One Japanologist's blog: Shiawasecon

Shiawasecon was a really small convention (it was more like an anime meeting), that was held yesterday (18th of August) in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. It was organized by the newly formed anime club in Plovdiv, called Hiroyuki. I don't know why but there were about 30 people there, which is very weak attendance. The whole thing started at about 10:30 and ended at about 13:00, so as you can see it was very short.

The event was mainly about cosplay and I was really surprised to see only 4 cosplayers, who participated and I am very sorry to say that only two of them had made costumes that looked like the characters. So the cosplayers were Umanosuke from Samurai Champloo, Tony Tony Chopper from One Piece, Misa from Death Note and a random cat character, who introduced herself as Misa's cat. Umanosuke's costume was very nice and he really looked like the character, but I have seen this costume and his performance at previous events, so I wasn't impressed. Chopper was cosplayed by a girl and was really cute. Misa hadn't put any effort in her costume and here hair was brown and wavy and it actually should have blond and straight. There was also a girl in a maid costume and a girl in a lolita costume, who were selling the tickets for the event and their dresses were gorgeous and looked really great on them. Umanosuke and Chopper won the prices for best costume and best performance. They both won free tickets for the two days of Aniventure, Umanosuke won a Death Note DVD box set and Chopper won a Soul Eater DVD box set, which my opinion are really nice awards.

After the cosplay there was a quiz and Vasilena (the friend that came with me) and I won prices. I won a creepy dog-like plush key chain and she won an Antistar skull badge. There was also a short discussion about Bulgarian cosplay.

I expected a lot more from this event - more cosplayers, more audience and I expected it to be longer and more entertaining, so I feel a little disappointed. I think that club Hiroyuki had made everything they could to make the event happen and to make it enjoyable, but maybe they didn't advertise enough and that is the reason why there was such weak attendance.