AX Tokyo Report

> 1. Name(s)

Todd Whitesel

> 2. Position, Home Department & Division for 2003 and 2004

AX03: Member Services Division Head, Registration Department Head.
AX04: Retired.

> 3. If you attended the AX Tokyo convention, what events did you attend?

Of course I attended, otherwise it is not clear why I would have been
sponsored by the SPJA and therefore need to submit a report.

I went to the dealers room, which was ridiculously small. Not surprising,
really, since you could find plenty of Anime stores in Sunshine City and
the streets between it and the Ikebukuro train station. This dealer's room
was more about promotion than it was about sales.

I also saw the art show, which was also teeny but had very nice art, and
swung through the main programming room every now and then to see what if
anything was going on. Fortunately for me, opening ceremonies started a
little late, because I didn't get my con badge until 12:30 (and that was
a temporary, I finally got the real one 2 hours later).

I watched part of a panel on the 2nd day. Unfortunately I missed the one
panel that was really interesting, probably because I didn't look at the
schedule soon enough.

> What feedback do you have to offer?

Coordination in general was crap, but it was a relaxicon -- weakly attended
in terms of people-hours, so the staff headcount (clearly intended for a
much busier event) was easily adequate to handle any real crises that might
have occurred. However, for much of the weekend it looked like there were
a lot of bored staffers sitting at hallway tables with little to do.

Info Desk was not supported well by the rest of the con. At times I ended
up relaying messages to them myself because nobody set them up with a radio
or house phone.

The translation badges made no sense whatsoever. I and other people assumed
they were supposed to indicate bilingual staffers, but it soon became clear
that they were sticking those badges on any and all english-speakers on
staff. Some of those people got grilled hard in fluent Japanese by random
attendees, and started trying to remove their badges, which of course did
not go over well with the con managers.

> Estimate of total hours attending convention?

Probably 10 or 12, most of it on the first day. Wandering around Tokyo
with other retired AX staffers was much more fun.

> 4. If you worked the AX Tokyo convention, what position/dept/div did you
> staff?

No position, but did occasionally attempt to help friends who were on staff.
For example, newsletter had no net connection the first 1.5 days because it
all depended on one of the Japanese staffers, and while I was able to show
they had IP connectivity, they had no name server configured and without
that it was impossible to do any real work with the outside world. I didn't
want to break anything, so I told them they were pretty much stuck waiting
for their Japanese staffer to finish setting it up.

> What feedback do you have on your staffing experience?

I shouldn't have had one, really. But I'm a sucker for helping staffers
I know who've been left to fend for themselves.

> Estimate of total hours worked at convention?

1-2.

> 5. What other anime/manga related activities did you do while in Japan?
> For example: watched movie in theater, went shopping in Akihabara, etc.
> YES, shopping for anime- and manga-related goods does qualify as a
> business purpose!

Lots of shopping and general wandering around.

Sunshine City Mall, with offices / hotels / Convention Center:
    Toys 'R Us: bought Mermaid Melody toys for a friend in the US.
    Miyazaki Store: bought Jiji bathmat, Totoro coasters and postcards.
    Bookstore: bought an excellent phrasebook "instant japanese" and
	a flip-over alphabet book about the katakana and hiragana.
    Namja Town: finally, a round white cat whose paw is NOT raised
	for good fortune. Otherwise, a vaguely disturbing family
	amusement park, built inside the mall and underground.
    Family Mart: there's something amusing about a 24-hour convenience
	store called "Family Mart" where 1/4 of the magazine section is
	various types of porn. I guess young kids in Japan just learn
	that the stuff has cooties and don't find it interesting until
	they hit puberty. We certainly saw plenty of moms with kids in
	tow visit the stores while we were browsing.

Ikebukuro:
    Sega Building: that is one huge arcade, with confusing escalators.
	It has an entire floor of picture booths, and we never made it
	to the Anime cafe on the top floor (while it was open, anyway).
    Train Station: like Times Square station but much bigger. We heard
	of the fabled vending machines that sell used panties, of course,
	but never saw any. Then again, we didn't exactly go exploring.
	It's easy enough to get lost in there as it is.
    HMV. Ah, the Tower Records of Japan. I didn't realize what it was
	until the night before we left, so I snuck back the next morning
	and bought $160 of techno/trance stuff. Only 2/3 of it was
	european stuff remixed by Japanese DJ's! Still, it was interesting
	to see what sells well in Japan.

Harajuku:
    Togo Shrine: Out of the way, but dignified. Just like history has
	treated the man himself. That dude deserves a lot of respect.
    Tintin Store: I finally settled on the Snowy mug. Inexpensive, and
	I'd actually use it a lot. It took me _forever_ to decide what
	to buy here. They have animated Tintin DVD's!!!
    Cowpoo: how can you not like a clothing store named "Cowpoo" ??
    Kiddy Land: I succumbed to the evil that is Capsule Machines here.
	It is amazing how popular Neon Genesis Evangelion still is, but
	then again -- "oh god I'm in heaven, teenagers in tight suits".
	Anyway, 200 Yen got me a Misato figure. 200 more got me an Asuka
	bathing suit figure -- woo! 200 more got me a second Misato. I
	spent the rest of the week looking for a Rei bathing suit figure,
	only to find that they were all sold out, even in the stores that
	sell you capsule figures for 2-3 times the capsule machine price.
	I finally found one in an Akihabara consignment store for 490 Yen.
	(The person who took me there succumbed to a total binge of scantily
	clad female figures from other series.) Kiddy Land is also the place
	where I bought my little boiled-egg Nyanko's, who look very cute in
	their little basket. I find the whole cat-in-food-item-stuffed-toy
	concept disturbing, but they are so insanely cute that I finally
	had to get one. I still think they look more like steamed pork buns.
    Condomania: the shop was so small, we had to wait to get in. So we left.
    Goth Lolita shop: aside from the weak selection of rock T-shirts, and
	scarves with deliberately offensive stuff on them like skulls with
	"f**k f**k f**k" (censoring mine) written all around them, this
	store featured a Wall of Offensive Accessories. Black nazi armband
	... uh huh ... Black nazi armband with red paint trying to look
	like blood stains... whatever. This was also one of those stores
	that had signs all over warning you not to take pictures or else.

Shinjuku:
    I might have bought something in the red light district. Maybe.
    We were mainly looking for a late-night dessert restaurant when we
    went here, but there weren't any good options, so we settled for a
    quick narrated tour and went back to Ikebukuro for the Denny's.

Akihabara:
    100 Yen store: not only are there 100 Yen stores, the department
	stores have 100 Yen departments marked off where everything
	inside that square is a buck. I got some cute plastic shelves
	that fasten to the walls with pushpins, and a few other random
	house knickknacks. I'm using some of them already.
    Electronics: I wasn't really interested in these, because I didn't
	want to buy stuff that might not survive the trip and would be
	hell to exchange. But I did find the Plat'Home store, a Linux
	and BSD friendly computer store, at which I bought a BSD Daemon
	T-Shirt, which of course is almost too small for me to wear --
	the biggest they had was XL, and for us that is like an L shirt.
    Figurines: There were a couple stores here that had complete floors
	dedicated to models and figurines of mecha and anime characters,
	and life-size statues of popular figures in the front window.
	I don't normally go for this stuff because it is pure display,
	but it is clear that some people put so much care and detail into
	these figures, it was hard to resist the urge to bring some back.
	I settled on the capsule machine Evangelion girls, which only ran
	me about 1100 Yen total. If I'd gotten that rare dirty pair set,
	it would have run me a LOT more.
    Porn hidden in plain sight: many shops had stairways visible from the
	street with signs on the sides of the steps like "ADULT DVD". It
	is quite amazing just how ubiquitously available porn is in Japan.


Notable Food!

Sunshine City:
    Big Chef: steaks, yum. The place was decorated in a sort of submarine
	theme, complete with classic Jacques Cousteau diving helmet in the
	ceiling with a light bulb inside it. I feel sorry for the waitress,
	it took us forever to figure out how to ask for separate checks.
    Lotteria: Liked the teriyaki burger much better than I expected.
	ALL WESTERN FOOD IN JAPAN HAS TOO DAMN MUCH MAYONNAISE!
	Excellent fries and pepsi syrup ratio, though.
    Family Mart: the one closest to the mall had these really cool rolls
	of cookies that were like Ritz Crackers with Oreo Cookie filling
	in them. But none of the other Family Mart's had them. (I checked.)
    McDonald's: I spent all week trying to figure out how to correctly
	say "no mustard, no ketchup, no mayonnaise" in Japanese so I could
	get an edible cheeseburger. Eventually I managed to write something
	viable down on paper, but the guy at the counter still had to check
	with his manager for approval. Later on I found out that asking for
	special orders is somewhat offensive in Japan because the cooks put
	so much care and love into their creations, but apparently their
	ethic of serving the customer wins out. So I was able to ride the
	bus back to the airport munching happily on a Double Cheeseburger,
	fries, and vanilla shake (Japan McD's, like the Italy McD's, don't
	offer Big Macs or Quarter Pounders or sundaes).

Ikebukuro:
    Takase Bakery: Damn Fine whipped cream eclairs. I kept sneaking back.
    Milky Way: simply the coolest dessert place I've ever been to. Very
	blue and white, and glowy stars everywhere -- even little star
	shaped cookies in the ice cream. The chocolate cake was excellent.
    Denny's: "always open", and the inside feels like a western Denny's,
	but the menu is totally unrecognizable.
    TGIF: not called that, but owned by them. It had a similar party-time
	atmosphere, but the food was all Japan. I wanted to try some sake,
	so I bought a bottle of the mid-grade stuff. Someone told me it 
	would taste like watered-down vodka, and it did. I took the bottle
	home as a souvenir, rinsing it out and filling it with water.
	The Narita airport staff totally ignored it in my carry-on luggage,
	even though its bottle shape stood out like a sore thumb on the
	X-ray screen. They were more interested in giving my CostCo rolling
	suitcase a full cavity search.

Harajuku:
    Shakey's Pizza Buffet: yummy flavored sodas, and the pizza...
	Scrambled eggs & bacon - my favorite.
	Custard eclair & pineapple - okay.
	Shredded something and corn bits - ehh.
	Curry - pass.
	Squid ink and tentacles - Definitely Not.
	They also had a small salad bar and pasta dishes as filler.
	An amusing episode occurred the first time I filled my plate,
	because the pizza slice fell out of the tongs and unbalanced
	my plate (which already had lots of pasta on it), dumping the
	whole pile onto one of the other pizzas in the buffet! I made
	a big show of being the embarrassed gaijin trying to clean his
	own mess, and the cooks and other patrons in line with me all
	laughed like crazy as if this was some corny scene from a
	reality show. Which was good -- I was half expecting to get
	some manager running out to make sure the health code was
	enforced or something.
    Banana Crepe: Damn, asian people like their bananas RIPE. yuck.

Shinjuku:
    I saw more McDonald's in the red light district than I had seen
	in the rest of Tokyo. I guess they need the calories...
	When we got to the other side -- where the police barricade
	was -- and our guide said "don't cross this street unless
	you are REALLY horny" ... that was when I really knew I was
	in a foreign culture.

Akihabara:
    Vending Machines: there was a huge row of vending machines outside
	the train station, and I had all kinds of drinks while we were
	waiting for some people to finish wandering through the bakery
	of the department store. People may warn you that Japan has a
	lot of vending machines (and someone did warn me during the flight
	out), but you won't really believe them until after you've been
	there a while. I lasted about a day and a half before I just had
	to announce, "my GOD there are vending machines EVERYWHERE here!"

> 6. Any additional comments or suggestions you would like to make.

nah. I think I've said enough. ^_^