Anime Los Angeles 2009 Friday Report

Anime Los Angeles (ALA to its fans and attendees) is a small convention that begins the 2009 anime convention season by taking place on the first weekend of January. Located at the Los Angeles Airport Marriott Hotel and a stone's throw away from the LAX airport, visitors from across the country can fly in for this convention and easily fly out when the con ends without worrying too much about commuting. Although a small convention, ALA continues to evolve from a bunch of anime fans milling around a hotel acting like fools while the real world looks on into an organized bunch of anime fans milling around a hotel acting like fools while the real world looks on that learns from its mistakes and avoids repeating them.

Flashback to 2007 when rain dampened most of the attendees' spirits during the convention. You could not blame ALA for bad weather, but you could blame ALA for its overzealous security that angered Fansview.com to the point of storming out from the convention. Two years later and the changes are undeniably noticeable. Fansview.com is now a Guest of Honor and the staff is ready for a fun time while maintaining order. Throw in an underground rapper, relaxing yet educational panels, a well-run Masquerade, a bunch of fellow con attendees to make friends with, and a well-stocked con suite for refreshments and you have ALA 2009.

Now sit back and enjoy the tales of Anime Los Angeles 2009 from my field report.

Friday, January 2nd, 2009

I began the con late in the afternoon after bidding farewell to Claudine, who would join Traveling Valentine at ALA later that night. Given my current leg pain combined with my misanthropic nature, I again chose Dr. Gregory House as my lead costume. This costume has been through enough cons to earn me the nickname as the Asian House. There already is a White House... two if you count the building. The first familiar Bay Area face Victoria and I saw was BSaphire, who told us of an interesting proposition for Ichiban-Con. We look forward to working with you on this endeavor.

After we grabbed our con badges, Victoria filmed parts of my antics as House. She did not film as much as I needed, but she did cover most of the Cosplay Chess, an event I always wanted to try. Cosplay Chess is a convention event where costumed participants standing on a human-sized chessboard reenact the movements of two chess players playing each other. If you remember the French Revolution chess scene of Me Brook's "History of the World, Part I" you pretty much have the idea minus the queen gangbang scene. All of the participants are assigned a chess piece and are instructed to keep character while moving or loudly advising the players. I played a white pawn situated on the far left side while fellow Traveling Valentine member Stan played the bishop behind me. As a ranked chess game, chess masters would scoff at the both players' poor strategy. But Cosplay Chess is simply about allowing cosplayed characters duke it out with each other. Every chess piece/character received at least one move and one capture instruction. When it came to capturing, the pieces had to capture or die in the style of the cosplayed characters akin to the old school game Battle Chess or the more recent Wizard's Chess of "Harry Potter" fame. This is one of the rare times where a live audience could see Dr. House could beat the stupid out of Naruto. Believe it!

As a pawn of limited use located in a strategically unimportant location, I spent most of the game playing with my cane, popping painkillers, taunting the black team, flirting with the black pawn maid directly across from me, and advising the chess players on who to capture in order of most annoying. When it was finally my turn to move, I whined that my leg hurt and I had a note. But move I did and soon enough the maid I flirted with earlier was now my target to capture, which I did with one jab of my flame cane during a medical examination. And when the black queen decided to capture me, I overdosed on my prop Vicodin and died before she had a chance. Eventually, it was down to the two kings and white team won after a match of Jan-Ken-Pon.

After the end of Cosplay Chess and receiving my little trophy, I headed over to the Con Suite. The Con Suite is an ALA tradition and perk. Attendees march on on their stomachs, and Pocky can only go so far. Real food is needed and the Con Suite is stocked with all sorts of snacks. Peanut butter and jelly with some fruit and hot tea makes for a great light meal. With attendees filing in and out of the Con Suite, the place is also a good spot to meet new friends and chat for a bit. True to our words, I met with the maid I captured earlier during Cosplay Chess and we chatted. I eventually found myself shooting her and the rest of the maids during the maid gathering that followed. I tracked down Victoria and Deb and escorted Deb to Carl's Jr since she wanted dinner.

Claudine rendezvoused with me at the ALA hotel and together we hoofed it to the Travelodge down the street. We dined at Denny's while talking over the events of the day after she checked into the room. Service was slow, but the food was decent. We dropped our baggage inside the room and returned to ALA. Claudine did not have an ALA badge so she hung by the lobby with BJD people while I scouted around the lower bowels of ALA. Most of the attendees were at the AMV Contest. I liked AMVs when they merged rhythm with lyrics to anime, but nowadays AMVs feel more like playing around with special effects. I blame George Lucas for that. I ran into Karisu and Chibiko at the Rum Party.

Then life began to imitate cosplay when I noticed a female attendee stooped over one of the garbage bins. Still dressed as Dr. House, I approached her and instinctively tried to diagnose what was wrong. First guesses were alcohol/drugs or exhaustion. Mind you, the most medical training I have is intermediate first-aid. After checking her pulse and offering her water, Alex from ALA staff came around the corner. He radioed for additional support like my friend Sarah and the official medic to take care of the patient. I was amazed at the prompt response of ALA staff in handling the situation. I was more amazed that ALA staff allowed me to observe and help when they found out I was one of the first on the scene and was not rubbernecking. Once ALA staff relocated the lady, I found Claudine and we retreated to the Travelodge room to call it a night. I reunited with a familiar love of mine in that motel room that night: Television. Even though they were all reruns, I haven't watched television in at least a month.