After 4 years since my first AX in 2018, I have returned to Anime Expo in 2022 but with a renewed mission of having fun. While one may think it might be risky to travel, as far as I am concerned, at this point in time; if I am going to die from covid, I might as well have fun before I go, thus me and my sister went to LA with the sole purpose of getting autographs, buying merch and experiencing the biggest anime convention in North America with the hope that we will not die in the process. Let’s see how things go from this Day 0 account of our AX journey.

Even before taking off on the flight, I was worried that our AX badges haven’t come yet; they were supposed to come weeks ago. These photos above are like literally 1 day away before we were supposed to take off on June 30. Fuck. Cutting it close there Jamaica NY mail customs processing..

The back of the AX map instructions had this nice poster thing with the AX mascot girl in something of a Eva Asuka plugsuit. Noice.

Said other side of the poster and printout. Truly, “One Step Closer’ just, cutting it a bit to close for comfort in my opinion…

Oh god, we are at Pearson International airport at like 6-7am, the place is packed!

Our nice boarding passes, after lining up for the self serve kiosks. This was the easy part.

Damn, look at all the people. I’m pretty sure traveling to LA four years ago wasn’t this busy. I guess this is the effect of end of school and prime travel time/long weekend summer and people finally able to get away to travel with covid restrictions lightening.

Black women is all like “Dayum, I have to push this cart full of ma shit stylll!”

While wandering around the terminal trying to drop off our luggage it appears the gate for our flight has changed and slightly delayed. “En Retard” of course.

After dropping off our bags in a self serve manner where the attendant overseeing things totally didn’t give a shit because of the chaos we lined up for security/carry-on checks.

In observance of this lack of care and chaos, there was a the black youth handling bags and a women asked him a question of “where do I go now?” To which he replied “I don’t even know fam”. lol shit. Tru dat.

The line for this security check is actually a lot worse than it looks here, it goes all the way back and snakes around several times to the area where we got our boarding passes from the self serve kiosks…

“Are you conditionally approved?” I guess? The wording sounds pretty dumb. lol.

After going through the security checkpoint, I was in the clear but they stopped the processing of people because the new queue ahead was still bottle necked. During this time there was a white women who was semi-frantic about finding a lost rhinestone that was missing from one of her shoes, she was asking all the security workers if she could go back behind the checkpoint and look for it, but she was denied. She was there for a good 15 or so minutes looking at the ground and checking the empty cleared bins for her worthless plastic rhinestone. When we passed to the next checkpoint, she was still looking for it…

I never saw her ever again after that.

Once you get past the security checkpoint, you go into a small room with chairs, you would think that you are near the end, but no. You are greeted with this horror, a huge snaking line last approx 1.5-2 hours to get through US customs!

God damn this was the worst. We were here for so long, it took alot of mental and physical stamina. All throughout the line you hear people saying they are like 1 hour behind their scheduled flight and such, getting worried and shit. Others, getting triggered because some people get to jump the line because they are even worse and even later, getting them angry and pissed for increasing their own delay. What a shit show.

Finally, after such a long time we passed US customs, we more or less literally ran to the terminal to board. Normally there is chill people sitting and such waiting for flights, not here. One you pass the US customs and enter the duty free shop, there is like no one around, since everyone just rushes to their terminal. Once we boarded we noticed like more than 50% of the flight was empty. Shortly after the pilot announced exactly that, more than half the flight was still stuck in US customs and they had to wait for the majority of the people to get through. In the end we waited for alike another hour and a half or so. 16 passengers didn’t make it. RIP.

Customary of Westjet, you get no meal for a relatively short flight but can order some ghetto food if you want for a price.

Aw yea, that’s the shit, free refreshments and pretzels! And McDonalds coffee too, they even had the sticker and loyalty card shit. Damn.

After a 4 or 5 hours we landed in LAX, as busy and packed as ever. Kind of a shit airport but what can you do. Nice crutches and moon boot women.

It’s interesting to note that in LAX a good majority of people have stopped wearing masks, unlike in Pearson where it is still mandatory.

Walking the path to get dem luggage.

Waiting for the luggages. We were standing for a few minutes pondering how do we get to the hotel when some guy comes around and says, that if you came from Toronto, your luggage is at another luggage thing further down. Sure.

The shiny greasy face of a man who is not dying yet even after a 5 hour flight and 4-5 hour airport ordeal. LAX has this weird shuttle thing where you take a bus shuttle to go to a place where you then get off to take either a uber, cab or pickup. Four years ago I don’t remember having to do this? It’s weird but it works I guess since LAX has limited space for car idling.

We got to the hotel, the Westin Bonaventure which is not exactly the closest to the convention center but apparently one that alot of staff and industry stay at.

Pretty swanky indeed, with most of the guests I can imagine being here for AX. From what I overheard from the guys in front of us, even some of the Trash Taste boys stay at the place as one of their friends allegedly said they saw “Conner” white boy in the elevator the day before.

Here we are, your nice hotel room with two big beds.

Well..not that big. They are two twin beds so a bit of a downgrade from the bed I use as home, which is a Queen sized. At least the sheets are nicely made, although they tend to slip off and the mattress itself slides far more easily around that what I’d like.

Pretty standard I guess, all hotel rooms look like this I suppose.

Standard TV and mini fridge hidden behind the wood cabinetry.

Looking outside is a pretty nice view of some art installation thing or whatever. Cool.

The bathrooms are pretty nice and fancy although honestly the layout is kinda shit in my opinion. Who the hell thinks of having the sink at an angle and the toilet is a bit misaligned, with not enough room on the right.

The shower is pretty fancy tho with water coming directly down from above. Not sure how I feel about it but it works so I don’t mind. Free shampoo and soaps as per usual.

After washing up from our long journey we embarking on our new missions in LA. First, get some food and get our Covid wristbands.

Walking down the street, going to some place, in LA, feeling alright.

Aww yea, we got buns man, asian buns, do you know where?

85 Degrees bakery that is, the same one that we went to alot in 2018! Aww yea boi. We actually kinda rushed going here first before getting covid wristbands because they were closing soon, and as such, their selection remaining was limited, not very many savory ones left unfortunately. Too bad.

Everywhere I look I seem to take similar pictures that I had taken in 2018, but different. I guess the randos with masks is one big difference. I forgot how close Jinya Ramen was to 85 Degree Bakery, dayum.

Alright, it’s Thursday evening, gotta get those covid wristbands so we can start the convention for real tomorrow.

There was a lineup in LA live complex near what was formerly known as the staples center, now Crypto.com Arena. I wasn’t sure what the line was for, but knowing the events going on during the convention it was probably a concert or rave.

Got peeps everywhere I look, doing the same thing.

So this was the line to get our covid wristbands, supposedly to ‘prove’ that we were vaccinated. This is good in theory but in actuality, it’s just administrative bullshit so that AX can say that ‘they tried’ and had protocols in place. All of the people giving out and checking covid vaccination status 100% didn’t give a shit, you could have showed them a Chinese fast food menu and it would pass as proof of vaccination. They truly didn’t give a shit, making the entire ritual a moot point.

Ah yes, downtown LA live complex, where once concerts and many events were held. This year however, no such big displays or presence of AX was put up front, which is unfortunate.

On the main road they put up these cool inflatable balloon AX mascots, noice and cute.

Making my presence known, KN95 mask as all, just as everyone was doing selfies as well.

Upon closer inspection, while cute, they do look kinda derp looking from certain angles.

Size comparison between balloons and random guy passing by. Sunburst too on the middle one.

Other entrance, nice Gundam Witch from Mercury Banner.

This is the place where they hand out autograph tickets for all days of the convention. They only give out tickets for that day so for instance you want to try to get an autograph for someone on Saturday, you gotta line up on Saturday for that day’s signing sessions. We wanted to get autographs of the Trash Taste Boiz and Shindo L so this is where we gotta be tomorrow on day 1 early. Some people I heard in previous years camped that shit the night before.

Everything seems familiar since the last time I was here, but different.

Walking back to the hotel we decided to visit ol Walgreens to pick up some drinks and water. Slightly out of our way but still something we thought was worth.

Sameeeee. As to be expected from the American version of shoppers drugmart, but a bit more ghetto-er.

I have only heard of these online, they removed the glass on the doors and instead put lcd displays to show the price and product…excessively over engineered and doesn’t really solve a problem at all, actually making it worse since you can’t tell for sure if a product is in stock.

Madlad taking off his mask, taking a mirror photo shot. Proof of existence, just like the Cheetos in front of me.

Nice roads and streets. Sometimes when you walk down the street I forget that I am not in Toronto but in LA, big cities do eventually all seem the same in some parts.

After going back to the hotel and dropping off our drinks, we took a Uber to Little Tokyo to do the shit, what you do before and after AX.

Nice and familiar, but different. Even for day 0, it’s still very busy in little Tokyo.

The presence of mask and non-mask people are clearly evident. Nice Maid Dreamin advertisement.

Filled with ramen shops and other Japanese food places, I can’t remember if anything has changed since I was last here in 2018. What is different is this little kid standing on this rock.

Going inside the Japanese grocery store is what you do in little Tokyo while waiting for people or reservations at restaurants.

Awww yea boiii, the cup noodle Curry flavor, the best cup noodles they have in stock but damn, that price, 3$ per cup? Shit man that’s expensive, regardless, still brought quite a bit to take home since we can’t get them here in stores.

They have a whole bunch of other ramen goods but some of these i’ve seen before at our own local bestco or TnT so kinda ignored.

We were actually waiting in queue to go into Kura Sushi but the wait was estimated to be something like 2 or 3 hours. Regardless we still decided to give it a try and wait. During this time, I was gettting pretty hungry, we didn’t really have anything to eat all day, just a light ghetto breakfast at home so we were running on empty aside from drinks and pretzels from the plane. Decided to order some takoyaki at the place that sell okonomiyaki, chinchikurin.

Chinchikurin was was placed that I didn’t get to try back in 2018 because every time we came it was either packed or was closed so it was something that I wanted to get revenge on and rectify. Unfortunately by the time we arrived, they were no longer seating people, just those on the wait list. Next time maybe. Soon.

Even though Chinchikurin was no longer seating people, the takoyaki window was still taking take out orders. Apparently they are considered a different business, which is kinda weird to me but whatever.

Peeps just chilin about, they know what’s up.

Pretty choice photo of this thing, although it’s slightly misaligned. If I cared more I would adjust it, but I didn’t. Ahwell. Still cool.

The price for the takoyaki came in. Shit’s not cheap but worth a try I suppose considering I was starving. Shit was already at like 8:22 pm, we hadn’t eaten anything substantial in like over 10-12 hours or so.

In front of Kura, taking a photo of the business hours, getting scared we won’t make it in time before they close.

Found some benches and ate our takoyaki. Shit’s pretty good, it’s like I’m back in Japan eating these balls in Osaka in that tourist place by the river/bridge again. Good shit. Worth.

Oh yea boi, we made it into Kura! After eating the takoyaki we just sat in front of the benches right in front. One of the workers came out and asked us if we were on the waitlist and said yea, he wanted to know who was just there waiting cause if you were sitting waiting in front, you had greater priority. They weren’t going to wait for people using their text/email system because fuck that, seat people who are waiting in line who are actually there. So while we originally were told something like 2-3 hour wait, it was more like just under 1.5 hours because they weren’t going to seat people who were not physically waiting outside, ah yea boi.

A tired man is happy that he is finally seated and awaits a conveyor belt sushi experience, one that he has not had since 4 years ago.

Nice plate gacha system and instructions/self order system.

Pretty sure the prices have increased but what can you do, inflation is everywhere. I think each plate was like $2.5 or $3 unless otherwise noted.

Tuna something sushi with ponzu glaze I think, noice.

Tiliapia I think, or was it yellow tail, can’t remember.

Leaner tuna I think.

Some crispy roll I think.

Nice spread with some other ones that I forgot.

Salmon with ponzu or sesame I think.

This might be otoro? Can’t remember lol.

Some white fish, could be tilaipa or yellowtail, cant remember.

Fried ebi box, same shit that I had before last time I was hear. Good shit.

Yum yum, rice and more rice with fried shit is so good.

The gacha machine broke when we entered the plates into the system, you are supposed to get a prize if you put in 15 or so plates but when we did it nothing happened, or rather, no prize came out. Apparently we asked one of the workers and she said the machine was broken, but that’s ok, she would bring over a box with random capsules instead for us to randomly choose, same thing. What my sister got was basically a lego sushi toy that you have to assemble, pretty cool shit. Kura branded toy too! Noice.

At one point in time, I thought about abandoning our wait for Kura sushi and try eating some other place but luckily our patience and perseverance paid off, we also got to have takoyaki as an expensive appetizer as well before too. Good shit. After a nice meal and a very busy travel and eventful day zero we called another uber and went back to our hotel.

Back at the hotel, chillin before we have to wake up in less than 5 or so hours because we have to camp the line for autographs. Shit. this is what the covid wristbands look like. So ugly and generic, I kinda hoped that it would at least have something to signify the event name or whatnot but nothing, you could literally print one of these and bootleg it if you wanted to but whatever. I ended up wearing this for the entire duration of AX, even during sleep and showers. I didn’t/couldn’t take it off or else I would have to get another one.

And that wraps up my summary of travel and Day 0 of AX! As one might notice the photos taken are somewhat erratic, especially once we landed where they are more sparse and in-between, that’s because at this point in time I didn’t fully dedicate to using my phone yet to be the primary photo device, I was still using my old Canon G15 camera, the same one I had used for over 8 years prior, the same one that I first used in Japan for photos. As the trip goes on, I found it just easier and faster to use my smartphone for photos instead of my dedicated camera which ended up being just as good or better image quality so by the third and fourth days of AX, I had almost entirely abandoned the use of the G15 and committed to taking all my photos on my phone. I’ll probably create another post once all of the ‘main’ phone photos have been documented and make another Side B or Extra post to fill in the gaps and show the photos I took with my G15 and from my sister’s phone, which are still good.

More to come…