Let’s do this foodie pics first, because it accurately depicts the order of importance to me of what happens at this con. To recap, A-Kon 31 announced fhana and BACK-ON and subsequently un-announced them about a week before the show. In their place we got Shihori and Diana Garnet. We also got surprise-SG5.

CattleAck BBQ is one of Texas’s best BBQ joints, and a perennial top-3 in Dallas-Fort Worth region. So I went with some folks. This tweet sums it up well.

when in texas ? pic.twitter.com/yJkmspV8ea

— Ken (@kenbolido) June 4, 2022

The con itself deserves some mention, as it’s my first time attending A-kon. For one, it’s one of America’s oldest cons, and it has its share of highs and lows. Without getting into it too much, 2022 featured a completely new venue as they move into DFW area proper, literally 2 stops away from the airport on the local train, between DFW and Love Field. It’s a nice location as it used to be just wilderness and the new development is, well, new. The con center is next to the Westin, and around the area are other nice hotels, foods, and venues. There’s an open space with free rave music on the weekend even.

The weather in early June was actually pretty cooperative for Dallas. Nothing I can complain about really.

Toyota Music Factory is a pretty new venue that was built there and it felt a tinge of LA Live, dare I say? But the venue was new and pretty good. Shihori and Garnet made short work of a small crowd, but I had fun just trying to feel that concert mojo again.

What was really impressive was the fan idol/odorite showcase at A-Kon. The IM@S, Aikatsu and Love Live groups made the thing felt like a fan-made Bannam Fes (which I watched not that long ago as of attending A-kon). For a fan production it is pretty high level, but it’s also clearly still on the crest of cringe. If you enjoy idols like I do I think this is all very precious though, so it’s fun seeing some of these acts trying their best given what they got. There was a full on Million group that wore 3rd cosplay outfits and that got to me pretty goddamn hard.

The fun part about this is also SG5. Turns out they were socializing with all the other fan dance groups the night before at a party which is amazing, lol. SG5 closed out the fan idol showcase with some serious firepower and yeah, clearly professionals at work. After the show there was a post-show autograph area where you can go and buy stuff, so I got an autograph there and a 2shot. I also talked to some of the other fan performers and it was fun to see them just do their thing.

I was able to go to SG5’s panel on Sunday and get more 2shots. Real Idols in America hurrah. During the panel, I learned more about the situation behind their prior works. These LDH-branded entertainers have real chops and maybe this is all very produced? But who’s idea is this? It’s amusing.

Besides that, I guess I did do a lot of chilling in Texas, talking to folks who I haven’t seen in quite a while is always good, to catch up in person versus over social media. It was a nice retreat from the daily grind. I took a quick walk around the con, but didn’t explore every corner. It’s a fairly large crowd for a relatively small space between a couple hotels and the con center, I think. There is a lot of outdoor areas though.

As a con, I don’t have a whole lot to say, as a result. I can talk about the con experience as I had it, which is that A-kon 31 was a bit of a mess, and the least organized one I went to among Acen and AB, but that doesn’t mean a lot in this day and age. It’s a new venue after all, so I had came into it with that expectation. I also heard it was run by some newer folks. There were also some interesting things they did…like a foam rave, or showing films at the Alamo inside the shopping/entertainment complex the con is part of. I think the overall experience was okay, as long as they fix some line and crowd control issues. It’s also unfortunate they dropped the ball on guests! Still, I guess I didn’t mind the lemonade much from the lemons A-Kon gave me. It help cut the grease from all that BBQ.

PS. Covid was definitely a guest at A-Kon because masking was poor if at all, despite con’s policy about it being mandatory. I guess this is how that part of the country rolls, unfortunately. On the bright side much of the con experience is outside, and other than inside some panel rooms or parts of the Westin, you’re either outside or in big open spaces. Even the very crowded dealer hall probably isn’t as bad because of the better ventilation of a modern convention space.

It’s a bit unusual for me to write up these cons so long since I attended them, about a month ago. But here we are.

The COVID-induced ennui does things, I guess? But at the same time, there are plenty of good reasons to not go to cons for fun, as AX discourse showed us. That’s coming right up isn’t it? Well I am not going despite that Aniplex still came through with two big seiyuu guests…

People like Aoi Koga came into prominence in and around 2018-2019 and in a way you feel about them a certain way, as their biggest impact was during COVID. It can definitely be said of ASCA, which Sacra/Sony Music brought to Anime Boston as a guest. It is my first “normal” anisong concert since February 2020, so it felt a certain way. ASCA already performed once in Hawaii for Kawaii Kon so this is her second stop. She’s also going to Germany for AnimagiC next month, but the thing I want to state from this encounter is having that anisong experience with calls is a thing she has not had as a performer until recently because Japan still bans calls at shows.

Since ASCA officially debuted in 2019, she’s not really had a solo show with calls, as this COVID-era new artist said as much. It was moving to hear the handful of us doing the calls. Well, not really sure how many people caught on in the audience during Howling, but howling at ASCA at AB’s Friday night concert was a ton of fun. It was also stirring. It’s like having old synapses firing that you forgot were there. You feel in ways you have not in some time, and yet that sensation feels new.

This is the kind of rending of emotions that I welcome in a post-COVID world, much like old friends reunited since the era of quarantines and travel bans. This is why this summer, for better or worse, travelers will be bustling, COVID counts be damned.

The problem in that scenario as things play out isn’t so much just the pandemic, but that these events and organizations are also now putting on a show to record crowds, many having to weather the storm and lost much in the process. Anime Boston did probably the best job out of the 3 cons I attended this year trying to mitigate things. Overall they were well-staffed and for the most part the con ran okay. Crowding was an issue during peak Saturday, but it was still manageable if chaotic.

The autograph ticket line was set up using spare panel rooms, which meant lining up to get seated, and they handed out tickets by moving people in rows of seats. That was fun. At con badge line was basically none by the time I arrive Friday afternoon.

What was hellish was that MIT and Harvard both had graduations that Saturday, which meant hotel and flight prices went through the roof (airlines and hotel industries are part of that “events and organizations” aspect I guess) for AB’s dates. It’s bad, because those 2 (large) schools postponed their 2020 and 2021 graduations to 2022, so 3 years worth of grads walked on the same weekend. Luckily they had a batch of hotel rooms in the con block open up in April which made things a bit less painful. The drive from my home to and from the con was also pretty crazy for traffic, because other schools across CT also had graduations (did you know there are a lot of colleges in Connecticut). The NBA Playoff Conference Final was also on Friday, which adds an extra layer of logistical fun, I suppose. The Prudential Center (basketball venue) is literally the venue attached to the con upstairs. Oh, it’s Memorial Day Weekend, which is a huge travel day in the USA anyway to start. Anyways, it kind of was a terrible date to have a large fan con in Boston.

I was only at Anime Boston for about 24 hours, which is unusual for a change–had family stuff to deal with that long weekend. During that time I tried to make the best of it. I walked the Dealer’s, which was mostly just to say hi to a bunch of folks. It’s a little sparse but not too bad. I should walk the AA but I didn’t get around to it. If I had stayed until Sunday could have caught a BoSox game. Ah well, maybe next time.

PS. Not much fooding. Just a pic.

Legal Seafood is like last resort at the venue. Both because it’s a bit pricy and it’s not that good, and it’s open when everywhere else is full. I think it’s still an okay place to take first timers to, but I’ll get the fried scallops next time.

I went to Eataly on Saturday for late lunch and that was way better and costed a bit less. I should have went to grab some groceries before I headed out of Boston. Cannolis are my sins.

I’m going to jot down some thoughts about COVID-19 as it intersects American anime conventions. Think of it as my own feedback from going to 3 cons on back-to-back weekends. Thinking about it some more, having a very personal take is the only take possible. As with all testimonies about COVID, it probably needs a grain of salt or two. My situation will be different from yours, but hopefully the insight helps with your particularities nonetheless.

Mask adherence anecdote
Acen: ~70% (required for most events)
ABoston: ~90% (required)
A-kon: ~10% (required)

— omo@KawaiiKon2024 (@omonomono) June 4, 2022

A bit of background in case you’re new to this blog–I’ve been going to anime cons since the late 90s, and probably averaged about 7-8 a year for the 10 years leading up to 2020. Since the pandemic hit, I have been working from home and I normally do not leave the house. Maybe once or twice a week to get food and supplies, tops. That said, I have flew out of state and to Europe since 2020, and as COVID restrictions decreased in 2022 I have done more traveling out of town, by car, train and plane.

For example, I went to AnimeNYC in November last year, and went through that whole Omicron rigmarole. That was also a good (anecdotal) example of how a con actually didn’t do much to worsen spread of the COVID beyond a community baseline. Omicron was just beginning, though, so I won’t treat that datum with much weight.

I currently live with elderly, immunocompromised people, so I try to cultivate my inner hikkikomori in a way that avoids indoor, crowded spaces generally. The good thing is this comes naturally, I am totally a shut-in nerd when I want to be one. The bad thing is that it also means sometimes I just want to get out of the house! It’s where I both work and play, for starters. Remember I used to go to many cons a year, plus Japan, and other gatherings? I wanna hang out with other eventer friends I’ve not seen in years, thus these cons. Something about an itch?

Anyways, too much isolation is bad for you too. The goal is to try to balance and minimize the risk without getting sick of being a shut-in. I realize this is personal in the sense that people’s risk tolerance (perceived and otherwise) differ by many different factors, and ultimately we want to keep COVID transmission no higher than existing community levels. This is kind of a policy statement that reasonable people will come to different conclusions on, but ultimately I draw the line at “not making things worse.” You might want to draw a much closer or farther line. Either way, this is not important to me. The goal is to protect the people near you, your family and immediate friends. This means you don’t want to bring COVID home, and this is really the one and only primary objective this con season for me. If I go to a con and catch COVID, I won’t say it will never be worth it (If Natsuki Hanae or Aoi Koga gave you COVID, isn’t that not necessarily a bad thing? This is a joke, all right?), but it most likely won’t be.

To do that, we have to understand the actual risks. The distinction I make between reckless COVID spreading behavior and a reasonable new normal is the difference between habitual risk-taking versus occasional risk-taking. There are things we do habitually–some people are out and about in the town every day because that is their lifestyle. Some people always eat out, for example. Then there are the occasional outing that puts you in a crowd. If you are the former, you are rolling COVID gacha all the time. In that case, even if the activity is at very low risk (wearing masks while out and about), you will likely catch COVID eventually due to the overall duration and permutations of the interactions. If you have infinite money, you don’t need a suptix, in other words; if you have infinite time, you will eventually catch every disease (assuming you don’t die)? A few rolls at even greater risk, the odds are lower that you end up with COVID when these risk are rarely taken. And as you’ll see, “greater risk” here is not even so much greater if you take the right precautions.

[By the way, this is also why COVID disparately impacts the working poor. They are all rolling with their masks on because they live this way. The moment they let their guard down, which we all invariably will as we are mere mortals, is when the virus will strike. The Laptop Working Class can reduce habitually risky behavior in their lifestyle, so they can afford to fail to properly protect themselves more often.]

It’s not fully clear how dangerous it is to go to a con today, so to be safe, it’s best to treat it that you will be in proximity with someone who is COVID positive. Even so, outside of the few very crowded areas of a con, you are likely not next to that someone much, or at least if such someone is a random stranger. It’s a higher risk, but short-contact tradeoff. I went to 3 fairly large cons, each probably had more than 20k attendees, and it wasn’t that common that I was surrounded by people as long as I’m not in line.

Which is just to say, it could be a shut-in at the con in line behind you, or it could be the barista at the Starbucks you go to everyday. Either could give you consars. One you will see many days a year, the other you will see just once ever, even if for an hour or two at a time. It’s not a simple risk tradeoff, or rather, it’s more about how many hours you spend in proximity and with protection than just the fact that someone surely has COVID in a crowd.

Furthermore, at a con, you have the power to tactically lower your COVID risks too. Avoid crowds! Isn’t that the main problem with cons? (Actually, no, read on.) It turns out, you can still be at a con and avoid the crowds, most of the time. And try to distance yourself where it’s reasonable to do so. This is where a good con and a bad con can make a difference. Are lines well-controlled? Is there enough hall space in the dealer’s room for the crowd to spread out enough so at least the traffic isn’t jammed? How long are you in line for anyways? I can give props to AB and ACen about these points for the most part, not so much for AX. Some streetwise can go help you avoid a biologically nasty situation, as well. Keep your wits about, I guess.

By the same metric, the basic understanding is that without cons, maybe there is less spread than with a con. But without cons, people are still going to do the things that spread the virus–that’s what’s been happening since the beginning of the pandemic, and in the USA things are just ramping up to a hot summer travel-wise, according to industry predictions. Cons are going to be one of those things people are going to do. Which, if you think about it, in some sense, air travel in the US is pretty much a good proxy of what people do at cons…maybe minus the real ways cons spread COVID. You literally all crowd through a busy line, have to take your mask off for the TSA officer, and most airports have large, airy designs with tall ceilings.

What makes cons dangerous for spread of COVID is just really one thing. It’s the exact same thing that makes COVID dangerous at home.

Hanging out with friends unmasked is the way to catch COVID at a con. This could be eating a meal together, this could be a room party, this could be several different things. Meeting friends who you haven’t seen in years is great! But just be careful about unmasking. At ANYC last year I did a booth karaoke with 2 other people who have been sorta careful, so we did it without masks, but I think I was lucky in that Omicron wasn’t the prevalent strain yet at the time, as it is much more contagious.

Going back to Omicron at ANYC, the cluster CDC investigated is totally just the one guy’s friends and people he hung out with at the con, and it’s those people that got the consars. That’s how COVID spreads most of the time. You can take the statement I make with all the salt in the world, as I don’t have hard science to back it up, but it is the most logical conclusion if you think about how most people get COVID, and what people do at cons.

In other words, what you shouldn’t be doing to avoid spread of COVID when you’re at home is the same thing that you should avoid at cons. There is really nothing that much worse about cons and the crowds themselves as long as you take the right precautions. Most large cons, ones bad enough for that sort of crowding, are in large con halls with high ceiling and good ventilation. You can always opt out of the rave (lol), or go to an empty area in the back like I did at Acen’s Synergy. You can try to avoid crowded chokepoints and spend less time in them when possible (like dealer’s rooms). These things are much easier done than keeping your mask on while drinking at a party, unfortunately. It’s that party, that’s how the virus gets you. And if you insist on having one, in June 2022, this means booster-vaxxed and antigen-negative considering Omicron still infects the vaccinated.

Most importantly, wear N95 masks. It makes a huge difference, and it only costs a few dollars each, if that. It protected many health pros during the COVID early days, during the Delta and Omicron surges, and N95 masks continue to protect them today. It’s proven to work along with proper usage and other good hygiene practices, plus the vaccines. It is what kept me COVID-free so far, with these 3 cons back to back (AFAIK I have yet to contract it), knock on wood. It’s smart to also carry around a small hand sanitizer thing (or use the ones at the con), because you need to use it before you eat after touching…the mahjong set or whatever it is that you do at cons.

Taking these reasonable precautions go a long way to make your consars rolls manageable. It’s not failproof, of course, but I think these risks, after reasonably managed, are small enough to be taken with good conscience. It’s still not as safe as not going to cons at all, but the precaution you need to take for cons are not significantly different. The flip side of the coin is also true–stay home and you won’t have to worry about most of these mitigation methods. Still, you should still avoid meeting friends unmasked unless you have good confidence they are also “clean.”

In short, the take away from me is, wear N95 mask, as much as possible. Even when with friends at a room party–especially when with friends at a room party.

We have updated our COVID-19 Health & Safety Protocols. While face coverings will still be required inside the LACC, we will no longer be requiring proof of vaccination or negative test for entry. More information is available here: https://t.co/H5Oe6HnQcD pic.twitter.com/8BTY7H07mH

— Anime Expo (@AnimeExpo) June 8, 2022

I will end with just a note on the COVID policy things that Acen and AX (today!) bungled, which is to change them for the weaker. I think on the whole, given that most people catch COVID at cons not through crowds but through personal interaction with people they know, it’s almost more theater than sound theory. However the risk profile does change–if your con goes from “full vax and mask” to “partial mask” the con needs to offer refunds. Each person makes a decision to go to AX or Acen based on their personal risk factors, so it’s not something that can be explained away by ham-fisted social media posts about public health policies. If you change the nature of the event, you need to offer refunds. Just like if you offer to sell a white car then it changed to a black car, even if you said the color might change in advance, you need to offer refunds for people who don’t want it anymore. Acen didn’t and that’s a bait-and-switch in my book. Shame on them. Anime Expo at least didn’t do it 5 days before the con, but 24 days before the con is not a lot better, given AX prep tends to be much more extensive even for locals.

At the same time, Anime Expo is always a terrible line con. Pre-COVID, the con already had prior struggles with lines and keeping attendees outside in very high temps for hours. Don’t forget also the people in the AA that one year, LOL. I have zero confidence AX can wing a vax check without putting more people in ambulances for heat stroke or what have you. Not checking vax is lesser of the two evils in that case, as much as AX in-person is already, arguably, evil. And as I say to many of my friends, AX is consistently the worst-run con that I attend every year (before COVID, anyway).

Still, I think people want to have a good time at the con and they shouldn’t have to worry about COVID. A good COVID policy goes a long way to remove that mental barrier to enjoyment (eg., a mask mandate basically resolves this). Good implementation (not what A-Kon does) will smooth things out. Having a strict policy on COVID and smoothly implementing it like how Anime Boston has done it is the best, but I understand that won’t be possible for every event. Certainly however, changing the policy last minute for sure raises the specter of this pandemic to the fore (well, maybe that’s not all bad?) and it will tarnish people’s enjoyment, which works against the purpose of anime cons completely.

There are some lingering linecon competency problems and venue management issues with enforcing COVID measures as well, and on top of added HR cost and real cost to manage the vax check. This means there are real financial gains with dropping those COVID policies. Whatever it is in the end, just don’t let idiots who think cons have to follow CDC or WHO guidelines get their way–cons are private events and they can set their own COVID policies just fine. Guidelines, as the name implies, are just suggestions and don’t dictate what private events can do. It might affect cost, or cause attendees to queue for extra long (which is bad too, from a COVID transmission sense), but it’s not because they can’t.

Enough of this depressing topic. Maybe I should follow up this mostly-serious post with some Real Eventer COVID Woes topics:

• How to do calls with duckbill N95 masks, since it moves around; which N95 are best for calls?
• Which of my oshis is most likely to give me COVID (or another disease w/e)? Do you really want it given the chance?
• When you get a 2 shot with an idol, do you keep your mask on or take it off?
• When will Japan actually open for eventers, like, not North Korean style?
• How do you handle the feels from a COVID-era debut artist who heard their songs performed live with calls for the first time?