Halloween Cosplay & ALA 7

For a bit today I put on Junpei to cosplay as I ran errands, but didn't go out tonight; instead, I was getting my haircut. But I did try on Junpei in the configuration that I plan to wear at ALA 7 two months from now. I'm skipping the holster for the Evoker, which I plan to get before the end of the year. What I plan to use instead is one of the black belt holsters that I used for my FMA "Special Ops" cosplay, then work on getting the holster for FanimeCon 2011.

Tomorrow (or today in some parts of the country) is November, which means two more months to the end of the year. Has been that long since we started this 2010 Con Season?

Another Year, Another No-Show to Yaoi-Con

So myself and Zanney are not headed up to Yaoi-Con which starts tomorrow and runs through Halloween. At first Zanney was going to go but backed out due to finances. Finances also play a reason into why I'm not going, but I made up my mind about a month ago.

I really want to go to this con not for the yaoi, but to see how well this con is run. There are also the legendary myths surrounding Yaoi-Con, and maybe maybe maybe I just want to see if those myths can be achieved.

It feels like Yaoi-Con has become the new Anime Expo, and maybe since I went to Anime Expo finally Yaoi-Con is on the horizon.

But for now, we'll have to wait another year to cover Yaoi-Con.

Hetalia Day 2010 - Los Angeles Division

Avi and I were actually the co-hosts of this event, so I'm not 100% sure I can give everyone an unbiased report of the day, since we were kind of the people running the thing... But here's a quick run-down of what I did, condensed to as short and sweet as I can make it.

Also, the rest of the weekend leading up to Sunday was trampled by drama llamas, so I shall leave the beaten corpse out of the report out of respect.

An Overview of Hetalia Day in L.A. 2010:

I think I began the day feeling jittery and excited. There was some tension due to a couple issues the night before, but I felt like we were gonna have a great event. I'm not afraid to say that while we did have some internal snags with a few staff members, I am still very pleased with how things turned out at the end. I only lost my cool once, and that was at the very very end when I had been instigated by someone. I think that's a personal achievement for me, seeing as how I've previously been notorious for flipping out at these things when I'm faced with as much stress as I had been burdened with all day.

There were some speed-bumps, but I think we got over 'em just fine. Opening ceremonies went smooth as silk and my buddy Nathan (who was cosplaying as Wayne Brady to represent Jamaica based on a joke me and Avi made ages ago) helped us explain the Hetalia Day Code of Conduct--which, by the way, was written by Avi and me and is translated into four languages and available for your reading pleasure on the main Hetalia Day website. Nathan was amazing as ever, and his improv had the entire crowd in stitches, especially when he sang us a lovely little tune I like to call, "Please remember to keep our area clean!"

I spent the rest of the morning at the Staff Booth with two members of my staffing division who were the only ones to actively request shifts, but I honestly didn't mind much. They were lovely company and since we had a nice view of everything from the staff booth I wound up kicking them out so that they could go play games after our Historical Trivia event, "Are You Smarter Than America?" in which I portrayed Alfred F. Jones as a participant in a game show where contestants were asked to put their faith in the fact that I was smarter than a 5th grader.

The host of the game show was Lucas, another member of CaliConBlog who cosplayed as Austria for the day. I hear he plays an awesome rendition of Edelweiss on the acoustic guitar, by the way. He was a HUGE hit, especially when Avi stood around to listen--it was ten times as d'awesome 'cause she was cosplaying as Oktoberfest Fem!Prussia.

Around lunchtime, I noticed the weather turning a bit foul and there had been rain all week before the event, so I wound up pushing a lot of activities around and re-arranging the schedule, just in case we got rained out. My wrist started to hurt pretty bad by the time HetaMUN (a model United Nations crisis event organized by Jet and applied to Hetalia) started up, so I asked Lucas to keep an eye on the time for me. We wound up having to stop HetaMUN early, because we were almost out of time for the main event--the Miss Hetalia Day Pageant!

We were a bit ahead of schedule, and I didn't fill the contestant slots up to the number we had planned for, so I grabbed a waiting list I was keeping of my own staffers interested in participating and called out some names. The contest was pretty awesome, and the winners pictures are gonna be added to the blog photo gallery once I get them from one of the many photographers I spoke to. We had seven pageant awards, and one staff award.

It began to rain shortly after awards, which was a bummer, so Lucas and I directed everyone to an open area on the grass while the rain was still light and we all scrambled over there to take a group photo, and then we all made a bum-rush back to clean up our spot and get out of the park cause the Lifeguards were going around in their trucks telling us that they'd be closing the park in 15 minutes.

Everyone, not just staffers, helped out with clean-up. And when I say everyone, I mean even Dad, who carried several tables and chairs we borrowed from one of the photographers to his car. I stood with two large piles of equipment while their owners brought their own cars around to load everything up and head home, and due to the rain and the shuffle and some extra drama at the end of the day, Avi and I opted to cancel the staff dinner. We'll probably try to reschedule it next month if there's time.

I was pretty stressed out by the end, and I guess I had been progressively spiraling without realizing it all day, but I'm so thankful that I had staffers who would loan me their ears when I wanted to kick someone's butt for being frustrating even though I never truly meant it.

However, even though there is that much stress leading up to the event, the feeling of accomplishment is just sooooo wonderful when you've gotten home and taken off your cosplay and you've had a nice hot bath. You have no idea. The icing on the cake was probably checking my email later in the evening after eating some soup for my shredded vocal chords and discovering that I had won a drawing for tickets to see the Boom Boom Satellites. I believe Matt had mentioned the contest to me earlier in the month and so I sent one email with my name and my favorite song by the band and forgot all about it.

I think that my crowning moment of TRIUMPH at Hetalia Day, though, was when my Dad showed up to see it just before the big cosplay contest at 3:30PM.

My family's very against my interest in cosplay since they're all a bunch of old-fashioned, uptight Austrians who think I should be attending a fancy college right now if I'm not planning to get married. This weekend was my Parents Day at the college my younger brother just got into (NYU, in New York City) and so Mom and Dad had planned to fly out to see him. I had asked Dad to come to my event on Sunday if he had time, but retracted the request when I learned from Mom that they had plans to see my brother instead.

So when Dad came up to me and pulled me into a bear-hug in the middle of the crowd, I think I almost cried. He told me he was very proud of me. That's something that's so rare I would probably have to expect the guy from 'Bed Intruder' attending this event and bringing a batch of Double Rainbow cookies with him for the potluck before Dad praising me in front of people.

I later learned that Dad canceled his trip to NY because he felt like he wanted to see what I want to do in life. Event planning is my dream, and since he already knows and understands why my brother wants to do, Dad decided it was a good opportunity to see what I have in store for the future. To have my Dad's praise on top of everything else is so incredible to me that I can't describe how I feel in words.

But at the end of all this, I'm proud of the other volunteers who worked so hard, the attendees who had such a good time, and I'm even proud of myself too for doing my best to stand at the top of this event and oversee it the best I possibly could while lending a hand when I had the ability to do so. We did a great job. We did such a great job.

I posted a big thank-you list on my dA this afternoon, and I did leave a few things out so I'll be adding them later on. But here's a link for those of you who might wanna read a little more: http://regencymothball.deviantart.com/journal/35837078/

Last but not least, some of the photos I have already received. (There will be more added to the blog gallery until I can afford to buy a domain name for Hetalia Day in L.A.)

That's me as Black Armband Protest!America with my best friend Tony, the alien! He later won the Team USA MVP Award for HetaMUN by a unanimous vote--for some reason my teammates really loved the little guy~ He got a cool United Nations pin for his scarf.
He likes to collect them.

Two of my staffers got caught sleeping on the job, but it was just too cute, so we forgave them and got blackmail material for later. XD They're cosplaying as France (left) and England (right) which is one of my favorite Hetalia pairings.

Our theme for the day was Halloween, so a lot of attendees and staff dressed up as alternate versions of their favorite character. One of my volunteers is shown here with her epic use of make-up to portray "Explosion Germany" which is based on a Hetalia fan fiction a lot of my friends are reading right now called Seven Little Killers. By the way, that is in fact a cookie with the German flag on it. Another volunteer baked these for everyone. I'm a bit bummed that I didn't get one before they were gone though, but that definitely means they were yummy if they were devoured so fast.

This is the amazing Lady BelBel, the winner of the Miss Hetalia Day Pageant. The costume was crafted and designed by Anec-Dotes of Deviantart. She was awarded "Miss Hetalia Day 2010" for her clever interpretation of a Hetalia character who looks like Lady GaGa by incorporating attributes of Belarus's character design into an existing Lady GaGa outfit. Needless to say, the 'Paparazzi' were after her 'Bad Romance' for most of the day.

Jet, the organizer of HetaMUN, brought us a world map poster that everyone got to sign. We'll be sending this along with some photos to Tokyopop Inc. as a thank you gift for their AMAZING prize donation. They sent us trading cards, pencil boards, posters and five copies of the first volume of the Hetalia manga!

Hetalia Day Is Tomorrow!

Well as I sit here in Sacramento, the rest of the CCB crew down in Los Angeles area are setting up for tomorrow's Hetalia Day in Van Nuys which is one of three confirmed Hetalia Day events in Southern California (four if you want to count San Diego). There are three confirmed in Northern California according to the official site (San Francisco, San Jose, and Madera), none of them in Sacramento, so I'll the only one who's not participating in Hetalia Day tomorrow.

So if you're headed out to Hetalia Day tomorrow, head to one over at Lake Balboa for a great day of fun! Don't forget to say hi to the crew while you're there!

Disclaimers About "What's Wrong With Anime"

I've been getting some complaints about posts that feature Jared's "What's Wrong With Anime." My original intention was to promote Jared's series and his channel, Jaded Otaku Media, and most of these people feel that this series contradicts the mission statement and beliefs of the California Conventions Blog.

Therefore, I won't be posting anymore "What's Wrong With Anime."
I do apologize for those who watch it on the blog.

What's Wrong With Anime - Highschool of the Dead

Hey, it's that anime that's like Left 4 Dead with fanservice!

Banner Contest Changes, Again!

For some odd reason, I keep adding in staff members that cosplay from Hetalia. First it was Zanney now Avi. But because I don't think you can fit all five chibi characters plus the logo for the Hetalia Cosplay banner, it'll make it so that you must have myself, Ryan, and Lucas in the banner; Zanney and Avi are optional but recommended if you can fit them.

I'll make these changes on the page as well.

Good luck everyone! Get those submissions in ASAP!

Girl on Film

Hello there~! I've just joined Cali Con Blog as a new *coughamateurcough* photographer! My name is Avianna, though I usually go by Avi. I've been photographing everything from cosplay to BJDs for about 5 years now, though I'm certainly still practicing. One day, I hope to save up for a fancy SLR so I can take my photography to the next level.

As you can probably tell, I'm now the second female on the team. *crashes the sausage-fest party* Woo! I'm looking forward to photographing at PMX, ALA and any gatherings in between for our team here at Cali Con Blog~!

You can see examples of my photography on my dA and Flickr.

And Now For Something Completely Different, Meg Whitman Edition!

Usually I don't blog about anime and manga in general, just anime conventions and similar events, but this I couldn't pass up.

Here in California, we have a hot Governors race between Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman. We all expect a media blitz as November looms especially the use of social media like Facebook and Twitter, but yesterday one of Meg Whitman's spokespeople really messed up when using social media as a campaign tool.

One of her spokespeople put out this tweet yesterday:

[San Diego County] Sheriff [Association] says @Whitman2010 [for governor]! RT: @Murphy4MegNews: [California] Cops get it: Jerry Brown is too soft on crime. http://bit.ly/bNCAV

The problem is that it doesn't link to the press release and instead links to this:




Yes, that is a cross-dresser playing a bass cover of Fuwa Fuwa Time from K-ON!. Apparently he's Korean and is Youtube-famous for his covers.

What had happened is that Whitman's spokeperson forgot to put an "r" at the end of the bit.ly link. With the link http://bit.ly/bNCAVr, it goes to the press release.

The funny thing about all of this is that the day after the tweet went up, it's still up there unedited.

As for the content I'm pretty sure deep down somewhere Meg Whitman wants Ho-kago Tea Time playing at her inauguration, assuming she wins.

[LA Times Blog] [Gizmodo]

New Guidelines for Banner Contest

With Zanney joining the blog, I should add her to the Hetalia banner list. So it would be myself, Ryan, Lucas, and Zanney as chibi Hetalia cosplayers. If you just have myself, Ryan, and Lucas to submit at this point I won't penalize you in the final decision.

I'll update this on the contest page as well.

So send in those banners folks, I'm waiting to see some handsome artwork!