It was somewhat agonizing physically to me that is on the journey but it wasn’t as bad as Joann who had her entire luggage lost by the airline company. She had to go through almost a week without new clean clothes. Its something nobody has to go through at all.

Being in the United States didn’t really hit until we landed in St.Louis. The situation in San Francisco felt more like being in Singapore than anything else as there were so many Asians around. Felt a bit like home really.

Once arrived at St.Louis Airport we were picked up by our graduate mentors Onur and Jeniffer who drove us 2 hours south of St.Louis to the small city of Carbondale. After checking into our dorms at the Southern Illinois University Carbondale we heard that the Indonesian group were going to be late as some of them were detained in customs and missed their flight. Racial profiling perhaps? Maybe. Gonna talk about this in a later post.

All the Indonesian group finally arrived at about 2am local time though. The first night was cold and I mean freezing cold. It rained a little that night but I think the major problem was with the very cold air conditioning. Shivered like crazy and had to use an extra towel as a blanket. Found out too late in the morning that there was an “off” switch on the said air conditioner though. Dammit.

From left: Fareeza, Farah, Joann, Faizal, Sabina, Ridwan and me.

It has been quite a tiring journey and I’m still having a bit of a jet lag right now. The people here have been great and very friendly. A big difference from the usual antics we have back home. Gonna stop for now.

Next update: Classes and such.

Arriving at Changi we checked in at a transit hotel but because we checked in our bags earlier we cannot collect them unless we leave the transit area pass immigration. The problem was if we went out to collect our bags we cannot go back in as our boarding passes was only allowed to be collected before the flight itself. Due to that really incredible rule I’m now left with the same T-shirt I’ve been wearing the entire day without a change of clothes or even my long sleeve shirt for the long duration flight.

Seriously, WTF???!!!! and FML!. On the bright side, the airport offers free Wifi and the inside of the duty free area looks like a mini shopping mall. Damn the liquor and cigarettes are cheap. So gonna get a few bottles on the way home after this.

Looks like football fever does not stop even the busiest of travelers. There’s a few spots in the airport organised by the airport authorities itself that gives guest an opportunity to watch the World Cup live. A great idea if I do say so myself if  you’re on the go. Thats actually quite considerate of them.

Looking how I do not have anything/anyone to hug to keep the cold away I hope they would give me a blanket soon. Gonna try to stay awake tonight so I can sleep on the plane. Plane departs at 7am and its gonna be a 20 hour flight to St.Louis’s airport. I predict my butt is gonna die and my entertainment supply will only last me for so long. I think I’m gonna dread this journey…I really think so….

Next stop…Narita Airport.

Day 2 of AFA was remarkably better than the day before in terms of numbers of both guest and cosplayers. Maybe it was because the cosplay competition was held on day 2 or that May’N’s concert was gonna be held that evening. Well to me it didn’t matter though although I did regret not buying a certain hand figurine much earlier.

Cosplayers were everywhere to be seen not to mention the quality of most costumes were really really good. Its either some of them are ridiculously talented in making costumes or some of them are so bloody rich they could afford to import cosplay items and accessories such as Zero’s (of the Code Geass series) mask/helmet. Though I like to say the first but then again after having a close look at some of their costumes and props I do have to admit some of this Singaporean(?) cosplayers are really really loaded. Suddenly I now feel abit tad sad living in Malaysia.

I bet you 10 bucks its a guy in there.

As though it didn’t get any better I met some friends from MMU’s Emina Melaka such as Lisa, Loo Mun, Hsia Liang just to name a few. Haven’t seen them since GACC earlier this year. I so missed the time we started GACC together…that was such a blast.

Though I didn’t manage to catch Aniki’s mini concert on Day 1(heh…) I did however catch a glimpse of his special performance on day 2 although it was nearing the end.

Anyways, I saw the most perfect Ranka Lee cosplayer evar!!! She fits the character so perfectly I was literally stunned for a few seconds.

I have to admit that there were particularly a large number of Hatsune Miku cosplayers and also those from Vocaloid.

Wut? A manga kissa? In Singapore? No way….but seriously its not that surprising. I haven’t been to their actual shop but I figure it must feel like its our local (chinese translated) manga rental shops but with more zest and more equipment like massage chairs and Japanese books.

I have to admit. I had my ass handed back to me from playing Tekken 6 against Nikki but only because I had not played Tekken for a long time okay?!!! As expected, the graphics and gameplay was good. Its really amazing that they manage to bring in the arcade machine as its currently only available in Japan. This goes the same for the new Street Fighter game as well though I did not manage to give it a try.

Fancy meeting Reno there as well. I first meet him while I was judging the Animax cosplay competition a few months back but I didn’t get a chance to talk to him until now.

Finally, a complementary picture of my overlord and master Akiko.(unfanged version cause I promised that I won’t put it up)

Then last but not least, the time that everyone has been waiting for…MAY’N!!!!!!!!!!!!! The amazing thing about being in Singapore is that not only that they have a reliable transport system that comes on time but their event schedule too starts on the clock unlike their bigger neighbor up north(unfortunately…). All I can say about the concert was that the sound system sucked so much it did not give her voice the justice it deserved, the crowd was so big I had to view the concert from a balcony 150m++ away with a 75-300mm zoom lens in which not only hurts my eye while sniping taking pictures of May’N it was also the only means in which I could get a good view from up close in which you can see from the pictures below.

The crowd went wild just as she appeared on stage and as you can see from the pics some rich otakus fans were even seen waiving glow sticks.

This was seen during all of the six songs she performed. I think its from the Diamond VIP ticket holders. Dammit.

But at the end of the day, all they got was a pre-signed piece of autograph on a square card at the meet and greet session. Disappointing to say the least.

Her last song that she performed which was ‘Iteza Gogo Kuji Don’t be late’ was so bloody EPIC I actually shed tears. You can asked any of the Emina members that went. They can vouch for me. Remember on my earlier post that I will do a Kira post at every ACG event I attend this year? Well to no further a do. Here it is…

Yes…I do know that I look like I was going to consume her soul from this picture but you can blame Nikki for this using my Sony Alpha. Its ok Nikki I know Sony is not your thing I prefer Nikon myself if I got a choice.

Oh, by the way I didn’t actually cry while May’N was singing ‘Iteza Gogo Kuji Don’t be late’ taking the long range shots through the viewfinder just took a strain on my eyes and tears just flowed.

Oh…

my…

GAWD!!!!!!

There’s even a queue on the OTHER side.

When we finally got our 2 day tickets and went in the fitst thing that greeted us was…

a 1/10 scale Exia!!!

There were variuos displays the Gunpla Bakuc competition corner, the exhibitors showcase row, and even works by various local mangakas. There were so many booths selling stuff from card holders to PVC models at such great prices I had to stop myself short of using all my cash on it. Even Chuang Yi Comics, a local manga distrubutor also had a booth there too bad they had nothing that I wanted though when I was there. I heard that they had a bigger selection but it was mostly in chinese unfortunately.

The gunpla works submitted for the competition was good. So good in fact I had an itch to suddenly go assemble one. I wanted to get a VF-25F Ozma Lee Custom but due to a lack of funds I had to resist the temptation of getting one. Damn…

I did not attend the Goda Gundam designer Kunio Okawara’s talk but I heard it was interesting and that he had some brilliant powerpoint presentation slides. If only I knew what my friend meant by that. Darn it, I knew I should have made my shopping till much later.

The various product displays by figurine companies like Alter, McFarlane, Figma, Goodsmile, Revoltech and even SquareEnix just to name a few was a real crowd puller. Visitors were snapping pictures faster than you can say “Kyah~~”.

I like the lighting reflection on the Ironman.

The details on the figures are simply in lack of a better word “mind-blasting!”.

Amazingly but not surprising Odex had open up shop there and looking at how it was going it seem that the locals do support Odex in one way or another(in buying anime related merchandises). I had assume that the booth would be ignored by anime fans due to the controversies involved with them but to my surprise it was pretty packed with people. They were selling Domo-kun related items, anime t-shirts and erm… bad subtitled font anime vcd/dvds. It would also seem that they had also licensed Toradora, Casshern Sins and Code Geass to be distributed in Singapore. I just hope the Japanese companies know what their doing.

Most of the cosplayers I’ve seen are some of the best that I’ve ever seen so far. High quality costume, a fine attention to detail plus a suitable personality to fit into the character really pulls it off. I’m pretty sure they are some Malaysians there cosplaying too but it goes to show that ACG has no boundaries.

When I first saw these guys I immediately went *clickety click*. I *heart* Macross.

A friend of mine has that very same banana.

Thats more or less day 1 for me. I skipped the Mizuki(Aniki) concert that evening because I was too tired. Day 1 was okay in my professional opinion but they could have done better in getting the crowd more excited by having more of a energetic MC’s and on the spot games instead. Until day 2 of the event, I now leave you with the best cosplayer of the day…Bakucman!!! (Isn’t he just awesome?)

Just kidding.

Anyways, the trip started out in a bad way. So bad it was predicted it might happen as a worst case scenario and it did happen. I overslept. My bus was leaving at 9.30am and I was suppose to wake up at 5am to pack my stuff, then pick Nikki who was going off with me at 7am and then get my sis to drop us off at the Bangsar where the bus was leaving from. Instead, I woke up at 8.15am had 15mins to bath, pack up, call Nikki to apologize profusely and ask her to grab a taxi there instead and then had 1 hour to get to the bus before it leaves by riding on my dad’s motorcycle due to the insane traffic condition. Suffice to say, I made it in time meeting Nikki at the bus who arrived 10 minutes before me. It was nerve breaking to the start of a tiring day.

We stayed at Fragrance Hostel. For SG$22 per night it was pretty good. Located near the city center it was quite convenient to move around.

After a 5-6 hour journey, grabbing a bite at MOS Burger, solving the puzzle on the Singapore’s EZLink card, getting lost on foot finding the hostel and waiting for the others to arrive we decided to visit the Cosplay Cafe located in Chjimes (on Akiko’s suggestion).

We only had drinks as it was quite pricey on our budget. Overall the place had a really relaxing atmosphere but unfortunately the cosplay theme was overrated as it was just a regular restaurant cum pub joint with waitresses wearing semi-maid-waitress type uniforms.

Chjimes on the other hand was simply superb. Being converted from church It was beautiful. With an al fresco dining style in the open serving many western and mediteranian cuisine it would be awesome if I could afford anything there but unfortunately I could only afford to take pictures. Next time I’ll definitely visit this place again to try the food out if I’m ever in Singapore again.

Seeing how it was such a nice nite and within walking distance of our hostel we then decided to walk back instead and drop by Burger King for a quick dinner. Looks like the roads are being readied for the Christmas with simply stunning decorations and lights along the roads.

I’ve never felt that walking was so much fun as in anywhere else. There was so many things to see and explore I just wished I could stay there for a few more days just to walk some more and coming from me its really shocking indeed cause if this is in KL I’ll be complaining already.

Interestingly, we saw the above image being projected on to the walls of their art gallery in conjunction with a Japan arts week or something. A gundam was also projected as well but due to rushing I was not able to get a good shot of it. Looks like anime-fever is already hitting town. Now its rest for the big day tomorrow.