Worldcon Dispatch #1

Originally written 8/30/07 1:25pm, transcribed from physical journal 8/31/07 8:03am, 12:37pm, 4:18pm

At Worldcon in Yokohama, finally! solarbird and spazzkat have gone to programming, of which there is lots, though nothing yet I want to hit. So I'm breaking in my new journal with the first of my Worldcon notes.

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Worldcon Dispatch #2

Originally written 8/30/07 5:34pm, transcribed 8/31/07 4:52pm

Well, so far this afternoon has been, in solarbird's words, a "firehose of awesome".

I was lame with getting stickers made to trade at the con--but once I saw Dara and Paul having so much fun with it, I had to go and find the place on the first floor of the convention center where people were getting stickers made right and left. I have now burned through my first sheet and will have to get more!

More on the awesome when I come back to this entry!

Worldcon Dispatch #3

Originally written 8/30/07 10:10pm, transcribed 8/31/07 6:08pm, 9:30pm

So, to continue the day's non-stop firehose of awesome:

It was strange and cool to be standing on a bridge in Yokohama and to see a cityscape that Miyazaki might have drawn--and to hear cicadas chirping all over the place. We heard two different kinds, in fact: one kind that sounds like the crickets spazzkat and I know from Virginia and Kentucky, and the other, Paul told us, sounded a lot more like a classical anime cicada. It's kind of hard to describe its chirp properly, but it was this multi-note, complex thing that solarbird took for a birdcall.

There are a number of cool sculptures scattered around in the immediate area; Dara and Paul have both taken pictures. I liked the abstract red one with separate rotating pieces that sometimes lined up and sometimes did not.

I was delighted to find the first on my search for funky-flavored Kit Kats: orange and chocolate flavor! Survey says: not bad. Dara didn't care for them, though I liked them a little better. This specimen was not as crunchy as an American Kit Kat, with chocolate that was a bit on the bitter/dark side, and subtly flavored orange cream filling.

Back at the con, I totally missed Paul getting flash-mobbed with admiring Japanese fen when they realized he had an iPhone--since it hasn't been released over here yet.

But I did not miss an opportunity to get an autograph from paulcornell2--who was very amiable, especially when I mentioned that I was the one who'd called the two-parter of "Human Nature" and "Family of Blood" riveting--as had been mentioned to him in IM by mizkit! (As per my promise to her in email, that specific hour of today's fun must clearly be devoted to her. :) ) Later, he even found Dara and Paul and me in the con's wi-fi area and introduced us to his wife. :) I am quite thrilled and honored, and happy to have made my best Doctor Who fangirl moment for likely the next five years.

Over in the dealer's room we found yet more unmitigated awesomeness. Highlights include a full working replica of Nausicca's glider (with video of it in action!), cute little articulated, remote-controlled robots, a great booth full of Ultraman stuff, and another place to get sheets of stickers for trading. I turned out to be their first customer, and they were very friendly and eager to please even though communication was spotty between us. They even gave me my first sheet of stickers for free since they came out a little weird, and even nicer, let Dara and Paul print fresh sheets of their own stickers. So now we're all restocked, yay!

The cute little girls in costume came to me for sticker exchange, but sadly, I ran out before the second one got to me--so it's good we've gotten more stickers! The girls were darling in their costumes, though, it must be said. They were a robot maid and a robot fairy, maybe? Anyway, they were the first hall costume we saw.

Dara was quite happy that they had two newsletters going: the official one and a secondary one, which was coming out as soon as they got enough material to fill it. So far the examples we've been seeing are with a bunch of Japanese send-ins, a little English, and several anime-looking pictures.

Opening ceremonies for the con was fun. They got the mayor of Yokohama coming in on a rickshaw (and joking about taking that up more as an energy conservation measure) to tell us how honored he was to host the first Worldcon in Japan--and Asia in general. Very cool. :) Three of the GoHs were Japanese SF luminaries, and I haven't learned their names yet, but the old gentleman in the kimono (who quipped that he liked to wear it at conventions because it made him look cool) was neat. On the US GoH side, we had David Brin and Michael Whelan, both of whom gave their little speeches in Japanese and English both,which was neat. (All of the speeches were translated, in fact, and some of them by a young lady who said she was a voice actress. She did have a lovely voice. :) )

Fast running out of steam at this hour, and fighting down a headache besides; the one drawback to the trip so far is that the humidity is just kicking my ass. But the front desk gave me a pain reliever, so now I'm going to fall into bed and let it do its job.

More awesomeness tomorrow!