Belle Shaped Anomaly: My Animangaki Experience Story

Foreword:
Currently listening to Mako's Our Stroy. *download available here, nice song, try it out!* (Or listen on YouTube)

"This is our story, that we can take back someday."

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Animangaki is an ACG (anime, game manga) event held around August annually in Malaysia. (Normally at Sunway Pyramid Convention Centre, Subang). This year it was held from the 9th to the 12th of August. The name Animangaki derives from "Anime + Manga + Gaki (Gaki is Japanese, meaning "brats" in a fun way in this case). It is one of the major ACG events we have in Malaysia (besides Comic Fiesta, held annually in December, at KLCC, also a larger scale event).

~Pre-event:

So weeks before the event I signed up to be a volunteer for the event, half-heartedly to be exact, and feeling sorry for the people in charge because they might be treating this volunteer thingy seriously. Because as typical Asian parents are, they don't really support me attending anime events as as normal people thinks that it's not mature (this is a personal topic for everyone depending on how anime affects their lives, however that is another story). So I wasn't sure if I could attend the actual event but I'm still curious and wanted to book my spot and give it a shot, see what my fate brings me on the actual day of the event.

So as normal events, there is a group for us volunteers on where we do discussions. There were two volunteer meet-ups for briefings and sadly it's not convenient-wise for me so I couldn't attend. However the person in charge of us volunteers is quite serious about his job and even asked us to confirm our attendance and shifts. This got me even motivated to actually go for it.

A cute picture we had in the Volunteer group, liked how they associate the lion head of Sunway onto the Japanese palace (?). >.< Disclaimer: Picture belongs to Animangaki.

~Day 2 of the event:

I can't attend Day 1 so I volunteered for the shift on Day 2.

And I was late because I had a run on the morning on the same day, and one of my friend had won a medal and we wanted to stay for the lucky draw so I ended up going home later than expected. I dropped a message to one of the person in charge of us volunteers, July-senpai, a day before the event (Day 0) and what I was happy about his response was that even if he was busy with preparations, he replied me stating that he is busy at the moment, and somewhere after midnight he actually replied my questions even though he should've been tired from all the work.

I reached Sunway at 2pm++. It was crazy, just up the escalator to the convention center, there is already a bunch of (I'm not sure crew or volunteers) super hyper people welcoming people, cheering and shouting on. Really hypes us up! >.< And I went to AMG HQ booth, the person over there gave me my tag and told me to wait around for the boss to assign me to a post. (Ze boss = ze head of us volunteers/ representative from the committee) It didn't take long enough for me to be assigned to the entrance of the exhibition/stage where us volunteers are to check that visitors have their tickets before entering the hall. (And ze boss turned up to be cosplaying, speaking of indulging into the event, thumbs up! And he really was kind and generous enough to explain the job/post to me although he might've already done that a lot of times these two days.)

And I turned up saying a lot of repetitive stuff like "show your tickets please", "thank you", "welcome" and stuff or the sorts. Luckily my volunteer-nakamas (companion/ partners xD) are very friendly and the job would be tiring without them. Occasionally when no one is passing through we would chat get to know each other. Or we were watching the Touhou matsuri opposite our post, or look into the hall, at a large Miku stuffed toy sitting on a chair. :3

Some lovely, friendly, fun, interesting people I get to know on my post, turned out I was the youngest lol.

The hall is open to public after all the stage interviews/ performances/ competitions are over, however it was slightly delayed due to some minor issues. Around that time us volunteers at that post was so eager to be free to rest/ do whatever we want. And ze boss just appears and stood there with us for the last few minutes, and in the end we all counted down to open the hall to public together, shouting out the count down! Tons of fun!

So after that me and some people I just got to know walked around the hall, looking at merchandises, watching the prize giving ceremony and taking pictures with some pretty cosplayers. I also found out that I wasn't like before, not really getting hyped or eager about buying stuff, probably because I already have a heap of stuff in my room not knowing what to do with them, also probably because I didn't budget myself before the event hahah.

However thanks to Karen, a girl on the same post, I finally have the mood to take some pictures with some cosplayers. >.<

One of the competitors cosplaying as Meiko (if not mistaken), however her suit is striking and reminds me of Rurouni Kenshin.

I am always happy when I see a Tales of the Abyss cosplayer. I love Tear Grants and I think ToA should have a higher popularity.

Still, I'm quite a Square Enix fan, and will get super hyped up when I see people cosplaying characters I know/ adore/ love from Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts. (Sadly I didn't see Aya Brea, but I saw a Sora and Roxas while dutying, was quite happy although I didn't get to take photos with them.)

So after having some stroll around the place, we went back to our volunteer's area, where some volunteers which are still hanging around are listening to July-senpai talking about the event, and we joined in. July-senpai is very good at talking in public (which in this case, us volunteers), adding a little humor while talking about some points. He told us about some incidents that happen in the event and how some people responded to it, and how we should react as a team. He also made some reference to some scenarios on Comic Fiesta (the even major ACG event in my country) and how they dealt with stuff. What I like about him is there is this certain aura (or vibe) that he has that makes us listen and not being shy to speak up and interact, knowing how to lead us. At the same time, he also says some good stuff about our boss which we all couldn't agree more, our boss is very kind, helpful, friendly and which I find as a good inspiration when working as a team.

Ze boss, Zheng Yaw. We all volunteers love him so much as well as July-senpai (which I forgot to selfie with).

A group photo of volunteers who are still present at that time (after end of event). (And yes, we are allowed to cosplay when volunteering) However I couldn't join them for dinner as I had to leave early. But still they are all very friendly and gave me some wonderful memories for the day. Photo credits to Nurul Najwa.

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~Side notes:

-Quite sad I couldn't come for Day 1 as Animenz (a famous YouTube anime pianist) only came one Day 1 :'(

-The giant Miku stuffed toy I was staring at while dutying turned out to be a prize for the cosplay contest. Emcee A was announcing the winner while Emcee B was holding it, walking down the stage towards the winner. And Emcee A went: "Where are you going? Why are you doing with the Miku?" *turns to the crowd* "He wants to steal the Miku!!" xDDD

-There were some people who waved at me while I was dutying, however I really don't know who you guys are because you guys are cosplaying!!! Really sorry I am very bad with faces.... (however one of them turned up to recognize me via Facebook picture and which I've never met before) :P I only managed to recognized one friend who was not cosplaying.

-Maybe I should've made the effort to arrive early, free lunch for volunteers....

-A big shoutout to the voulunteers and crew who made this event a successful one! And to July-senpai and ze boss Zheng Yaw for all the hardwork and being a very good inspirations to me that I would not want to forget.