12 Days of Anime: #1: My First Anime Con

Every anime fan would kill to go to a con. Or they can join a local anime club. Up to them, really. I don't condone violence, just FYI.  But I'm getting off-track again.  The important part is that everyone wants to go to at least one anime convention in their life.  I had the opportunity to do so over Memorial Day weekend, at FanimeCon 2011, and boy did I ever have fun.

12 Days of Anime: #2: ROAD TRIP!

In May of 2011, 2 of the biggest joys of the year occured, both of them being related to conventions.  Of course, because the local anime club is fairly thrifty, we drove to San Jose.  And road trips ALWAYS have inside stories that are only funny to the people that were on the trip.  The ride to Fanime was no exception, even if there weren't many stories.

12 Days of Anime: #3: Let's Make A Deal

As a broke otaku AND a broke college student, finding good deals on anime and manga is a must.  RightStuf.com usually has awesome sales, but if I'm going to a brick-and-mortar shop like Hastings, where such sales are less frequent, I often resort to the clearance bin for good deals.

The clearance bin is a great way to not only find out-of-print DVDs and manga, but often find them for insanely low prices.  And for someone with very limited income, like myself, this is huge.  Finding a volume of a popular series like Chobits for under $3, for example, is one such bargain available in the clearance section.  Another one is finding DVDs of UFO Princess Valkyrie and All-Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku for $5 total.  Sometimes, there's an upside to a distributor going under.

RightStuf.com is great, because it effectively cuts out the middleman, and ships the stuff directly to me.  The regular prices are lower than I'd find somewhere like Hastings, and shipping is incredibly affordable.  The best part comes when they have sales on certain distributors.  I've saved a lot of money shopping at RightStuf, and gotten a good number of hard-to-find manga and toys from them.

Raiding the clearance bin or aisle is a great way to save money, especially in a hobby where the merch can get rather pricey.  $1-$8 a pop for manga, and shipping as low as $5.  Can't really beat that, honestly.  Being otaku OR college student might be suffering. I happen to be both, and it is suffering.  Finding bargains helps me support the American anime industry without murdering my bank account.  I'm bi-winning, I guess.

12 Days of Anime: #4: Censoring The Censor

Recently, the US federal government drafted a bill entitled the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).  This bill, which was so poorly written that it didn't even have countermeasures written in, threatened to effectively censor the internet.  Now, how does this possibly relate to anime?  Just sit right back, and I'll tell you...

Living outside of Japan, the only way I can watch new anime is to download or stream it from the internet.  SOPA would effectively shut down even legal sites like Crunchyroll and Netflix, since the bill is so vague about streaming.  This would create a domino effect that would hurt the anime industry in Japan, which kills said industry in the West.

So what measures did I take to help fight the bill?  Well, I increased the amount of viewing I do via streaming, in the hopes that someone would notice.  Seems like my efforts helped, since the vote on the bill won't even happen until next year.  Another victory for bronies the internet!  We will fight until the bitter end!  We will not submit!

Censor the internet? Like hell.  And even if it DID pass, people would find a way around it.  You can't underestimate the internet generation.  'sides, it's not like the Prohibition did anything... History buffs, you guys rock.  Ah, now I'm getting off-topic, so that probably means I need to wrap this up.  Sorry that it's thinner than usual.

12 Days of Anime: #5: Calendar Shenanigans

Starting with the 2011 calendar, I have taken to ordering a calendar on J-List every year.  They have so many calendars, it's sometimes hard to choose.Once I finally decide on a calendar, I wait a few weeks until it eventually comes.  It's fun, because every calendar is different, yet one thing is true: the art is beautiful.

12 Days of Anime: #6: Just Whose Line IS It, Anyway?

The other day I was watching reruns of the British/American game show Whose Line Is It Anyway.  Now, before you run me out of here, I want to justify why I brought this up.  There are many games on the show that I really like, and Film, TV, and Theatre Styles is one of them.  One day, while I was watching, this game was played, and anime was one of the styles selected.

12 Days of Anime: #7: Casting Pods

Over the last year, I had an opportunity to participate in a few podcasts.  Of course, this necessitated buying a headset.  Nonetheless, I found myself with a cool opportunity to get myself a little exposure.  It also made me feel like I belonged somewhere.  I also discovered a few other things about myself by podcasting.

12 Days of Anime: #8: Shaken Earth

This next topic is related to anime, and at the same time, it isn't. In mid-March, a very large earthquake struck Japan, throwing the whole country into turmoil. The timing of the disaster wasn't that great, either.


When the earthquake hit, the anime series Puella Magi Madoka Magica had hit its climax plotwise, and everyone was waiting for the next episode to see what would happen. The earthquake delayed the series' epic finale by 2 or 3 weeks.

I was on a vacation in Phoenix, Arizona at the time, and I had just woken up and turned on the news. Once I saw that an earthquake had hit Japan, I switched the hotel room TV to NHK World. The TV stayed on that channel all day, and I rarely left the hotel room

Over the next few months, I consistently made donations to both Red Cross International and, through J-List, Red Cross Japan. Even though it was thousands of miles away from me, I did whatever I could to help a crippled nation.

One thing I've learned in life is that sh*t happens, and that was entirely true on March 11, 2011. Thankfully, Japan rebounded well, and is running just as well as before. But for 3 months, many countries united as one.

12 Days of Anime: #9: Raw Novels

Last year, I read my first raw manga, which was fun.  After that, I thought "Why stop at manga?".  So I went to browse Amazon.com, and found the first Haruhi novel in paperback for, in its raw Japanese format.  I was thrilled, until I came to a realization.

12 Days of Anime: #10: Figures

Figures are a key part of a hardcore otaku's life, and I'm no exception to that. Sadly, I could barely afford a basic figma until recently. This, again, connects to the convention, where I doubled the size of my figure collection in one weekend.  What sorts of figures reside on my shelf? Well, I'll tell you, if you'll just be patient...

12 Days of Anime: #11: The Anime Club Experience

Technically, I joined the local anime club in 2010. But I feel that 2 months isn't enough time to really say anything significant.  In 2011, though, many great things happened in that club.  Of course, some bad things happened, too.  But I'd rather focus on the positive.  Today, I'll recall a few things that happened during the year 2011 in the University of New Mexico Anime Club.

 First and foremost, the highlight of every semester in Anime Club is the convention trip at the end of the term.  Over Memorial Day weekend this year, I was able to attend one of those trips, which I'll cover in more detail in a later 12 Days post.  The club drives to the conventions, which creates its own stories before the con even starts.  Again, that's for another post.

While it is an anime club, it also doubles as the video game club.  There are generally 2-4 TVs, all hooked up to different consoles.  Despite not being the vocal point of the club, this part does attract a good chunk of the members.  I will admit, I find myself wandering over to that room quite often.  After all, the screening isn't always something I like, so there needs to be an alternative activity.

Last, but certainly not least, is the week-to-week activities, such as maid cafe, cosplay day, swap meets, and the Halloween party.  The various events the club puts on add variety to the club, instead of it being monotonous every week.  Additionally, the screening themselves are usually themed, which is nice.  It lets me decide if I like the theme of the anime screening, and if I don't, I go to the video game room.

A year later, I'm really glad I joined the anime club.  It's given me something to do after work on Saturdays. It's also been good for my social life, as I've made several new friends, either in club or at the trip to Denny's after the meetings.  I also gained a place to chill after class during the week.  So, if you're an anime fan who's worried about your social life... join an anime club.

12 Days of Anime: #12: My Addiction to bad anime

Hi. You may remember me as the owner of this near-forgotten blog.  I've been hearing everyone in the blogsphere talking about this 12 Days of Anime thing, and I thought I'd give it a shot.  So, without further ado, I give to you my first post in 12 Days of Anime.

 Long ago... okay, several months ago, my friend Jon from Project Haruhi re-introduced me to a show I had tried to follow as it was airing.  That show was Kampfer, and Jon sold it to me on the basis that it was "so bad, it's good".  Of course, me being as somewhat naive as I am, was completely convinced and proceeded to watch it.  I was instantly hooked not only on Kampfer, but on bad anime in general.

Look at her, jumping like that. She's the male lead.

Following my experience with Kampfer, I would look at the charts for the upcoming anime seasons and pick out the absolute worst anime I could find in addition to the other shows I legitimately want to watch.  Of course, since there are two kinds of bad anime, my results ranged from complete trash, like Maken-ki, to amusingly bad shows like Kore wa Zombie desu ka.  Such is the gamble of my addiction.

 Was it worth it watch such awful anime for my own amusement/addiction?  Well, not every season can be a gem, and the bad anime helps to make some seasons look halfway decent.  Additionally, not every bad anime can be Kampfer.  Some were truly atrocious, some were just as good as Kampfer.  Granted, that's not saying much, but still...