Japan Expo 2014

Bonjour everyone, Kahotan here! (@gsc_kahotan)

I safely returned to Japan after my trip to France early this morning! I managed to sleep rather soundly on the plane home too, so I’m not even feeling the jet lag!

But anyway, as I’m sure most of you already know that I had been in France since the 30th June! The reason for that was of course that I was attending…

Japan Expo!!!

More Info About Japan Expo:
http://event.goodsmile.info/event/japan-expo-2014/?lo=en-us

With that said, today my blog is going to be a report of the event! (｀・ω・´)

– The Japan Expo Event Hall –

I also made a number of tweets from France which you can read up on from my Twitter! Be sure to check there too! ♪

Let’s get started! ヽ(*・ω・)人(・ω・*)ノ

 
– Event Hall Entrance –

There were two different entrances to the event hall, but this was the one that I always used! If you look hard you can see an advert for ‘All You Need Is Kill’! ♪

– GSC Booth #1 –

The display area featured a lovely open glass design! You can see exactly what was on display over on my Twitter account!

☆ Kahotan Twitter: https://twitter.com/gsc_kahotan/media

Some of the series even had full dioramas made to display with them!

– GSC Booth #2 –

We even had a few colored prototypes brought through from Japan to show everyone in France! figma Racing Miku 2013 EV MIRAI ver., Nendoroid Saori Takebe and Nendoroid Yukari Yakumo!

A special Nendoroid explanation panel!! (｡・д・｡)

There was also one for the figma series beside it! These were made to explain what the Nendoroid and figma series are all about!

The area next to this was used to show a few videos, including some of the work done in the factories in China as well as Good Smiles TV adverts. The video of the factories painting the gradient onto some hair parts seemed to really attract peoples attention and got some great reactions as well!

– GSC Booth #3 –

The items on sale were on display on the side with a busy pathway beside it! Each of the products had a lovely background to match it, showing off Maritan’s lovely artistic taste! ☆

Maritan is the kind and charming figure lover who is in charge of advertising, PR and the blog for Good Smile France! ♡

☆ Maritan’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/gsc_maritan

The photo above was taken from Maritan’s Twitter account! She was being held up by the members of Nudist Beach!! I’m actually quite jealous…!

– GSC Booth: Sales Counter –

This photo was taken on the first day of the event! There was a queue just seconds after the event started!

We also had an adorable Kongou-chan handing out sales lists…!! (*´Д`)

Here is a look at what was up for sale!

After just the first day around half of the items were already sold out!!

A big thank you to everyone who was at the event!!!

The arrow here shows the end of the sales queue! (ﾟＡﾟ;)

According to our French staff members, people don’t get to ‘line-up’ very often in France, so some of those lining up actually found it a rather exiting venture!

– Hands-on Time! –

A section of the GSC booth was used for a special ‘Hands-on’ time, where guests could come by and ask questions! On the other hand, we also got to ask them where they bought figures, what anime series they were enjoying at the moment and all sorts of other things! It was a very enjoyable corner! (｡･ω･)ﾉﾞ

One guest really loved figmas but couldn’t quite get the posing right, so Akane Eiseihei gave a posing lecture for everyone!

We were even asked for our autographs, which let to a rather spur-of-the-moment autograph session too!

Akane Eiseihei had an awesome looking signature.. whereas I just wrote my name in Katakana… ;_;

– Japan Expo Outfits –

The staff were wearing matching happi coats!

The French team prepared these lovely outfits for the event! ♡

This photo was taken on the last day, so it was rather creased… but that just show how much it was used and loved! (；´∀｀)

– Together with the France Team –

Everyone was so kind! Such a lovely group of people!

They were happy to help me out with a smile even though my terrible French and English…

A huge thank you to all of you!!

Let me take a look around the rest of the event too! ♪

– FREE HUGS! –

People all over the event held ‘FREE HUGS’ signs! There were people being hugged all over the event!! Even I was hugged while being told something like ‘Did you come from Japan? Have fun!” in French! ( -ﾉｪ-)

– Itasha! –

There were even some itasha on display at the event! It seems like KanColle is even popular in France! Although the admirals of Japan did mention that the game is rather difficult if you don’t understand Japanese – there were many that did speak it very well though!

There were even some personal itasha out in the parking lot, which made me realise it doesn’t matter what country you’re in! Fans will want to decorate things with the things they love! ☆

– Gaming Tournaments! –

There were booths with gaming tournaments going on which were surrounded with fans! Just watching the heated battles was really fun! ♪

– Dance Together! –

Everyone was watching a dancing game and dancing together in this corner of the event! It was a popular corner throughout the event! （*´▽｀*）

– League of Legends!! –

This was without a doubt the booth that had the most shouts and excitement at the event! The popular PC game, ‘League of Legends’! Apparently the most played game worldwide at the moment!

There were also lots of cosplayers from the game! ♪

Speaking of cosplay…. I would now like to take a look through some of my personal favorite cosplayers at the event!

“Frozen” – Anna / Elsa

“Attack on Titan” – Hanji / Levi

“ONE PIECE” – Borsalino

“ONE PIECE” – Chopper / Nico Robin

“Card Captor Sakura” – Sakura Kinomoto

 

 
“Card Captor Sakura” – Sakura Kinomoto 

 
“Pokemon” – Misty / Ashe
 

 
“Haikyuu!!”

Kei Tsukishima / Ryunosuke Tanaka / Tobio Kageyama / Shoyo Hinata / Koshi Sugawara

“Alice in Wonderland” – Mad Hatter / Alice

“Saint Oniisan” – Jesus / Buddha

Aaahhh… （*´▽｀*）

 
I’m normally too shy to ask permission to take any photos, but I decided that I may never get the chance to meet the cosplayers of Japan Expo again, so I mustered my confidence, brought Akane Eiseihei with me, and took as many photos as I could!

I often get messages on Twitter and via email from other countries telling me how they love anime and figures… but to actually go somewhere and experience that love for myself was an incredible experience. I realize how much people truly do love anime, games and figures after seeing how much fans enjoy these events first hand.

I also really enjoyed answering everyones questions at the booth, and loved seeing all the photos that were shown to me! A lot of fans also told me their favorite animes and characters, and even through the language barrier I was able to communicate with them through their love of the series!

It didn’t matter that I didn’t understand French when someone came to the booth wearing a Ren-chan shirt and shouted out “Nyanpasu!”. I was happy to respond with my very own “Nyanpasu”! I also remember someone telling me an anime they like just by humming the theme song – even without knowing English or French, I was able to have a great time thanks to shared love in hobbies!

It also made me realize how I’ve managed to connect with people all over the world through my blog and Twitter. It was a truly magical trip to France! (｀・ω・´)

I’ll be sure to continue to inform everyone both in Japan and overseas about all things Good Smile!!

ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･ﾟﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･ﾟ ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･ﾟﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･ﾟ ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･

／Kahotan’s Inner Voice＼

∧＿∧
（　・∀・） .。０ (You can find more photos and little stories…)
oノ∧つ⊂）
(　（　・∀・）.。０ (…over on my Twitter!)
∪（　∪ ∪
と＿_）__）

Tomorrow will be another blog by Chanshuu-senpai while I recover from my journey! It’s finally time for ‘Wo’ to surface…!

See you all again soon!!!

Planning Team / Kahotan
Twitter ID: gsc_kahotan