Easter Sunday marked the third and final day of Sakura Con. We were ready to check out before 10AM. Jared and I had planned to attend the Baccano! gathering later that morning. We were not quite sure where the gathering was. I finally figured out it would take place at the site of the Saturday Blood Drive and the Friday doll gatherings. We took an alternative route to the second floor. We took the escalators at the main entrance of the convention center. It was really interesting exploring this side of the convention center. There was plenty of art work displayed. For a second, I thought the convention was taking place in a museum.

I decided to go scout around for the rest of the Baccano! people. The gathering was organized on the Sakura Con message boards, not cosplay.com. Many of us were getting hyped to pull off this gathering. While Baccano! is a lesser known series, it certainly has a dedicated following. Jared joked that Baccano! is the new anime for the cool kids.

For the most part, we did a few reenacting a few key scenes from the anime. Jared was cosplaying as Dallas and he went up against Firo in a classic 1930s style one on one rumble.

Knives are fun! Thankfully, I was able to borrow Jared's knife for a few of my Chane LaForet shots. Surprisingly enough, my costume was mistaken for Lust from Full Metal Alchemist by a few Ramune Babies.

One of the aspects that made this gathering extra special was the free swag. For example, the Issac and Miria pair brought Hershey's chocolate bars with the Baccano! logo on them. Everyone had to get their photo op with the series' signature logo.

We had two sets of Issac and Miria cosplayers both in the Flying Pussyfoot variant. I thought it was really cute that one of the pairs were two stepping to the Baccano! soundtrack. We had someone bring the Baccano! soundtrack so we could have series approrpriate background music. For the most part, we had the gathering area to ourselves. I think the Axis Powers Hetalia group were supposed to converge in the same gathering spot, but I believe the Rail Tracer scared them off.

We had a superior Vino / Claire Stanfield / Rail Tracer cosplayer arriving fashionably late to the Baccano! gathering. It was worth the wait. As people were getting their pictures taken, a few of us were awed by the extra prop that the Vino cosplayer brought - a dead body. Not only we were impressed by the gory details, but we had a Vino willing to bite off the Czeslaw Meyer's fingers.

We also did a few more versus shots from the Baccano! OAV (or better known as dvd volume 4 in the Funimation release). We had a Graham Specter with a giant monkey wrench that went up against Vino and Chane.

Another piece of free swag were Flying Pussyfoot train tickets. Those who were all aboard the train to New York City, posed to get their tickets inspected by Vino. No ticket? Vino gets to throw you overboard.

The Lolita gathering was right across from the Baccano! gathering. Being that we were all in period clothing, the Vino decided to unscrupulously pose with the Lolitas. Of course, he brought his dead buddy with him.

One of the Miria's joked around about Dallas' real fate - that he ended up with Chane somehow. We joked around about taking cutesy shots of the two knife wielders. Otherwise, we had a great time at the Baccano! gathering. I have not had this much fun at a cosplay gathering in a while. This was a good group of people and we all shared our love for the series. Finally, our last piece of swag was Baccano! napkins from the Funimation booth. The Miria cosplayer grabbed a bunch and gave it out to those of us who were present at the Baccano! gathering.

Many thanks to all of you who were at the Baccano! cosplay gathering. Thanks for the swag and the memories!

We decided to hit the dealer's room one last time. Anime Pavillion had a huge sale on manga - 8 volumes for $60. Anime Pavillion had all of the X/1999 manga I was missing. However, we were on a tight schedule since our ride to the airport had to get us at noon. We did last minute shopping and found a few (not Baccano!) cosplayers, including a gijinka Easter Bunny giving away chocolate.

Honestly, I would have loved to stay at the convention for a little bit longer, but I can understand time constraints. We were able to squeeze in a few more sight seeing of Washington state. For lunch, we met up with Nick, Stacey, Robert, and Mao for family style Chinese cuisine. at Szhewan Chef on the other side of Seattle. I'm not a huge fan of Chinese food, aside from orange chicken, but this restaurant had to be one of the better Chinese eateries I have been to.

I owe a huge thank you to Hector, Claudine, Stan, and Jared for persuading me to pick Sakura Con over AniZona. I really had one of the best times at an anime convention. Though I was slightly under the weather during the convention, Sakura Con was a breath of fresh air and it gave me the break I needed from the California cosplay scene.

We boarded our flight at 4PM out of Seattle airport and touched down in Long Beach just a little bit before 7PM. The first thing I wanted to do when I got home was have a filling dinner with a side of green tea. Sakura Con was unforgettable (in a Nat King Cole kind of way).

Pictures are copyright by Scarlet Rhapsody (formerly Traveling Valentine). If I took your picture, feel free to use it on your site or cosplay gallery. While you're here, do sign the guestbook. This site was brought to you by the font Wicked Queen. Many thanks to Chaz Boston Baden for the image resizing and watermarking program.