Otakon 2009 - Finally... the Report!
So I took some time to rest and just sit back for a while before I decided to write this report. It almost seems surreal that it has only been a few days since I got back home.
Thursday started out with me packing the day of the con (as usual) at 6am. Arnell was nice enough to come take me to the airport that morning, even though he lives almost halfway across town. Landed in Baltimore and ladymercury waited for me there since her plane came in about 20 minutes earlier. Took the light rail to the convention center and immediately tried to get our room. Of course it wasn't ready yet -_- so we decided to stop by Subway for lunch. And yeah I was complaining a bit since I did not want to miss the VAMPS autograph signing. After Lauren arrived and everyone finally got settled, it was already 2pm (it starts at 2) >_< Nick was nice enough to drop us off by Sonar so we could wait. After waiting for a bit over an hour there, Merk was able to find out what's going on from some of the Japanese concert goers and let us know what's up. In the end they only get in 200 people and never told the rest of us what's going on. After Merk asked one of the people at the door, we finally decided not to stand there for another 4 hours to wait for the concert.
So we ended up meeting Jonnie and his brother for the first time by the National Aquarium. Hung around the area for a while until it was time to pick up pre-reg badges. So around 5pm... maybe it was 6-ish? ... anyway we headed out and got in the VAMPS pre-reg line which was non-existant! XD We asked a staffer and he told us to go upstairs. We immediately was able to go to the pre-reg booth and got our pre-reg. In and out in less than 5 minutes. So off to the concert we went. There was a line but it didn't seem like we waited long. Inside of the club, the ventilation was just so bad the our bodies were sweating from head to toe (literally). It was the most disgusting feeling ever!!! But hey, it was an AMAZING show!! I would seriously love to see them again ^^ We took a taxi back to the hotel. No way were we gonna walk... especially past their little mini red light district. And so the night really ended there.
Skip on over to Friday. Luckily us girls are early risers. We all ended up waking to the alarm (and got up together). Merk and I headed out earlier than Lauren since she had to put on her crazy costume. BSed around a bit then got in line for the VAMPS Q&A. According to Merk, I was fangirling like crazy (lol). Who wouldn't? It's Hyde!! After that it was more BSing around until our two panels starting at 8:45 to about 11pm. I think it was mad successful for I really didn't see many people leave at all. At the end, we ended up friending Chika, Myra, and Lena who stayed to chit-chat with us. ..and ended up acquiring Chika as our new hotel roommate for the rest of the con XD Wow...Friday's notes are way shorter than Thursday's =p
Saturday, we really didn't have much to do. I was only looking forward to the Wakeshima Kanon concert. We didn't really do much but just hang out wherever until then. I actually ran into my old friend Mike from Cleveland whom I haven't seen since... 2000? Since we had our panels Friday night, I was kinda bummed that I didn't get to see him spin at the dance so it was such a treat to see him on staff for Kanon's concert. And a big thanks to him for getting us some awesome seats!!
After that we ended up going to artist alley where I finally got to meet up with Renee and Anne at their table, and bought myself a cute animal orb ^^ then went on over to the dealers room but didn't buy anything.
After that the group (me, Chika, Myra, Nick, Renee, Pernell, Lauren, and Pernell's 2 friends) ended up rallying at our hotel room to plan out dinner. We ended up going to this extremely expensive seafood restaurant which is across the street from the Hilton, and still in great sight of the convention center. Chika and I were absolutely in heaven with our soft shelled crab and king crab legs! lol After that we pretty much just gathered the others and got ready for the dance. At first we were debating on going at all. Luckily I really didn't need to get changed at all since I was already in a dress and for once my shoes were not killing me.
The dance needs it's own paragraph here. Probably the best convention dance I have ever attended. We met up with Chika's friend Carmen and her group. Outta nowhere Nick disappears so it ends up being a group of like 8 girls and then Donovan XD The first part seems to be a total blur to me. We were just dancing together and having a good time. I'm not really sure how in the world the girls ended up dancing with Lelouch. I just remember a whole lot of screaming. The group kinda moved over to the cypher (or the circle if you wanna call it that instead). I was near the back so I couldn't see anything (as usual). All I could remember was that guy's hair =p How we ended up dancing with Tony, I've not a clue either!! lol I've always been one that is pretty reserved... he's the only guy who has ever made me drop my defenses (yeah, surprise!). When I go to dances, I rarely dance with strangers since there's usually a crazy amount of guy friends around. But yeah, the girls took turns dancing with the two guys while Lauren and I just did our own thing while we watch. Halfway through I ended up getting pushed towards Tony. To be honest, I wanted to turn back and run XD I can be extremely shy. Pretty much just took a deep breath and said "fuck it. let's just have a good time." I don't recall how long we danced... time just felt like it stopped. I had so much fun dancing with him. Definitely the best dance partner I ever had. Chika and the girls ended up teasing me the entire weekend _o_ but still, it felt really good to just step out of my comfort zone for a while. We also met Ryan halfway through the dance. And like the others I'm not sure how we ended up dancing with him but that's alright because he's extremely nice. In the end I ended up not dancing with Lelouch at all since the other girls were dancing with him. He's also extremely tall. Having experienced many many dances with tall guys, it isn't necessarily fun... and you really can't snuggle with them either ^^;;; lol So that Saturday night dance really brought the entire group together. Most of us have now added each other to Facebook and MySpace. Some of us are still trying to add people ^^;;;
Sunday we just ended up BSing around Inner Harbor for a while. I was sad that I didn't get to see Malcolm, June, or John at all that entire weekend =( But hey, there are other cons and I can always just travel to see them. We ended up eating at the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch, going to the galleria, to harborplace, and then Chika, Myra, and Pershanna had to leave T_T oh sadness... so in the end it was just Nick, Lauren and I till Monday. We ended up hanging out in the hotel room and went out to Cheesecake Factory for dinner.
Monday consisted of just us packing up and heading to the Nest for lunch. After that I headed off to the airport. My plane was delayed in Florida (again, like last year) for 2 hours _o_ After a ton of BSing, I got out of Baltimore by 5:30pm. Arnell was again nice enough to pick me up and we headed off to California Pizza Kitchen for dinner. And so my wonderful vacation ends. It still feels so surreal that it's over. Even though the convention itself didn't have too much to offer me this time, I made a lot of new friends and got to hang out with friends I only get to see once a year. It was just an amazing weekend that I won't forget for a very long time ^^
Thursday started out with me packing the day of the con (as usual) at 6am. Arnell was nice enough to come take me to the airport that morning, even though he lives almost halfway across town. Landed in Baltimore and ladymercury waited for me there since her plane came in about 20 minutes earlier. Took the light rail to the convention center and immediately tried to get our room. Of course it wasn't ready yet -_- so we decided to stop by Subway for lunch. And yeah I was complaining a bit since I did not want to miss the VAMPS autograph signing. After Lauren arrived and everyone finally got settled, it was already 2pm (it starts at 2) >_< Nick was nice enough to drop us off by Sonar so we could wait. After waiting for a bit over an hour there, Merk was able to find out what's going on from some of the Japanese concert goers and let us know what's up. In the end they only get in 200 people and never told the rest of us what's going on. After Merk asked one of the people at the door, we finally decided not to stand there for another 4 hours to wait for the concert.
So we ended up meeting Jonnie and his brother for the first time by the National Aquarium. Hung around the area for a while until it was time to pick up pre-reg badges. So around 5pm... maybe it was 6-ish? ... anyway we headed out and got in the VAMPS pre-reg line which was non-existant! XD We asked a staffer and he told us to go upstairs. We immediately was able to go to the pre-reg booth and got our pre-reg. In and out in less than 5 minutes. So off to the concert we went. There was a line but it didn't seem like we waited long. Inside of the club, the ventilation was just so bad the our bodies were sweating from head to toe (literally). It was the most disgusting feeling ever!!! But hey, it was an AMAZING show!! I would seriously love to see them again ^^ We took a taxi back to the hotel. No way were we gonna walk... especially past their little mini red light district. And so the night really ended there.
Skip on over to Friday. Luckily us girls are early risers. We all ended up waking to the alarm (and got up together). Merk and I headed out earlier than Lauren since she had to put on her crazy costume. BSed around a bit then got in line for the VAMPS Q&A. According to Merk, I was fangirling like crazy (lol). Who wouldn't? It's Hyde!! After that it was more BSing around until our two panels starting at 8:45 to about 11pm. I think it was mad successful for I really didn't see many people leave at all. At the end, we ended up friending Chika, Myra, and Lena who stayed to chit-chat with us. ..and ended up acquiring Chika as our new hotel roommate for the rest of the con XD Wow...Friday's notes are way shorter than Thursday's =p
Saturday, we really didn't have much to do. I was only looking forward to the Wakeshima Kanon concert. We didn't really do much but just hang out wherever until then. I actually ran into my old friend Mike from Cleveland whom I haven't seen since... 2000? Since we had our panels Friday night, I was kinda bummed that I didn't get to see him spin at the dance so it was such a treat to see him on staff for Kanon's concert. And a big thanks to him for getting us some awesome seats!!
After that we ended up going to artist alley where I finally got to meet up with Renee and Anne at their table, and bought myself a cute animal orb ^^ then went on over to the dealers room but didn't buy anything.
After that the group (me, Chika, Myra, Nick, Renee, Pernell, Lauren, and Pernell's 2 friends) ended up rallying at our hotel room to plan out dinner. We ended up going to this extremely expensive seafood restaurant which is across the street from the Hilton, and still in great sight of the convention center. Chika and I were absolutely in heaven with our soft shelled crab and king crab legs! lol After that we pretty much just gathered the others and got ready for the dance. At first we were debating on going at all. Luckily I really didn't need to get changed at all since I was already in a dress and for once my shoes were not killing me.
The dance needs it's own paragraph here. Probably the best convention dance I have ever attended. We met up with Chika's friend Carmen and her group. Outta nowhere Nick disappears so it ends up being a group of like 8 girls and then Donovan XD The first part seems to be a total blur to me. We were just dancing together and having a good time. I'm not really sure how in the world the girls ended up dancing with Lelouch. I just remember a whole lot of screaming. The group kinda moved over to the cypher (or the circle if you wanna call it that instead). I was near the back so I couldn't see anything (as usual). All I could remember was that guy's hair =p How we ended up dancing with Tony, I've not a clue either!! lol I've always been one that is pretty reserved... he's the only guy who has ever made me drop my defenses (yeah, surprise!). When I go to dances, I rarely dance with strangers since there's usually a crazy amount of guy friends around. But yeah, the girls took turns dancing with the two guys while Lauren and I just did our own thing while we watch. Halfway through I ended up getting pushed towards Tony. To be honest, I wanted to turn back and run XD I can be extremely shy. Pretty much just took a deep breath and said "fuck it. let's just have a good time." I don't recall how long we danced... time just felt like it stopped. I had so much fun dancing with him. Definitely the best dance partner I ever had. Chika and the girls ended up teasing me the entire weekend _o_ but still, it felt really good to just step out of my comfort zone for a while. We also met Ryan halfway through the dance. And like the others I'm not sure how we ended up dancing with him but that's alright because he's extremely nice. In the end I ended up not dancing with Lelouch at all since the other girls were dancing with him. He's also extremely tall. Having experienced many many dances with tall guys, it isn't necessarily fun... and you really can't snuggle with them either ^^;;; lol So that Saturday night dance really brought the entire group together. Most of us have now added each other to Facebook and MySpace. Some of us are still trying to add people ^^;;;
Sunday we just ended up BSing around Inner Harbor for a while. I was sad that I didn't get to see Malcolm, June, or John at all that entire weekend =( But hey, there are other cons and I can always just travel to see them. We ended up eating at the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch, going to the galleria, to harborplace, and then Chika, Myra, and Pershanna had to leave T_T oh sadness... so in the end it was just Nick, Lauren and I till Monday. We ended up hanging out in the hotel room and went out to Cheesecake Factory for dinner.
Monday consisted of just us packing up and heading to the Nest for lunch. After that I headed off to the airport. My plane was delayed in Florida (again, like last year) for 2 hours _o_ After a ton of BSing, I got out of Baltimore by 5:30pm. Arnell was again nice enough to pick me up and we headed off to California Pizza Kitchen for dinner. And so my wonderful vacation ends. It still feels so surreal that it's over. Even though the convention itself didn't have too much to offer me this time, I made a lot of new friends and got to hang out with friends I only get to see once a year. It was just an amazing weekend that I won't forget for a very long time ^^