Kummacon 2019 – Cosplaying something different differently

Good evening~

Kummacon was held this past weekend on 11-12 May in Oulu and I was there on Saturday only, checking out the new Kastellin Monitoimitalo that I'm pretty sure has never hosted a con before. Kummacon is one of the few remaining cons in Finland that still has free entrance and aims to stay that way, especially now when it seems that Kitacon is dead.

Let's get to the summary!

I woke up on the morning, fed the cats, myself and then proceeded to put on my Jedi garb. I had decided that I'm not gonna bother with any makeup or anything (unlike normally when I cosplay) as I was frankly too tired and woke up too late anyway to really have time. My Jedi clothes of choice were a combination of my Obi-Wan gear and parts from random cosplays, didn't want to wear exactly Obi-Wan's clothing as I was in fact just supposed to be a random Jedi and not a face character. I will admit though that I felt very naked and insecure without any makeup on, but tried to tell myself that it's a small con and no one really cares. #anxietyisreal

Stepdad was kind and drove me and Frozen Angel to the con. The trip took something past one hour and we arrived somewhere between 11-12 local time. The weather was pretty nice on Saturday.

Kummacon entrance. Kastellin Monitoimitalo.

Oulun Miekkailuseura had an info booth at the entrance.

As you can see on the photo above there was a historical sword fighting club present. As a former kendoka it was super cool to see, you could even try swinging one of the swords on a tire dummy. Chatted with the guys for a pretty long time and now I feel like I want to cosplay someone with a sword like that lol.

Once we were inside the building we instantly started to check everything out. Neither of us knew if any of our friends were there so we didn't really see any familiar faces, save for Karri who appeared for a brief moment during the last hours. 

This is pretty much the view you had once you stepped inside.

A bit to the right you had the Kumma kahvila (cafeteria) area.

They only sold vegetarian/vegan food and some sweets/bakeries mainly.

The con was decorated with these adorable... HATTIVATIT.

My first impressions of Kummacon was that it was comfy and I liked the building. Okay, it got quite crammed at times (especially when the obligatory line for the cosplay competition happened) but nothing too bad; had it been a bigger con there would have been problems though. The con building had two floors and the Artist's Alley and some of the chill corners were on the second floor while the rest was on the main floor. Kastellin Monitoimitalo felt fairly modern and I liked the white "pillars" everywhere holding the building up or something, idk.

View towards the toilets and the second-hand shop etc.

Kumma Kirppis, the second-hand store where congoers could
sell stuff they don't want anymore.

There was a karaoke room and a rhythm game room. Disappointed
that just like last year there was still no video game room. :(

Same view as on the other area picture, except this is from the other
direction, aka when heading back to the main area with all the merch etc.

I felt like the seikkailu (lit. adventure) theme was represented well, although maybe not as many funny signs as last year's cosmos theme had. Points for the watching Sauron eye sign in the second-hand store though, made me chuckle. xD

Main area, Urumi's shop to the left side.

A bunch of Pokémon plushies. Notice the Tyranitar!

I didn't buy anything this time but Urumi is always nice to see...

... because you know they only sell legit stuff.

Urumi's shop seen from above.

I saw this Milotic later on and was SO TEMPTED. ;_;

I feel like Kummacon had a lot of merchandise sellers for a small con, I was pleasantly surprised once again! It was everything from video games to literature and to the obligatory weeb stuff. A lot of the sellers I recognized from having seen at other cons before; I think many of the sellers are the same ones just circulating all cons in Finland but it's still nice to do some "window shopping" haha. Especially when it seems like there's always at least something new.

View of a part of the Dealer's Hall. Most was located on the other side
of where the cafeteria was, like basically on the "backside" when you went around.

There's no con without kigurumis, except I think these were poncho style?

Sci-fi figurines and stuff like that. Pretty cool.

Video games. Surprised at the amount of Japanese
imports, seemingly most were from a single guy's collection.

Pockys and ramune in abundance. There were
so many ramune flavors I had never seen before!

I'm sorry I forgot to take a photo of the ramunes on the other side of the Manga Cafe shop but there was stuff like coconut ramune and some other ones I was really curious to try! I just wish ramune wasn't so expensive. Oh well, maybe next time.

When I looked at the people around me I felt like more than half were not cosplaying, which I think is pretty usual. There were some furries (pretty many considering the con's size?) and some people wearing j-fashion but overall everyone was very colorful, except those dressed in black of course. There was a lot of people wearing the pride flag's colors and even rainbow flags draped over their shoulders. Cons are so nice as it's one of the few places were being LGBTQ+ feels like the norm and you are wholly supported by almost everyone attending. ♡

This was next to the entrance. Super clever idea!

I found some more of the hattivatti army... xD

It took us a while before we realized that the Artist's Alley was on the second floor, actually. Despite the obvious sign next to the stairs. *facepalm* Almost the whole second floor was in fact dedicated to the AA, save for the end half that was just a water drinking spot along with a general chill area where you could sit down. There were a lot of artist's there, much more than I expected as some other small cons I've been to have barely had more than one, lol.

A small part of the Artist's Alley "corridor" upstairs.

View of the chill area upstairs.

The first thing I check for when I go to AA is always magnets. Because I want my fandoms visible (wow that sounds so weebish lol) and cool art on my fridge where I can see them and they're useful for holding whatever papers I currently have there. When I find magnets of a style I like it's almost a guarantee that I'll buy something from that table. :D Another thing I keep an eye out for is other useful items along with keychains, necklaces and such, although I start to feel like I already have way more lying around than I have space for lmao. I'm a horrible hoarder of all things cute, can't help it.

The library inside the building had the only game console at the con...

... and there was only like 4-5 uninteresting games, imo.

I feel like if Kummacon won't have a proper video game room next time I'll contact them myself and lend out my PS1 and Wii or something. Honestly once I'm done exploring the building and checking out all the merch I quickly get bored as I have "already seen everything", especially if I have no friends around me whom I haven't seen in a while to chat with. Now it was just me and my brother, who of course works for company but yeah, we don't have so much to talk as we see each other almost every day lol. Note note note that I am not criticizing the con! It's just that I've come to expect the video game room to be there –as it's such a staple– and a lot of congoers play video games so yeah, it always feels like something is missing when it's not there.

Extreme nostalgia when I saw this poster!

There were some lectures that I was interested in but sadly I thought they were on Sunday (had checked the programs before the con only), so we didn't actually check the con's schedule leaflet until we were done with all the exploring and then it was already too late for the most interesting panel. :'( Felt discouraged after that to care for the other interesting-but-not-as-interesting lectures and besides, there was a tier 5 legendary raid coming up at the nearby Pokémon Go gym across the street – so we made a call for others to join us and went to kick Mesprit's ass instead.

I almost missed this at first but I found a Monster Hunter plushie!
It's Legiana from MHW. So happy that you can regularly find MonHun
merch nowadays. It's my con challenge to find something. xD

When we were done with the raid the con was on its last half an hour before closing for the day, or that's the impression I got as many were leaving. We called stepdad to come pick us up as we felt satisfied for the day once we had quickly snagged some proof photos that we both did dress up as Jedis and that it wasn't just a prank.

Proof that I tried to be a Jedi.

I hate my hair, for real. It looks the worst when it's newly washed (weirdly enough) because it's quite literally everywhere, it "floats", waves and kinks however the heck it wants, looks like garbage and feels like fucking frizzy hay that is 100% uncontrollable. It won't stay put or normal no matter what I do to it and sometimes I am mighty tempted to just cut it all off and hope it grows back normally, like it used to be for some years ago before it turned into this dry static shit. Seriously give me back the straight, behaving hair I had in my early teenage years that I still hated because of the split ends, I'd take that back any day of the week now lol. I should just have worn a wig but wearing a wig while not wearing makeup makes me look horrible and... yikes. :S

I must admit though that I was surprised that people actually came up to talk to us, some even asked for photos. I'm used to being left alone on small cons but I guess with basically everyone and their grandma knowing about Star Wars it was to be expected. A part of me felt flattered but another part of me felt like "this is seriously like a little to no effort cosplay and I get more attention for this in 20 mins than I get on a full day when I wear a proper cosplay and do my makeup for like 2 hours lol". Anyone who can relate to this mood?

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Kummacon was overall a comfy experience. I'd definitely keep going there and the organizers have their hearts in the right place too, seen by how they this year raised money (the price of what "tickets could have been") for Mielipotti charity campaign, to help battling mental health issues, which is common among con people based on my personal experiences; a lot of attendants relate, symphatize and thus donated to the cause.
Kummacon has the charm and comfiness typical to a small con and go all out with the decorations to set the mood for the year's theme. Everything seemed to run smoothly and I didn't notice anything severely lacking or ruining the overall quality, or illusion of quality at least. In hindsight I do think though that the location was perhaps a tiny bit too small, especially when compared to how roomy Pohjankartano is.

I generally felt safe at Kummacon's cheery atmosphere and despite battling long-running mental illness myself it felt okay, save for the nowadays obligatory uncomfortable feeling I get when someone asks for a photo and, after the initial seconds of happiness and perceived appreciation fades, I stand there looking into the camera and dread my life decisions as I know that it's gonna look like shit because I'm ugly af but I'm too kind to decline. Asdfghjkl.
This is obviously not a fault of the con itself, just me being reminded of how it felt to cosplay and be a target of attention after going casual and being "safely invisible" at a lot of cons lately. *shrugs*

And before I end this post, here's my con purchases:

Two magnets from Artist's Alley and Pokémon cards from
one of the merch sellers who sold single cards.

Thanks for reading my summaries!

~ Shiro Samurai out.

Kummacon 2019 plans??

Hello guys!

It seems like Kummacon will be my first convention for 2019 and I am quite excited to be honest, it's been half a year since my last convention (Skecon) so any chance to get to geek it out is appreciated. Kummacon is held during 11-12 May in Oulu, Finland, but I will only be there on the first day on a day trip as my stepdad will drive me and Frozen Angel there and check out some stores meanwhile we are at the con. I am quite curious about the new location Kastellin Monitoimitalo though, my aunt said that it's about 3-4 km away from centrum. 

I must admit that when the con revealed that the theme this year is "seikkailu" (adventure in Finnish) I started thinking that maybe I should cosplay and not just be lazy and go casual again. But then I remembered that almost all my cosplays are currently unwearable for one reason or another and so I started brainstorming if I could throw something fitting together in time. Sadly I realized way too late that what I feel the most like cosplaying from right now is Sea of Thieves, my latest video game addiction – and the problem is that I have nothing in my closet that I could use to even do the most basic, starter pirate outfit with; I feel so disappointed in meself, lol. No I'm not doing just the underwear, even though that would be even easier. xD And I want a gunpowder barrel as a prop but that ain't happening in less than a week either. *sniff* So I have to postpone my pirate dreams for a later convention (Närcon maybe, idk?) but I feel like I'm missing such a fun opportunity as it would fit the con's adventure theme so well.

No pirate's life for me this time. I don't really have sewing equipment
at home and don't want to stress either as results would 100% be ugly af.

Oh well, I stared at my cosplay list for a while and thought that I know for a fact that I want to do a movie or a video game character. I haven't felt any hype for anime/manga in a while to be honest (except that I still want photos of my costumes, Hotaru from SDK in particular right now) and I have thought about writing a blog post about this dilemma but I'll save that for a later date.
But whatever the case I feel like just doing a random Jedi would be comfy and easy enough – and with May the 4th recently passed and a new movie in the makings it feels very relevant... and fits the theme! Now to hope that me and my anxious ass keeps to it and doesn't bail out at the last moment.

Kummacon cosplay plan for Saturday:

tl;dr - I want to be a Sea of Thieves pirate but as I'm Matti Myöhäinen again I'll just be a random Jedi knight (without lightsaber cuz I'm a poorfag) on Saturday, to fit in with Kummacon's adventure theme. 

Anyone else going to Kummacon this upcoming weekend? See ya there!

~ Shiro Samurai

Kummacon 2018 – Free and awesome

Hello people!

It's time to write about my trip to Kummacon, the small free-entrance con in Oulu that was located in a new place called Oulu's international school – and by "new" I mean that I've never heard of any other Oulu-based convention being arranged there before (and there's multiple). Kummacon was held during 28-29 April but I only attended on 28th, aka the Saturday, as my whole visit to Oulu was just a day trip with my family. You see, my mom and stepdad wanted to go shopping and so me and Frozen Angel got a free ride to go check out Kummacon meanwhile! Win-win, in other words. :D

Okay so, Kummacon. I need to make it clear that this summary will only be about my experiences on Saturday and thus I have no idea what Sunday was like, although I can assume it was very similar to Saturday but just with different activities (the cosplay competition was on Sunday, weirdly enough). 

Kummacon 2018 info leaflet.

The night before the con I was thinking if I should cosplay or not. My original idea was to just dress as a random Jedi (Star Wars, duh) because of the con's cosmos theme but yeah, the more I thought about it the more I felt like I didn't want to carry around a bag of changing clothes all day (read: heavy and bothersome) and spend hours of my limited con time on dressing up and then take off the costume before going home. I ended up going casual but packed with me a horse mask, just in case. Sadly I ended up not getting to wear the horse head as, by the time I was ready to derp around (finished exploring the con etc), mom suddenly called me and we had to leave. xD

Okay so, the con morning went without any issues. I woke up on time, the ride arrived on time and everything was smooth. Before the con we stopped at Kärkkäinen to go shopping (glad we did as I found a really nerdy Playstation logo t-shirt!) and have a snack. 

I think me and Frozen Angel got to Kummacon somewhere after 12-ish, although I'm not sure at all as I didn't pay attention to the clock. ^^" To be honest, before going to the con we actually headed out to go battle a Tyranitar raid that was at a nearby Pokémon Go gym. xD There was a Latias raid right after at the next gym so yeah, we totally did that one as well as I heard from a friend that the locals were raiding it too. After the pocket monstering we finally headed for Kummacon (and we both were dumbfounded by how there constantly were 3-5 raids active nearby, that's insane when compared to our hometown, lmao).

Kummacon entrance.

My first impression was a bit sceptical but that little bit of doubt flew right through the window as soon as I stepped into the building: I was met by this kind of small-but-crammed con with a really welcoming atmosphere! Kummacon felt relaxed and despite having no entry fee it seemed to be arranged well – I was actually really surprised by the quality! I haven't been to a small (local) con that have felt this good for a long time and it just made it all the better as Kummacon is, in fact, the only con in Oulu that is free to attend. And I pray that it stays so, on behalf of my anorectic wallet, lol.

The first thing we did when we got inside the con was stare at the really full cloakroom at the entrance. It didn't take many seconds before a person (I assume a con worker) stepped up and kindly informed us that there's another cloakroom upstairs that we could use that is much less crammed. I said my thanks and we hurried upstairs. It might not seem like much but already this small but observing and thoughtful gesture gave me a good first impression because, honestly, I've been to some cons on which information has been really lacking. So yeah, we left our jackets and I left my hoodie hanging upstairs and then we headed back downstairs to go on the obligatory first exploration round.

Entrance view. Information desk in front.

These Daleks were at the entrance.

Entrance, aka first floor view. Stairs leading upstairs visible.

Despite it being a school building it didn't really feel like a school building, ya know? At least not the main areas because they were quite spacious, modern, very light and luminated and thus gave me the impression that it's a nicer building, lol. But I can admit that the corridors looked very schooly.

I was positively surprised by how easy it was to find empty chairs to sit on though, despite how it seemed like there was a lot of people around at all times.

The Dealer's Hall was really crammed, not gonna lie. It was a bit hard to move around there occasionally and get in the front to actually be able to see and buy things. 

I was really excited when I noticed a portfolio with old Pokémon cards lying below the table of one of the sellers. I picked it up and started going through it and the nostalgy levels were high – I even found some cards that I wanted to add to my collection! Before going to the con I was actually hoping that there would be someone selling Pokémon card singles, as I had seen it at Matsucon last year. My hopes were fulfilled. x)

Pokémon cards for sale! *excited screaming*

Except for the cards I was also surprised by the amount of sellers who sold stuff like pocky and ramune as there seemed to be so many! Ramune is still too expensive on my watch, although I find myself temptated anyway. Suffer in silence, you shall.

Urumi was there, as always. I appreciate legit merch sellers.

Of course the Ginga Densetsu Weed plushies were available!

There was a fair amount of fashion stuff available as well.

Pocky heaven...

... and ramune heaven. :DD

There was a respectable amount of sellers (especially considering small-cons-in-the-north standards) and I liked how the Artist's Alley was separated from the Dealers's Hall by being on different floors. Artist's Alley was on the second floor and, it might just be me, but I'm pretty sure there were more tables than average. I ended up buying some beautiful fridge magnets by SaQeArt, a winter-themed fox magnet and one depicting Amaterasu's head from Ōkami, one of my all-time favorite video games. There was a lot of tables with really nice art for sale!

View of the second floor.

Second floor but from a different angle.

Beautiful art by Waittiz and Sysirauta. ♥

Super nice Pokémon stickers by Kristmarian. ♥

Every time I check Artist's Alley I'm on the lookout for more magnets to decorate my fridge and freezer with, haha. It's the main thing I check for and if I find art that I like I'm almost certain to buy one. x) *hinthint* I love stuff that's decorative and useful at the same time and that brightens up my day – magnets do all of those and they add that personal, geeky touch to my home. I would buy stickers otherwise but I can't deal with the thought that they'd eventually get worn out. ;_; I want my con memories to last for years.

Galazy muffins at the Dealer's Hall.

I didn't run into any familiar faces at Kummacon but despite that I really enjoyed my time there – the whole con felt bubbly and somehow really inviting. It was as if I almost had in my grasp that little something, that I had lost along the way, and which is what made going to cons fun for all those years ago when I first started – Kummacon had a bit of that magic feeling. It's really hard to pinpoint what exactly it is but I guess it's something with the light-hearted mood of the con, coupled with the way it seemed to flow so effortlessly and how it just felt like a small family instead of the dreaded "we and them" camps.

Kummacon's LGBTQ+ booth.

I'm not aware of the con's inner workings but in my eyes it seemed to work well. Every time I went to the info desk I got really helpful and clear answers, despite being a really awkward person and asking potentially dumb questions like "where's the toilets" as I literally didn't find them myself this time. xD Kummacon had water drinking spots laid out etc and activity rooms were marked with funny signs that raised the mood. Speaking of which, I adored the effort the Kummacon people had put into decorating the con to match the cosmos and space theme! There were countless galaxy artworks (seemed to be painted on black plastic bags as canvas) spread around the con, funny Star Wars signs and a lot more. There was even a Yoda and a Chewbacca plush doll sitting at the info desk and being all cute. x)
The silly decorations had me smiling all along and they really set the atmosphere just right – it's the small things that make the experience go from good to great. I wish more cons bothered to spice up the con building with hilarious geeky signs.

Info sign in Yoda speech. Genius.

First-aid sign. These cat signs were so cute!

A reminder sign to drink water.

It seemed like Kummacon also had in use the backyard(?) of the school. There was some kind of playground in there and it was overall a nice area to just hang around with if you wanted more space (pun not intended). The front yard was also a good place to chill at and there was even a statue in front that was a Pokéstop, fuck yeah! Someone kept putting lures on it too and so I just sat upstairs and caught whatever mon that spawned. xD

Funny sign leading to the backyard(?).
Pun is "outer space" as in outdoors, haha.

I had originally assumed that we'd get to be at the con until it closed at 18:00 (I had planned to wear the horse mask later on but yeah, it didn't happen cuz sudden leave) but mom called me when the clock was around 15-16 something and said that they were done shopping and asked if we were ready to go. Me and Frozen Angel were pretty much done exploring so we thought we had seen enough to feel satisfied. Of course I could have stayed longer (it was fun to just hang around) but as it was just a day trip we were both dependant on getting a ride back from le parents. x)

Kummacon had a board game room and a karaoke room
but sadly no video game room.

I left Kummacon behind feeling really content. I went in with my typical low expectations for a small con and came out feeling that it's without a doubt one of the best small cons that I've attended in a long time. The quality was really good considering that I didn't pay a single coin for the experience – perhaps the only thing I'm a bit meh about is that there was no video game room at all. But, then again, I was so busy playing Pokémon Go because of the lure opportunity that it didn't really matter much anyway. xD

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Kummacon was a really pleasant experience, all in all. I'd definitely go there again and I approve of the international school as a con location. Kummacon had the charm and feel on point while still having enough to offer to keep you smiling and entertained. The decorations really set the mood just right and I enjoyed how friendly, humble and relaxed the whole con felt. Everything seemed to be arranged and planned with care and I didn't experience anything that made me feel uncomfortable either. 

I hope Kummacon can keep on being a free event and keep the current quality, as this was definitely a 5/5 achievement in my books. I didn't really feel bored at any point and despite not attending any activities or panels I still had a good time just chilling and savoring the happiness and community vibes that were all around me. 

I'm probably repeating myself a lot but fuck it, Kummacon nailed it in small-con-standards and I'm super happy that I spent a Saturday of my life to go give it a visit. It's really refreshing to see a quality con, albeit small, that's going around without money bills flashing in front of their eyes. I've seen way too much horse manure, greed and drama with other cons having constantly rising ticket prices and then being complete flops in terms of value for money so yeah, I'm so damn thankful that Kummacon is free (so few cons are nowadays) and still does a good job. Amen.

Thanks for reading! 

~ Shiro Samurai out.