Oulun Animeseminaari 2014 – Disappointment is the name!

Hello!

Here's my newly baked report from Oulun Animeseminaari 2014 (Oulu's anime seminar), directly from the oven!

So our trip to Oulu started on Thursday 7th August and me and Hasakitsuki packed our stuff as usual and headed out during late afternoon or such. We met with Jäätynyt Enkeli at the bus station. We took the bus to Kemi and of course we spotted the obligatory spurgu (drunk guy) in the bus – you can recognize them by the horrible smell. xD When we got to Kemi we went to a nearby Lidl to buy some provisions and then we sat and waited for our train to Oulu. [shit humor] Meanwhile we waited we ate some yoghurt and stuff and well, we were sitting on a wooden bench and at some cursed moment of history my body suddenly entered "Explosive Surprise Fart"-mode and out of nowhere my ass struck a mighty tone and I got instant feedback from Hasakitsuki and Jäätynyt Enkeli that the bench vibrated because of the sudden outburst of power, oops. It was so bad that it was good. xD [/shit humor]
The train was late but nothing too bad (approx. 20 min) and the train ride took about one hour. Actually our booked seats ended up being taken by a random group of young army guys and well, I don't have balls enough to go tell them to move, "hey yo, you sit on my place! 8C", because one of them was seemingly sleeping (or at least veeery tired) and I have respect for people who do the army anyway. So I just kindly and quietly sat down in a nearby seat.
At Oulu we dragged our suitcases to our awesome gamer aunt's place and there we chilled and watched a thunder storm magically avoid us. I saw a mighty lightning bolt far away that was super clear, thick and lasted for at least one full second, flashing three times. It didn't have many branches though and so it was pretty straight. gay thunder is cooler! :-DD I'm glad the thunder storm avoided us because I'm really scared of lightning, especially if it comes even remotely near. ;_; I can sort of stand it if I can tell that it's far away though.
After the storm was over we popped to bed... and I toasted and spread out everywhere on the bed while sleeping, effectively minimizing Hasakitsuki's bed space, lol.

8th August (Friday)

It was time to get up at 09:00 local time and well, I couldn't. Jäätynyt Enkeli and Hasakitsuki seemingly got up no problem but I kept lagging on. At some point Hasakitsuki kept trying to harass me get me up by shoving the horse mask in my head and this annoyed me so I pulled my bedsheet over me. When it was past 10:00 I could finally pull myself up and I had some yoghurt for breakfast.
Earlier yesterday we had called Sairu-chan and asked that we change our cosplay plans, or more like, change on which day we wear what costume. The reason for this was because gamer aunt had said that she had work on Friday (aka this day) but not on Saturday and on Saturday she could show us where this one garden park thing was where we had planned to photoshoot our Hakuouki cosplays. So basically my cosplay plans swapped days and so I was a horse on Friday.
I must say it felt fucking sweet to be able to just put on the planned clothing, put on a headband (so that my hair wouldn't be a bitch when I have the horse mask on) and put on the horse mask and –BOOM– done! Actually, going to an anime event with no makeup on felt pretty dang weird.
Okay, honestly I didn't put the horse mask on before I arrived at the con place. Reason? I didn't want to be run over by a random car because of zero side vision. xD I kept the horse mask inside my bag –for the surprise effect– while we crossed town to get to the library building, where the con was held, but when we got to the con area the only thing I could think was: "Is this supposed to be a con?!". There was barely anyone outside the library – it looked almost dead. There was no lines or groups of weirdly dressed people in front of the building; there was nothing to indicate that an event was being held there. First impression: disappointment. :'C
Luckily it didn't take many minutes before a familiar tall figure approached us – Karri, the werewolf guy. He is so awesome to be around, certainly his company made our presence at the event more fun and worthwhile!

Karri borrowing my horse mask – Gangnam Style!

We went inside to check what there was and well, barely anything there was. There was no merchandise, no Artist's Alley, no rhythm/music game room and well, there was basically not a single shit to keep you entertained; unless either folding origami is your thing, reading borrowed manga in a corner or you'd like to participate in a drawing contest...
It seemed that Animeseminaari was mostly only using the very base floor of the library as "theirs" and the rest was just like the library usually was – nothing geeky whatsoever. In other words there was barely any con feeling at all and well, frankly I never got the feeling that I even was attending an anime event – it just felt like I was at a library and happened to be there when a few other geeks were there too. It didn't even feel like an event of it's own. Needless to say it was a dead bore and you could tell most other people seemed to think along the same lines too; most people were sitting outside in the library's outside grass area and a fair amount were strolling around in the city instead.

Animeseminaari entrance.

Inside. (base floor)

Sure that there was a few panels but the only one I found interesting was one about the way of the sword, samurai culture and how it's represented in the Rurouni Kenshin manga but I didn't end up attending it because there had been a spoiler warning at Animeseminaari's website and well, I've only seen pretty much the original anime and the Tsuiokuhen OVA so far and Rurouni Kenshin is one of the few series I haven't gotten spoiled yet. I also know that the manga goes farther than the anime and that's why I gave up on the panel – because I want to avoid any possible manga spoilers because I plan to read it.

Animeseminaari's program list.

We got bored and went to troll in the city and also to have lunch. I kept on the horse mask the whole city ride and I got so many smiles, waves and comments that it was purely awesome! 8D There was some dad with his kid who saw me and said loudly to their kid whom he was holding in his ams "Look, there's a horse! It's a walking horse!" and the kid looked surprised/weirded out. Some people even came and touched/patted my horse mask but I didn't know of these, until my company told, me because I couldn't see them. :'D There was this one old-ish woman who came up to me when we were at the market square and asked a lot of things like "is the horse kind?", "does the horse bite?" and then she asked if we were from a "polttarit" party (pre-marriage celebration in Finland when you hold a carneval party, have fun and commonly dress up). When I said we weren't from said party she asked what was going on and I mentioned there was an event held for Japanese pop culture at the library and then she looked surprised and exclaimed "it must have been badly informed because I haven't heard anything and I frequently visit the library". I told her it's open both Friday and Saturday and then at some point she asked if we were Japanese. :-DD lolnope. She seemed almost surprised and said "Oh, you are from here", as if it wasn't obvious; I speak Finnish like a native.. maybe because I am one? OTL She then wondered what my outfit had to do with Japanese culture and I had a hard time explaining that it's because of randomness and con culture. She also asked me if it was the Japanese who had the Shinto belief and I told her yes and then she asked if there's Christian believers there. Why does religion always have to show up? ._. Oh well, she let us go after a while and we headed into the city and found our way to a Hesburger hamburger place where we ate because I had sale coupons. Of course I had to get ketchup and dressing on my left sleeve because I had a white shirt of all the colors I could possibly have worn. -_- Niin perus.
Oh well, after that Sairu-chan called and informed that she had finally arrived at the con library and so we went to meet her. We found her fairly soon and someone of us asked where her Colossal Titan mask was. She pulled it out from her bag, put it on and then I could feel it... THE NEED TO WEAR THE MASK AND BECOME A TITAN TOO.  My outfit totally went from a fabulous horse to a fabulous Colossal Titan, yolo!

Titan wall smash sooooooon...

puskatitaani kimppuun!!

After a while the Titan returned to its owner and I was an amazing horse again. :'( I think I need one of these masks myself too.. waitwat. No, wait. The Titan mask didn't return to Sairu-chan – it found it's way to Karri and took over his head!!

Fierce, isn't he? Badass motherfucker!!

Hasakitsuki also got a piggyback ride from horse!Karri. It was beautiful. One of the highlights of the event.

Around 16:00 something me and Hasakitsuki went to sit outside in the shadows near a bridge do de-toast and drink some lemonade we had bought from Lidl on Thursday.

Lemonade for you, sir!

We sat there for a while and chilled... until we wanted ice cream from the nearby ice cream stand. We bought a cone with two balls of ice cream – mango & melon flavor and white chocolate & strawberry flavor. The mango & melon one was surprisingly awesome mmmh! And Jäätynyt Enkeli tried to call me at least twice –while we were eating our rapidly melting ice cream– and he was so persistent.. "oh for fuck's sake, I don't have time to answer bro! OTL" xD

Our ice cream feat. Hasakitsuki.

When we had finished our ice cream le gamer aunt showed up and said that we could go to the garden park thing already later today instead because seemingly bad weather had been promised for Saturday, aka rain and thunder storm. We considered it but Sairu-chan she can't be bothered.
After this all four of us got so bored of Animeseminaari that we decided to go back to gamer aunt's place and play some Wii U.

Let's go, the video games are calling us ~

On the way there we went into a food store and some bought coffee (not me) and Dr. Pepper lemonade (me). We also bought some Thai candies and a can of jackfruit in syrup from a Thai/Asian market in the Kauppahalli building at the market square.

When we got inside the high house building we took...

... AN ELEVATOR MIRROR SELFIE!

Gamer aunt wasn't home yet but we all played a little Super Mario 3D World and then Sairu-chan had to go. :'( Me, Hasakitsuki and Jäätynyt Enkeli kept playing until we reached the 3rd world in the game and then we got game blörgh and watched "Funny home videos" on TV instead. 

Gaming time!

I spent the remainder of the evening/night on internet and stayed up a bit longer than I maybe should have. When I finally went to sleep I tickled sleeping Hasakitsuki's feet to annoy her to have her wake up because I was concerned about how we should do on Saturday. We knew that for Saturday it was promised rain and thunder and we thought it might be pointless to even go to the event –in more elaborate costumes– if it starts raining. Our aunt had also said that if we decide to go there on the morning we should head back before the thunder storm comes and after that she'd make food for us. We then pondered a while and came to a decision that maybe we won't even attend Animeseminaari on Saturday – it's not like there was anything to do and the event would end already around 14:30.
After our plan talk and some other shit I eventually fell asleep.

9th August (Saturday)

Me and Hasakitsuki woke up 09:00 and after my laptop was planted next to my face I woke up and checked the weather forecast.

Perkele.

This sight made it seem even more pointless to even put on a cosplay to begin with, not even mentioning going to Animeseminaari.
It would probably take us 1-2 hours to put on our outfits and by then rain would be about to start. We wouldn't have much time at Animeseminaari before lightning would start roaring –likely– and then we would have to head back before it comes over us. It didn't make it any better that the forecast site I checked had a warning for Oulu about rain and violent thunder storms for today. Not going out if that's the case.. Seemingly the remainder of the day would be rain as well... bleagh!
I called Sairu-chan, who was sleeping, and she said no one in her group planned to go to Animeseminaari and so my company decided to stay at gamer aunt's place and spend our time playing Wii and Wii U instead. Time better spent.
Actually the rain and thunder started several hours later than what the forecast said but it still came and we spent pretty much the whole day playing video games, but before we started gaming we headed out to buy Dr. Pepper again and Ranch chips. I can feel an addiction to Dr. Pepper is about to start.. We also went to the market square and bought fabulous lollipops and some cool stuff again from the Thai/Asian market in Kauppahalli, namely four bags of green curry paste.
Oh, and it rained the remainder of the day so we couldn't go and photoshoot my Ibuki cosplay at the garden park. I'm a bit bleh about it but no can do.. it's not like it wasn't fun to game and rage on Super Mario 3D World instead. xD Gay pipes, cheese doodle throwers and köttmul/köttklubban. <3

So, what do I have to say about Animeseminaari?

– Let me demonstrate:

Aika paska. Heppakin kuoli hetkeksi.

It was plain bad. There was nothing to do, nothing to see and it felt like there were less people than previous years.. and someone tell me what's the point of having a two-day event when the second day is ridiculously short and has pretty much nothing to offer? Sure that I had very low expectations when I left for the event but I must say that this takes the price – it was so downright boring that I don't even feel any kind of regret for not attending on Saturday.
The whole Animeseminaari was so insipid and –without lying– the most boring con experience I've had so far. The only thing being a saving grace was my company and the awesome guy known as Karri. I really hope Animeseminaari will be better the next time it's held because otherwise I would consider skipping it; I really don't want to be so negative about more "local" *cough100kmawaycough* events but... bleh. It just was really disappointing this year, especially when compared to previous years. :'( Oh well...

Bonus pic!

I can be a scary fire horse too, rawr!

Shiro Samurai rolls out of here.