give any spoilers to those who where there and hadn’t gotten that far yet. Various other topics came up as we walked and everyone seemed to be having a good time.
The walk to the Giordano’s was so much shorter than last year’s walk to the Denny’s which seemed to take forever. I think that Giordano’s may be the place to for us to have our Acen MSA dinners (or lunches) in the future as well.
As we approached the Giordano’s we passed a gas station from which a woman came running towards us. She saw us walking by and apparently is an FMA fan so she had to come over and ask for our picture. We all posed in the parking lot of the Giordano’s and then she walked a little longer with us to ask if we all made our costumes or bought them. I think that the military people all had bought our costumes. Then the woman headed back towards the gas station.
I told the group that I had tried to call and make a reservation at the Giordano’s for us but was told that they wouldn’t take reservations because “there’s going to be a big convention in the area that weekend” to which I responded, “I know, I’m part of that convention” but they still wouldn’t let me put in a reservation. There were ten of us all together (which ironically is the number of people I guesstimated might be there and was going to put in a reservation for) and within minutes they had put together a table for all of us, or rather a few tables put together with a couple extra chairs added on. Again, much better than at the Denny’s where we had to wait for quite some time and still weren’t able to be seated together. Of course we had more people at the Denny’s but still.
We decided to get a couple of large (or extra large?) pizzas to split - one stuffed and one thin crust, and some people ordered additional items too. Emma and I each took some pictures at the dinner - well, and a waitress took a group picture with my camera too.
During our dinner we had a fun time discussing FMA, the new Brotherhood series (and how Funimation better get the same voice actors back), how surprised we were that we actually got to see “Fullmetal Fantasy” (I think many of us had been at the concert that afternoon), various other anime and manga, ACen, and some other things.
When it got to be nearing to 7PM we got our bill, and thanks to there being so many of us, we each only had to pay about $2 for the delicious meal. So it was also a lot cheaper than last year’s trip to Denny’s.
Emma and her friends left the restaurant a little before 7PM to go back to their hotel in order to pick up the games Emma made for the MSA games. A little while after they left, I headed out with the two Roys, Hughes, Breda, and Havoc. In the three years that I’ve been cosplaying as her, I have never felt more like Riza than when I was walking back with this group. We had a good time talking about various things such as FMA, cosplay, and video games.
Along our way back we had some people waving or beeping at us from passing cars and there was a group of girls who started either filming us or taking out pictures as we walked. The first Roy asked if they wanted us to stop to pose for a picture, but they didn’t reply, so we kept on walking as they filmed us. Later, we had a couple of giggling fangirls following us, which was kind of strange, yet amusing.
As Emma asked me to, I gave her a call once we were nearly back to the Hyatt so that she could come over to meet us. There was definitely someone filming us from inside the building as we walked towards the door inside the Hyatt. Once inside, we were stopped by a couple of people, including a Momiji Sohma from Fruits Basket cosplayer, who wanted group photos of us. One of the people who asked us of a photo asked while I was on my cell phone talking to my little brother to let him know that we’d gotten back. I took a minute to put away my phone since Riza Hawkeye on a cell phone doesn’t really make sense.
We found an empty table in a semi-quiet area of the Hyatt, over where the fountain used to be, and thought that that would be a good place to play out MSA games. While we waited for the others to arrive we dragged some extra chairs over and looked through some of the advertising postcards and fliers that were on the table. One of the postcards was advertising an anime con/camping trip, which sounded a little strange to me, not to mention that the picture on the postcard looked like someone doing a flip over a campfire. Strange.
My brother and my friend Paulene arrived first and I introduced them to the group. Once Emma and her friend arrived we decided on which game to play. Emma brought FMA charades, FMA Uno (I think), FMA apples to apples, and I feel like there was another game that’s slipping my mind. FMA apples to apples won - that’s the main game we played at last year’s MSA VS the Rangers games, although we also played pin the automail on the Edward at ACen 2008. Not everyone knew how to play apples to apples, so Emma gave a brief description of the rules and so forth and then we got started playing. The game was fun and resulted in a lot of laughter and crazy matchups.
While we were playing I definitely saw some people taking out pictures, though I have yet to see any of those pictures online - aside from the ones that a few of us took. In the middle of our game this guy came up to our table and said something along the lines of “since we have the Amestrian military here, I have to ask, what’s your stance on the war with Ishbal?”or maybe he asked what our stance on the conflict with Ishbal was or something. We sort of sat there for a minute in silence and then the first Roy goes, “I’m awesome,” which cracked me up, and then the guy who stopped by our table walked away.
During the game I noticed someone on the other side of the room who appeared to be my friend Alexis, but I wasn’t totally sure. I got up to go see if it was her, but the L cosplayer went up the stairs. Then I asked my brother if he could go up there and see if it was her, and so he did. At this point the masquerade had let out and my friend Aryn joined us for a little bit, though she didn’t play. My brother had been gone for a while and I was a little worried, so I told the first Roy, who I was sitting next to, that I would be right back. I went up the stairs and looked around for my brother but didn’t find him. When I got off the escalator to go back downstairs this guy stopped me and asked for a hug, which I gave him, and then he said that he usually would ask Roy, but that I would do. That was kind of confusing. Anyhow, my brother andI got ahold of one another via cell phones and then met up back at the game at pretty much the same time.
FMA apples to apples wound up lasting the entire time we set aside for the MSA games. It resulted in a tie between Emma and Hughes and then my brother suggested a tie braking round, which Emma wound up winning.
Before we all went our own ways we took a couple of group pictures. After that some of the people in the group left right away , but I made sure to ask the Amestrian military guys who were still around for their email addresses so I could send them copies of the photos that I took, and so we could stay in touch.
Since my brother and I wanted to go to the Sunday morning worship service that Vic and Caitlin were running the next morning, and it was getting kinda late, we decided to head back to our hotel room. I feel like there was maybe another panel that started even earlier that we had wanted to attend also, but I don’t remember what it was.
The lobby was of course crazy crowded due to it being Saturday night and the masquerade being over, so it took a while to get to the doors. On the way I ran into my friends Kelly, Jennie, and Beth, got a picture of them and introduced them to my brother. My brother briefly talked with Jennie about Percy Jackson and then my brother and I headed outside. Once outside my brother alerted me to the fact that Aryn and Paulene were calling my name and were sitting on the curb eating something, so we went over there and talked with them for a little while longer. They were headed to cosplay karaoke after that. At this time my brother also pointed out of me that there was a cool Zell from FFVIII cosplayer walking by and so I went and got a picture.
On the way back to our hotel my brother took pictures of a Gohan and a Lulu that we passed along the way.
My brother and I caught each other up on what had been going on while I was at the MSA dinner.
I feel like it was that night, but maybe it was Friday, when from our hotel room we heard someone with a crazy laugh in the halls that sounded like Kefka from FFVI. Bizarre.
Before bed I quickly did a test run of how to put up my long hair to make it look short in the style of Tamaki so I’d know what to do in the morning. I was pleased with the results.
On Sunday morning I was crazy tired and kept wanting to go back to sleep for a few minutes. I also felt really sick to my stomach and couldn’t finish my whole bowl of cereal for some reason, until after I had taken another quick nap. After which I didn’t feel as sick.
I was under the impression that getting dressed and ready to cosplay as Tamaki would take a lot less time than it does to get ready to be Riza seeing as I wouldn’t have to deal with getting my bangs all sprayed/gelled/styled in her particular way, and I wouldn’t need to get the back of my hair spiky. However, I was wrong about that and we wound up leaving the hotel a lot later than we had intended.
As soon as we entered our hotel’s lobby these two girls who had been getting some breakfast over in the little food shop area stopped and were like “Tamaki!” and ran over to me for hugs. This kinda surprised me but it was cool. I also stopped at the front desk to check about getting a late check out.
We wound up getting to Vic and Caitlin’s Sunday worship service about half way through it. The room was pretty full of people and so my brother and I stayed at the very back of it. What we got to see of the service was really nice. I’m sorry that we didn’t get to be there for the whole thing of it. During part of the service Vic walked back by us and told us quietly that he was going to close the door, which he then did. That was kind of cool, especially since my brother hadn’t gotten to meet Vic before.
After the service we got a hold of Paulene who said that she was running a little late and that Aryn would be meeting up with us late because she wanted to sleep some more. We headed across the street to the Doubletree to get in line for the Vic Q&A that was going to start up pretty soon. Strangely, there was no identifiable end to the line, but rather a bunch of people kind of grouped together in the area outside the room where the panel was going to be. A staff member told us that the end of the line was somewhere in the middle of the room, which didn’t really make sense, but that’s where we went. When the doors to the room opened everyone went in n a way that seemed to disregard any line that there might have been.
Shortly after my brother and I got into seats, Paulene called me and I went outside to meet her. She literally was running (really fast!) from the convention center - where her hotel’s shuttle dropped her off) over to me. She complimented me on my cosplay and then I helped her tie her tie. Then we went into the panel where Vic was having people call their mothers as it was Mothers’ Day (he called his too). Vic invited those who wanted to, to sit up front on the floor, and so Paulene went up there.
Vic’s panel was lots of fun! He told us that he needed to keep his voice in good shape as he was going to be recording something on Tuesday and therefore he asked us to please not request any Broly impersonations. However, someone did later, asking him to impersonate what he thought Broly’s answering machine outgoing message would be, which was hilarious even though I’m not familiar with the character. He also talked about Ouran, a little about his character in D. Gray Man, FMA, his love of Star Trek and how he got to be part of the online series called New Voyages, and a variety of other things.
Pretty early on in the panel Paulene got called on and asked Vic to say something to Aryn on her video camera, explaining that Aryn overslept. Of course Vic agreed. He also asked us all to say “Hi Aryn!” which was sort of strange for me because unlike when voice actors at panels request the audience to say hi to so-and-so or to sing happy birthday to so-and-so, I’m actually good friends with Aryn.
Vic asked how many of us came to the concert the day before, and a lot of people had, but not everyone. He told us about how he had originally been planning on going to a con in Louisiana during that weekend, but then he found out that his friends from M.O.V.E. were going to attend ACen and he decided that he would come here instead because rarely does he ever get to see them. Apparently they had been wanting to do a collaboration for a while and somehow it was decided that they would do a variation on “Nothing I Won’t Give” and so M.O.V.E wrote the Japanese translation and then they decided to surprise everyone by performing it on Saturday. Vic said that he had the lyrics written out phonetically and taped to the stage, but you totally couldn’t tell that based on the performance. He then did a little bit of the chorus for us.
There was some talk about the rivalry between Vic and Travis and I think that it as in this panel that Vic said, “Travis is awesome!” Which, of course, I agree with completely, lol. But it was cool to hear Vic say that.
Vic had us vote for if we wanted the last part of he panel to be more Q&A or if we wanted to see a video. Watching a video won out. So then he wanted to know which we wanted to see - “Fullmetal Fantasy” or “The Ballad of Middle Tennessee”. Pretty much everyone wanted to see “Fullmetal Fantasy”. So then it was discovered that there wasn’t any cables to hook up the laptop/projector to the speakers, so one of the staff members went off to go get some. This was taking a really long time so much later in the panel Vic commented that we could have dug into the foundation of the building, refined the metal we found and made our own cables in the time that it was taking.
Once we were finally able to watch “Fullmetal Fantasy” I got my glasses out of my bag. I hadn’t worn them the first time we saw it as I don’t wear glasses as part of either of my current cosplays, but I wanted to be sure that I was able to take in every detail of the film this time around. There was a little girl cosplaying as Sakura from Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle who had some really adorably sweet comments to her parents during the film. The audience once again went crazy for it. I feel really lucky to have gotten to see it twice!
Vic announced that after the panel he was going to be doing autographs in the convention center. Although my brother and I weren’t going to get in line for the autographs, we headed back over there to meet up with Paulene and Aryn once again and they were in line to meet Vic.
On to the way to the autograph line I got stopped for a picture by someone for the first time as Tamaki. I think she was wearing an Ouran jacket too, but I’m not sure that she was cosplaying.
My brother and I also did a little shopping on the way to meet Paulene and Aryn. I found an adorable little figure of Toadette on the bike I like to use when I play as her in Mario Kart Wii, which made me happy.
When we found Paulene and Aryn Vic stood up on top of the chair at the autograph table and announced that he had some people with boxes of his CDs selling them for really cheap at either end of the line. He also waved at Paulene and me, probably because we were cosplaying as Ouran people. I forgot to mention that at his panel he was telling everyone that if they don’t like his CDs, since they’re such a cheap price, they are welcome to do other things with them like use them as coasters or turn them into ninja stars, lol.
Paulene handed me some money and asked me to go buy a CD for her, so then I walked to the end of the line and decided to buy her “Metafiction” because I knew that one had a few songs on it she already knew and liked a lot. On the way back to Paulen and Aryn, my brother stopped to take a picture of and chat with a Gau from FFVI cosplayer.
While they continued waiting in line Paulene and I posed for some pictures that Aryn and Anna were taking, and then later, once my brother rejoined us he took some pictures of us as well.
At first I found it kind of hard to switch the way I was acting from being Riza on Friday and Saturday, to being Tamaki who is such a different character. I kept having to remind myself to smile more often and think more Tamaki thoughts, but as the day went on I really did get into character, and actually, I’m probably more like Tamaki than I am like Riza. Probably. I also realized that subconsciously I had had made a connection between Tamaki and this friend of mine from high school, which I had never thought about before, but made a lot of sense once I started thinking about their similarities. This also helped me to work on getting into character.
My brother and I decided to do a little more shopping in the dealer’s room. I wanted to find something that had Tamaki on it to commemorate my first year cosplaying as him, and so I wound up buying a Ouran pencil board that the Funimation booth was selling. Sometime around then, my brother and I spotted someone cosplaying as Master Onion from Parappa and I got a picture with him, which turned out pretty cool.
I also found a duo of cosplayers who were dressed as Ryou Bakura and Yami Bakura from Yu-Gi-Oh! Which I thought was pretty awesome to see hem walking around together. When I asked them for a picture the Ryou Bakura apparently didn’t hear me, but the Yami Bakura did, so then she called to the other one like, “Hey! Ryou!” and she didn’t respond, and then Yami Bakura called to Ryou Bakura using her real name and then she responded.
As we were headed out of the dealer’s room my brother spotted a guy cosplaying as Ninten from Mother 1/Earthbound 0. Apparently hardly anyone had recognized him during the con, and a lot of people kept thinking that he was cosplaying as Ness from Mother 2/Earthbound. He was so happy that my brother did that he asked him for a hug, which I thought was sweet.
We needed to get back to our hotel to get our stuff together and check out of the hotel before 3PM - which was much better than the original check out time which I think was like noon. On the way back to our hotel my brother found someone cosplaying as a Colette and Lloyd from Tales of Symphonia. The Colette was holding a chocolate soft serve cone and my brother was a little disappointed that she handed it to someone to hold while he took their picture as he thought it would have been interesting to have a picture of them with her holding the ice cream cone.
Once we got back to our hotel we quickly had something to drink and I think we also may have had some chips or something, but am not sure. Then we got everything packed and so forth and since the con didn’t end until 4 and we needed to check out before then, my brother decided to carry our rather large duffle bag for the rest of the day. I’m not really sure how he managed that, but I thank him.
Throughout the day I kept trying to get a hold of Alexis and Beth, but that didn’t really work out. I didn’t reach Alexis, and Beth and I kept playing phone tag or calling one another at times when we had other things going on and it wouldn’t work out for us to meet up.
When we got back to the convention center my brother and I weren’t sure if they would let him in with the huge duffle bag, but thankfully they did. He went to one of the first shops that he’d bought something at at the con and exchanged a Sephiroith figure that he’d bought for a different styled one.
I can’t remember if it was then, or before we left to go back to our hotel, but we tried to find the booth where the Spoony Bards were and we wound up finding it, only to find two random guys who weren’t part of the band sitting there and eating their lunch, which was so strange. My brother saw M.O.V.E at their table and tried to point them out to me but for some reason I didn’t notice or wasn’t able to see them. Also, I found this cool shop that I hadn’t seen before where they had some Ouran and FMA stickers, so I bought some.
We contacted Paulene and found out that she, Aryn, Anna, and Anna’s sister were doing something over by the car show. It was almost time for the closing ceremonies to start and so we decided to wait for them near one of the entrance/exit areas of the dealers’ room. Paulene sprinted back and forth between us and the rest of the group a couple times. She really can run fast! One of the times she was over by us some girls who were sitting down against the wall in that area called us (Paulene and me) over to them. At first I wasn’t sure if maybe I knew them, but then it turned out that they wanted hugs from us.
Once Aryn, Anna, Anna’s sister, and Paulene had rejoined my brother and I, we went over to the Hyatt and arrived at the doors of Closing Ceremonies only to discover that it just ended and people were leaving. Apparently it ended half an hour early this year, which is kind of strange, I think. As people were walking out I heard “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond playing, which I found kind of ironic since my friend Caroline wasn’t able to make it this year.
My brother spotted the first Roy, Hughes, and Breda walking out of Closing Ceremonies together and encouraged me to go over and say hi to them. I kind of ran after them and I think it may have taken them a moment to recognize me since I was in a different cosplay. We chatted for a little while as I walked with them and then someone stopped me to ask for a picture. Paulene was letting me use the fake rose that she had with her and so I added that to my pose for the pictures. After that person left, Breda asked me if I’d add my number into his phone and I agreed. The first Roy said that he was glad that Breda was getting my contact info as his phone was totally out of power.
Just after I had entered my info into Breda’s phone, someone else came up to me and wanted a picture. I suggested that they wait a minute until Paulene could join me and we could pose together. They said sure and I motioned for Paulene to join us. We had some really fun poses for these photos involving Usa-chan, but strangely enogh, I haven’t seen them anywhere. We chatted with the lady who took the photos for a little bit since she had been to the Ouran fan panel, and we hadn’t, she told us a little bit about what it was like. Apparently it was designed to be like the Host Club, which sounds fun. In the meantime Roy, Breda, and Hughes had continued on their way, which I was a little sad about cause I would have liked to spent more time with them too, but I’m sure they had to check out of their hotel and so forth. I’m glad we got to exchange contact information though!
Paulene and Aryn had already checked out of their hotel and were waiting for Aryn’s mom to come and get them. My brother and I were waiting for our dad, and Anna and her sister were waiting for their mom. So, the six of us hung out in the area of the Hyatt outside the main ballroom. This involved my brother and I trying to get Usa-Chan back from Aryn and back to Paulene, multiple times, lol. Also at some point the fake rose wound up attached to my sleeve, which was kind of strange. There someone, an ACen attendant, who started playing on a beautiful piano down the hall - so my brother went and watched/listened to them for a while. I found myself feeling more and more in character during this period, which was fun.
I suggested we all go down to the arcade which was supposed to still be open, but after going downstairs we found that it too was closed.. When we went back up to the lobby there was someone playing their guitar and I wasn’t sure if maybe it was one of the Spony Bards at first. It wasn’t. .
Shortly after that Anna and her sister had to go, and then the rest of us decided to go across the street to the garden area and hang out there for a while. As we crossed the street a nearby car that had its windows rolled down was playing “Ready Steady Go” which was pretty awesome. That’s my favorite of the FMA openings.
There were some crazy blowing/swirling leaves in the garden area, and some falling petals from flowering trees. All of that seemed appropriate for happening at an anime con. We took a few pictures in the garden, and then I was feeling kind of cold so we headed back into the Hyatt. I was also feeling tired and in need of coffee, which my brother was able to supply thanks to the bottled frappuchinos that we brought along and happened to still have like one of. My brother also gave Paulene and Aryn bags of chips.
When we were back in the Hyatt we found a bench to sit on while we talked and so forth. Paulene and Aryn were giving me a hard time about my pink cell phone saying that it wasn’t very Tamaki like to have one in that color, lol I told them that I wasn’t sure if my dad would recognize that I had a totally different costume on than the one he knew I was going to wear. My dad has a tendency to not notice things like that. However, it wasn’t long until my dad did come to get us and he did notice that I had a different costume, which really surprised me.
Before my brother and I left, we all hugged and said goodbye to one another. Then Paulene and Aryn headed off to the area where they told Aryn’s mom they’d wait for her. I don’t think that they had to wait a whole lot longer.
It really helped a lot with the overall depressing feeling of the con on the last day, to have Paulene, Aryn, and my brother with me, and to be doing fun stuff with them even after the con was officially over. On the way home my dad asked me if I wanted to stop by this bar and grill near our house called Hawkeye’s and get another picture. We did this the first year I cosplayed as Riza Hawkeye, which was funny, but really didn’t make sense with me cosplaying as Tamaki Suoh. Plus, I really don’t think that Tamaki would ever go to bar and grill by choice.
Before I changed out of my costume that evening, I had my brother take some pictures of me being depressed in a corner “building hamster homes” and “planting mushrooms” ala Tamaki. I also had my brother take pictures of me examining our small jar of instant Nescafe which we bought on our most recent trip to Mistuswa, the Japanese shopping center in Arlington Heights, IL - specifically because it made us think of Ouran and I wanted to try some of it.
Like always, it was sad coming home and having ACen be over of this year. It always goes by much too quickly! I still say that it would be cool if the con lasted an extra day or two, like the Harry Potter conferences generally do (they tend to go for about four or five days), though even then those don’t seem to last long enough. But it would be difficult with the con taking place when a lot of people are still in school or in finals, so it would be unlikely that those people would be able to come for an extended weekend like hat. Oh well.
Anyhow, ACen, as usual, was awesome! It’s always so great to see my friends and to make new ones as well. And I am so glad that my brother was able to come, too! So much fun! :D
As an afterwards, I wanted to make note that although the Roys, Breda, Hughes, and Havoc that I wound up inviting to come along to the MSA dinner were not at the time members of the MSA (though were of course fans of Travis and Roy Mustang), I am proud to say that several of them let me know that they signed up after they got back to their houses.