Sunday, July 19, 2009

Sign and Sounds of KL

Well KL is first thing on my mine for makan and sightseeing, after a whole day at Daicon. With a group of friends we decided to go out to explore. KL usually will have traffic jams in many parts of the day, till at night. The night scene in is much better than in Singapore. People could stay long into the nights at coffee shops or cafes to chill out.

Chee Cheong Kai the chinatown of KL. Busting of people late into the night.
I like the buildings of old there. Don't see much in Singapore nowdays as most are renovated, till it looks new. And looks fake to me....

Newer parts of Chee Cheong Kai


The Street




KLCC

Who would forget A&W ?

Window view from the Hotel and the corridor

Friday, July 17, 2009

DaiCon2009 Review

Came back from DaiCon in KL CyberJaya on the 130709. Let me give you a review of this event. Thoughts of DaiCon to be a proper well-organized event are dashed, once I settled in the event hall. I don’t expect much from an event organized by the Uni student body. But at least some level of organization must be there. Some booth are not even ready yet or missing. Arrangements of how the booth requested by the exhibiter is not properly relay by the event planner. That leaves a bad impression fro the exhibiters.

Malaysia sure had good food to eat till we ate to our fill. The variety is a lot. Later at night one of the DaiCon organizer committee guy and 2 of his friends come over from the event hall to fetch us to our Hotel in KL. But it turns out to be a long trip as we are lost in KL traffic for an hour.

Day one DaiCon started off with a decent crowd flow.

Macross collections by the Malaysian Macross Fan Club.

HobbyMate booth displayed tools for modeling. The special price offer was fantastic.

From the displays of pvc figures by The Figure Mall to the dojin artwork by various dojin circles. The commercial and government booths are also present to promote and selling of products. The Malaysian dojin circle impressed me most.






Cosplay was pretty well done. Photographers would swam over to take photos and create temporary chock points that block passageways to other booths. The competition stage event for cosplay was fun and funny too with a dance trooper who entertains the crowds with his Michael Jackson moves.
Crowds form when ever popular cosplayers stops.

Cosplayer for Yui of K-On whose natural voice is like her!

The K-On cosplay team was great! The Mio cosplayer got the most attention as she was in the anime.

Day two, group cosplay was good also. Many did pay attention to the details of the costumes. I did notice for the two days event the popular cosplayers will usually go for private shoots requested by photographers.
A common trend in Singapore also.




The arrival of Minori for the Q&A session on the first day.


Unfortunately this was a closed door event. Blue high wall partitions were place between stage area and the booth section. Many people of course are upset of this decision and some attempted to take photos over the partitions.
An attempted quick shot.


At one time a crowd did form in font of KKNM blocking the main entrance to the stage. The jan-ken-pon game was fun to watch even you are not a participant because it was executed nicely by the cosplayers.
I can say KKNM has the most crowds in DaiCon and also AFA08, their queue was the longestog all.


The last day was the main core event, Chihara Minori mini concert. It was highly anticipated by everybody and the anxious waiting for 3pm to arrive. You could imagine how messy is it as there are people queuing for KKNM and the crowds started to gather at the concert entrance.

I wonder what was on the management heads when they switch off lights of the entire hall at 2pm, leaving every one in darkness. I believe this is done for Minori’s arrival that someone doesn’t care about the rest of the event anymore and just focus on the concert. The lights went off when people are still doing business, photographers taking photos of cosplayers and various activities.
It was so lucky that no one hurt them selves, molested, products stolen in the darkness. I saw groups of dojin booth owners outside the hall expressing displeasure. The lights only come on at about half an hour later.

Before the concert starts, the Japanese hardcore fans who come all the way to see her are well prepare with flags and light sticks. They are kind enough to issue out the limited amount of light sticks to other fans. Kudos to them!

Chihara Minori’s mini concert started with loud Chants of Minori’s name till she arrives on to the stage, singing the first song.

A shocking incident happens right after Minori’s concert ended. Why did it have to happen to both DaiCon and AFA08? Over Zealous fans?
Both events share something similiar, AFA got Mr “Kou Tou” and Diacon got Mr “Bottle Drinker”. This had case uproar and it had alearly spread to Sankakucomplex.com and maybe 2chan. All because of a Malaysian blogger who went up the stage and grap the mineral water bottle that Midori had consume from when she was performing. I saw it in front of my eyes and others did. We are just so shock and shouts ring out all over the place. The point of him taking the bottle to show around was thought as a stunt at first. But later I heard that he drank from the bottle ones he got out of the concert area... OMG

In any other events there are bound to be photographer who will annoy the hell out of people. From types having raging hormones, those who like to stick to people like glue or downright rude and others. DaiCon have its share of them. I would not mention who they are but many people sure had seen them in ‘action’.

This self proclaim professional photographer with a black helmet whom I had taken notice, took many endless photos of KKNM cosplayers. He even squat down to took pics while the girls are standing up, an attempt for an up skirt shot, but friends of KKNM are always on the look out. I had seen him many times over at their booth. He appears to be very interested in one of the cosplayers and try to ask her for email and contact number. Even come close to stalking. Finally he was told off by the staffs of KKNM.


Another who likes to stick to people like glue. Just because he had some friends at the KKNM booth, he keeps on coming for a visit or just stands there. Never thinking that KKNM is doing business and their booth can be very crowded. And he is not small size for your information. Saying of thick faced or blur, he even come along for the KKNM cosplayers private shoot, even he had no rights to join in. No words for me to describe.