Day 2.
I woke up at 4am because it was hot.
I know jet lag has to do something with it too.
Anyway, I worked on my video game files because I couldn't go back to sleep.
This trip is slowing me down for sure.
I left to go to Tokyo Anime Fair (TAF) at around 8:30.
Just in time to ride the sushi zume train.
Sushi zume is like sushi squeezed inside a container.
Like...sardines?
This was my first time riding the train where it was so crowded that station attendants need to push the people in to close the door.
At one point, there were three attendants working on one section.
It was a great photo op, but I thought it would be rude so I didn't take the picture.
Sushi zume was not fun.
I was crammed up against a guy's back that my neck got cramped.
I wondered if my insurance will pay for my chiropractic bills.
Luckily, the sushi zume lasted only from Ikebukuro to Shibuya.
After that it was a pleasant ride to Kokusai Tenjiba, where Big Sight is.
At the ticket registration I saw John and Masumi from CPM.
They were kind enough to let me cut in at the front of the line.
I also saw the Bandai Entertainment group: Iyadomi-san, Taku, and Lord R.
Then I went inside.
Now is a good time to show my pictures.
This is Big Sight from a distance.
A sign indicating TAF.
The girl is not me. It was a random girl who just happened to step in front of the sign when I was taking the picture.
I thought it was funny with all the round balloons.
When I went to dinner with company G, I promised them that I would advertise their newest show, Gurren Lagann.
This is Aniplex's section for Gurren.
This is the GAINAX booth.
They served free drinks here.
Cosplayers at the KONAMI booth.
At the BROCCOLI booth, they were promoting the Aquarian Age arcade game.
The black part on the bottom has sensors that can read the special Aquarian Age cards.
It was quite impressive.
Oops, I forgot what booth this was.
It's a Detective Conan ship.
I don't know what show this is from, but the outfit is cute.
She kept handing me Karas cards.
I only know about this show because of the Nissin cup o' noodles commercial.
Classic anime, although I haven't seen one episode.
But I do know that the father (the eye) has a high voice.
My friend used to always imitate his voice.
If you played a game and scored well, you get one of these prizes.
I really wanted the t-shirt and I tried over 5 times.
I only got a poster, and I misplaced it somewhere.
This is the game. A baseball game using a bat with a spring.
You pull the bat back and hit the ball.
You need two homeruns to get a t-shirt.
Don't know what it is, but it's cute.
The tanks are uber cute.
A plushie of the tank (baby version).
I haven't seen much of Lupin III, but I thought the KEEP OUT tapes were nice.
This is the MADHOUSE booth.
I met my friend Yoshi here.
I also saw Maruyama-san. I always have to take off my glasses when I greet him because he knows me more without my glasses.
The Princess Resurrection anime stand.
They were giving out coasters, which I will send to my editor at Company DR.
I just took this picture because he looks like a friend of mine.
The Pierrot booth.
NARUTO, BLEACH, and BLUE DRAGON were what they pushed.
Actually, these figures were creepy.
They had a special section of robot anime.
I went around and realized I only saw about four robot anime.
Doraemon, Evangelion, Gunbuster (work related), and Code Geass.
They had it divided into the period they were released.
This is 1980s.
They had a history of robots and other information.
I would like to ride a robot that is a big version of me too.
I didn't know Shana likes Melon bread.
Melon bread reminds me more of Di Gi Charat's character MinaTaku.
Tezuka booth.
The display of his manga was amazing.
The tiny manga that is really hard to read.
I like the red one the most, but the blue one was appealing to me to take a picture.
Keroro was playing with someone else.
I got to go to the Romeo x Juliet production announcement.
The president was saying that he wanted to aim for Hollywood, so he chose the star-crossed lovers for this project.
From the left:
The director, the voice actor for Romeo, the voice actor for Juliet, and president of GONZO.
I didn't know Mizushima-san was doing Romeo.
I met him at Fanime last year.
I stayed at TAF from beginning to end.
It was very tiring.
I met up with Yuka-san, a character designer.
She worked on Da Capo and other projects.
I met her at AX last year.
We then met up with Y-san from Company B and went to Shinjuku for dinner.
It's a nice restaurant...the customer base was old and we were the youngest ones there.
And we all look at least 5 years younger than our actual age, too.
This was in the front.
We sat at the bar.
I've never sat at the bar so huge that someone can sleep on it.
They have fresh vegetables and seafood sitting in front of the chefs.
Oh, it was sooooo good I can't even describe it.
It was a really long day, but I had a lot of fun.
