all work on page, as always, + some comments by eternaly great Anna-neko

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Hello everyone, and welcome to the main event for ANFCP in Y2k1: Anime Expo 2001. The biggest West Coast Anime convention took place July 5th-8th, at the Long Beach Convention Center. A lot different from last year's locale at the Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim, the convention site this year was a lot larger & spacious, spanning throughout the LBCC, a large theater for main events, and 3 hotels! With two new costumes, a caravan full of friends, brother, and girlfriend, and (of course) LOTS of film for my camera meant some planning in advance. So would AX 2001 live up to my expectations? Find out now as ANFCP: Anime Ng's Freestyle Cosplay Photographs takes a look at Anime Expo 2001.. here we go!

Pre-con stuff

     Tuesday, July 3rd: The Preparation
After a final day of work, which I would not return to for 8 days, I went with my brother Thomas to the rental car place, and got a Chevy Astro Minivan for our trip to AX. Went back home, and later that evening while my brother went to pick up my friends Ace, Fernando, Tony, and Chris and all their luggage, I went to pick up my girlfriend Stella and her luggage. All parties gathered at the house, we begun the loading of the van and it was a little tougher than expected. Mainly because 2 of the 7 passengers were passionate cosplayers, while one was just hard-core. hehe But we managed to stuff as much as we could comfortably, and got what little sleep that we could before heading out early Wednesday morning.

     Wednesday, July 4th: Trip down to Long Beach
Woke the troops up at 6:00am, and left around 6:30am, with Tom taking the first stretch of the driving. I took over about 2 hours later, taking us all the way past Magic Mountain in Valencia. On the drive down I-5, I counted 9 Carl's Jr. restaurants along the way so it was only fitting when we reached the 10th one in Valencia, we stopped to eat a quick lunch. Continued the drive, and made it to Long Beach around 2:00pm. Awed by the size of the LB Convention Center, we proceeded to check into our rooms at the Hyatt. It was perfect timing as we approached the hotel's main entrance, a taxi pulled up and our friend Alma (who stayed with us but traveled by plane) arrived. :) After settling into our room, myself, Tom, Ace, Nando, & Tony went to help my former boss Hugo at Paradigm at the dealers' room loading/unloading dock. (Got a sneak peak at the massive hallway which the dealers' room & art-show was being held) After helping him unload his van and moving his product inside, we regrouped with Alma and went to the Westin Hotel to take care of pre-reg. (That was when we first realized the walking distance from the Hyatt to the Westin.. =P ) Pre-reg. & even regular registration out of the way, we walked around the back-streets of the Westin, trying to find this elusive Chinese restaurant that was listed in the AX program guide. Finally found it, and ate there, and took some food back to the hotel for Stella. Walked back to the Hyatt, and took the looong scenic walk around the lake while admiring the fireworks being shot off all around (almost got my head blown off by all the kids playing with them.. Don't you know fireworks are illegal in CA?!!) Met up with Hugo at the Hyatt, and he asked me to take him and his friend Lauren to LAX to pick up another co-worker. (It went with the deal of getting a dealer's badge, but it wasn't a problem as I had nothing else to do for the rest of the night..) Got back later, after being stuck in a little traffic from the 4th of July festivities at the LBCC, and then prepared for the next day: Day 1 of AX2001!
 



     Thursday, July 5th: Let the fun begin!
Woke up early, and walked around (in normal clothes) looking for cosplayers to take pictures of, going as far as the Westin to check out the attendees registering, and checking out the line for the Opening Ceremonies but didn't attend. Went back to the Hyatt and got into my first costume: Hideo from Rival Schools AKA Project Justice. Went to the lobby and met up with a few cosplayers, like my friend Lily as Kyoko, Elfeater as Momo, and a couple other guys who were Hayato, Roberto, & Boman. (Sorry if I forgot your names, guys!!) Took some individual, pair, team, and big group pictures, but not as many showed up as originally planned. Wayne showed up later as another Hayato, so I got a picture of the Justice High School Teacher team :) The day went by with mainly taking pictures of cosplayers, going back and forth between the dealers' room, and the lobby of the Hyatt, looking for more people in costumes. It was later that evening when Stella and I dressed up in our SNK costumes: Nakoruru for her, and Kim Kapwhan for me. (Yes, Kim is supposed to be retired, and he is for KOF, but I had yet to do a Capcom vs. SNK cosplay, so this was the exception.. hehe) Met up with Jaymie (in her final appearance as Chun Li) so we took some nice pictures together. Before going to check out the URAN Japanese Cosplayer Panel, Stella and I waited in line to play our favorite videogame, ParaPara Paradise.! What was kewl was that we were in costume, and so with a crowd around, it was a treat for them to see cosplayers do PPP! ^_^ I believe my friend Maryssa videotaped me as Kim playing it, so I don't know if I should be happy or worried.. ^_^;;; Due to the loooong wait for our turn at PPP, I managed to catch the end of the URAN panel, and got some nice pictures of the always-fantastic Japanese cosplayers, along with my friends who were at the panel. Finished up the night talking with friends, and spending some time with Stella after her performance at the 1st round of the karaoke contest. (forgot what time i slept..)

     Friday, July 6th: The Debut of the new KOF costume
Woke up early Friday morning, and waited in line with Chris, Tony, Ace, and Alma for the Music Video Contest tickets, and the good thing about this year's passing-out of tickets was that the seats were numbered. So no more waiting in line for the Music Videos or Masquerade.. (I could get there like 5 mins. before showtime, and my seat would still be there.) After getting the tickets, did more of the same as I did on Thursday, by taking more pictures of cosplayers walking around the lobby of the Hyatt. Time went by fast until the evening approached, and that was when it was time to prepare for the Cosplayer Friday-nite main event: the King of Fighters Cosplay! Due to some miscommunication as to what time it was going to take place (either 5pm or 8pm?), our group got ready around 4:30pm. Tom & Nando got into their Ralf & Clark costumes, Stella wore her new Athena '99 costume, and I wore my new KOF costume: King '99. (For those of you who don't know who King is, she (yesh, I said "she") is a female bartender who knows Muay-Thai Kickboxing, and was seen in the SNK games "Art of Fighting", "King of Fighters '94-00", and "Capcom vs. SNK" I chose to do King as my new KOF costume because I like her character, like kickboxing, and the simple fact that I could wear her tuxedo-like costume which covered all of her body and not be too revealing. ^_^;; Plus I decided to do her alternate '99 color of blue, rather than the default Joker-color purple.. =P So with that in mind, I decided to *gulp* CROSS-play for the first time, and it wasn't all that bad. Stella helped me make the jacket (we took a long sleeved shirt, and turned it into King's jacket) and helped me find the other materials to the costume which weren't easy: bright blue pants, a blue bowtie, white dress shoes, a blonde wig, and clip-on earrings. Alma helped me find the wig, style it, and Stella also provided a little make-up to give that finishing touch. The end-result looked too good, with my friends being amazed at how the costume turned out. I admit, it was tough wearing women's golf shoes, a tight cumberbund, and clip-on earrings was DEFINITELY NOT COMFORTABLE, but it was worth it.. Oh, and since I had my Kim Kapwhan costume with me, no sense in letting it just stay in the hotel room: Tony tried it on, and surprisingly it fit him perfectly! So he decided to join our KOF group when he originally wasn't planning to. How was the turnout? hehe Let's just say that I thought the KOF gathering at Animagic 2000 was good, but with all the planning for this cosplay through word of mouth, and the AX Message Board, the AX 2001 KOF Cosplay was a success!! Didn't get a full count, but when the Initial group first posed for the large group pictures, we had almost 40 cosplayers. Other members arrived a little later, but we still took group photos with the 2nd group. Wish everyone from both groups had remained behind, so we could've gotten one, huge band together.. but it was good enuf. Check out my King of Fighters Cosplay pages: the event was so big, it deserved to have its own section to itself to showcase all the great pictures! :) During that time Cody from the East Coast arrived, much to fangirls everywhere (he was just a dashing Wolfwood! hehe) We stashed his stuff in our room, and then went to the music videos, one of the main events I was looking forward to at AX. It took a while to watch all 30 music videos (10 each for the categories of Action/Adventure, Dramatic, & Comedy) Naturally, they saved the best ones for last with comedy, and the audience members were busting out while watching their favorites like "Right Now", "Shiro Shonen", "Mambo No.5", and my 2 favorites: "Odorikuruu" and "Tainted Donuts" Great job to ALL the music videos!! Afterwards (and after the looong walk back to the Hyatt) we decided to go grab a bite to eat, and so I drove a van-full of people to the nearby Denny's. Unfortunately, it was busy (with con-goers and regular customers) and we got a table, but after waiting 20 minutes our order wasn't taken nor were we even given water!! So we decided to walk out of there, w/o ordering, and drove across the street to the Carl's Jr. We ordered combo meals to go, and the fast service there fixed up 7 combo meals in less than 5 minutes!! (Should've given them the tip!!) After eating our dinner in the Hyatt lobby, some of us went to sleep or stayed up playing the 24-hr. ParaPara, DDR Machines, and Fighting Mania (AKA Fist of the North Star) I stayed up with Stella until about 3am, and needed to get some sleep before going to stand in line for the Masquerade tickets.
 

     Saturday, July 7th: Cosplay & Masquerade Madness
Woke up after getting maybe 90 minutes of sleep, and by that time Alma and Tony had left first to stand in line for the tickets. I joined them later, and stood in line for a few hours before they started passing out tickets. It was confusing during that time whether or not we would be allowed to videotape the masq. since I got conflicting reports.. But still, we got good seats for our efforts, and then walked back to the Hyatt. I tried changing into Trowa, but my hair glue (after 1 year of usage since AX2000) finally gave out, and Trowa almost didn't make it.. So I decided to MAX-out the glue (despite it being very gloopy) to make sure the Trowa hair stayed on. It finally did, although I was checking it every 5 mins. to make sure it looked alright. Alma helped me make a new mask, which was nicer than the older one in that it was plastic (instead of cardboard) and more durable. :) Walked around, and made it in time to join a Gundam Wing cosplay for pictures and fun. Inside the dealers' room my friend Margaret was there, just arriving for Saturday, and I said hi to her and took pictures. The day went by quickly, and soon it was almost time for the masquerade. Cody also had to leave around 5pm, so it was a short stay for him at his first AnimeExpo, but he had fun. We said bye to him, and looked forward to seeing him a month later at Otakon.. Before the evening arrived, I realized I was running out of film! 4 rolls left for the Masquerade, post-masq. pics, and Sunday (plus Monday for Dland) wouldn't be enough, so I drove to the nearby Rite-Aid and bought some extra rolls just in case.. (always good to have too much film than too less ^_~) I made it back just in time (thankfully the Masq. seats were numbered) and arrived to the theatre right before it started. Overall, the masquerade was pretty good, and there were a lot of good skits & costumes. The annoying "Chair Chant" was present as usual, but the chair got what it deserved towards the end.. bwahahaha!! I noticed there were a lot of double skits throughout, probably by coincidence but get a load of this: 2 Magic Knight Rayearth skits, 2 Clover skits, 2 skits involving 2 girls dancing side-by-side on stage, 2 skits involving a trio of girls but one girl was a guy (?), 2 Sailor Moon dancing numbers, and 3 Lady Marmalade skits.. ^_^;;; But all of them were really nice, and entertained the audience for a few hours. In between the judging for the awards, they showed the Comedy Music Videos again, (no "Tainted Donuts" but we saw "Odorikuruu" again!), and then we were treated to live singing: the opera-singer (who was at AX '99) who sang the Escaflowne movie song, and then the best treat: Kikuo Inoue (Voice actress for Belldandy) sang the opening song from "Ah! My Goddess" It was a dream for AMG and Kikuko Inoue fans alike. The judging for the Masq. skits took place afterwards and it was good to see my friends win prizes. :) Those friends of mine who didn't win, well.. my prize to them will be a copy of the Masquerade tape. ^_~ When it was over, the post-masq. pics took place outside the auditorium, and I took a lot of pictures. (Glad I bought that extra film..) After another tiring walk back to the Hyatt, we had more Carl's Jr. for out late dinner, and then like Friday, whoever stayed up to play ParaPara or just hang out did, while everyone else went to sleep. While most of the guys were sleeping, I began the job of packing my stuff up because of the Cosplay Fashion Show on Sunday, and wanted to pack as much as I could before I got too tired.. I stayed up as late as I could, but gave in to sleep eventually..

     Sunday, July 8th: "One Day More"
For the 3rd night in a row, I still couldn't sleep in because I had to get up early to wait in yet another line: the line to get autographs from the Japanese Guests of Honor! Chris, Tony, and Stella waited in line at first, and then I joined them. Sadly, Kikuko Inoue left early so I couldn't get my AMG! OST CD signed by her. :( But I other stuff to sign, and while I waited in line to get Kia Asamiya's autograph, I asked Stella to have my Love Hina pencilboard signed by the Character Designer. Was so pleased that Mr. Asamiya signed my Nadesico Manga #1, but he noticed that I had brought my American #1 issues of Nadesico & Silent Mobius, so he kindly signed those as well! Shook his hand, and left while Stella got my Love Hina pencilboard signed. Went back to the room, and changed into my Seishiro (X:1999) costume. Loaded up the car with my stuff, and then around 11am tried to find the fashion show. Finally found it before it began, and there was a long line of people wanting to watch it. Saw my friend Erika in line, and she graciously let me join her to watch the show, but because there were too many people ahead of us, viewing the Fashion Show from the back and trying to take pictures wouldn't be worth it, so I signed up for it for the heck of it. Backstage, took pictures of cosplayers, and then walked on stage as Seishiro, sporting the suit, sunglasses, Spirit Wards, and even a Subaru plushie! ^_^ After the event ended, met up with Stella and we hung out in the lobby, saying bye to everyone we saw, and taking our farewell pictures to finish up Anime Expo. Leaving Long Beach in the afternoon, we went to Hollywood first, watched "Scary Movie 2" and then walking up & down Hollywood Blvd. Drove to Anaheim in the evening, and rested up before Disneyland in the morning. That was a lot of fun, with Melanie & Elizabeth joining us (for a few hours) and we partied in the park until midnight. We slept in, and then spent the day driving everyone to their respective homes, as life resumed again, but the memories of Anime Expo 2001 were still on our minds..




 

  Thank-you & shout-outs list
Allie, Ashley, Tiff (AMC), Mack, Gina (NCC), Henry, Wayne (AGSMA), Kelly, Justin (Maxmana), CJ, Christina (Elfeater), Lily & Kie (DCC), Kiyoshi, Claudia, Johnny, Margaret, Yaya, Jeremy, Nadine, Christy, Dommi, Ollie, Cody, Meg, Erika, Karrie, Evie, TenKen, (Iplay), Melanie, Elizabeth, Aaron, Jenny, Leo, Matt, Kimi & Irvinator Chris (Phoenix Seed), Maryssa, Lisa, Charlene, Natalie, Jaymie, Fiona, Steve & his g/f, Hoi (Kyo Squall), Frank, Samantha, Van Donovan, Alma, my brother Tom, Ace, Fernando, Chris, Tony, Claudine, John, Jae (Otaku Outpost), Hugo, Steve L., and everyone else whom I met or saw but forgot to mention.

Special thanks go out to my girlfriend Stella whom I was glad was there for me at AX, and we had fun together for that week away from home and work. You made my weekend really special, and I luv you for that! ^_^

Extra special thanks goes to Anna-neko. She contributes so much to ANFCP's cause in 2001 with her help with the pages . Check out the other pages she's done for the cons I've been to in y2k1
~~~
Katsucon
Fanime
Anime Central
Animazement
 


Looking back to Anime Expo, I would say I had a lot of fun, mainly hanging out with my g/f Stella and my friends, whom I hadn't seen since Fanime or Animazement. Didn't have too much time to hang out with many of them, watch any anime, or attend any panels save for the URAN cosplayer panel, and missed out on some cosplayer pictures. But I still got a LOT of pictures as you will see shortly.. At AX '98 I took 1 roll of film (why didn't I take more?!), at AX '99 I took 5 rolls, and at AX 2000 I took 10 rolls.
This year, I broke all the records, even the record I made at Animazement 2001 with 15 rolls.. At Anime Expo 2001 I took a career-high 22 rolls of film within the AnimeExpo weekend!! They were mainly of my friends, who always enjoy getting 4X6" reprints from me (hence the main reason I don't go digital) and the great KoF cosplay group on Friday. Hard to say whether or not AX2002 (if I go) will top that record, but I'm glad that the majority of the pictures came out so well. Yet because of the long walks back and forth from the Hyatt to the dealers' room to the Westin & Terrance Theater and back, I missed out on some of the good cosplayers and groups.. Since AX 2002 will take place at the same location at the LBCC, the same thing might happen again, but I'll worry about that as AX2002 approaches..

You can check out my old-site, showcasing conventions I've been to in 2000. Visit there at: http://members.nbci.com/anfcp/cosplay.htm and while you're there, please sign my Guest Book as I'd love to hear from you and appreciate your comments.
Up next for ANFCP will be the biggest East Coast Anime Convention: Otakon, at the Baltimore Convention Center from August 10-12th. Will I be able to break my record of pictures taken at AX? You'll find out soon enough.. 'Til then, take care!

CIAO!!   
-Albert AKA Trowa Al   

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