Anime Evolution 2007 Day 0
My brother, Jan, and sister, Jamie, went ahead to SFU last Thursday to pick up my 3-day pass. Apparently, there’s a masquerade ball that night so they said I should come up too. Well, an AE event is an AE event so I might as well join.
I got there and first up is making the mask. I met a trio of guys. I know one’s called Marc and the other is Anthony (heh, easy to remember), but I forgot the name of the third one. I gave them my e-mail address since it’s the easiest to remember. Anyway, most of us were wearing glasses and we noticed that putting the mask on will hurt your eyeballs via the glasses. Needless to say modifications were in order. I opted for replacing the elastic string with a ribbon that you just tie behind your head. My brother followed the suggestion of another guy of actually taping the mask to the glasses >.>.
Anyway, we all had masks and it’s time to dance. I missed the waltz tutorial while making the mask, so I had to wing it. They made the participant line up in two row: girls on one side and boys on the other. OK, that saves me from asking someone to dance by myself. Yeah… I have crap social skills when it comes to stuff like this. Anyway, I got paired up with a girl named Rebecca.
Oddly enough, the first dance was not a waltz. It was the cha-cha :o. I have no clue what to do and neither does my dance partner. After our introduction, we decided to take a look at the others. That didn’t really help so we both agreed to just do whatever the hell we want. Somehow we were dancing. Dancing felt good but tiring at the same time. We both enjoyed it but I definitely need to exercise more…
Anyway, swing and tango came next. We "knew" swing but were totally lost dancing the tango. Waltz music came on but it was time to line up again. This time, I got paired with Linda. She’s pretty and her dress suited her fine. Unfortunately, this time we have to change partners randomly when the emcee calls "Switch". After only one dance, I had to move on to the next one. Damn, parting is such sweet sorrow.
So dancing and switching partners became the routine. I made a habit of asking the name of my partner so that I can have a conversation while dancing. After a few dances, I finally "mastered" the waltz. This just means I know the steps and that I can apply it without stepping on my partner’s feet. This is a good skill to have because it’s not good if you’re just constantly looking at your feet and not at your partner.
By this time, I heard a lot of names. I’m gonna list them here just to acknowledge them. Besides the first two, thanks to Shadow (nickname, real name I forgot), Ama (sp?), Adrina, Emilia, Shannon, people I forgot to ask their names, and people I forgot their names (Sorry!).
In the middle of the dancing and switching, I ended up with a girl named Jessica. he wasn’t wearing a mask since she made one of those with a handle. I thought she was pretty cute, and I ended up talking to her about her one-week trip to Japan. Before she could tell me about it, partners switched again and I wound up dancing with Jacqueline (I dunno if this is the spelling of her name since it can be spelled various ways). It turns out that she’s Jessica’s friend. I thought she was pretty too, even with the mask. I forgot what we talked about, but I remember asking her if she went on the Japan trip with Jessica. Anyway, dance-switch-dance-switch and I was tired as hell.
I took a break and noticed that my brother wasn’t on the dance floor at all. He was talking to a girl and they seemed to be getting along quite nicely. I talked to him later and it turns out that she listened to him sing last year when he won the Anime Idol contest so she’s like a fan. Go, go Jan! 
Meanwhile, my sister was just sitting near the entrance. Since she’s staff, she has to check ID’s. Being the nice brother that I am, I asked her to dance. I thought it’s not fair that she can’t dance and that she can ask other staff to man the station. I danced with her twice. The first time, it was just a normal waltz. The second time, the music was Nakashima Mika’s "Find the Way", the Gundam Seed 4th ending. Hahaha, we ended up singing while dancing. No one can hear us anyway because the music’s pretty loud so it was just fun. Feeling good about my brotherly love, I went back to rest in one of the chairs.
By this time, I wanted to talk more to Jessica and Jacqueline. I thought this would be a good opportunity to talk to people that I just met. I occasionally would run into the trio that I met earlier but obviously, talking with girls you just met is different. Somehow it’s more difficult if you find them pretty. So the first step was finding them. I saw Jessica sitting on one of the chairs.
I thought to myself that this is a good chance. But what the hell am I gonna say? Well I think I ended up saying "So how was the dancing?" Unfortunately, she was talking to a friend one row over and I was calling at her from one row behind. Crap. I felt kind of stupid but fortunately she didn’t hear that and no one else heard it. I tried again after moving to her row. I got a "Hey" response. I moved closer and repeated my question. I learned that the dancing was cut short because someone stepped on her foot. Sure enough, one of her feet had a dressing. Ouch. I felt sorry for Jessica but I felt even more sorry for the guy.
Anyway, after some talking, I went back to dancing when they asked us to line up again. I was enjoying dancing so I wanted to dance some more. Well, it was all very fun and near the end, I was talking to Jessica and Jacqueline. We got to talk some more and we talked a lot. Since they’re fun to talk to, I asked if we could exchange e-mail addresses. Since none of us had a pen, I told them that mine was just jennard@hotmail.com. After a while, I felt bad that I didn’t ask them theirs. They might forget my address and I’d miss an opportunity. So after a bit, I asked them for theirs and they told me.
I asked Jacqueline if she wanted to dance one more time and she agreed to dance when the music is suitable. At that point, Utada Hikaru songs were playing and they’re not really danceable. Finally, the announcement came that it’s gonna be the last song. I proceeded to the floor with Jacqueline, but Jessica also went with us. I felt awkward since I thought she wasn’t going to dance with her injury but I guess it was ok. Good thing I spotted Anthony and so she had a partner. Anyway the music was swing, and I was having a good time with Jacqueline. I looked over at Anthony and Jessica. Man he sucks. I told him, "Hey, you gotta move those hips". He just laughed and continued "dancing". Oh well. But you gotta make the most of the music.
After we said our farewells and hoping that we’d run into each other during the con, I began muttering their e-mail addresses again and again. Wow, I must really want to stay in touch with them. Thinking about it, it’s obviously because I found them pretty and interesting, and the opportunity arose for me to ask that info. You don’t let girls like that leave without you knowing their phone number or e-mail.
All in all, the night was awesome. I got to exchange e-mail addresses with some people and I really had a blast dancing. Dancing was soooo fun!
Day 1 details coming soon!
