for the toys I didn’t get to buy: Toy Con 2009

[At the time  of this writing, Toy Con 2009 will have just ended...]

Picture this, say, you could only attend ONE convention a year — I feel it should be Toy Con.  Honestly, I’ve missed like 70% of the similarly-themed conventions over the last year, but I always attend Toy Con.

My name is Paolo, and I’m a 6th-time attendee of Toy Con.

Being situated over the course of what is (was) a payday-on-Monday-long-weekend, I was broke for this Toy Con.  Like most of you lovely Toy Con attendees, I have this list of things I.MUST.GET, but I would bet you all the money in my wallet that most of the time, the unplanned finds end up being the best toys you get for that Toy Con.

Again, the day’s event/programme is busy, packed with contests, bands, videos (Dead Fantasy, woohoo!) and cosplayers while most of the attendees are busy buying plastic.  Recession?  What recession?  People are clearly buying toys!  It might save economies!  )

Not that I always end up buying anything anyway — I go for the company.

Toy Con is, of course, never JUST about the toys, or the haggling, or the sex-ay cosplayers, it’s about getting a huge venue to house — even for just two days — people with similar interests.  So if ever you’re into the toy, cosplay, art (please let me still be in DAMEAT :p ) , comicbook or animation scene, chances are, some of your similarly-interested friends are there already.

Most of these similarly-interested friends, I only get to see during these conventions, so that’s the best reason to go, really.  It’s just a really, really big plus if you get that big huge discount on the toy you were looking for.

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Let’s see what the bats in the wallet got:

• Jetfire/Grimlock Gift set - Because I don’t have a Jetfire yet!  :p
• Transformers Music Label Soundwave/Soundblaster MP3 Player – An MP3 player that turns into a robot that’s almost in-scale with TF Classics/Universe!

Both were acquired at a great bargain!

And here’s what Snacks bought:

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Kudos to the organizers, the sponsors, the (new and old) friends, the sex-ay cosplayers, the big expensive chunks of plastic that we all love — It was a fun, tiring, NERDgasmic Toy Con, and here’s to next year’s!

Toy Con 2009 TVC

Here’s the TVC for the Toy Con this Saturday:

Toy Con 2009

It’s that special time of the year once again — lines will be formed, people will show up in unusual outfits and money will disappear from wallets — traded for plastic goods.  (gods?)

ToyCon 2009!  Here are several things to expect:

• Cosplay!  (And BIG prizes!)
• MINDStyle MONO
• Various booths selling plastic goods (gods?)
• Various bins of comic books!
• Bands!
• Toy contests/displays!
• Friends who collect toys / People you might know but didn’t know collected toys / New friends-with-similar-interests waiting to happen.

Can you imagine?  And that’s NEXT WEEK.  See you kids there!

[more info over @ The Toy Con site.]

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From the Site:

TOYCON is organized by Collectibles Unlimited partnered with the SM Megatrade Hall and is presented by Globe Broadband, Solar Entertainment and HERO TV. Also brought to you by Royal Tru Orange, Maxi Collector, Comic Odyssey, E-Games, ABS-CBN Interactive, MINDstyle, Toy Kingdom, Theaterworks, LG Mobile and WACOM. In cooperation with SugarFree N Blue, Wimax , Hobbymaster, Warner Brothers,Tribu, Club Astoria, Psicom and Creative Voices with media partners, ABS-CBN, Jack TV ,SciFi Channel, Fudge Magazine, Magic 89.9, NU 107, 105.1 Crossover and the official music channel, MTV.

The 8th Philippine Toys, Hobbies and Collectibles Convention
June 13-14, 2009
Megatrade Hall 2-3 and Conference Center A and B
SM Megamall, 5th Level Bldg. B
10am-9pm
www.toyconph.com

east to north.

The distance from the house to Malolos, Bulacan: 35.77 miles. (And that’s assuming you travel in a straight line; The shortest distance between two points is a straight line.)

So why would I bother with the trip? Because it was Sheila’s birthday last week, and I don’t get to go to Bulacan everyday, so why not? (To note, her house is too far, in fact, that Google Earth maps haven’t taken a proper detail photo of their area. It’s just a mess of greenery.)
I left the house at 12:24. An fx ride, a wrong train ride, another train ride, an fx ride and two toll booths later, me and a couple of other common friends were in Malolos Crossing. We were just a tryke ride away from the destination.

To sum up the whole ordeal: Sheila, Sheila’s friend’s baby, Angela, food and conversation, drinking more when I realized that I was drunk, a spritz of clam juice, a spritz of Monmon’s perfume, 2nd-degree burn number 3 for the year, waking up at 3 and realizing that I forgot to go home, lost my earring, leaving at 5 am, touchdown in Antipolo by 7:20 and the batcave by 8:15 AM, Sunday.
(Fellow attendees can fill in the blanks.)

It was fun. I went to Bulacan and all I got was this lousy 2nd-degree burn. :p

(photos here.)

toycon day1.

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Conventions are always holidays for collectors; giving them (us) a chance to purchase the things they (we) obsess about. Oh, and also, there’s the slight chance to feel empty afterwards, after being toyconned into buying over-priced goods. (But this is rare.) What, the booths/stands cost a mini-fortune, so merchandisers have to break even too.

The office was there promoting Dangka and TOL, which rocks, since I hear they got a lot of sign-ups. (and sucks, since two of the V masks were picked up! boo!)
(P.S. I’ll be at the booth tomorrow. Whee)

And what did my salary get me? Check it, this signature series Hush Batman costs 250 (two-hundred and fifty) dollars. I got the painted Batman for 900 pesos. Now THAT’S a bargain. Oh, I also got some pokemon figurines — a mudkip and a koffing. If you visit 4chan … “so, I herd you like …”

And in the years of convention attending, I find that I don’t go primarily because of the merch, but I go for the people. It’s always nice seeing my dameat friends, Toy Empire kids, the ZFC people and the AME people. (You guys rock.) Special mention: Mikko, Raz, Dodo, Jori, Blitz, Six-One, CK, Akutenshi, Pope, Mika, Darkmotives and Delru. (Delru even handed me a flier for this year’s AME convention … for December! Now that’s planning!)

(P.S. Ekis yung Grimlock ni Blitz. Haha, kidding, congrats!)
(Photo by Jori)

[this part was supposed to be for last night. fell asleep.]

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Looking for pants is always tricky for me. Finding one with a great fit counter-balanced with the amount of money I have available is always the issue. Anyhow, what’s up with Levi’s? Do they only come out in buttonfly, oddly-washed and torn styles nowadays? From where I checked, they don’t sell flat-front, straight-cut and zipper-operated jeans anymore. (A man must never struggle with buttonflies when he needs to take a piss.) I tried on a lot of pairs, but it was either too-oddly-washed, the wrong fit or too expensive. Goddamn.

I could always break down and try on a pair of Rock and Republic jeans, only to seal them up and never wear them forever. (The lowest they cost here? 9999.01 pesos.) It’s just not practical with my salary.

I ended up going home with no new pants.