Anime Expo > X Games

Well, another Anime Expo has come and gone, and the J-List crew had a blast, meeting our awesome customers and handing out thousands of our trademark Japanese pocket tissues (which are free with each order by the way). This year was stranger than most years because ESPN’s X Games extreme sports event was held at the same time, which caused some inconvenience because of blocked-off streets and packed restaurants. But the most bizarre thing was that half the people staying in the area hotels were lovers of Japanese pop culture while the X Games fans made up the rest, so every bar was filled with Touhou and Hetalia cosplayers sitting alongside the somewhat more jock-ish fans of the ESPN event, which lead to some mocking comments by the X Game crowd and anime fans feeling like we were all back in high school. Still, this past event wasn’t quite as strange as 2006, when AX shared a hotel with a large church convention and — I swear I am not making this up — a gay square-dancing group. It really made riding the elevators interesting, since you never knew which group you’d be riding with.

The mix of Anime Expo and X Games was odd.