Anime Festival Asia 2014 !!

Hey-hie mighty-o!!
That was just a random thing that came up while thinking of how to start this post. Wow look at the date of the last post.. It has been close to 2 months since I last blogged.. That isn't too long I guess~ At one point I thought I haven't blogged for months so yeah~

Back to the main title! I just came back from Singapore last week! Why was I in Singapore? Why of course to attend Anime Festival Asia (AFA) 2014! It's officially a 3 full day event now~ And soon it's gonna be a week long event mwahahaha! Iit used to be a 3 nights 2 days event with concerts on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights and exhibitions on Saturday and Sunday from 9am to 9pm. I skipped Friday thinking I was gonna be super bored there as I was pretty much all on my own this year and went for Saturday and Sunday only. Which of course I proved myself quite right. I flew to Singapore early Saturday morning and came back Monday night. The original plan to fly early morning is to skip trying hard to wake up and get out of bed while in Singapore and to listen in on Starchild's main stage event. Which I skipped cause I wasn't that interested in the other main stage events.

Now for the lengthier, detailed day-by-day part. Excuse the English.

[Saturday - 6/12/2014]

Pretty much skipped sleeping as my OCD kicked in and I was afraid of missing my flight. I woke pretty early (considering I only wake after noon time on a daily basis) on Friday... So I was pretty much sleepless for over 36 hours yey! Reached the airport, ate breakfast, checked-in and went on observing people at the departure hall. Didn't realize my FB status update had a typo due to lack of sleep... Instead of "Up up and away!" I typed "Off off and away!" and thought it was normal.......... 6.55am flight... Much yolo-ness in it. I picked the airport closer to home so I won't end up chasing the airplane. While waiting to board the plane, I heard someone playing the Minions' Christmas song video behind me. I get super excited whenever I spot Japanese around me and thought the girls in front of me were heading to AFA too but they weren't. Oh well~

After an hour's flight, around 8.15am, I finally reached Singapore! ♥ The plane somehow "parked" super far that we had to get on the shuttle bus to get to the airport building. It was awesome ♥ and suddenly dundundunnnnn why this? Tthe moment I switched on my phone, the horror of the year 2014 (in my life) happened.... NO ROAMING! Yep. For the first time ever I'm in Singapore with a phone that does not have roaming and best part? It's also the first time I'm traveling alone. And if that's not enough, the wifi at the airport doesn't work. I know it sounds a little exaggerated since it's only no roaming no wifi and stuff but it wasn't at all. Okay fine maybe a little. It wouldn't be a problem at all if I was traveling with friends. It wasn't that big a problem too even when I was traveling alone. But it is a HUGE problem when you're not sure if your friend is at the airport to pick you up and you have no way of contacting him to know. A friend sorta offered to pick me up at the airport but without roaming or working wifi, I couldn't contact him to find out. Maybe due to lack of sleep, it didn't cross my mind that I could just use the public phone (if any) or borrow someone's phone to make the call. "What if he's already at the airport waiting somewhere?!" is the only thing that came up in my mind. (Roaming thingy worked last year.. Then I realized I changed my mobile plan thingy just months ago....) Got on the MRT and off to Chinatown I go. For the third consecutive year, I chose to stay at 5footwayinn @ Chinatown for my AFA trip. It wasn't until I reached the inn, got connected to the wifi that I confirmed my friend did not go to the airport to pick me up. Phew~ Got myself checked-in, ditched the luggage, ate my second breakfast (since it was still available) and off to the venue, Suntec City I go~

There were no maid / butler cafes this year~ Moar space for other stuff *cough* Bought my ticket and in I go~ Walked around blindly since I'm not sure where to start. As usual there's Odex, Muse, AFA Shop, Culture Japan, Good Smile Company, Animax booths. I spotted the Asia Anisong-Singer Audition booth next to Starchild's booth and watched as people go up the stage taking turns to sing~ One of the main reasons I decided to step into the exhibition hall this year was to get Tsuda Kenjiro & Horie Yui's autograph. And to my expectation :

 

QAQ Did you hear the sound of my heart shattering into pieces?! Well yep.... I'm sure it's fully given out thanks to Horie Yui's appearance... My TsudaKen autograph T_T The other reason I decided to enter the exhibition hall was the Unlight Card Game booth by Gloczus which wasn't actually a whole booth thingy but just a corner of the table with characters with item codes on them being given away. Oh and a Evarist standee. The rest of the booth was mainly promoting Hakuoki otome game. I spotted one of the Unlight players cosplaying as one of the Unlight character but I didn't greet her and just walked off. *shy* 

The nico nico Kunikaigi area was huge and awesome! owo As much as I'd like to try the karaoke, I dare not to cause like... It's live and I can barely remember half a song |D I wish I joined the dance area activities... Looked fun qwq There were 3 karaoke booths. The AAA booth, nico nico karaoke booth and the one by brother. I wandered around listening to people singing karaoke for like 80% of the time I spent in the hall. Yep I was that bored. OO-Kun balloons (Animax mascot) were given out at Animax's booth from time to time and being the "I want all freebies" person that I am, I went to queue for it ///w/// Went out for lunch at the food court near the fountain area. I tried to order Japanese Curry Rice like I did last year and got the same reply of "oh curry no more" like last year...... Fine. I end up eating the same thing I did last year with an extra Chawanmushi. Yey! Cheap and pretty good chawanmushi~ Shared tables with 2 girls that came for AFA too. They were shy to ask where I got my OO-Kun balloon~ Darren spotted me when I was eating. We end up ordering from the same food stall. He came a day earlier for the concert and what not. 

Went back into the hall after lunch while still thinking whether or not to get angela's autograph again since I already got it last year.  Ended up not getting it since I already got it~ And it's collecting dust somewhere *cough* Around 4.45pm, I sat at one of the karaoke booth (brother) and started dozing off........ I was fishing (in chinese, expression of dozing off) there... When Lost Ash was about to come on stage again, I quickly dashed off. I was quite out of place so hehehehehehe.. I wonder what I did for the rest of the hours... Before the concert started, I was right outside the concert halls leeching wifi and bumped into Aiko! We were both like "wow we finally meet" We were both thinking when will we bump into each other. Greeted Mayu and confirmed my Monday McD lunch mwahahaha~ They went into the concert hall leaving me behind soon.

By 8pm the exhibition hall was pretty empty but the AAA booth was still on! I went to take a seat while deciding whether or not to get on the mini stage to sing. The emcee was like telling everyone "Come on stage and sing whatever song you want. It's free for all to sing. You already came in the hall so why not!" In which I finally gave in and did~ I came in and bought nothing, did nothing much so hey why not~ Once in a life time, yolo moment~ Chose moment by Vivian or Kazuma cause I'm pretty sure I can't sing Rolling Star by YUI well enough in that condition... I was shaking and shivering as expected but I finished the song nonetheless~ Thank you random event go-er stranger that sorta encouraged me and gave me a confidence boost :') At some point during the middle of the day, the emcee of the AAA booth sang "What does the Fox say?" on the mini stage. Like wow. It was nice! Before I got on stage, I had to run to one of the booths in the corner to get water. Haven't had water in HOURS. My singing probably sucked even more thanks to not drinking water *cough*excuses*cough* After singing, I went to Starchild's booth to ask about a lucky draw they were having. I asked the quite-kakkoi-looking staff since he's the nearest staff and he went "aa boku wa shiranai" and walked off cause he couldn't understand what I asked... Sorry dude I couldn't ask it in Japanese... It was cute and funny how he just moved away and let the other female staff deal with me~

Before I left the exhibition area, I went to buy the super cheap, price-lowered curry rice from Seika Cafe! It was sold at $8 during the day and by 8.45pm it was sold at $2 each!!! Regretted so much for only buying two! I spotted some Sherlock calenders being sold at one of the doujin booths! Too bad it was a little too expensive for me... Stood somewhere near the exit to have my curry rice dinner while listening to people singing FLOW's GO at the brother booth~ I left the hall just as it was about to close for the night. While making my way to the MRT station, I found a new KOI Cafe branch! I have no idea what I was thinking when I decided to get the KOI Cafe membership card thingy when I only go Singapore like once a year....... $5 gone. Finally got to try Black Tea Machiatto tho. It was as heavenly as Green Tea Machiatto~~ Went back to my inn at Chinatown only to see Xen's message saying I could just hang out at their hotel while waiting for supper...... Which was way back near Suntec...... Ouch. My kokoro is brokoro- wait wrong. My legs are brokoro. Ah much better. I could've... Saved my $5 qwq Oh well... What's done is done...

I had to ditch my other curry rice and my KOI BTM at the lobby while I moved my luggage to my room. While walking up to my room, I was praying the staff would lead me to the attic room and voila~ Attic room again it is~ I stayed in the exact same room 2 years ago during my first stay here~ Except this time I got the bed Hermes got 2 years ago~ But I got the same drawer/locker thingy I got two years ago~ Into the refrigerator the curry rice went~ Saved it for lunch on Sunday~ Waited for the supper call while surfing the internet like finally~ Met up with Xen, Zhao Han, Ashe, CJ, Wei Lee like finally @ 11.30pm. Supper time! I thought they figured out where to have our supper but nope. Most places were close so we ended up going somewhere near Zhao Han's place for tao huey owo Xen has an Olaf in his car!! And Wei Lee was messing with it .____. CJ thought I couldn't recognize / don't know him but I do. The first thing I said to ZH when I saw him was "hie stickman". ahahaha I'm evil :x It's the first time I got drove around in a friend's car in Singapore! It's usually either MRT MRT MRT or taxi. Thank you for fulfilling my nonsensical request for supper even though all of you were probably super tired m( __  __ )m They dropped ZH back at his place, then me, then went back to their hotel. I took my shower, set my things around properly and went to bed~ I notice the milo supply at the inn sucked badly this year. It's like 95% water and 5% (or heck maybe even less) milo powder... /muchsad/

That ends day 1 in Singapore and I shall continue later on as it is now 4am. HAHHAHAHA as usual when I start typing, I would end up typing for hours on end. Good night to me~