Day Two
I swear, our hotel room had the weirdest alarm clock I've ever heard; it was just plain annoying when it went off at 7:00 am, but I guess it fulfilled its task because it woke me up. After getting a shower, updating the con report and reading a bit of my Berserk volume 4 that I'd bought the previous day, I stopped at McDonald's for breakfast.

We continued to the press room and then stood around for a while, figuring out what to do. While in the middle of our difficult decision process, several members from Ender's Manhattanville Anime Club (MAC) happened to stumble upon us, and I was introduced to Fred, Julia (who cosplayed as Yomiko Readman from Read or Die) and Chad. They were quite an excited group of people but not quite of the same cut as most others; perhaps it was a certain glint in their eyes that I can't quite place my finger on.

Anyway, after we began to disperse, Ender and I used the power of the mighty press pass to go down and check out the dealers room before it officially opened, and believe me, it's nice to walk around the room when there aren't hundreds of otaku roaming about in the aisles. We strode about for a bit, picking up random DVDs and manga and talking about them, but then we left and went upstairs to the Webcomics and Webmanga panel.

We arrived a bit late at 10:50 am, and I wished we'd been much earlier for the panel. Panelists included the creators of AppleGeeks, Little Gamers, Mac Hall, VG Cats, and a slew of other webcomic creators, both big and small. The panel was basically a nintey-minute question and answer session, but the hundreds of people in the audience asked many great questions. Answers concerned mainly how money influences webcomics and their fan base *cough MegaTokyo cough*, the evolving style of any webcomic, as well as tips for creating webcomics and the sites to host them. Overall, the panel was filled with laughs and everyone had fun. However, we left at 11:27 am for the Production IG panel…

… which turned out to be a Production IG and Starchild Records panel, and this brought back memories of Anime Expo 2004. Our front row seats allowed us to sit next to the J-Pop group Angela, but we didn't pester them with demands for autographs or photos. Anyway, the panel itself featured the same trailers and industry representatives that were at the same panel at Anime Expo 2004, and surprisingly, I found that attendees on both coasts ask many similar questions. I'll spare you the repetition of details and just say that the panel ended at 12:39 pm.

After we grabbed a quick bite to eat at the local food court (which didn't involve me haggling with a family over who sat at the table first), we went back into the dealers room. Ender and I walked around and checked out many booths when I came upon volumes 3 through 7 of the action-horror manwha series Island. I picked up the volumes to talk to Ender about them and then went to put them back on the shelf… but they wouldn't leave my hand. After much cursing at myself (and giving a new name to impulse buying), I bought the five volumes in hopes that I could find the first two somewhere. Also, I was later introduced to Emma (who cosplayed as Ogin from Kyogoku Natsuhiko's Worldly Horror Stories) and Jeff from MAC at the Geneon booth, and it was a pleasure meeting them.

Anyways, we went up to the press room and waited for a while until we were led out of the BCC at 4:15 pm. We arrived at the 1st Mariner Arena at 4:35 pm, and although we didn't get the red carpet treatment, we didn't have to wait in line with thousands of other otaku. Our seats weren't the greatest, but for a concert like this, we're glad we didn't get front row lest we lose our hearing permanently and be forced to change this site's name to Deaf Academy. While we were waiting for the concert to begin, they showed the first episode of Fullmetal Alchemist, which was a sound choice because it was a good teaser for everyone who was waiting, and the second opening theme song Ready Steady Go, which was cut and pasted over the first episode's credits, is sung by L'Arc~en~Ciel themselves.

The concert itself began at 5:35 pm, and right away, I was truly thankful that we weren't given front row seats. L'Arc~en~Ciel plays some good music, but our ears would've been bleeding by the end of the show. Throughout the concert, they played Driver's High from Great Teacher Onizuka and Ready Steady Go from Fullmetal Alchemist, although the majority of their songs were from their new album, Smile. In between songs, lead vocalist Hyde asked the crowd, "Did you have craps?" (perhaps he meant crabs since it was Baltimore), as well as saying, "Evangelion? I am Evangelion! Going berserk!!!" Let's just say that there was more than one instance where he got weird looks or caused the entire audience to quiet down really fast. The concert ended at 7:07 pm and a wave of more than 12,000 otaku was quick to flood the streets of downtown Baltimore, causing many traffic jams and other fun stuff.

We came back to our cars to pick up all of our stuff again and decided to go find a restaurant somewhere else in Baltimore. However, our endeavor proved to be fruitless as we couldn't find parking anywhere else in Baltimore and ended up going to a local pizza joint.

The next event was Masquerade, which began at 9:03 pm. There was a different host this year, and I think that he wasn't quite as good as the previous one. After a quick introduction of the judges, Masquerade kicked off! Features included Jewish Wolfwood, a troupe of guys dancing to the song Yatta! and the Muppets meet Revolutionary Girl Utena. Kain, Kjeldoran and Corpse left before the end of the Masquerade portion, and I was left alone to watch the costume show, which featured cosplayers walking across the stage and not stopping long enough to properly show off their costumes. Afterwards, a Para Para dance group came on, and I was out like a light bulb. A phone call from Kain at 11:38 pm woke me up when Piano Squall was on playing Aeris' theme song from Final Fantasy VII. I was quick to leave and didn't stay long enough to find out who had won the Masquerade categories.

We left the BCC at 11:44 pm and got back to the hotel to watch a movie called Battlefield Baseball. It was an incredibly funny movie, but I quietly fell asleep on the floor while Kain chainsawed a Winnebago to pieces. That's another way to fall asleep on Saturday night!

Day Three
This was the day I had been dreading. Last days are always hard. But, as Anime Academy's Staff, we could not let ourselves succumb to such frailties. This day we claimed for ourselves.

We all woke up at around 8:00 am. Quite an accomplishment given last night's viewing of Battlefield Baseball, but we were all able to pull through and get out of bed.

At around 9:00 am we had all assembled outside. The rooms were locked and the keys were returned. We now had to say good-bye to Kjeldoran, Corpse and Jigenuck. As tears fell and hands shook, we all split into two different cars to go our separate ways. That is, until Jigenuck's car required a jump. By 9:25 am, we were all leaving the hotel we had come to call, um, our hotel.

We reached the convention center a few minutes later. Our group was down to Kain, Gatts, Eek, Mugs and myself. With whatever time we had left, we all took one last dive into the dealers room.

Eek, Kain and I walked around scoping out last-minute deals. I was able to get the last volume of Captain Harlock: Endless Odyssey and a plushie of Jonathan the seal from Kaleido Star. In the mean time, Eek continued to search for the first two volumes of the Island manwah. Along the way, we ran into Fred and Emma (in her Haku costume) from MAC, and I took a group photo.

After hanging around the dealers room, Kain, Mugs, Eek and I went over to the 35mm room to watch Jet Li's Hero. Before the movie started, a staffer was giving away free copies of Zatoichi as part of a Miramax promotion. The movie began at 11:30 am and ended at around 1:00 pm or so. It was alright, but could have used some more spice.

After that, I had to part ways with my Academy brethren. Quite a sad affair. This was my first time walking with these gods and I regretted it ending so quickly. I stayed around the convention for a little bit after that scoping the sights, but it just wasn't the same.

Because I was new to anime conventions, Otakon 2003 is a priceless memory, but Otakon 2004 doesn't rank quite as high because I wasn't blindly enjoying the experience; simply put, I had expectations this time around. The rain didn't hold off entirely for the weekend, never did I find Island volumes 1 and 2 and Friday had quite a few lulls, but those are really minor complaints. Nevertheless, the Anime Academy panel was a lot of fun (even with a badgering from Frog) and I got to meet many friends that I only see once a year. In the end, Otakon 2004 kept the message "teh Tak Tak aer teh rawk rawk" alive in my mind throughout the entire time. Expect me to be back for Otakon 2005!

I have been to many anime conventions in my life, but this was my first Otakon, so I really did not know what to expect. I guess that's the best way to be for these things. After all, if you go into anything with too many expectations, you will be left with large disappointments. I will say that although some things didn't work out as well as other things in this con, I have learned not to let that get to me. The people who run cons are only human, and humans make mistakes. I will say this, though: part of the reason I enjoyed Otakon 2004 was not only because of the things there were to do. I enjoyed it because I was with a group of people who enjoyed this stuff as much as I did. And that's the secret to any con, even one as big and chaotic as Otakon; if you're with the right crowd, everything can be fun. And that's the key here, to have fun.

Chainsawed a Winnebago, eh?

Return to Otakon 2004: Part I...