Kumoricon Con Report
The  Con: Kumoricon

The Place: Hilton Portland and Executive Tower
 

Kumoricon is the anime convention held in Portland over the Labor Day weekend. It has become a Labor Day tradition. Kumoricon beats a trip to Sprit Mountain to donate to the Native American welfare fund. (at the slots or Blackjack table).

My adventure started on Friday. Unlike last year, I leaned the hard way to pre-register in advance to avoid the five-hour death mach of the unregistered line on Saturday. Still I was annoyed with the wait. There was one glitch; I was issued a child’s badge by mistake. While asking some cosplayers were was the line, they notice and was interested in my large Hello Kitty Plush in the Window. This lead to a decision to  take her in the convention rather than my small kitty. She was a hit with the con goers. Not caring for the typical cosplay pose I had took my pictures with the cosplayers holding my big Hello Kitty.

I arrived to the Hotel in time for the opening ceremony.  This was the first experience with the problems of the hotel: it was stifling in the hallways and because of the fire codes, crowd control polices we a pain, it limited how one can travel. I decided to skip out of the AMV contest. Another problem was the lack of lounge space. I did catch the AMV show afterwards. I was also disappointed in some of the panels. I was not impressed with the cosplay 101 expecting more than a question and answer session or the creations station panels.

I returned to the convention Sunday in time for the ever-stimulating Religion in Anime panel then pretty much mover around form lobby to karaoke lounge. Finally, I went in for Guy’s late night AMV viewing, he puts on a very good show.

 

Monday was pretty much the same. I went to the did your anime jumped the shark panel and roved around with big kitty. There was some confusion concerning the closing ceremony, at first there was long line. I was told I could not get in, there was a cut off. So I spent a few minutes in the view room, when it ended I went out an hour later to find they are letting anybody in.

 

The Good:

The Convention and Religion in Anime panel

 

The Bad:

Cosplay and art panel, content everybody content

 

The Ugly:

The Hotel, break out the Rick Astley we been ricked rolled. Supposedly, we wee told at the  2008 closing ceremony, the hotel would allow for more space. If there was more space, I haven’t seen it. My problems include poor layout, the ballroom with one exit, bathrooms with wall size windows so that the outside watch me pee and the lack of a quiet lounge/hangout space.