Omonomono

April 6, 2016

KawaiiKon 2016

By omo

From what I heard, some of the people who run AWA take a vacation in the Spring to visit Hawaii. While at it they also produce Kawaii Kon. Spring is a good time to go because it’s considered off-season, and the weather in Hawaii doesn’t really get much colder in April than it does in any other month.

The con is located in Oahu, Honolulu, in Ala Moana, wedged between the large shopping mall and the north end of Waikiki. It’s pretty natural to stay in Waikiki for the con and also enjoy the vacation destination setup that it is. Too bad I’m already allocating all my off time this year for events so I can’t stay the extra time to enjoy Hawaii…

[I hear AX this year is going to be pretty good guest-wise? I’m just full of hearsay today.]

I really do not know what I am going to get at Kawaii Kon. That will be part of the experience attending a con at a vacation destination that is known for its tropical weather and coastal beauty. I don’t really have much to add besides it also sort of redeems missing Sakuracon and AX, as far as Hanabe goes? And I’m probably going to see Waka again? How many Trigger cosplayers will be there? Not even really excited for Garnidelia makes me a little sad but ML3rd is like this thing that drives me, and that’s next week.

Oh wait, Shimoda Asami. I’m flying to Hawaii to see Shimoda Asami. This would be the 4th time I’ll see her in the past 11 months? I’m not even an Tokachigumi guyÂ LOL.

Since my attendance is kind of last-minute we didn’t plan much, other than this live stream in a couple days, a BBQ, and a dinner on Friday. Nothing out of the ordinary!

I am justÂ glad to be able to get away from this faux-Spring weather with sub-40F temperature in the morning…

A stepping stone to Machi Asobi and AFA in the future I guess? Getting farther and farther out? Or maybe I need to take it west and hit up Europe for some of their offering? Anime 2016 in Netherlands sounds like a fun time…

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts

March 31, 2016

What GATE Means to Me

By omo

First read this Clickhole article about Bernie Sanders. Yeah, it’s gonna get political, because that’s what my problem is with GATE. It might also get spoilery so consider yourself warned on both counts.

It would not be fair to boil down GATE as a simple power fantasy about Japan and its SDF arm doing what it’s good at doing. But unfortunately there’s not a whole lot to go on in GATE in the theme department. It is a very pure kind of wishful hypothetical.

Unfortunately that sort of thinkingÂ also is sort ofÂ what Japan’s Asian neighbors find abhorrent about Japan’s behavior during WWII. You can ask the people of Taiwan, for an example, on how they felt about being Japan’s model colony for roughly 40 years. Yeah, model colony. I believe the Japanese can do a way better job as a colonial power than many European countries of the day, too, so this I share with GATE’s SDF author. It might not even be too different than from what you’d get if you asked the hapless farmers and tribals the SDF rescued in the show. Of course, that’s missing the point.

What’s missing from GATE are all the important stuff that sort of spoils the fantasy, basically, just like how a statementÂ is missing in that Clickhole article about propping up puppet dictators. Or colonialism is problematic and inhumane. Or you shouldn’t really write a story where the SDF basically installs a puppet government. FWIW there are some recent movies where the bad guy’s end game is to do this! I don’t think Japan’s public has gotten that memo on colonialism yet. To be fair back then they didn’t have the internet! We’ve long since moved on from it! Maybe Japan’s post-warÂ generation failed to take note on international politics and explained how things work to the Lost Generation because they were too busy building their economy? “Yo guys, but we’ve gone from colonies to just plain dictators that we prop up that serve our international interests, and proxy wars like Syria.”

1 comment | posted in GATE, Modern Visual Culture

March 29, 2016

Anime Boston 2016: Wrap

By omo

If I wrote this post with a list of microcontent…

“Anime Boston 2016: I Learned How to Hedge Value in Yet-to-Air Anime by Buying Chara Goods Before Seeing the Character” – Where I describe how I bought this $20 Cospa XXL shirt (which are the unicorns of Japanese anime chara merch) from Crunchyroll, featuring Nico…Niyama. Heh. And only then I watched Kiznaiver a day later (while wearing said shirt, BTW), and found out that she’s a Kuno Misaki character.

“Anime Boston 2016: How To Karaoke All Night Long” – Where I describe how Joysound on PS4 is a lot of fun, until it prevents people from sleeping, and yet it doesn’t.

“Anime Boston 2016: Bag Checking a 25000-sized Con Suck Major Butts” – Where I just gripe about Anime Boston’s ails from Hynes being all politically ass-wiping of itself at the expense of con-goers. Boston being its chilly and rainy self (nearly freezing temperatures at times) also did not help when bag check lines often extended outdoors.

“Anime Boston 2016: Eventers Edition” – In which I talk about meeting people from Overseas, and how KR fans flew to Boston to see Sasaki Jun, plus this dude from Tokyo, and running into some local (big tall white) guy who went to Symphogear and YuiKaori. Actually listening him describing YuiKaori was kind of LOLs, for a first-timer. Oh, there may be a big thing going on for AX this year if you like anison.

“Anime Boston 2016: The West Discovers nano.RIPE’s Sasaki Jun Has a Schtik, Will Run With” – In which I describe how nano.RIPE’s leader is a nerd and is hilarious. But it would just be an embedded tweetÂ along with a description of how Julia is his girlfriend.

Okay, I think you get the idea.

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts

March 27, 2016

Anime Boston 2016: Day 3

By omo

For various reasons I actually was able to watch all the namas that I wanted to see that took place in Anime Japan 2016 Sunday. Well, not counting one of the nama that overlapped with another and I didn’t have enough bandwidth to stream both.

This means I was up basically from Saturday AM until with about an hour of sleep broken into a couple chunks when I was able to settle down. I’m looking at this from the bright side/silver lining of not sleeping much.

Gonna ramble nau.

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts

March 23, 2016

Anime Boston 2016 Means Prepping for Anime Japan

By omo

I skipped last year because I didn’t feel like it. This year I think I’m going only because I wanted to see nano.RIPE. Why didn’t I want to see LiSA last year, or want enough of it to overcome various issues, I don’t know. She’s great in the flesh, don’t skip a chance to see her if you come across one.

Some interesting tidbits about AB2016 if you do go.

Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts, Seiyuu, Idol, Pop