So not so long ago, on the weekend of 1-2 March, Kitacon was held in Kemi. Of course me and my company would drag our asses there because c'mon, it's the closest con to where we live and free entrance!
About Kitacon: this year it was a 2-day con. Actually, the later Kitacon events have for some reason, as far as my crappy memory goes, been only one day but this year they went back to having it last both Saturday and Sunday. I say sweet!
Kitacon poster.
So, back to the beginning. Friday evening me, Jäätynyt Enkeli and Hasakitsuki went over to mom's place to sleep there over the Kitacon weekend because, well, it's closer to Kemi + free ride to the con and back, wopee!
On Saturday morning I woke up, went to shower, had breakfast and started changing into my Sannan cosplay. Too bad for me it took forever to get the goddamn eye makeup to look decent (I had to redo parts of it a lot) and so everyone had to wait for me while I was battling in the bathroom a very serious fight – because cosplay is not so serious business.
When everyone finally was ready mom drove us to Kemi and there we stepped into a building we had never been in before. See, Kitacon has all these previous years been held in another building. I must say that Sauvotalo is pretty cool.
It didn't take long before we found Sairu-chan dressed as Sieni Shiemi!
(random mirror picture and yeah, I have beautiful camera face censor)
We also ran into the epic werewolf guy from Oulun animeseminaari, also known as Karri. He is just too awesome for words and we spent quite a lot of the con hanging with him!
Karri feat. borrowed pink hat
Except for striking chats with familiar faces, photoshooting Sairu-chan's cosplay, checking out the building as well as the Dealer's Hall and Artist's Alley I didn't do anything else on Saturday. There were some interesting panels on both Saturday and Sunday but I either missed or saw the time it was held too late. :( Also I must say that the air inside was pretty bad; I couldn't stay inside the con for very long before getting a major toast effect and needing to go outside to cool down.
Kitacon is mostly a hang-with-friends con for me; it just feels very relaxed, slow-going and chill compared to the bigger and more ambitious cons with a lot of panels and people crowding everywhere.
Random con picture feat. Dealer's Hall &Artist's Alley.
At some point we got bored so we went up to the second floor, occupied an empty table and played some Monster Hunter. It's always a good idea to have a handheld gaming console or something else with you in case you need entertainment!
Gaming time, gaming time ~
We did look for a location to have a sort of "creepy!Sannan feat. ochimizu" photoshoot at some point but it quickly fell through when it became obvious that we were in the middle of the city and Hakuouki and modern buildings just don't work well together... at all. Also, the weather was very dull and gray and I wasn't eager to walk in waraji on more or less stone-y and slippery roads to go see if there would have been some less modern areas nearby.
One thing I did though was buying a Tracon ticket! Yeah, you could buy them in advance at the photo studio for a cheaper special price, namely 15 €.
Tracon ticket bought! (and Okita plushie photobombing wanting to be on the pic)
Not so much more to say about Saturday because we barely did shit. We did go eat at a Chinese restaurang when we got hungry during mid-day; otherwise we stayed at the con until they closed the first floor and that's when we went back to mom's place to eat salmon soup and sleep.
On Sunday when I woke up early I felt so laggy, lazy and blööörgh that I highly considered not cosplaying at all and just going casual to the con. I probably experienced all possible stages of "can't be bothered" and whatnot but after having my breakfast cereals something magical happened – I felt like I maybe could be bothered to cosplay after all.
So yeah, I put on my Gin cosplay and soon enough our Bleach cosplay trio arrived at Kitacon. At the con we just walked around until Sairu-chan showed up, aka Rangiku Matsumoto and our final cosplay group member. With everyone together we went outside to have a photoshoot... and I can only sum it up by saying "ei siitä tullut helvettiäkään". :-DD
And, if you wonder, the quality was something of this caliber:
I don't even.
Gin demonstrating how to eat cereals!
Everything was hilarious. Even stupid things.
HURR. Gin approves photographing Rangiku.
Yeah, herpsis derpsis everywhere and beyond. My cereals must have been drugged because I couldn't be serious to save my life. The so-called photoshoot was nothing else but glorious photobombs that I failed to eternalize (provided by Jäätynyt Enkeli, of course), laughter, so-bad-it's-good faces and horribly frozen fingers.
Oh well, some hours later it was time for FFFight, this time an improvised one – the pre-planned one was on Saturday if my memory serves me right. I admit the main reason I went to watch it was because Karri would participate and the other reason because there wasn't much else to do.
About FFFight I can say that sometimes it was hilarious and sometimes pretty meh. The final fight between the Dubinators –holders of FFFight– and The Challengers –including Karri– though was something so awesome. I kind of hope it was recorded because it was really funny and I'd like to see it again! "Ylipaino on ylivoimaaaaa!"
such quality. much violent. wow. (FFFight)
I don't remember when exactly it was but at some point in the Dealer's Hall/Artist's Alley someone started a "letkajenkka" and soon there was a long line of people following the leader who was blasting at least the What is Love song from a cellphone and walking around. xD It was beautiful.
Part of the "letkajenkka" line.
I don't have so much more to say about the con itself – it was nice and relaxed just like previous Kitacons. I did hear though that the cosplay competition was pretty bad (I didn't watch it this year) or well, more like that the judges were inexperienced and that some competitors got more attention than others and that it basically was very unprofessional. I hope for the contestants that this will be fixed in the future because hey, even Kitacon's cosplay competitions have had the quality of the costumes rising over the past years and so the judges need to level up to the next level as well and have some actually knowledgeable people judging, so that it's fair to everyone.
Oh, and speaking of other cosplayers here's a little shitty photo video I quickly put together with a few cosplay pics and randoms:
I don't have more to say. Bye bye and thanks for reading ~
Le Samurai is out.
A few days after Tracon it feels good to come back and write a little about it. This time I don't have all that much to say I hope so let's get on with it!
But first...
Have some ducks!
(from Sorsalampi outside Tampere-talo of course)
My journey to Tracon started early on Friday morning. Me, Jäätynyt Enkeli and Hasakitsuki woke up, ate breakfast and put in the last stuff in our suitcases and then we waited for my stepdad to come pick us up from our apartment. He drove us to Liikekeskus Corona in Kemi where we waited for the carpooler to turn up. Meanwhile we waited we went inside to Prisma and bought provisions for the trip - Moomin lemonade and candies, what did you expect?
We drove to Oulu where Jäätynyt Enkeli jumped off at the bus station (he would take the train) and then we went to pick up the driver's cousin from Oulu and then the journey down started. During the car trip down I mostly just played on my Nintendo DS and PSP and lagged. It didn't feel like it took super long (then again I'm used to traveling long distances) and soon enough we were in Orivesi. Yes, Orivesi, not Tampere. The carpool duo stopped here so me and Hasakitsuki had to take a train from Orivesi to Tampere, luckily one came after around 30 minutes. Now we hadn't preordered train tickets but that proved to be a good move and that's because when we were at the train the train conductor never came.. or it was that one guy who super-speeded past the cart. FREE RIDE AAAAWWW YEEEAAA! >8D
Oh well, at Tampere train station we were met by Ri-kun, exchanged hugs and walked to Omenahotels.. but before going to the hotel we went to a nearby foodstore to buy something to eat at the hotel. At Omppu we just chilled around until Jäätynyt Enkeli arrived and when it got late we went to sleep.
Saturday
The first con day arrived. We woke up at 08:00, had some breakfast and then started to put on our cosplays. All three of us had simple/casual cosplays so it didn't take all that long until everyone were ready. My cosplay for the day was Kureno Sohma from Fruits Basket and Tracon would be his debut con. I'm kinda happy I didn't choose Hijikata for Saturday because Saturday was a rather hot day and I would so have toasted.. c'mon, even Kureno was toasty! D: Then again, having a flashier cosplay on Saturday would have been more fun I guess.. Well well, our group of four walked to Tampere-talo and soon we split up because me and Hasakitsuki had to find the Fruits Basket group. It soon turned out that the meeting time had changed from 11:00 to 11:50 or something but we found everyone and took some pictures together. After that the group kind of split up and I just randomly walked around the con building, taking pictures of cosplayers, meeting friends and checking out the dealer's hall.
Random Kureno self-picture feat. pocket monster bird!
15:00 it was time for the symphonic wind ensemble at Iso Sali -which I had been looking forward to- so I went there with Ri-kun, Jäätynyt Enkeli, Hasakitsuki and Sairu-chan.
Symphonic wind ensemble playing the Red/Blue Medley from Pokémon, duh
I must admit that I didn't recognize any of the songs except the Pokémon medley (oh my god the waves of nostalgy when they played that one! <3) but that didn't stop me from having 45 minutes of my life well spent.
After the symphonic wind ensemble we all were super hungry except Sairu-chan so we headed out to town to get something to eat. Sadly Sairu-chan had to go back to the con half-way to help a friend or something and change cosplays but oh well. We ended up roaming a kebab place not too far away from the con and of course that meant what was on my plate was a..
Kebab animal!
Or well, we are more used to it in this form:
I must say the kebab was surprisingly good! I wonder how come I have only eated kebab maybe 5 times in all my life.. this needs to change!
With kebab animals inside me we rolled hihi back to the con and had a photoshoot at Sorsapuisto outside Tampere-talo. Gosh I love this place!
Soon enough we moved to another spot and had a follow-up photoshoot.
Again photographer was Jäätynyt Enkeli.
I didn't really do anything special on Saturday so I don't have so much more to say, when we got tired we just walked back to Omenahotels and derped around the rest of the night. I must say that the Saturday weather was surprisingly hot, felt like a summer day even though it's autumn! Not that I really complain though, Kureno isn't the warmest of cosplays. *coughunlikeprettymuchallmyothercosplayscough*
Oh oh, that reminds me! I met two of my con friends at one point and they told me this one pretty awesome story or whatever to call it - basically they had spotted me as Kureno from a distance and been asking themselves something like "is it [insert one of my internet nicknames here] or is it not? He's not wearing a kimono but it looks like him.. is it or is it not?". The thing is, I've pretty much always worn kimono cosplays to conventions (like, 95% of the time) and some people know me by that and well.. when I suddenly turn up in western clothes it seemingly throws people off and they don't instantly recognize me. :'DD Well, me too. lol My trademark is kimono style BOAHAHAAH ~ ... ehrm, yeah.
Sunday
We woke up one hour earlier than on Saturday, which meant 07:00 it was time to lift our asses up from the bed. Oh, ya know, everyone had casual cosplays on Saturday but Sunday was like.. how about the total opposite? :DD Yeah, so for me it was rasetsu!Hijikata and for Hasakitsuki oni!Chizuru from Hakuouki Shinsengumi Kitan, Ri-kun turned into Bilbo Baggins from The Hobbit and Jäätynyt Enkeli into his signature cosplay - Kratos Aurion from Tales of Symphonia. So yeah, there was contact lenses, kimono dressing, horns to put on your forehead, making ears pointy and gluing of feet hair going on in the hotel room on a Sunday morning. Hey, seems perfectly normal to me!
What also is perfectly normal is having a suitcase that is overflowing with ~STUFF~ and having Chizuru ordering Hijikata to sit on it so that there would even be a slight chance of getting it closed. It's not like we got it fully closed but almost.
This is how you do it!
(shitty photo quality is shitty, taken with my old camera by Jäätynyt Enkeli)
We left the hotel around 10:00 and walked to Tampere-talo with all our luggages. I'm happy no one died because it wasn't all that awesome.. and the weather wasn't either; kinda cloudy and boring but not cold at least.
When we got to the con I put on the rest of my cosplay - namely the ponytail, swords, headband and... blooooood ~ >8D Yup, it was weirdly fun to get your face and hands red! Hasakitsuki's face when a bloody Hijikata came out of the bathroom was pretty fabulous. When I was all donned up we went to walk around the con a bit and low and behold, we spotted Kazama!
Just had to strike a rival battle pose ~
Soon enough we decided to go outside to have a photoshoot because the weather forecast had promised slight rain around 13:00 to 15:00 and well -as our luck would have it- when we reached the wooden dock next to Sorsalampi and had taken a few pictures it started raining and the umbrellas came out - save the silk!
Luckily the rain ended soon enough so we just stood there waiting under our umbrellas until it ceased. Then our photoshoot continued! (and our efforts to not get ducks photobombing everywhere as well...)
Of course I also got my time to shine alone and some pretty cool gusts of wind made me look 20% cooler!
Photographer is still Sairu-chan.
Under the photoshoot someone else had laid their power-hungry eyes on ochimizu...
A CROW!
After ending our Hakuouki photoshoot I went to shoot Ri-kun's Bilbo Baggins cosplay. I must say that meanwhile I was shooting their cosplay I noticed that not all people around me were con-goers, then again it makes sense because we were in a pretty well-known park in Tampere. I swear some of the looks I got from the non con-goers were priceless, the best one being that little boy (maybe he was around 8 years old) who passed me by and stopped and stared with these huge eyes and open mouth. His expression was something between fear and fascination (or both?) and even when he had passed me his head turned back and he still stared at me while he walked. I swear his eyes were glued on me for what felt like 5 minutes.. xD I was trying not to scare him by doing a creepy smile or something because hey, it's perfectly normal [not] to have a bloody samurai with white hair and red eyes who walks with an obvious limp next to you. But yeah, pretty much everyone who wasn't a Tracon visitor stared at me.......... :'DD I wonder if anyone thought I was actually hurt..
After the photoshooting was over we bumped into Anniilaugh as Battousai version Kenshin and well, Kenshin got a sip of our drink of madness.. which is made by the blood of Moomins.
"This looks suspicious.."
One bad thing was that I missed the Zelda piano concert! It started 13:00 and during that time we were photoshooting our cosplays outside, damn! I had really wanted to go see it but meh, shit happens I guess. :'( Oh well, maybe this chance comes again...
The advertisement for the Zelda piano concert
When inside we went to sit in the cafeteria to relax. My hurt foot had been, well, hurting, over the weekend because of all the walking around so sitting down for a while was really appreciated. Hasakitsuki bought a bread to eat and we just sat there chilling.
Hijikata chillin'
Because I missed the Zelda concert I didn't have anything else to keep track on time for.. except that the carpoolers had informed me that we would need to leave 17:00. I decided to not go eat during the con time because if we went to eat outside it would probably take us an hour or two and I wanted to spend as much time with my friends as possible, especially Ri-kun whom I probably wouldn't see anymore for the year.
You know, except for the fact that it was pure awesome to be all bloody it was quite a bother sometimes too, mostly because I couldn't really touch anything without having to think first. Sure as hell I didn't want blood on my silk kimono because I don't even know if this thing washes out! With that said, I needed help whenever my cosplay was going everywhere as well as with carrying stuff and that help was always in the form of a certain oni. But despite the extra brain activity needed to do anything myself I'd totally want to be all bloody again!
assistant!Chizuru fixing headband
The Sunday went by really fast, really.. or more like, the whole Tracon did. During the last hours I just hung around with my friends; sadly Sairu-chan had to leave a few hours before us and I didn't get to say goodbye to her... :'( Neither did I get to say goodbye to Ri-kun. ;_; But at least one hour or so before we left I decided to take a roof photo of our group (except Sairu-chan who had left) looking up.. funny thing was that this random masked guy ninja'd his way into the photo just at the right moment! And the scary part was that I didn't even notice him until like 5 seconds after the photo was taken. Damn.
Random masked guy ninja photobombing.. WITH STYLE
With that I'll end my Tracon summary. All in all it was a great con (with surprisingly little rain for a change, if compared to the other cons of the year) and Tracon still stays as my favorite Finnish anime convention. Tampere-talo is just such a great location to host a convention in!
Oh, and lastly here's a cosplay photo video of all the photos I took of other cosplayers during the con weekend:
Thanks for a great con and bye bye ~
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.........
Wait, you really thought I'd just let you leave like that?
This time I don't have any bonus pictures but I have... BONUS GIFS MOTHAFUCKAAH!! >8D
When I tried to get up - also known as "Chizuru, don't step on my hakama dangit!"
Drinking ochimizu... it's seemingly not very effective.
