Finally, My Say About UP Otakufest 7: New Golden Age

February 08, 2014

For others, this might be an ordinary day. But for me, this was one of the most challenging and memorable day I have ever had. And I owe it all to UP Otakufest 7.

For those who do not know UP Otakufest, this event is Cebu’s biggest collegiate cosplay and hobby convention in Cebu. It had humble beginnings on its introduction waaaay back in February ___, 2007. In fact, I was there when I witnessed how it started. I remember as clear as day. It was still so simple: only a few people, no official rented stage, and there weren’t many booths in the event, it was just a gathering of all “Otaku.”

From there, slowly it grew popularity yearly, more people talking about it, and more improvements and theme changes for every event. In fact, this was one of the few reasons as to why I decided to enter UP, hoping that I could play an important part in this event someday.

And it did happen.

I remember how Otakufest was on its fourth year when I entered the university, and on how I was just a mere volunteer/marshal through being a member of UP Nichibunken (ユピ日文研), the university’s Japanese culture appreciation organization. It was tiring to run around and be a messenger to the heads but it was fulfilling. And at that same time a new dream and challenge opened to my interests: to be UP Nichibunken’s head and to head UP Otakufest on my fourth year in college (since Otakufest was a yearly event made by the fourth year batch organization, a tradition that happened as years went by).

Once again, it happened.

I was still on the middle of my foreign exchange program in Japan last 2013 when I gained the confidence to volunteer to my batch mates that I will be leading the next Otakufest. It was not because I was thinking way over my head, but because I believe that I could make use of the things I learned from my one year stay in Japan and hopefully inculcate it in organizing Otakufest, and to hopefully make it as innovative and the best Otakufest ever, and to make it a different convention than what other people go to yearly.

So when I went back home last July 2013, a lot of things happened that may be a sign of success to lead this event. I immediately became UP Nichibunken’s head, and as I was struggling to catch up with my studies, I and with my fellow batchmates and UP Nichibunken, had our first meeting on that month. They were surprised that it was early, too early maybe. 7 months before the event and yet we already have decided on the theme New Golden Age and on the things we wanted to have on the day, and we were already starting with promotions and advertisements.

I also remember on the first day of our online promotion in Facebook, it already gained a lot of likes and noise on just its first night. That was what got us so excited. From then on, we started with the final conceptualization and stared on the papers, actions, and more meetings.

As months passed, stress was getting over me. I never expected for this event to be REALLY big. To top it off, the pressure and anticipation of everyone was getting to me, and as the head organizer I cannot help but make an event that exceeds their expectations.

There were a lot of problems that we encountered as we were getting nearer and nearer the event day. And please allow me to rant on things I kept to myself for months on this blog post.

One was on the delays, both evitable and non-evitable. Non-evitable things like delays on operations due to the recent major earthquake and supertyphoon that hit our country. They were somehow okay, but the evitable delays got me the most. As a business student, I organized this event on a business perspective, applying all the things I learned. One of those things I learned from my professors was to never be late on meetings, deadlines, and tasks no matter what the reason may be (except death). And it really gets in nerves when people put up a lot of reasons as to why they were not able to do such tasks in the given time. One of the reasons was that they were not the only ones who were busy. I was busy too, in fact, more busy than them perhaps. Another one was that when you promise something that you can do something, it is then expected of you that you will do it, regardless of what. Lastly, delays give out a lot of consequences financially. But despite those things, after all those project crashes and patience, things went okay (for most of it).

Another problem we came up with was on the issue of including a Kpop Dance competition in a cosplay and hobby convention, which has never happened before. There was a lot of clamor when we posted the official guidelines, with people claiming as to why there be a Korean Contest in a “otaku” convention, and with people saying that they would not attend because of this. Because of this, we posted an official statement a week after and thankfully it cleared out the issue, and everything was calm again. But there were several reasons why I decided to include a Kpop competition in Otakufest: one was that from my exchange program in Japan, I first handedly experienced the Otaku culture, and knew that there was a growing community of Japanese kpop otaku. Second was that I had to be innovative. Otakufest, being in its 7^th year, definitely would not remain stagnant. Lastly, being a kpop and anime fan myself, I wanted to try these things to be together and somehow people could get to appreciate these things.

The rest of the problems were already minor issues (like on the ticket prices and the code of conduct) and I was glad everything went okay.

As the event got nearer, we were starting to get sleepless nights, lots of arguments on issues, and losing focus at school. We had a lot of challenges to conquer, along with our studies. Probably one of the greatest challenges I had was when I left for Korea for an exchange program, 2 weeks before Otakufest, and I had to balance work, studies, and managing the event.

Stress was increasing until it came to the day of the event. Finally, all our labor realized. With 3 hours of sleep, exhaustion, and nervousness for anything might go wrong, I just did what I could, and that was to stay strong.

Despite the rain that delayed the program, and some minor problems, I’m really thankful for the success of the event. I have a lot to be thankful for. Thank you to everyone who came and enjoyed the show, to the sponsors, partners, and contributors for helping realize this event, for my friends and family for the support, for our special guests Ae Ri, Lyron, SIXX, and F Prime of X for attracting a lot of people and for gracing our event. For our hosts Ara and Gab for keeping up with us and for making the event more lively despite the gloomy weather, for the whole team for enduring months of exhaustion to give an awesome event, and lastly, to God for helping us make this event happen.

This event helped me add more fuel and motivation to achieved my dreams. I hope I could be able to organize more events soon and learn from them to be better (and hopefully organize kpop events soon? :D)

Otakufest 7: New Golden Age: the biggest collegiate cosplay and hobbies convention in Cebu was the first event to inculcate kpop in a mixed convention, was the best Otakufest of all the seasons in terms of earnings and attendees, and was the first event in Cebu to have an international audience (all thanks to our Japanese partners and for the advertisements). This event, despite being a student-organized event, and having no compensation on our part, was really for everyone to enjoy, and for having a day where people with interests can gather and be happy. This event gave me a lot of insights and realizations on what I needed to improve as a person and on my skills.