#NerdsUnite: Around the world with @HeatherReusz (Tokyo International Anime Fair)
<editorsnote> Nerds, meet my buddy Heather. She's a nerd who is currently living in Japan by way of Chicago. Yep, talk about a culture shock. She's here today to talk about her life, love (which she is currently balancing long distance) and all things nerd. I only have one more thing left to say ... HIT IT HEATHER!!!</editorsnote>
#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @HeatherReusz
This weekend I did something that I normally don’t do here in Japan: I let my freak flag fly and owned my nerdy love for anime. I usually don’t let this “otaku” side of me show mainly because I wanted to establish myself as a teacher and a professional here before I started nerding out. You can always find “that foreigner” who is here in Japan solely because of their obsessive love of anime. They will generally be kind of loud and obnoxious about it which really annoys Japanese people sometimes…at least that’s what my coworkers explained to me. Not wanting to be “that foreigner”, I try to rein it in as much as possible.
Anyway, I’ve been going to anime conventions back in the States since I was 13 years-old. They are always an amazing experience. It’s a chance to meet so many fun and rad people who have common interests. I get to really connect and geek out with thousands of people. As soon as I got here, I did some research to find out where and when I could go to an anime convention in Japan. Much to my delight, I quickly found that one of the biggest anime conventions in Japan was in Tokyo not too far from me in March. I eagerly marked the date down on my calendar. I even recruited my friend from Sendai to come down and go with me.
On the morning of the con, we headed to Odaiba. Odaiba is a man-made island off of Tokyo. It’s still considered a part of Tokyo since it is so close to the city. The convention was held in Tokyo Big Sight which is an exhibition hall that basically looks like a strange space ship docking on Earth. We followed the signs to registration and much to my surprise got in immediately. At all the cons I’ve been to in America, you have to wait hours sometimes just to get in if you wait to get your tickets the day of the event.
We excitedly rushed onto the convention floor and giggled like giddy school girls at all of the anime we were surrounded by. Being teachers, we also snapped our first photo in front of a statue of Anpanman, who all of my kids are obsessed with.
I must say, I was really surprised at first by the size. I thought it was much smaller than what I have seen at most American conventions. The difference here I think was that the only people allowed to display were well established animation companies. There was also no area where large amounts of vendors were selling anime gear which normally takes up the majority of the space at an American convention, at least the ones that I have gone to. There was also no space dedicated to displaying art or having panels. There were two main stages but one required a ticket to enter and the other was basically children’s programming. Each booth did have its own little stage though where they were making announcements or interviewing famous voice actors or animators within their company. We didn’t really stop and spend too much time watching these though as we don’t really understand Japanese.
We spent the majority of our time just wandering the convention floor looking at all of the cute mascots running around. The cuteness was through the roof here. Everything was cute. The characters, the merchandise, the free flyers, everything!
One of the things that surprised me the most was that cosplay wasn’t allowed. For anyone who doesn’t know, cosplay is the art of dressing up like your favorite character. Some people even act in character while in costume. It is an absolute staple at any convention. You will see tons of people who spend hours sewing and perfecting their costumes. They can be totally stunning! There was almost none of that here. My theory is that the companies hired professional models to stand and cosplay at their booths so they didn’t want the average person or cosplay artist to outshine or take attention away from their booth or their model. Which makes sense but I was disappointed to say the least.
Between the size of it and our lack of truly being able to understand what was going on, we only spent a couple of hours there. It was well worth it, though, with all of the free comic books and bags that we came out of it with. It also felt very freeing to be a complete and utter spastic nerd for a couple of hours without feeling like I had to apologize for it here. I can now proudly say that I have been to an anime convention in Tokyo! Check that off the list of things I need to do before I die.