NY Super Week 2015

I hope everyone is getting ready for the New Year. I don't know have any resolutions this year other than trying to maintain the ones I've set for myself awhile ago. I hope you all get to spend it with the your family or loved ones!

This year I was lucky enough to grab myself and Boba 4 Day tickets to NYCC. Believe me I was super shocked it happened. I am used to only being able to grab tickets for a single day. I knew that when you bought a 4 Day you were given a NY Super Week card for free which gave you access to events the week of NYCC. You still had to pay for the tickets to the individual tickets, but many of them were under 10 bucks. This year NYCC was October 8th-11th with the NY Super Week events starting the Monday before on the 5th.

I used the NY Super Week app to take a look at events and settled on two: Black Girl Nerds vs. FanBros Live Podcast on the 6th and the Crossplay Cosplay Contest hosed by FanBros on the 7th. They both sounded super interested and you know I gotta support my geeks of color and blerds. I let Tiff know about the crossplay event since it she also cosplays male characters. I may get into more crossplaying as I pick more cosplay. There are a bunch of male characters I want to cosplay and many of them I don't want to be genderbent. Also it highlighted POCs cosplaying non-black characters.

Black Girl Nerds vs. FanBros Live Podcast

I have been getting more into podcasts and I thought what better way to experience one than live. Especially when it can be hard to pull out a book on a crowded subway. I was already a huge fan of Black Girl Nerds prior to attending this live podcast.

The goodies in each chair

Before the podcast started there were some bomb ass mixes being played. I think they were made by BenHaMeen. I remember there was a dope mix that had the Rugrats theme, a mash up of Stronger Than You from Steven Universe and Just the Two of Us, and an amazing Mario mix. I really need to see if he has a mixtape because those songs were lit.

The podcast was broken up into 5 segments that centered around pop culture, geeky news, and current events. The first segment was "This Week in the N Word" which really addressed racism, anti-blackness, and pain ol tomfoolery that was currently happening. Rihanna, Kanye West, and Pokemon were discussed.

After this they followed up with Geekquently asked questions where the audience could them ask FanBros and Black Girl Nerds questions. They even took some questions from twitter. One question that came up is if not Harriet Tubman on the the 20 dollar who should it be. Feminista Jones commented on that question and she was extremely eloquent and brilliant on the subject. I really need to follow her on twitter and check out more of work. There actually a few other famous people there like author of Shadowshaper, Daniel Jose Older, and a gentleman that worked for DC Comics, Joseph P. Illidge.

Waku Waku +NYC Day 2 [Pic Heavy]

Hey y'all, I hope that had a wonderful Christmas or holiday if you don't celebrate it^^ I had a relaxing day with my friend at his apartment in Queens with his two cats Ali and Boom. I'm back to finish my adventures at Waku Waku +NYC.

Day 2
On Sunday, the first thing on our list was to attend a panel called Introduction to Manga and Anime Studies and it was really interesting. We both are writers (Tiff more so than me), so we figured it would be cool to go to a panel for a career or hobby we are interested in doing. Since I'm a big fan of the humanities (particularly literature) I spent a lot of my time reading in school and analyzing texts. I haven't analyzed manga or anime yet, but I think it would be something I could be potentially interested in doing. The panelists talked about looking at anime and manga under the same lens as film and other contemporary media. They discussed why such a field should exist and one of the reasons being that mainstream American pop culture has been influenced by anime and manga. You can see its influences in shows like Steven Universe and Adventure Time to name a few. Putting these texts and films into context is a great way to explore why these influences exist. I wonder if one day the US will be like how it was in Blade Runner.

It's interesting that for manga and anime to be such a huge influence on American pop culture that there is no such thing in schools as an anime/manga studies major or minor. There are a few schools that has Comic studies as a minor. But students that want to examine Anime and Manga are usually studying it under a Japanese literature or film studies major.

The also pondered what is categorized as manga and anime citing for an example that Miyazaki does not like his work to be called anime. I had no idea he felt this way because he is often heralded as a major front runner to the popularity of anime in the West. His work is usually synonymous with the word anime. They also brought up shows like Avatar the Last Airbender and RWBY and how there are debates about whether or not shows like this can be considered anime. It was a really informative panel^^

After the panel we headed back to the Brooklyn Expo center to grab something quick before lining up for the Baby the Stars Shine Bright fashion show. We remembered how long the line was the day before for the PUTUMAYO fashion show and figured it would be even longer for Baby whose show we did not want to miss. What I grabbed to eat was so scrumdiddilyumptious like oh my word! I got a chicken katsu sandwhich from Katsu-Hama and my life was changed.

Waku Waku +NYC Convention: Japanese Pop Culture Festival Day 1 (pic heavy)

Hey everyone! I hope the weather hasn't been too harsh for ya. NYC hasn't been told cold which is a relief and kinda worrisome at the same time. Fingers crossed for a mild winter! I've attended quite a few events and I'm behind on writing about them. Ah the convention season lol

Back in August Tiff and I attended Waku Waku +NYC and it was amazing! It was the first time that this convention had been held, but it didn't feel like it. It was ran very well except for a few minor snags here and there. Waku Waku +NYC is a two day Japanese pop culture festival that launched this past summer in Brooklyn. The festival consisted of many aspects of Japanese pop culture like anime, manga, music, food, film and fashion. There was a dealer's room, exhibits, panels, screenings and fashion shows.

We learned beforehand from the schedule that the event would be spread out over five locations in Greenpoint and Williamsburg (Brooklyn Expo Center, Transmitter Park, Wythe Hotel, Brooklyn Bowl, and the Verboten). They were also kind enough to have shuttles that went between each location and would also pick you up from the Greenpoint subway station. The first day I cosplayed as Kagome and Tiff wore her young Eren cosplay from Attack on Titan. 

The pre reg line was great which was a welcome change from what happened at AnimeNEXT. They were kind enough to direct everyone to stand in the shade. The line was slightly wrapped around the block but it went very fast to our relief.

6% Doki Doki booth

We headed straight to the dealer's room the place where your hard earned coins go to die lol I lied to myself sayin I was only gonna spend $50 haha Yeah right! I went in the first day and spent way more than I originally wanted. I don't feel like anything I bought was a waste :)

Mi spoils lol