Hong Kong Ani-Com 2007

These pictures were from earlier at the Hong Kong Ani-com 2007. (Yea, I know i know, I am slow~!!)

"Ani-Com is short for anime and comics combined, which means it is a conference about animes and comics, which at the beginning, I thought was kinda like the equivalence of comincon (comics conference) in the US.

I had been to a couple of comicons in the States but never in Hong Kong. So I was excited to go!!


The experience of the actual Ani-Com here, though, turned out to be quite different comparing to that in the US.
The ones in the States are very much about the US comics, its artistic quality, and sometimes its sex appeal from the comics. This Ani-com in Hong Kong, on the other hand, was mostly about the popular Japanese comic/anime trend, their cuteness, the accompanying new toys, the latest video games, etc. Very commercial, if you ask me~


Main Theme: Buy Buy Buy!!!


Look, it's Keroro!!


Toys and T-shirt. All about commercial products~ $$$$$



And of coz, we can't miss McMug and McDull, the most renown local comics stars of HK. Ain't the little piggies cute?!



Childhood Memory


Doraemo!! For those who don't know, Doraemo is a mechanical cat from the future whose front pockets carry all kinds of amazing and surprising tools that always end up brining troubles (mostly due to user-error, I'd say!) It's one of my favorite cartoon when I grew up!!


Another favorite anime of my childhood - Saint Seiya, which is about a group of mystical warriors fighting for their princess and justice~ One hell of a classics!!



A bit disappointed that we didn't get to see too much Cosplay (i.e. dressing up as anime character). Only a few girls dressed up as Japanese maid in this booth...



There were mini-concerts, coplay competitation, singing or hiphop dancing contests every night. It was some rock singing contest the night we went, which unfortunately was not very good...



The Comics

And of coz, how can one miss the comics in a comicon?!


Focus of the comics is still mostly those pocket-sized popular Japanese comics, which pages are black and white. Contrasting those with the full page colorful US comics, very different presentation!!


In addition to the cute Japanese comics, we saw a small number of some locally-produced comics that are more "manly".






We ended up buying two really cool looking comics gallery books for Brett, our comic artist friend in US.


Gundam (Gunpla) Models Display

First of all, I grew up knowing Gundam as Gundam and was a bit surprised to find out that it somehow got renamed to Gunpla. Weird.... I thought they were just making fun of the name in Keroro, but apparently, Gunpla has become its official name!!


Gundam Complex!!?

Can you tell how many Gundams are in this one?

Whoever made this really loves Gundam models, wouldn't you say?




Classic version


Delux version


Cute version


Grand version (My personal favorite)



Cross-over version




Hey look, who's that?!?


A close up!! If you don't know me, you might get tricked by this picture that I do really like Gundam!! haha...


In Addition...

Besides the comics and models, we saw some really weird, random stuff there as well!! For example,


A monster with.... another monster coming out from its head?!!


Pink booth babes who kept hiding inside the mysterious red BanDai box room!!


"The Wire Head"?!?!


Bruce Lee, female version??!


The guy, the girl, and the Panda!!


The Crowd


One thing that is the same in both US comicon and the Hong Kong ani-com though is the crowdedness.


Lines everywhere, lines to watch the latest toys, to buy comics, games, or just for the sake of going in a crowd!! It's crowded everywhere!!!

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Side story

Something very funny happened to Mike at the Ani-com. He got caught by a bunch of teenage girls who tried (very aggressively) to sell him boxes of cute plastic food models.
The girls were joking with him becoz he's pretty much one of the very few white guys in the conference. They spoke to him in very childish and cute English phrases trying to persuade him to buy their products.
"These are very cute, colorful and very cheap!! You can pick as many boxes as you like. Mix and match as you like!!! ..."

Facing the enthuastiasm of the girls, Mike didn't know how to react but looked to me for help!! (I could tell that he didn't want to buy the toys but felt bad for disappointing the little girls).
And I, haha... I was just grining evily the whole time standing next to him ;) He ended up buying one box!!

Ahh... I wished I had a video of the whole process, it was sooooooo funny!!~ It showed how HK tourist industry can do so well!!~~ Thanks to the nice foreigners who don't know how to refuse!! Hahaha...

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We stayed at the Ani-Com for about 2 hours. Overall, I'd say it's fun experience, even though not the most fresh kind!~


We were so tired when we took MTR back home!!