So it's about time I write up my weekend! Japan Expo....well, it was amazing!
WHICH WAS BEST DAY.
But....Fiona and I woke up late. And I had to enter the Expo before 12:15. Ahahaha. I barely made it, but it turned out to not matter anyway! So it was about 12:30 and I wandered around a bit to try and get a feel for the place, which didn't work because it is just waaaay too big. DID, however, manage to find Lauren and Max! I befriended Lauren a mere 2 months ago at May Expo at Hideo Baba's signing. As soon as she heard about the Tales contest, she made plans to come to Paris for it, and they made it over! And it was seriously like I had known them forever. They are just so damn nice and I have Tales to thank ;___;
Onto the events! First thing we did was go to the Tales panel held by Baba and Konishi. We got there early and, to our surprise, the Namco stall was selling Tales stuff! Tshirts and tote bags~! They hadn't been selling anything at the other cons I'd gone to so I was pretty shocked! We stared at them and then decided to pick up a shirt later and just wait at the stage for the time being. And then Max came back with Jude tshirts for both Lauren AND me! How nice is he?! We seriously like just met properly and he gave me something so awesome and just sakjndsj. Then the Namco staff gave everyone Tales of Xillia ribbons right beforehand too, which became a trend over the weekend. They gave out a different color each day!So we had Tales in our bags already, and the panel/talk just started!
Baba announced that, as we all know now, ToS Chronicles will have dual audio, which was pretty cool to hear firsthand! But not as cool as hearing Konishi voice the arguably most emotional scene of Lloyd and Colette's in the OVA: When Lloyd finds out Colette lost her voice. Oh. Holy. Martel. That man is amazing. I mean he was right there, doing this for the first time outside of Japan, and he freaking NAILED it. He just DID IT. He sounded like he was crying. He was screaming. He was perfectly synched with the video. I was in such awe, gyah. The panel ended soon after, but not before a group picture holding up our ribbons! Which is the one on the facebook page =3 You can see me in Sophie, look for the only bright wig visible xD
Next up we met up with mah bud from home, Megan! Who I felt a bit bad for as we were rushing around the stalls before having to head off to the contest and I think she had seen those things already;; I shall make it up to you! ;o; Had to split up with her for good once Lauren and I had to go to the contest too as she had to leave >< Wargh.
Lauren and I got to the stage for the contest way early because...we did not realize we didn't have to be in costume when we showed up oTL. Still, we needed those mirrors and my scissors and glue came in handy for people! A lovely Estelle cosplayer was the first person to approach Lauren and I as I think we looked pretty nervous and the few people there already had clicked and talked. She was so nice and looked so good! Lauren, who was cosplaying Martel, then spotted a Yggdrasil who was also in the contest! Instasmiles >w< Elise came up and talked to us too! We became everyone's English practice, haha! Though they were my French practice. I had so much fun speaking French that weekend, holy crap.
So eventually the time came to all gather together and line up according to the wristbands we got earlier. I ended up standing in between the German cosplayers! A wonderful and freaking amazingly accurate Milla was in front of me (I never caught her name!) and Shiina and Yama as Leia and Alvin were behind me (and Lauren behind them). Ended up talking to them after watching them do Alvin and Leia's victory handshake dance jig. What is it called? xD Regardless, they were amazing and spoke English fluently so Lauren and I got to talking to them pretty quickly!
Then the performances! Max filmed them and I hope he put them up somewhere, because I could only manage to see maybe 3 or 4 of them including Milla's, which was really creative and my favorite of all 4 I saw. I went on and messed up, WAHEY! I grabbed my Sopheria too soon and then just...stood there. Oops! Oh well, I can say I did it anyhow!
I was one of the last so the first part of the contest ended quickly after! And the top 5 were chosen fast, all well deserved! ;w; Onto the Q&A! Was quite surprised by how little some of them knew tbh. I think that may have been them struggling with English though, which is understandable. Alas, as Lauren, Yama and I watched from the side I was crying a bit inside as I wished this was just a Q&A as I knew the answers to all the questions I could heard. And thankfully, so did Shiina! >3 The last half of the stuff was so hard to hear because of noise + faulty speakers ugh, but Shiina came out victorioooous! And we all got to go back on stage together and then Baba and Konishi came onstage and we shared a stage with them omgomgomg. Then we got free tales swag. It was PRETTY COOL.
Backstage times included happy talks and info exchanges and private signing sessions and photos with Konishi and Baba and just overall amazing fun! Was pretty damn tired after all that standing and stage lights and such and I was gonna change into my new Tales shirt but Lauren stayed in Martel so I bucked up and stayed in Sophie too xP And good thing I did, because as I was leaving, having no idea how to walk back to the hotel on my own, Kimi spotted me! She and her buds were just about to leave too and their hotel turned out to be next door, so she invited me to tag along with them. Which was really fun! I hadn't really spoken to her at length before, and I'd not gotten a chance to speak to Katja or Marie before either despite them being like right next to Kimi the past few times I'd seen her. Thus started the halfhour walk back to the hotel (and it turned out Fiona, who I was looking for, was in a group right behind us xD) and the day ended with delish pizza in our hotel room and the earliest night I had in months.
FRIDAY TIME. What happened Friday...AH. I was cosplaying Black from Pokémon as Natalie and Fiona and some of their friends had also decided on Pokémon that day! Started the day (a bit late again but it worked) with a shoot in the woods on the way to JE, which was really fun! Honestly wasn't expecting to be with a group ='D I was the only trainer whose color scheme didn't have lots of red and my Snivy was abused fff xP
Once that ended, we agreed to meet up later and headed into JE! Where I met up with Lauren and Max once again, and also Yama very shortly after! Lauren was in Lloyd cosplay to meet Konishi and Yama was Waitress Estelle! ;w; We rushed aaaaaall the way to the other side of the con to get to the signing...thing. In order to wait in line to have to go up to this booth and stick your hand in a box and pray you pull out a coin that allows you to get an autograph. We all did! Bit nervewracking tbh! But we stood in line and only Yama and prepared something to get signed, so Lauren and I were just hoping they would give us something to get sign...and they did! A lovely poster with both Xillia's and ToS:C's cover art on it!! KONISHI AUTOGRAPH GET! And we got more photos. So many photos with these men over the weekend xD I split off from them after that as I got to meet up with an old friend of mine, Laura, at JE! I hadn't seen her in yeeeears and I mentioned JE to her and bam she got a cosplay and buds and showed up! Met up (late. Was such a bad day for being on time) for lunch and then realized...I had to meet up with the Pokémon group already. SUCH BAD PLANNING. But thankfully they were eating too so I got to relax and eat and talk kpop IN PERSON with Laura. First time talking kpop with someone else who enjoys it in person aaah~!
Dragged Laura and her friend around with me to the Pokémon group because we....decided to take PuriKura photos! Which I had never done before! It was so much fun! Even though we accidentally picked a very difficult frame to pose in 3 times oTL. You had to be in a certain position to be seen...and there were 6 of us. IT WAS HARD. But we picked other good ones and gee those machines are demanding! Tell you how to pose and everything. But it was a lot of fun and the photos turned out really freakin' cute. After that Laura showed me where the best kpop stalls were and I spent money on 4 posters and a CD \o/ And then Laura and I just talked, it was a lot of fun!
OH what else I spent my money on was....TALES ICHIBAN KUJI! They had it at the Namco stall! Naturally I about died and spent 70 euros on tickets, so worth it. SO worth it. I got Xillia 2 phonestraps and Teepo and Lulu teatowels and Asbel and Flynn chibi figures and wanted to buy more but was told no by Lauren and Yama by the end of Saturday. I may have been a bit addicted!!;;
Friday ended pretty well! Fiona and I were about to order food when we noticed Natalie, Kimi and everyone chilling in the lobby and they had just ordered pizza so we mooched off them a little bit (I had very little okay!!). We talked for aaaages about SnK and theme parks and I don't even know what, but it was a lot of fun and I met some really cool people! I hope they remember me if I see them again at Aya.
Saturdaaaay! The hottest day and I was in my hottest cosplay. WHY JUDE WHY. Tshirt + button up shirt + labcoat = death. Pants that had two layers = more death. I WAS SO HOT. Thankfully the layers were easy to take off but still, damn. Not much happened in the morning really! All the good stuff was the afternoon, starting off with the ECG finals! Met up with Lauren and we watched most of it. I was so cool, everyone was amazing! Cheered loudly for Belgium, which was okay because there were a couple others cheering for them too. When it came to the UK though, Lauren and I were the only brits in a sea of others and we got looked at as we were damn loud, ha!
We had to leave ECG early though as it was running late and overlapping with the Tales talk. And we had been tipped off by one of the assistants at Friday's signing that Saturday's talk had another surprise in store, so we absolutely COULD NOT miss it. Lauren and I managed to get there just in time and found Yama in the crowd, and the three of us huddled together in anticipation. And then it happend. Someone held up a copy of ToX2 and Baba nodded at it and then the pocketwatch was on screen and we all FLIPPED OUR SHIT. Seriously, it was so amazing to be there for that with so many fans and us three were just hopping excitedly and I teared up and messed up my eye makeup and it was very emotional and happy and wow. And then impromptu signing session happened and Baba recognized I was cosplaying Jude (I picked a good day to cosplay him, haha!) and I finally got a photo of the three of us with him and kjdsnjsh. That was a really good moment in time.
The day ended kinda shoddily though as our food took forever to be delivered and they didn't even bring my order and we were cranky as hell and it was midnight by the time we finished eating and ugh. But! I did have a lot of fun in the meantime talking to everyone and I hope they did too. At least we had good desserts as well!
And then Sunday, final day! I wore the costume I slaved away on the most this day, despite needing to leave early: Syo from UtaPri! I had a lot of fun in him, was recognized a lot too! I was out of the hotel for less than a minute before someone stopped me for a photo (not in my boots though oTL). Oh yeah my boots broke. Thankfully Fiona has the same shoe size as me and I was able to wear her boots she has for Tokiya (who she didn't wear due to the heat, which was smart as damn the weekend was hooot) and the were heels and my feet only just today feel like they've recovered. I was the tallest Syo ever, like, 5'11" or something. He wishes!
Highlights of Sunday were seeing Kimi's Symphonia group, having a shoot in Syo, eating those amazing frites again, eating the well-praised froyo and having one last go-round with Lauren, Max and Yama!
Overall, everything turned out way better than expected. I hope I can see everyone again soon!!
