Kummacon 2024 – I got mad gamer respects from the organizer

 Hello geeks of all flavors!

I'm sorry about the radio silence on this here blog, my life has regrettably been really exhausting lately and I didn't mean to just disappear. The truth is that I'm still struggling with mental health and blogging just hasn't been a priority, not to mention that I haven't had any new content to post as I haven't done anything cosplay-related for several months. I do have tons of ideas of what I want to do but finding the motivation and energy to do the thing is on an entirely different plane of existence lol.

I've had a lot of time blindness and whatnot and I had been living in that bubble of "Kummacon is months away" until Firith woke me up one day (figuratively, not literally) by stating that Kummacon is next weekend. Honest to god, I had completely forgotten! Luckily my original plan hadn't involved cosplaying anyway so I didn't have to rush to finish anything and could just rewire my brain directly into preparation mode. And preparation mode meant packing all the stuff for the con weekend and that included my PS5 and the smallest TV I owned. Yes, we took the train and yes, I sat the whole train trip with a straight face and a fucking TV on my lap and yes, other passengers stared at me weirdly. :'D *sighs and shakes head* What won't a gamer endure to secure the completion of their dailies?~

Oh well, so Kummacon is an annual free-entrance anime and literature focused convention that's held in Oulu, Finland. This year it was held during 18-19 May 2024 and that also means Kummacon got the honors to start my con year, woop woop! And just like the previous years I volunteered to be part of the work force.

Kummacon entrance.

Kummacon was held once again in Oulu's International School and that means it's very much in the heart of Oulu's centrum and thus it's very easy to find and close to everything (train station, bus station, food markets etc) so it's a very convenient location. I do like the building itself, it's decently roomy and well-lit for an event of modest size. Kummacon is extremely visibly pro-LGBTQ+ (I'd say it's the gayest convention in all of Finland ngl) with various queer flags plastered everywhere. The organizers are working very hard to make sure that the event is safe and welcoming for all attendants and that means there's a zero tolerance policy towards any kind of discrimination or otherwise bigoted behavior like racism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, sexism, bodyshaming etc. I think this is very important because events like this are one of the few public spaces where gender-diverse and questioning teens, youths and adults are free to explore and express themselves as their most authentic selves with minimal risk of harm being done to them. So thank you Kummacon for providing a safe space to those who need it the most in this increasingly hostile world.

Anygays, back on track. So me and Firith headed for Oulu on Friday night by train and our accommodation was the same trusty Sokos Hotels that we stayed at during last year's Matsucon. This time we got the salmon-themed room instead of the tar-themed one. Honestly I preferred the tar theme but that might be a me thing with my general love of anything with tar in it, be it sweets or boats. xD

Comfy hotel corridors provided a vacation feeling!

Before the con I asked to change my volunteer work station from the cafeteria to something more relaxed like the green room. Some might remember that I was a cafeteria worker last year but because my mental health and general tolerance of stressors has taken a nosedive lately I decided to play it safe. I ended up being relocated as a green room worker for the whole weekend and I don't regret swapping stations because this was the right choice for me.

Towards the end of Friday me and Firith were really hungry and so we went to eat at pizzeria Cantina because we were lazy and it was literally on the opposite side of the road seen from our hotel. It was one of these kinda expensive fancy-schmancy pizza places where my economically distressed ass had to settle for a margharita pizza (which I normally never take) because everything else was outside my budget lmao. But honestly I don't regret that choice and this one at least came with mozzarella – I mean look at this circular disc of deliciousness!

 

Ei ollut mikään kusinen klähmäkiekko tämä. #ökypitsa

 

I'm sorry but I have a massive brainfog and don't really remember much of this weekend, just bits and pieces here and there but no coherent memory of what I did during any given time or day, it's all just floating together into this mushy blob of "I know I was at a con and it was fun but I have no idea what I've been doing all weekend". :'D In my defense I had the worst con hungover I've had in years so that probably explains the partial amnesia lol – I was sooo spent when I got home it took me several days to even somewhat recover. What I do know is that I was working for a majority of the con's duration and that means I spent most of my time in, you guessed it, the green room.

On my way through the corrido o' depressio...

... to find the light at the end of the tunnel green room.

 

The green room was located on the basement floor and it was quite hard to find and very... small. You had to enter a door downstairs that was barely held open by a few stones (there were no signs the green was there) and then walk along an unlit corridor until you reached the coffee break room, aka the green room. It's far away from all the happening and con vibes, very isolated and although the work tasks were simple and easy to complete (refilling coffee and tea, running to and fro' between green and the cafeteria upstairs to bring food items over etc) I often felt like I was missing out on the con because sitting there for roughly 6 out of the con's 8 hours a day honestly felt very unbalanced in terms of work versus free time. I know Kummacon was understaffed (just like almost all cons nowadays it feels, it's a struggle to get enough volunteers) and so the organizers were in a pinch to have all the necessary stations running and I know it was hard to make it work because some volunteers ghosted and never showed up. I was the only official green room worker for the whole weekend and that does explain why my work hours weren't optimal and, although my personal con experience suffered due to the isolation and lack of time to explore, I still feel proud that I managed to row my tasks and responsibilities to shore despite my difficulties while also providing all the other workers with a place to relax, refuel, chat and bond with others of the Kummacon work force – olette kaikki ihania!

The highlight of working at the green room was of course hearing the best gossip of the con along with constant access to snacks and refreshments lol. Oh and green room was the coolest place in the con so there was also the perk of not overheating nor suffering from the, at times, dip in air quality upstairs because of how crowded it could get.

I might have been left unsupervised at one point and I might have decided to do something about the fact that most green room users didn't know where the fridge was. This is my level of humor, I have no regrets!

During my free time on Saturday I went to listen to a panel about time-travelling and after that I scurried along to quickly snap some general con photos for posterity. I did have time (when combining Saturday and Sunday free hours) to do my number one important con thing and that's checking out the Artist's Alley and the Artisan's Alley for loot to bring home. There were a lot of familiar faces but also a couple new ones I didn't recognize from before, which is always nice. I ended up buying a few pins from different sellers for my ita bag I finally have one and a Neuvillette Genshin Impact charm because he's my new obsession and I can't help it.

View near the entrance, info desk to the left.

Of course there was the obligatory snacks and sweets shop.

Artist's Alley was located in the room behind the info desk.

The Artist's Alley seemed a bit quiet during the times I visited and especially when compared to the Artisan's Alley upstairs that had constant traffic due to the cafeteria, secondhand shop, anime karaoke etc being on the second floor and thus most congoers spent a lot of time walking past those tables upstairs so yeah, those who were upstairs most surely got a lot more repeated exposure due to the placement. I'm not sure though if the few tables just next to the info desk were artists or artisans but that was, in my eyes, the most optimal location to have a table at because you were literally just next to the entrance and thus highly visible; I even overheard one of those two sellers saying during the middle half of Saturday that they had already sold more than they did last year on both days combined when they were upstairs. :O

View of the main floor while standing on the staircase.

View just next to the staircase upstairs (blocked by the pillar). :D

View of the Artisan's Alley upstairs.

 

Sunday was mostly the same as Saturday except for the sadness that meant checking out of the hotel room and bringing our mountain of luggage to the con for safekeeping. Yes, carrying a TV and a console around got heavy really fast. We ended up storing our belongings in the green room and this is also where one of the main organizers gave me stonks gamer respects because you have to be some level of hardcore to carry your gaming setup 100 km away from home just so you can do your daily streaks in a few live-service games. :') 

Sunday also was slightly different because Firith upgraded to be an unofficial Kummacon green room worker to help me out and so that I didn't have to be so lonely down there all day lol. Otherwise he would probably have been barred from entering the green room as both his panel and his work task as a cosplay competition judge were both slotted on Saturday. 

Once the con was over we made use of our con worker perks (free leftovers including matcha waffles!) and helped clean up the green room before it was time for us to leave. Sadly our train was very delayed due to "personal injury" which, as far as I know, usually is a nicer way to say that someone attempted suicide by jumping in front of the tracks. Of course it could have been something else too but if it was like a stroke or something I think another Finnish word would have been used. :/ It makes one very sad nonetheless, especially because I've heard that spring and autumn is the most common seasons for this to happen and that each train conductor witnesses on average about 4 attempts during their service and yeah, I can't even begin to think how traumatizing that must be for the train crew because often the only thing you can do is to hit the emergency brake and wait for the train to stop a mile later; even though it's not their fault I can imagine the haunting guilt must be incredibly difficult to bear...
In the end our train ended up being roughly two hours late but we got home safe and sound. Firith drove me back home from Kemi and that was the end of our Kummacon journey.

I know this summary is messy, all over the place and kinda brief on details and whatnot but I just want to get it out of the way and I don't think there's a lot of interesting tidbits to bring up because let's be real – a majority of my con time was spent sitting in the green room and waddling up and down the stairs to refill the warm food of the day, it's not a particularly exhilarating read. And no misfortunes happened either like me somersaulting in the stairs with a heavy-ass rice cooker in my arms lolol. Of course a lot of shenanigans, fun and educational conversations happened in the green room etc but what happens in the green room stays in the green room heheh..~

All in all I'm happy I attended Kummacon once again, it's such a chill and safe event and I hope it stays that way too. Sure I can't claim that everything went perfectly this time but overall I felt appreciated and the camaraderie among the workers was great. I also really liked what one of the main organizers told me about the reason why she created Kummacon in the first place and keeps organizing it each year – I don't remember it word for word but she said something along the lines of that she's creating the event for her inner child who didn't have anywhere to go and feel a sense of belonging and safety. Her wish is that today's outlier youth and children won't have to experience that same sadness of feeling excluded and not acceptable enough because of being "too weird", aka simply being yourself. That's such a noble and wholesome cause, to make sure that those after us don't suffer as much as we did.

And yes, the word 'kumma' actually means weird/odd in Finnish and it's something I think the Kummacon crew is intentionally reclaiming to be a positive trait. Embrace the weirdness!

Thanks for reading and see you at the next con,

~ Shiro Samurai out.