Post Asianim 4

All the things Asianim promised it delivered.

Location was OK. The Palais du Congres is, well, what the name states, a congress hall. Asianim had two amphitheaters: one for entertainment purposese like quizzes and games and one for cosplay and concerts. Brilliant idea. They worked out great.The was devided into 4 spaces: downstairs: traditionl Japan, upstairs: game/food hall, vendors’ hallway and amphitheatres.

Food was good. Hats off to the asian guys that worked so hard in the food section.

The avatar village was a let down  partly because it was preceded by the oh so cool Star Wars  fan village last week. So I was expecting igloos, benders of all races, and fire nation ship models. Other activities; didn’t have to do origami this time as people at belorigame had a full table all day long. The martial art demonstartion were cool! as all the other things well.

The cosplay was brilliant; That comes to show what a real stage, proper lights and actual music can do for such an event.  With comfy seats in the hall,  we sat through the entire 3h cosplay event  featuring  3 categories: individual, group and catwalk .

Merchadise. The vendors were located in the hallway in front of the amphitheatres, which was a beautiful hallway bathed in light from the  glass façade which could be translated info fucking bright light that made us crawls into the dark corners of the cosplay room. 23 might have been the biggest number of vendors to participate at Asianim however that didn’t translate into a lot of stuff. Luckily the few vendors that were there had good stuff: Bleach swords, nice trinkets, good cosplay outfits. Some second hand manga was available however the new editions where only available from Slumberland at €8-€9 a piece. Again expensive! At Forbiden Zone in Brussels you can get new manga for around €5-€6 so I’d expect big retailers and editors to sell it for less.

All in all Asianim was a fun event intended for 3 days. We only attended it Sunday and after spending about 3h – 4h  in the cosplay event  and the mandatory amount of time staring at the goodies on sale, we barely had any time left for games and other activities.

Here are some pics of the event taken from the Asianim facebook group

Asianim 4

Belgians love their anime so a week after FACTS we have Asianim.
The fourth edition of the Asianim festival is taking place on the 24th & 25th of October in Luik/Liege at the Palais des Congrès. The activities of the festival will be focused around 3 themes:

1 – Traditional Japan

• martial arts demonstrations -Karaté – Aikido – Jujutsu – Kobudo- by JAPAn asbl
• Sumi-e –traditional painting- by Suely Shiba
• Shogi, Japanese cooking  by Passerelle Japon
• Go by Club Go Liège
• Tessen demonstration –fan fighting- and painting on silk by “l’Orient en Occident”
• Viêt Võ Dao demonstration –Vietnamese martial arts-  by Vovinam
• Tea ceremony
• Bonsai  exhibition by Bonsai Club Liège
• Origami by BelOrigamo
• Calligraphy by Mrs. Manda
• Go

2 – Contemporary Japan

• an Avatar village
• Dance Dance Revolution booth
• AMVs
• anime projections
• movie projections – 20th Century Boys on Sunday
• Video Games – console, arcade, pc
• Inflatable Sumo
• various fanzines
• cosplay competition on Sunday at 14:00
• Jpop/Jrock/Visual Kei Concerts on Saturday

13:00 – Guren

14:00 – Pinky Doodle Poodle

16:00 -Bernard Minet

3 – Commercial

• 23 different vendors

Aside from this there will be Speed Painting and contests, karaoke, quizzes by Bulle Japon.

Practical Info

1 – Food & Drinks

Asianim announced it will provide reasonably price sushi. Menu should look something like this :

• Sushi €1,5
• Pack of 6 sushi – €7,5
• 2 Maki – €1,5
• Curry Rice – 4,5
• Sandwich – €3
• 0,33 soda can – €1

2 – Tickets

Pre-sale at Fnac and Slumberland:  €7/day , €12/weekend

At the entrance: €8/day, 15€/weekend

3 – Hours

From 10:00 to 18:00

All in all

So they seem to have all that I’d expect from a anime event in Belgium : cosplay, concerts, merchandise, games and touch of traditional stuff. Why tamper with a proven recipe, one might say. Other might say that we’ve seen it all before. However, I believe that, like myself, the ones attending Asianim are looking forward to learning another origami figure from the guys of BelOrigami or practicing their Shogi / Go or one of the other activities they’ve enjoyed at other events.

After FACTS,  I’m hoping to find the “manga for €1 booth”, which showed up at Animansion and Made in Asia and maybe some other reasonably  priced goodies. Assuming that the 3 years of experience will show, Asianim should be the best Belgian anime event so far.

See ya on Saturday if you’re heading there.

FACTS 09

Just got back from FACTS 09 and I am exhausted. This was my first FACTS  convention and my third anime con in Belgium.

First off: the line to get in was EPIC! We got there around 11, so about an hour after the doors open. That was the longest line I’ve ever been in however it went pretty fast, for it’s length. The organisers might get a kick out of seeing the lines outside however I disapprove, seeing how the chances of rain in Belgium are extremely high any time of the year. This happens because, aside from a few “early bird tickets”, all tickets must be purchased at the door.

FACTS is said to be the biggest convention of its kind in BENELUX and I can’t but agree. Of course they needed a  space to its size so FACTS it’s currently taking place in the Flanders Expo. Not the best choice of location.

The location

The Expo might be a big enough space to pack in all the geekines however it is not the best space for such an event

• It wasn’t very well ventilated.
• The ceiling are rather low so it make the space seem even more enclosed.
• There are windows all around expo and  natural light doesn’t make the best mood light.
• I don’t know if this is on the location or on the organisation but  the space was not very well planned out. Plenty of dealers, plenty of room to move around, not so easy to follow which ones you already visited.
• Also the artists were just lined up on tables, not booths, so they didn’t have much space to exhibit their works and there were no real activities involving them as well.
• The cosplay stage was kind of small and the sound quality was not too brilliant.Plus natural light cancelled out the stage lights.

The one other event I saw at Flanders Expo was a book fair and that suck as well, being cold and dark.

Cosplay

The cosplay was good. Over 60 participants in the competition (kids/group/individual). Loads of people running around in costumes. Apparently FACTS is the “official” Belgian cosplay event as the winner gets to go to EuroCosplay.

One thing though: why do the people presenting these thing suck at it? How hard is it to get someone to properly read the names of the contestants? Is there a shortage of bilingual anime watchers with that can hold a microphone? ‘Cause I can think of at least 3 of the top of my head.

The guests

Christopher Judge and Kevin Sorbo (and other guests as well)

I found it rather confusing how they did the entire signing/photo/Q&A sessions. On top of that the Q&A was done in an adjacent room to the expo hall, that could just as well be a storage room. I sat in only at the C. Judge Q&A and it was good fun.   Kevin Sorbo looks better in person that in his latest online pics, however I expected him to be  of a more imposing stature.

Merchandise

As FACTS is not an all anime con, there was a shortage of merchandise in the anime sector.The few wall scrolls and figures we found were reasonably priced, starting from €8. However the manga was expensive, most of it being around €8.

There might not have been a lot of anime stuff at FACTS however there were plenty of goodies. I loved a particular dealer selling medial costumes, everything from coats, dresses to armours. A German shop had a very nice selection of gothic inspired jewellery. Loads of vintage toys and tons of comics. Also (expensive) geek pride shirts, (expensive) patches, decorative weapons.

Food & Drinks

Expensive! Like at any expo. €3 for cola, €6 for a small box of very spicy pasta, €1,5 for a donut. Expensive candy was also available  for  €3,5 / 100g which is like 3 times how much it usually costs. The organisers were nice enough to allow you to go outside and buy  food. I’d wish I could buy theme food at such a place *sigh*

Other stuff

I loved the fan village… which was like a demo to the Star Wars universe. I’m not all that much into Star Wars however the people that are into it are so much cooler that the actual thing. LARP FTW! Not much else at FACTS, sadly enough.

All in all

It might sound critical however it was a pretty good covention. I guess my standard for FACTS were quite high at it is a long running event. All these being said, I am totally looking forward to next year 😀 and for the record I volunteer to present the cosplay event (I am bilingual, not afraid of speaking in public and I know what WOW is)

Here are a few pics from FACTS.

Pictures taken by and property of Laura Smekens.

Post Made In Asia

Made in Asia I

Last week-end, Brussels saw the first edition of Made in Asia… and what a week-end it was! I got the chance to be there for the full two days and it might have been a bit exhausting yet it was worth every moment. You can find the program of MIA I in a post below.

individual cosplay at MIA

First off: the people. You caught your first glimpse of them in the subway going to Heysel be it a forehead protector or full blown gothic lolitas. Doing welcome for MIA was actually a bit fun as you could tell whom was coming to MIA from the big smiles on their faces when they found the hall or such. We had an entire family in costumes, how can anyone say those are not fun people? I was astonished by the number of people going around in costumes without being in the cosplay contest. Also here we had the participants and organisation team. I found most of them to be nice, social people. I guess the enthusiasm of the visitors rubbed off on them and kept the fatigue at bay.

Second off: the activities. From belly dancing to calligraphy to DDR to Guess-that-anime-themesong(known as Blind Test, organised by BulleJapon) there was plenty of stuff to do so you could spend an entire day there, full of activities and the second day you could come back just for the shopping (see program for full list of activities). So pretty much all the stuff you’d expect to find at such an event. One thing I must point out here: no Wii but plenty of other console games that posed no interest what so ever to me.

Which brings me to point three:

The stuff! I heard someone bitching that there was too much merchandise there and I beg to differ. Seeing how shipping from the internet is so freaking expensive it was great to have all this stuff to choose from. Wallscrolls €10-€15, A3 posters around €2, plushies from €2 to €30, manga from €3 up, DVDs from under €10 ( 3 Tsubasa Chronicle DVDs plus messenger bag €30), action figures, accessories, etc. In short all the random silly things you just can’t like without (kitty ears anyone?!) at decent prices.

Other stuff worth mentioning outside these 3 general categories:

independent artists

culture  promoting organisation: BuleJapon, Ramen events, jmusic store

The overall atmosphere was very nice. An event just the right size for a quick dose of otaku. Sure, I’m bays yet I am sure there were no huge flaws in it so I am sure that MIA II has no where to go but up.

Made in Asia

Belgium has otaku love.

This time at Made in Asia, on the 14-15 march at Brussel expo, during the Creativa week-end.

What this one has extra is anime at the cinema.In short, this is  the program:

Asianim

It seems that the first week-end of November is going to be a great day for cosplay 🙂 Along side NijiKon in Bucharest , the far bigger Asianim is taking place Liége.

At it’s 3rd edition, Asianim will take place at the Palais des Congrès de Liège.

A glance on the activities section is enough to entice  any  person with a soft spot for japanese culture:

• Cosplay,
• manga drawing contest,
• DanceDance Revolution  -for your own amusement or for the amusement of others and maybe for prizes as well
• video games – to be played on: PS3, Xbox 360,  Wii and “vintage” ones Nintendo, Mega Drive, Néogéo et PC Engine
• guests (Junko Kawakami , Keiko Ichiguchi et Jean-David Morvan)
• martial arts demonstrations — with the help of: Japan Asbl, Team SK de LIEGE and La Mante Belge
• Origami, Haiku, Go, Mah-jong – brought by “Le Clan Takeda”
• Tea Ceremony, (japanese:) cuisine, languge ,caligraphy , the wearing of a Yukata – with the help of Passerelle Japon
• the art of growing a bonsai  by Bonsai Club de Liége
• role playing ( bleach, naruto and one piece mentioned)
• inflatable sumo  :))
• purikura booth
• fanzines
• anime projections (titles to be announced)
• amv booth
• j-music — with support from Abunai and Higashi Music
• concerts : AciD FlavoR
• snacks and drinks (sushi/sashimi/tea…they didn’t mention anything about sake thought)
• manga on sale — by Slumberland bookstores and also “used” ones from fans

Now if all that isn’t worth a trip to Liége I don’t know what is!

Tickets are already on sale  at Slumberland bookstores across Belgium. Prices being 7€ / day, 12€/week-end. Concents are 10€ apart from entry fee.

see ya there!

F.A.C.T.S. 2008

It came at a complete surprise how big Belgium is on otaku events. I started looking for such a convention here to kill time and found at least 6 or 7  just at a first glimpse. The most recent one that caught my eye is the Fantasy Anime Comics Toys Sci-Fi Convention 2008, in short F.A.C.T.S. 2008

Apparently, according to their website , a quite, long running event this being the 18th edition. Which makes the convention older than significant number of participants , I assume. 🙂

Another element which stands behind this particular convention is their association with well know manga publishing house, Kana, whom are sponsoring a Bleach cosplay section  and other competitions.

So yes, there will be cosplay at F.A.C.T.S. Featured section being: manga&comics, movies & sci-fi and  a kids section, all this aside from the Bleach one.

Guests at this year’s edition are :

-in the artist section: Michael Golde, Apparently, according to their website , a quite, long running event this being the 18th edition. Which makes the convention older than significant number of participants , I assume. 🙂

Another element which stands behind this particular convention is their association with well know manga publishing house, Kana, whom are sponsoring a Bleach cosplay section  and other competitions.

So yes, there will be cosplay at F.A.C.T.S. Featured section being: manga&comics, movies & sci-fi and  a kids section, all this aside from the Bleach one.

Guests at this year’s edition are :

-in the artist section: Michael Golde, Terry Moore, Eric Basaldua, Steve Niles, Sarah Wilkinson, Romano Molenaar, John Mcrea, Renee Witterstaetter and Lectrr.

-in the actors section: Battlestar Galactica’s Richard Hatch, Paul McGillion of Stargate: Atlantis, Cliff Simon and Morena Baccarin also of Stargate.

Judging by the presence of Kana I’m thinking / hoping there will be a lot of goodies to buy there . The full lenght program is to be announced at the  start of october .

F.A.C.T.S. 2008 is being help at the I.C.C. (Internationaal Congres Centrum )in Gent, which according to Google Maps is like 15min walk.

Tickets are 9€ per day.

Judging by the excitement and considerable number of members on the forum it definetly sounds like it will be a lot of fun… even with an after party

Nijikon 2008

So looking at my tag surfer I noticed that people have started googling “nijikon”. Despite not having attended last year’s edition I heard plenty of it at OtakuFest.

So it’s official, for any of those you looking , Nijikon 2008 is taking place on the 1st and 2nd of november at Children’s Place in Bucharest.

The official website is up and running . The program wasn’t been offcially announce but there will be amv’s, gaming aaaaand COSPLAY competition. Hopefully the turnout at OtakuFest will encourage more to join. I’ve peeked around the local otaku forums and, aside from the usuall yume crew, it seems quite a few people are joining in .

The increase in cosplay activity in Romania, or at least the intent to, is much due to the mangashop.ro . I am unrelately looking for some cosplay supplies of my own and their stuff seems to be quite of good quality. as for the prices, as far as manga and wallscrolls go, cheap. I don’t actually know how much shipping is but as long as they ship it from Romania by regular mail they price should be more than fair.

I was very sorry to not have been prepared for the OtakuFest event.

I’m guessing you can expect regular updates on this at bakaism.net along side the official website.

So , go , cosplay and have fun!!!

Otaku Fest II day 2

A day late . What can I say I more relaxed post for a more relaxed day such was the second day.

Less people, less heat, less commotion but in a good way 😀 .

At Suburbia they were suppose to have Paprika from 1pm to 3 pm . When I got there around 1.30 something was just ending. Either Paprika only lasted 30 min or they skipped it. We got in exchange some Japan’o’rama and ended up staying at the second part of Sakura Project .

At Atelier 35 people were relaxing making paper toys, the kind you got with the 3 issue of Otaku Magazine.

At K G & O G supposedly we had some movies or such . Saw no such thing, however I did noticed that quite a few of the Alien toys were gone, hopefully for the artist, gone in the “sold” meaning. Also the Coplay’ers got the courage to cross the road and migrated to this location as well.

If anyone knows how the cosplay contest turned out, drop me a comment, I’d really like to know who won.

As for the Sakura Project competetion winners *drum roll* :

3rd place:

2nd place:

1st place:

oh, almost forgot… thumbs up for having Aya Kato albums on sale and Atelier 35 and K G & O G

here’s some more pics from day one , check out my photobucket album for more pics and in better quality.

Temari . Finally, a cosplay’er with attitude!

grand exit for out little Sakura, she she jumped off the stage

Our Ken-chan walked on stage to the Stones “Has anybody seen my baby” …no Yachiru cosplaying girl 😀

all of the gang

we also had a girl doing face paint, the hit of the day one was Gaara’s love kanji

one of the workshops at atelier 35

manga at Kollector Gallery