This was the second time I bussed it to an anime convention. I arrived in South Station just in time to take the 6:30 bus to downtown Manchester. We ran into Friday evening traffic because of the rain. Though I was scheduled to arrive in Manchester at 7:45, I was able to get in at 8:15. My colleague from Anime Jam Session met me at the station and showed me a short cut to get into the hotel through the parking lot. The Manchester station was literally right next to the AAC.

By the time I got to my room, I was still tired from a long week. There were a few events running through the evening from various room parties to a ballroom dance. Normally, I enjoy covering ballroom dances, but I forgot to pack something formal. After taking a nap on the fluffy full sized bed, I decided to dress up as Mulan and hit the con.

Nerd Fit: Women in Nerd Culture
I was not quite sure what to expect out of this. I have not heard of Nerd Fit prior. I was half expecting a panel done in the vein of Feminist Frequency, but I was wrong. However, that is not necessarily a bad thing. The Nerd Fit crew had an unadulterated and politically incorrect discussion about annoyances in female characters in nerd culture. There was open discussion on who is the bigger slut in anime – Yoko or Asuka. There was a ton of laughs to be had and some interesting nerd debate if Samus really is a strong female character or if Cooking Mama reinforced the barefoot housewife principle. This panel was thoroughly entertaining and I regret not attending any of the further Nerd Fit panels at the con.

Youtube Meet: Pimp Your Stuff
Cosplay Nation hosted this panel on how to use YouTube and social media to promote your media. The panel hosts also talked about problems with using social media in the anime convention scene. Cosplay Nation highlighted a video on the recent Facebook incident where Facebook was deleting cosplay profiles. Joshua (Cosplay Nation) talked about how he had to approach Facebook to get his cosplay account back and made a video how cosplayers can do the same. During the panel, they also showcased cosplay music videos that were filmed at this year’s Otakon.

Cosplay Nation also invited people to talk about their YouTube pages. I ended up talking about Scarlet Rhapsody and I was quite surprised that there was interest for Bizarro World of Sports. After the panel, the Cosplay Nation crew interviewed me for a video project.

Other Nightlife Events
Evening programming lasted into the early AM hours. There were a lot of things to do. The AMV contest was running on for a while. I was able to catch it just in time for the theme category. This year, AAC’s theme was Year of the Dragon. It was very refreshing to see a Slayers AMV that preceded after a Dance in the Vampire Bund amv set to Rick Astley. There was also a bar called the Dragon’s Den that served adult drinks and general chill out space for the 21+ crowd. Right next door to the Dragon’s Den, there was Bad Hentai Dubbing. The line for the aforementioned interactive panel circled into the main hall. Bad Hentai Dubbing allowed audience members (heh, members) to dub those awkward scenes from hentai. The original clip would be muted and the two participants would make up their own dialogue as they go.

Overall, the nightlife provided by the convention was pretty awesome. Of course, there were room parties all around the Radisson. Yet, security was patrolling the elevators and the floors once it hit the 1AM hour. I turned in at around 1:30AM and decided to call it a night.

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