New York Anime Festival 2008 has made it as my 9th con. I had some mixed feelings about before but, overall, my experience was pretty good. Friday, Lara and I had arrived to the con a little before 3PM and found Hoc, Lan, Mia, and David at the Ningin booth which, was conveniently located next to the T.M.Revolution booth. Some pictures of cosplayers had already been taken and Lan had requested that we run around and get free stuff for them. My goodness, there was a lot of free stuff like bookmarks, manga, stickers and such. Half way through, the free bags were getting extremely heavy (especially for me since I had to carry two of them). We had also started pointing cosplayers in the direction of the booth for the contest.

Having previously been to 8 cons before I felt that Fridays would be very big but at NYAF, it was kind of dead. Most of the panels seemed a bit bland and the exhibitors hall closed at 5PM, which didn’t leave much left to explore. However, others made the best of it by randomly breaking out into song and dance (like Caramelldansen and Hare Hare Yukai) which makes everyone around feel a little bit better. Lara and I decided to be random ourselves by putting on our Ningin T-shirts, flapping our hands and running around like crazy people informing the cosplayers about the contest. We also jumped up on the stage to make an announcement about the prizes, where to go, and to follow the Mudkipz! Friday was just the warm up for the real work we would be doing Saturday.

Saturday was the most festive at the con. There was a lot more cosplaying going on, many more people walking around, and even glomping. Lara and I had cosplayed as Mudkipz and went about with signs we made advertising the cosplay contest. However, we got stopped many times to pose for pictures. Apparently, a lot of people “liek Mudkipz.”

One of the panels we (as fangirls) just had to go to was the one about T.M.Revolution and Abingdon boys school. There, everyone was informed about TMR’s long tour which includes many stops all over Japan. Special video messages from the band and TMR were also showed. In the last video message TMR stated that he has a new MySpace! Great news for English speaking fans since it gives them a great way to get information.

Well after all the fangirling SSS (squeak, screams and squeals) we continued our search for cosplayers to stop by the booth. Anime cons are the best places to be random and not to be seen as weird. Maybe because everyone else is just as random, but to our surprise witnessed a yaoi circle. Now we all secretly like a little yaoi now and then but, the continuous random kissing was a bit too much for us. Especially since none of the guys were cute and the cosplay characters didn’t correspond with each other. This was the only randomness of the day we couldn’t understand since we prefer AxelXRoxas pairings so we decided to leave and find some food.

Lara and I were accompanied by our friend Duke and we all ate at a nice little place called Burgers and Cupcakes. Lara and I got a few stares going to and from the con. Could this be because there were two random mudkipz walking around in NYC? Nah, maybe we just had something on our faces. Anyway, we had a nice lunch there and they even gave us a free cupcake! And I’m sure free is everyone’s favorite word!

When we all got back to the con, it was time for the plushie panel. There was a lot of helpful info on plushie making. The panelist went over the different materials and tools to use. They even suggested some books by Aranzi Aronzo which looked great for beginners.

Cons really are the best places to meet other fans which even includes other aspects of Asian media. We had made another sign to advertise the site, which had many names of different Asian stars on it and we got high five-ed several times because of it! On Sunday, Mia, Lara and I went to the Ichi P! dance workshop. My goodness, was it a lot of fun and these girls can dance! The song we danced to was Night of Fire and I’m surprised we picked up the dance so fast. Maybe it’s because these girls know what they are doing and how to shake it.

After getting our groove on, we decided to check out the room that would be showing the ABS concert on film. Dedicated fans had already started lining up in hopes of good seating. It was only natural for fangirls to get together and well, fangirl about the artist. So we decided to interview the first three girls in line. It’s really amazing to hear stories about how people first find out about their favorite artist. The interview was lot of fun but, not as much fun as the concert which, was out of this world even though it was just film. The energy from the fans was what really made it exciting. Those TMR fans really know whats pop’n!

The rest of Sunday consisted of more SSS as we met more fans of J-pop and even some K-pop. Some random dancing went down as well in front of booth. The con ended nicely and afterwards some of us met with a few TMR fans to go see some movie about melons. After the movie we said our goodbyes and headed back home to the land of trees and deer. I really enjoyed this con despite how slow it started out and the rain that came with it. It was a lot of fun to see the many cosplayers and hang out with the cool peeps aka the Ningin staff. I hope the next con we all go to will be just as great!