Uniqlo: Shopping

So... I was working on this post last fall when I read an article in the Star Tribune about how popular Uniqlo is and how it is making advancements to fashion and "changing rooms" by planning on spreading out branches throughout the rest of the US after the New York one continues on prospering and might even have digital screens that can image an outfit onto a person so they can see what it looks like without trying it on. I could have misread that, but I am pretty sure that's something the article had mentioned. Anywho... here is my meager comprehensible researching on the popularity of Uniqlo in NYC. Sorry I couldn't remember more to actually write a decent post about how surprisingly popular Uniqlo is in New York and how this cultural expansion might be benefiting Japan during this period of economic turmoil continued. I will definitely have to come back to this topic later and do some nitty gritty informational gathering.

Sorry!

1) NYC Uniqlo
2) More NYC Uniqlo
3) And More

Anime Detour 2014 & The Onion

So this past weekend was Anime Detour 2014 and I didn't take very many pictures... I honestly only took six of cosplay. It was a very mellow weekend and had typical convention drama within our group and the hotel overall. My ex took his new girlfriend there and I ran into them both during the rave. It was really startling since neither of them really knew how to just bounce around like a maniac in typical convention style and had an argument over their expectations of each other.

Overall there weren't as many cosplayers as last year, but more of those who did but more effort into their outfits. I was really impressed with two of them because of how much time it really took them to make it. I have no idea what their outfits are from, however I thought they were mighty impressive. Also I deeply apologize for the low quality of my pictures since they are not clear and I couldn't tell what they would look like coming from my phone and onto my computer.

(These top four pictures were taken by me, the rest were all taken by my friend.) 

Me & Some Friends at the Rave

Rave Buddy as Mario with Backpack Luigi

Starting with Friday, my friends and hotel roommates arrived at the DoubleTree Hotel in Bloomington around noon. We quickly got our badges and picked up the belongings of three others that were staying with us. Then my friend, Sandy, and I drove in the over-packed car to the Days Inn  a few blocks away and unpacked the entire car. We left the jackets in the trunk just in case people got cold and wanted to wear them, although nobody ended up wearing their jackets. Then we lazed around the room and three of the other six bused over on the shuttle between the two hotels and lazed with us. We five had stayed up the entire night in preparation and anticipation.

Then we returned to the DoubleTree and socialized the rest of the day until it was time to get ready for the Rave. Since Greg Ayres is unable to DJ the first night, the substitute was blasting some pretty awesome beats. However, being tipsy and keeping track of my drunk friend made dancing near impossible. We ended up losing her cat ears headband and consoling her a number of times when she cried about numerous events. She ended up walking back to the hotel room alone and we all ran into her and had pizza before crashing hard around 4am. We'd all had a long and busy day that started at 5am.

Corsets are a Huge Seller at Detour

Saturday arrived and we woke up early to eat breakfast at the Days Inn before 9am. We were disappointed because they didn't have an elaborate Sunday Brunch so we didn't really eat much. Then we all got ready and returned to the hotel after my friend dealt with her broken laptop. It was an accident, but still... shit happens at conventions. I wandered around mostly and tried on a corset. I mostly wandered around with the friends I ran into and sat in on a game of "Foxes and Fools" for a while. Then I caught the shuttle back and chatted with my friend's little sister a while about our generally uneventful days and what we should eat for dinner since we didn't have lunch of breakfast. Her cousin and brother called us to see where we were and joined us in deciding what to eat. Then after eating we all scattered and went to various events until later to prepare for the rave again. This time my friend was less upset and we had a crazy fun time running around the hotel tipsy. We made new friends, danced with old friends, one of which felt us both up casually while we all danced with and on each other. It was a pleasant evening until we ran into a mutual acquaintance who was in distress. He ended up walking home with us and slept on the edge of one of the beds. This time he was actually quiet compared to the last time we all partied together.

Lego Transformer

Sunday we were all very wiped out, so we pretty much only went to panels that gave prizes as motivation to stay awake to the closing ceremony. We went to anime bingo, the werewolf game, The Great Debate, and other anime themed games. We wanted to make the most of the last day and spent a good portion of the day in the dealer's room blowing the last of our savings on rare items and creations that we could afford. I personally bought my little brother a keychain, and a glasses lens cleaning cloth. I also bought phone charms, devil horns, cat ears, and a couple of posters for myself. I didn't have much money so I tried to make the most of it. I also bought a ton of Japanese candy and some vending machine bottled tea because I missed the nostalgic taste.

"The Nightmare Before Christmas"

One thing that I deeply regret about Anime Detour was not cosplaying. I really wanted to cosplay, however I felt really fat and unattractive so I didn't try to make an outfit. I know I actually have a very nice figure, but it was a bit discouraging because I wanted to do Miyuki Ayukawa from Basquash, but I didn't want to show my midriff with a pudgy gut.

 Below are many pictures my friends took of cosplayers that did really good jobs. I think that they tried really hard to put effort into what they made and showed a dedication to the characters likenesses. I hope you like this brief blog update of what I spent my weekend doing. I'm sure there is more that I could have written or done, so if you have any comments or questions, please let me know.

Thank you for reading~!

 

PS: Here is a hilarious article put out by the satirical newspaper, The Onion. Please enjoy~

Popularity of Little Red: Media, Me

When I was in Japan I noticed that Little Red Riding Hood was everywhere. On bento boxes, in horror films and in anime, just to name a few places. Even when I window shop online, little images of Red Riding hood can be found everywhere. She's unbelievably popular there. I couldn't understand why at first someone would want to post that fairy tale out of all of them anywhere. Especially since that fairy tale has such a negative connotation as being a warning tale about rape.

Then I began researching topics of interest for my English 380 Criticism and Theory class, I started with fairy tales. We began the class with Little Red Riding Hood, and that is how I wanted to end it.So, I did a preliminary Google search on Little Red Riding Hood in Japan. That's when I stumbled upon this. It was a New York Times article on Western Fairy Tale adaptions in Japan, aptly titled "Big Wolves Aren't so Bad in Japan." It was the kickstarter I needed. It reminded me of "The Ants and the Cicada" which focused more on togetherness than morals or consequences.

So now I'm beginning an intense research paper (just a mere 10 pages minimum) on Little Red Riding Hood and why she might be the poster child instead of other fairy tale adaptations from the west. I'm really excited because I have a lot of Books including Recycling Red Riding Hood by Sandra Beckett and The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood by Jack Zipes. These books at least have small sections on Little Red, which is a lot more than most books I scavenged for on WorldCat. It was partially thanks to Google that I was able to find and reserve these books because of "Google Books." The Google search was much more efficient because it just searched for books that mentioned both Japan and Little Red Riding Hood on the same page of a book. I wouldn't recommend this for everyone unless the topic or thesis for a paper was absurdly obscure or barely researched.

I'm not sure what I will find or what my paper will turn into, but I'm rather excited to see what develops based off my sources. The professor says that we should write our paper out in full first before reading and incorporating our sources, so I'm a little anxious about that. Once I get deeper into this project, I'll post more.