VidUKon: Much Belated Con Report
Life after Cardiff has been unusually busy, so this report has been delayed, which means that I've forgotten a good portion of what I wanted to say. Ah well, the motto around these parts is "better to do something half-assedly than to not do it all." So here goes.
Let me preface this report with a huge thank you to
buffyann and
bop_radar, who did a fantastic job in putting the con together. It ran like clockwork, and that is all due to their hard work. I especially appreciated the little touches, like the stickers and other vidding themed swag, the fact that we had scheduled Muffin Time (!!!), the feedback forms, the pre-con activities, the I AM AWESOME sign, the cozy con spaces--everything pointed to the thought and the care that they put into making the con as enjoyable and memorable an experience as possible. I also want to give a shout-out to
lithiumdoll who was the trailblazer who organized the very first VidUKon, and without whose vision this year's con would not have been possible. Thanks also to the local talent in Cardiff:
beccatoria and
brokenmnemonic, who scouted out the hotel and made sure that it could provide everything that was needed for awesomeness. Hooray for people who organize stuff!! They are the life's blood of fandom.
OK, on with the reportage:
Tuesday
I arrived at Cardiff on Tuesday morning around 9am after a surprisingly pleasant flight. KLM Airlines gets two thumbs up from me. I figured I'd get to the hotel early, maybe take a shower, nap a little, and be fresh for when
jackiekjono arrived later in the day. WRONG. I get to the front desk and am cordially informed that I may not check in until 2pm. SO MUCH SADFACE. I disconsolately ate breakfast in the hotel restaurant, checked the clock, and saw I still had 4 hours to kill. If the hotel had had any type of business center, I could have happily whiled away the time playing on the internet, but since they didn't, and I hadn't brought any electronics with me, I had to find other means of entertainment.
I'm told by the desk that city center is a great place to spend time, so I get some change for the bus, and I toddle off. The bus quickly arrived and I put in my two pounds for a return and grabbed a seat, thinking I had a jaunt ahead of me. Not so. About 2.5 minutes later, the bus stops, and everyone seems to be getting off, so I do too, thinking all the while, "damn, Cardiff is a small city." Little did I know I had merely gone around the block and was nowhere near city center. Oh, self. I was obviously not firing on all cylinders by that point. I wandered around aimlessly for about 30 minutes and had seen all that there was to see. It was very pretty with a shiny water fountain (the one from Torchwood), a wharf, a shopping center, and a cultural center. But I was not pleased because I still had over 3 hours to kill, and I was stupid with exhaustion. I headed into the cultural center in search of distraction. I decide to settle into their cafe, so I buy some chocolate cake (dreadful, by the way) and grab a table. After giving up on the cake in despair, I look up and what should I behold but a pay-as-you-go internet station. Nirvana!!! I rush over and plonk myself down, shove my coins in and prepare myself for some glorious websurfing. Foiled! The connection was horrible--I could swear it was dialup. In twenty minutes, I barely managed one measly email to my sister to let her know I was alive before I gave up in frustration. At this point, I look around for my purse, only to realize I had left it back at the table. ACKKKKK! I turn around, and luckily, it's still there, but there's a security guard staring at if as if he suspects it of being a bomb. I snatch it up, he yells at me for leaving my possessions unattended, and I scurry out of there, a weary and humbled creature. At that point, I decide not to press my luck any further, so I bought some postcards and sat myself on a couch, determined not to shift again until it was time to head to the hotel.
As I'm blearily writing my 8th postcard (my apologies to anyone who may receive one these, I was truly out of my head by that point), someone starts to talk to me. It was an older woman, and she must have taken pity on my pathetic self because she started chatting with me, and eventually she took me under her wing, gave me a quick bus tour of the city, and basically was a beautiful human being. She even walked me back to my hotel to make sure I made it there safely. What a sweetheart. Pam, her name is. She totally restored my faith in humanity. What a wonderful world, that holds such creatures! Haha. So, yeah, I was a little punchy at that point. But happy.
I finally got checked in and headed up to the room. Jackie had gotten there ahead of me, so I wasn't alone anymore. Yay! After greeting and squeeing at each other, I ended up passed out on the bed for a while, but we went out to dinner later to the Chinese buffet, which did a very brisk business in hungry congoers all weekend long. We were both pretty tired from traveling all day, so that was an early night.
Wednesday
Wednesday was Castle Day. Cardiff Castle is awesome, I heartily recommend it. I admit, I'm a bit easy when it comes to castles, because it's a freakin' CASTLE, but even so, I do think Cardiff Castle rates up there with the really cool castles of Europe. There was a falconry, and a banquet room, and a tower, and a bomb shelter, and a military history museum. It was very fulfilling. I was a happy tourist that day, and I could not have asked for better company than Jackie. After the castle, I think we wandered around aimlessly for a bit and then headed back to the hotel to chill out. I can't remember what we did for dinner--maybe Chiquito's? Yes, I think that was it. I was all--I have to see what the Welsh think Mexican food is. I must do it for SCIENCE. Well, the joke's on me because the Welsh interpretation of Mexican food is surprisingly tasty. YUM. After dinner, we went back to the hotel for another early night.
Thursday
Thursday was shopping day. Jackie and I discovered Poundland, and I may have gone a little crazy there. It's like the Dollar Store, only British!! I was so tickled. After shopping, we went to a very cool pub set in a refurbished theater complete with balcony seating, and I had ginger beer. Nobody makes ginger beer like that here in the States. Delish. Eventually, we walked back to the hotel, both very proud of ourselves for not getting lost. Cardiff is a great walking city; nothing is too far from anything else. And we had gorgeous weather the whole time we were there, so I actually came back to Chicago a little sunkissed. Who woulda thunk it?
Back at the hotel, we chilled out, and then went to the steakhouse right across from the hotel. We were not impressed. It was no House o' Meat, that's for sure. When we returned to the room, we decided to splurge and watch Despicable Me on the pay-per-view. Just as we were getting settled in with that, who should appear at our door but
lithiumdoll and
doccy. YAY, con people had arrived!!! We chatted for while, I gave Lithy her "slabby chocolate" as she terms it (Mexican hot chocolate), and
doccy acted as a live model of the UK for us. Good times. Eventually, they left and we decided to finish the film, which is totally adorable, for the record. I want to vid it one of these days.
Friday
On Friday, I took a day trip out of Cardiff because I decided I had not done enough touristy stuff. It was absolutely the perfect thing to do because I got to ride around in a cozy bus and got taken to a MINE and a MOUNTAIN and had gorgeous weather to walk about in. Oh, it was lovely! When I came back in the evening, it was time for dinner with my fellow VidUKoners. So many people had arrived by then. When I got to the room, there was
bop_radar who, though sick, was as joyful as always, and
buffyann, who is coolness personified, and two new-to-me people,
m_a_r_i_k_s and
brokenmnemonic. So many people--so exciting!! Bop and mariks and brokenmnemonic went off to find medicines, and
buffyann and I went down to join the crowd in the lobby before heading off to dinner. There were a lot of us gathered, maybe 20 or so?
beccatoria was slightly worried that we would exceed our reservation at the restaurant. Thus I had to make the requisite Thomas Hardy joke about how "We are too many" to Lithy and Doccy. Jackie had just mentioned the night before about how creeped out she is by all the child death in Thomas Hardy's books, so it had to be done. :)
On the way over to the restaurant, I struck up a conversation with
nemo_r and her friend RogueNoMore (not sure if she has an LJ), who are both wonderful. I think we ended up talking about the new X-Men movie and the high hopes we have for it. At the restaurant, I was seated next to
buffyann and
amnisias on one side, and
cesy and
theoret on the other. We had a long wait for food, so we had plenty of time to get acquainted. Doccy was the hero of the night and went up to bar to fetch drinks for those of us who were too discombobulated to do it ourselves. Buffyann ended up getting a buzz off of her ginger beer, which we all found amusing. Cesy gave us the starter pack introduction to bandom, and the picspam she showed us was mighty convincing. That stagegay shit is no joke. :)
After dinner, we walked back to the hotel through gorgeously-lit Cardiff Bay, and I could totally see why they film Torchwood there. It is a bit otherworldly. Back in the room, both Buffyann and I were pretty beat, so we got ready for bed. By the time
obsessive24 came knocking for Buffyann, she was seriously unconscious. I slept the way I usually sleep at cons, lightly and not long. I am never truly comfortable in hotels, which is why I'm always exhausted when I get home from vacations.
Saturday
We had a very full schedule for Saturday, and it started about 9am with setup and didn't stop until the end of Premieres at 11pm. It was a marathon of vidtasticness! Everything kind of blurs together when it comes to shows and panels. I kind of just let the awesome wash over me. I tend to prefer panels to shows since I reach visual saturation fairly quickly. At one point I left a vid show early to head to my room to chill out, only to find a note under my door. It turns out my little friend from the first day, Pam, had come to visit me at the hotel! How sweet is that? I managed to get hold of her before she had gotten too far, and we went out to lunch on the bay. The sunshine felt really nice after hours in a con room.
After my sunny interlude, I got back in time for the second half of Buffyann's Vidding vs. Time panel. And then: MUFFIN TIME!!! Except, there were no muffins. You should have seen our faces. :(((( HAHA. The muffins, they had been hyped. We were expecting muffins. Instead we got Welsh cakes. Very nice and all, but not muffins. LOL. Oh, well, the tea was very nice (ginger lemon), and the custard cream cookies Doccy gave me were quite yummy. ETA: I forgot to mention that tea time was also very nice for catching up with people. I had an opportunity to chat with
charmax and Mrs. Charmax, who were just as sweet and lovely as they could be, and I also got to congratulate
suechosethis on her excellent AU panel. We all kind of huddled in the hallway with our tea and did the usual fannish thing of talking and laughing loudly. What the business convention down the hall must have thought of us, I do not know. :)
obsessive24's vidshow and panel followed tea time, and then there was a buffet dinner. As I recall, I sat at a table with
jagwriter78 and
bop_radar, among others, and we had a talk about embarrassing first vids. It's fun to remember how we got our starts, how the love of a particular pairing or fandom drove us to create something new for ourselves.
After dinner was the Festivids show, which I skipped in order to refresh myself in preparation for PREMIERES. I didn't think I'd be as nervous as I was, but I really, really got the jitters the closer we got to showing my vid. And, of course, when the time came, all I could see were the flaws. I think I'm doing something wrong with the export, because the coloring looked like crap. Must investigate. Anyway, I think the vid went over okay, and I heaved a sigh of relief when it was over.
After Premieres, there was a gathering of Obsessive24 and Mr. Obsessive24 in our room, with
absolutedestiny joining as well. We chatted for a while, but wound down fairly early. As I said, it had been a very full day. Very full, but very emotionally satisfying.
Sunday
Sunday started bright and early at 9am with an excellent Femslash vidshow, followed by
mresundance's Epic Bromance, which included my How to Train Your Dragon vid, "Volare". That was a lot of fun to see with a crowd. People laughed and seemed to really enjoy it. Same goes for "'White' & Nerdy", which played in Cesy's Squee vidshow.
Finally, it was time for my panel, the notes of which you can find here. I was quite miserably nervous going into it, but I think it went well. At least, there were no huge, embarrassing silences to fill. I couldn't have asked for better audience participation--everyone was fantastic. :D
A whole swarm of us headed over to the Chinese buffet for lunch, and I got a chance to chat more with
phantomas and
brokenmnemonic. After lunch, I ended up in the consuite with
amnisias and
jagwriter78 talking about serial killers and the psychology of psychosis. It was marvelous.
The last vidshow of the day was all about the Squee, and it was absolutely the perfect note to end the con. The wrapup session run by
bop_radar was very encouraging. It looks like there's quite a lot of interesting in having VidUKon again--maybe in two years. I certainly hope it happens.
A bunch of us gathered in the evening for dinner at Chiquito's.
thedivinegoat, who had not been able to make the con, joined us. It was nice to see her again--we had met at the first VidUKon a couple of years ago. She entertained Lithy and phantomas and me with tales of the NCIS spanking fics that she somehow "forces" herself to read. For science. We LOLed. I had a truly amazing drink called the Mexican flag which, while delicious, looked like an underwater garden. There was a lot of greenery in that drink. ;)
After Chiquito's, we converged on Lithy and Doccy's room for booze and vids. I didn't last long, but some good laughs were had while I was there. It was sad to say my farewells. *sniffs*
Monday
I had to get up at 5:30am in order to catch a cab to the airport, so I snuck out of the room under cover of darkness, leaving Jackie and Bop to their slumber. Luckily, I was not alone that morning, as
phantomas shared the cab with me. Both of our flights were delayed, so we had some time to chat and get to know each other better. Finally, the boarding calls went out, and we went our separate ways. And that was the end of ViUKon. Long may it continue!!!
Let me preface this report with a huge thank you to
buffyann and
bop_radar, who did a fantastic job in putting the con together. It ran like clockwork, and that is all due to their hard work. I especially appreciated the little touches, like the stickers and other vidding themed swag, the fact that we had scheduled Muffin Time (!!!), the feedback forms, the pre-con activities, the I AM AWESOME sign, the cozy con spaces--everything pointed to the thought and the care that they put into making the con as enjoyable and memorable an experience as possible. I also want to give a shout-out to
lithiumdoll who was the trailblazer who organized the very first VidUKon, and without whose vision this year's con would not have been possible. Thanks also to the local talent in Cardiff:
beccatoria and
brokenmnemonic, who scouted out the hotel and made sure that it could provide everything that was needed for awesomeness. Hooray for people who organize stuff!! They are the life's blood of fandom.
OK, on with the reportage:
Tuesday
I arrived at Cardiff on Tuesday morning around 9am after a surprisingly pleasant flight. KLM Airlines gets two thumbs up from me. I figured I'd get to the hotel early, maybe take a shower, nap a little, and be fresh for when
jackiekjono arrived later in the day. WRONG. I get to the front desk and am cordially informed that I may not check in until 2pm. SO MUCH SADFACE. I disconsolately ate breakfast in the hotel restaurant, checked the clock, and saw I still had 4 hours to kill. If the hotel had had any type of business center, I could have happily whiled away the time playing on the internet, but since they didn't, and I hadn't brought any electronics with me, I had to find other means of entertainment.
I'm told by the desk that city center is a great place to spend time, so I get some change for the bus, and I toddle off. The bus quickly arrived and I put in my two pounds for a return and grabbed a seat, thinking I had a jaunt ahead of me. Not so. About 2.5 minutes later, the bus stops, and everyone seems to be getting off, so I do too, thinking all the while, "damn, Cardiff is a small city." Little did I know I had merely gone around the block and was nowhere near city center. Oh, self. I was obviously not firing on all cylinders by that point. I wandered around aimlessly for about 30 minutes and had seen all that there was to see. It was very pretty with a shiny water fountain (the one from Torchwood), a wharf, a shopping center, and a cultural center. But I was not pleased because I still had over 3 hours to kill, and I was stupid with exhaustion. I headed into the cultural center in search of distraction. I decide to settle into their cafe, so I buy some chocolate cake (dreadful, by the way) and grab a table. After giving up on the cake in despair, I look up and what should I behold but a pay-as-you-go internet station. Nirvana!!! I rush over and plonk myself down, shove my coins in and prepare myself for some glorious websurfing. Foiled! The connection was horrible--I could swear it was dialup. In twenty minutes, I barely managed one measly email to my sister to let her know I was alive before I gave up in frustration. At this point, I look around for my purse, only to realize I had left it back at the table. ACKKKKK! I turn around, and luckily, it's still there, but there's a security guard staring at if as if he suspects it of being a bomb. I snatch it up, he yells at me for leaving my possessions unattended, and I scurry out of there, a weary and humbled creature. At that point, I decide not to press my luck any further, so I bought some postcards and sat myself on a couch, determined not to shift again until it was time to head to the hotel.
As I'm blearily writing my 8th postcard (my apologies to anyone who may receive one these, I was truly out of my head by that point), someone starts to talk to me. It was an older woman, and she must have taken pity on my pathetic self because she started chatting with me, and eventually she took me under her wing, gave me a quick bus tour of the city, and basically was a beautiful human being. She even walked me back to my hotel to make sure I made it there safely. What a sweetheart. Pam, her name is. She totally restored my faith in humanity. What a wonderful world, that holds such creatures! Haha. So, yeah, I was a little punchy at that point. But happy.
I finally got checked in and headed up to the room. Jackie had gotten there ahead of me, so I wasn't alone anymore. Yay! After greeting and squeeing at each other, I ended up passed out on the bed for a while, but we went out to dinner later to the Chinese buffet, which did a very brisk business in hungry congoers all weekend long. We were both pretty tired from traveling all day, so that was an early night.
Wednesday
Wednesday was Castle Day. Cardiff Castle is awesome, I heartily recommend it. I admit, I'm a bit easy when it comes to castles, because it's a freakin' CASTLE, but even so, I do think Cardiff Castle rates up there with the really cool castles of Europe. There was a falconry, and a banquet room, and a tower, and a bomb shelter, and a military history museum. It was very fulfilling. I was a happy tourist that day, and I could not have asked for better company than Jackie. After the castle, I think we wandered around aimlessly for a bit and then headed back to the hotel to chill out. I can't remember what we did for dinner--maybe Chiquito's? Yes, I think that was it. I was all--I have to see what the Welsh think Mexican food is. I must do it for SCIENCE. Well, the joke's on me because the Welsh interpretation of Mexican food is surprisingly tasty. YUM. After dinner, we went back to the hotel for another early night.
Thursday
Thursday was shopping day. Jackie and I discovered Poundland, and I may have gone a little crazy there. It's like the Dollar Store, only British!! I was so tickled. After shopping, we went to a very cool pub set in a refurbished theater complete with balcony seating, and I had ginger beer. Nobody makes ginger beer like that here in the States. Delish. Eventually, we walked back to the hotel, both very proud of ourselves for not getting lost. Cardiff is a great walking city; nothing is too far from anything else. And we had gorgeous weather the whole time we were there, so I actually came back to Chicago a little sunkissed. Who woulda thunk it?
Back at the hotel, we chilled out, and then went to the steakhouse right across from the hotel. We were not impressed. It was no House o' Meat, that's for sure. When we returned to the room, we decided to splurge and watch Despicable Me on the pay-per-view. Just as we were getting settled in with that, who should appear at our door but
lithiumdoll and
doccy. YAY, con people had arrived!!! We chatted for while, I gave Lithy her "slabby chocolate" as she terms it (Mexican hot chocolate), and
doccy acted as a live model of the UK for us. Good times. Eventually, they left and we decided to finish the film, which is totally adorable, for the record. I want to vid it one of these days.
Friday
On Friday, I took a day trip out of Cardiff because I decided I had not done enough touristy stuff. It was absolutely the perfect thing to do because I got to ride around in a cozy bus and got taken to a MINE and a MOUNTAIN and had gorgeous weather to walk about in. Oh, it was lovely! When I came back in the evening, it was time for dinner with my fellow VidUKoners. So many people had arrived by then. When I got to the room, there was
bop_radar who, though sick, was as joyful as always, and
buffyann, who is coolness personified, and two new-to-me people,
m_a_r_i_k_s and
brokenmnemonic. So many people--so exciting!! Bop and mariks and brokenmnemonic went off to find medicines, and
buffyann and I went down to join the crowd in the lobby before heading off to dinner. There were a lot of us gathered, maybe 20 or so?
beccatoria was slightly worried that we would exceed our reservation at the restaurant. Thus I had to make the requisite Thomas Hardy joke about how "We are too many" to Lithy and Doccy. Jackie had just mentioned the night before about how creeped out she is by all the child death in Thomas Hardy's books, so it had to be done. :)
On the way over to the restaurant, I struck up a conversation with
nemo_r and her friend RogueNoMore (not sure if she has an LJ), who are both wonderful. I think we ended up talking about the new X-Men movie and the high hopes we have for it. At the restaurant, I was seated next to
buffyann and
amnisias on one side, and
cesy and
theoret on the other. We had a long wait for food, so we had plenty of time to get acquainted. Doccy was the hero of the night and went up to bar to fetch drinks for those of us who were too discombobulated to do it ourselves. Buffyann ended up getting a buzz off of her ginger beer, which we all found amusing. Cesy gave us the starter pack introduction to bandom, and the picspam she showed us was mighty convincing. That stagegay shit is no joke. :)
After dinner, we walked back to the hotel through gorgeously-lit Cardiff Bay, and I could totally see why they film Torchwood there. It is a bit otherworldly. Back in the room, both Buffyann and I were pretty beat, so we got ready for bed. By the time
obsessive24 came knocking for Buffyann, she was seriously unconscious. I slept the way I usually sleep at cons, lightly and not long. I am never truly comfortable in hotels, which is why I'm always exhausted when I get home from vacations.
Saturday
We had a very full schedule for Saturday, and it started about 9am with setup and didn't stop until the end of Premieres at 11pm. It was a marathon of vidtasticness! Everything kind of blurs together when it comes to shows and panels. I kind of just let the awesome wash over me. I tend to prefer panels to shows since I reach visual saturation fairly quickly. At one point I left a vid show early to head to my room to chill out, only to find a note under my door. It turns out my little friend from the first day, Pam, had come to visit me at the hotel! How sweet is that? I managed to get hold of her before she had gotten too far, and we went out to lunch on the bay. The sunshine felt really nice after hours in a con room.
After my sunny interlude, I got back in time for the second half of Buffyann's Vidding vs. Time panel. And then: MUFFIN TIME!!! Except, there were no muffins. You should have seen our faces. :(((( HAHA. The muffins, they had been hyped. We were expecting muffins. Instead we got Welsh cakes. Very nice and all, but not muffins. LOL. Oh, well, the tea was very nice (ginger lemon), and the custard cream cookies Doccy gave me were quite yummy. ETA: I forgot to mention that tea time was also very nice for catching up with people. I had an opportunity to chat with
charmax and Mrs. Charmax, who were just as sweet and lovely as they could be, and I also got to congratulate
suechosethis on her excellent AU panel. We all kind of huddled in the hallway with our tea and did the usual fannish thing of talking and laughing loudly. What the business convention down the hall must have thought of us, I do not know. :)
obsessive24's vidshow and panel followed tea time, and then there was a buffet dinner. As I recall, I sat at a table with
jagwriter78 and
bop_radar, among others, and we had a talk about embarrassing first vids. It's fun to remember how we got our starts, how the love of a particular pairing or fandom drove us to create something new for ourselves.
After dinner was the Festivids show, which I skipped in order to refresh myself in preparation for PREMIERES. I didn't think I'd be as nervous as I was, but I really, really got the jitters the closer we got to showing my vid. And, of course, when the time came, all I could see were the flaws. I think I'm doing something wrong with the export, because the coloring looked like crap. Must investigate. Anyway, I think the vid went over okay, and I heaved a sigh of relief when it was over.
After Premieres, there was a gathering of Obsessive24 and Mr. Obsessive24 in our room, with
absolutedestiny joining as well. We chatted for a while, but wound down fairly early. As I said, it had been a very full day. Very full, but very emotionally satisfying.
Sunday
Sunday started bright and early at 9am with an excellent Femslash vidshow, followed by
mresundance's Epic Bromance, which included my How to Train Your Dragon vid, "Volare". That was a lot of fun to see with a crowd. People laughed and seemed to really enjoy it. Same goes for "'White' & Nerdy", which played in Cesy's Squee vidshow.
Finally, it was time for my panel, the notes of which you can find here. I was quite miserably nervous going into it, but I think it went well. At least, there were no huge, embarrassing silences to fill. I couldn't have asked for better audience participation--everyone was fantastic. :D
A whole swarm of us headed over to the Chinese buffet for lunch, and I got a chance to chat more with
phantomas and
brokenmnemonic. After lunch, I ended up in the consuite with
amnisias and
jagwriter78 talking about serial killers and the psychology of psychosis. It was marvelous.
The last vidshow of the day was all about the Squee, and it was absolutely the perfect note to end the con. The wrapup session run by
bop_radar was very encouraging. It looks like there's quite a lot of interesting in having VidUKon again--maybe in two years. I certainly hope it happens.
A bunch of us gathered in the evening for dinner at Chiquito's.
thedivinegoat, who had not been able to make the con, joined us. It was nice to see her again--we had met at the first VidUKon a couple of years ago. She entertained Lithy and phantomas and me with tales of the NCIS spanking fics that she somehow "forces" herself to read. For science. We LOLed. I had a truly amazing drink called the Mexican flag which, while delicious, looked like an underwater garden. There was a lot of greenery in that drink. ;)
After Chiquito's, we converged on Lithy and Doccy's room for booze and vids. I didn't last long, but some good laughs were had while I was there. It was sad to say my farewells. *sniffs*
Monday
I had to get up at 5:30am in order to catch a cab to the airport, so I snuck out of the room under cover of darkness, leaving Jackie and Bop to their slumber. Luckily, I was not alone that morning, as
phantomas shared the cab with me. Both of our flights were delayed, so we had some time to chat and get to know each other better. Finally, the boarding calls went out, and we went our separate ways. And that was the end of ViUKon. Long may it continue!!!