07/07/07 only comes every 100 years. International Nana Day is a fan organized event that occurs world wide. Fans of Ai Yazawa's Nana franchise gathered in major cities to celebrate the Nana fandom. Why July 7, 2007? Simple. The occurance of seven in Nana is a recurring theme - the namesake / title, the apartment room number, etc. While 38,000 weddings occured on July 7, 2007, Nana enthusiasts gathered all together.

I went to the Los Angeles event. It took place around Little Tokyo. I went with my friend Stan who did an impromptu Ren. I went as Misato / Mai after she and Nana O went to Disneyland. In the scanlation I have, Nana and Misato / Mai went to Disneyland and returned home with mouse ears. The anime (ep 15) plays it differently, I'd imagine due to copyright! While I do have a Reira costume (my first costume I've ever made!), I thought it would be nice to represent the character I'm most like! After all, I did get picked as Misato / Mai in the Nana Livejournal Rating Community!

Registration occured in the Weller Plaza where the Kinokuniya bookstore is located. It was only $2 for the event. Nana fans were given wristbands. I originally intended to enter my dollfies (Eponine and Cosette) into the craft contest. I had them cosplaying as different variations of Reira. In fact, I made the outfits the night before. I was asked to participate in the cosplay contest. I was honest and told them that this was a found item costume, but they told me that the contest wasn't based on craftsmanship.

There was the bakery contest. The strawberry treats won because it fit in with the theme. For the crafts contest, the Blast fan by Neko Niku won. Yet, lots of thanks to Stan for babysitting Eponine and Cosette. And tons of thanks to the Nana Day staff for reassuring everyone that dollfies should be handled delicately. Another entry was fan art inspired by the art of Nana.

The cosplay contest consisted of a video interview. They asked us who we are, who are we cosplaying as, and why and how we got into Nana. We did the video interview and then posed for photographers. Nana Day Los Angeles had their own set of photographers as well as familliar faces in the anime convention press crowd - i360, Super Number 1, etc.

Of course, I represented Traveling Valentine. As far as cosplay goes, Reira Serizawa was well represented. Her Trigger tour dress seemed to be the most popular as three cosplayers did the Trigger tour variation. Eponine, my dollfie, wore a loose interpretation of the Trigger tour dress. As far as One True Pairings were concerned, Reira and Takumi were very well represented.

The event moved to the village district of Little Tokyo. Stephanie Yanez interviewed cosplayers before she performed on stage. The time was come to announce the cosplay contest winners. Suffice to say, no one came home empty handed. I didn't really expect much out of it, but I won third place (aka - The Hachi Award) for my Misato / Mai post Disneyland trip costume. It was fun being a silly Lolita Nana O fangirl!

Otherwise, for what it was, Nana Day was awesome for what it was. To end the day, Stan and I went to Cefiore for smoothies. It was getting pretty hot in downtown Los Angeles, so we decided to call it day. I had a BLAST at Nana Day! I have Nana stickers, postcards, a cell phone accesory, and bubble bath accessories now! Thank to all the new people I met. Tons of thanks to Dawn and her staff for having such a fun event!

Pictures are copyright by Traveling Valentine (tv @ scarlet-rhapsody.com). If we took your picture, feel free to use it on your site or cosplay gallery. This site was brought to you by the font Aardvark Cafe.