Yoshitaka Amano and New People

And after my excitement about Vienna, I slipped away to San Francisco and woke up the next morning to wander the JPop Festival and the grand opening of New People. Courtesy of Quinkee. (August 15, 2009)

I'd planned on leaving the house anyway because my sister had invited a throng of maybe twenty students she worked with at her community service group and I wanted out.

Going to bed at 1am and then waking up at 6am was slightly disgruntling. I have to admit though, it was rather exhilarating. Including the part where we had to sneak in and out of Wilson's house.

Quink, Amy, Wilson and I eventually made our way to Japantown at around 7am to discover the street blocked off and mini tents standing around. No sign of any long standing crowd of people waiting to get in; in fact, the store had barely unpacked its boxes! I suppose they did have five hours ahead of them before the doors officially opened, but you'd think they would have been a little further ahead in their schedule.

While Wilson parked the car in a more convenient location, the three of us decided to sit up high on a ledge overlooking the street and watch for any signs of a line. Amy immersed herself in her book and I happily sang along to "Hotel California," for the twenty times they played it.

Suddenly Andrew boy came walking past, recognized us, and informed us that he and his troupe were also looking for a line, only they'd heard more about the event than we did - there was apparently a line for getting tickets to get into the building somewhere, and we had to find her. A lady who worked at the store overheard our conversation as she walked past and pointed us in the right direction. Our tickets ended up being around the 107, 108, and 109 mark, slightly disappointing considering how early we had arrived. If only they'd put a sign somewhere explaining the process.

We wandered for a good few hours, stalking the vendors that were popping up and setting their items out. There was a stage at one end of the street and little white tents lining down the opposite direction. I don't think I'd ever been to a festival so early that the vendors hadn't even finished setting up their tents yet; I even managed to help a couple of women set up their tent because they had no idea how to use the tent. It was a much nicer and newer version of the ones we'd been using at archery camp, so I knew the basic idea of the tents.

We finally decided to wait outside the store with other people who had meandered over to wait and stake out a spot in line. Not that there really was much of a line; it consisted of a huge crowd of people squashing outside the store window, including some whose odors did not sweeten the deal.

At around 11am (mind you, by then we'd been on our feet for nearly four hours, on approximately four hours' sleep) they began lining us up in order of our ticket numbers. Damn, we thought. That means we're really going to be missing out on the Amano signatures, since only the first 50 customers who buy his books and tshirts will receive a ticket.

With the last hour before the opening, activity on the stage began. Some representatives of Japantown SF spoke about their enthusiasm and excitement at the success of this project, actors from the movie 20th Century Boys (movie 1) went onstage, and a few people from the city read Mayor Newsom's proclamation that August 15 be made into official JPop day. They broke the sake barrel (which nobody beyond the first row of people could really see, since the average height of the crowd was likely around the 5ft mark), cut the ribbon, and announced the doors open.

I think the prospects were pretty good, and despite not having heard about this event until Quinkee mentioned it to me, I had a lot of fun and excitement. For some reason I really anticipated the opening, and going inside among the first "VIPs," as they called people with tickets 1-150. Apparently they'd only given out 300 tickets, so that everyone else had to wait in line afterward. What an entrance for this store.

We hurried inside as the man ripped our tickets (I'm sure we went in way before our actual number - so many ticket numbers were missing before ours!) and found a huge crowd of cameras pointing at us. I laughed, a little shocked, but scrambled after Quinkee up the stairs. A line already formed at the cashier and I offered to wait in line as she looked for the right merchandise. Finally settled, we felt a little more calm, because now there really was nothing to do but wait.

I looked around and settled on "The Book of Genji." When the Final Fantasy art book came out, I took a look at it. I really did enjoy the book, but I felt much more drawn toward his Genji work and went with that, throwing a little packet of stickers into the mix to bring my total up to 30 dollars to receive my free tote bag and goodies. All that was left was to wait, and as we checked out each one by one we felt so relieved. I was a little sad that my book cover had a little nick in the corner, but they had none left even in the storage so I decided to just roll with it.

At last! Nothing more to push and complain about. At more of a leisurely pace we went upstairs, guffawed at the ridiculous pricing on some items in the clothing department, conceded that some of the prices were reasonable, admired Amano's work in his gallery on the third floor, and went down to the basement to find something dubbed playing on the screen. A commercial, I think, for the evening's premier of 20th Century Boys. I think it was funny that there were already technically three movies, but the first was only having its premier in the States.

LUNCH. I don't know what happened, but the lady serving us seemed to have a grudge against us; she skipped us for water, and apparently never gave our order to the kitchen, resulting in nearly an hour's wait for food. Really, lady, seriously? Was it what we were wearing? Because that is god honest discrimination. If we had worn our evening best, hair done up and in flowing dress, would you have kissed our toes then? Sigh.

We ended up lining up for the signing at around 3:30pm, a good half hour before the start. Quinkee was written up as number 15, two off from her favorite number 13. I was 16 and Wilson 17. Heehee~

As we rounded the corner and he came into view, I somehow became suddenly nervous. Probably because there were cameras and Amano didn't speak English and it was all very serious lining up business since he had to go through so many, many people...

I took photos for Quinkee as she went and hurriedly passed the camera on to Wilson, flipping open my book and finding myself in front of him. I think I was nervous at first because it looked like he was not in the best mood and I had heard he wasn't feeling his best, but he and the lady standing by his side smiled at me. He didn't begin drawing until he had a quick look at me, and proceeded to draw what I'm pretty sure was - well, me. The hair was exactly the way mine was. The lady beside him started speaking to me in Japanese; I had a little guess at what she was saying, because she was gesturing toward her shirt, but when I sort of showed that I wasn't quite understanding, I think she may have switched vaguely to English and I realized she was asking if I'd made my shirt myself. I sort of laughed inwardly as I said yes that it was probably pretty obvious I'd cobbled it together, as my ribbons were trailing threads and the shirt was cut somewhat haphazardly. Mr. Amano finished his signing and I thanked him and took my leave.

I think I somehow picked up this bowing thing from someone in high school. I want to say it was Jo, but I can't really remember. I was just reminded of it strongly when I stepped up to Amano and gave a little bow and left with a little bow. It really has become habit for me to dip my head and such in hello and thanks.

Thanks Quink, Amy, and Wilson!