Otaku / Geekitude

Osaka Cosplay Event 2019 (part 1/4)

Finally! Finallyyyyyy! I’ve been living in Japan for more than 5 years now, and I never took the time to go to a cosplay event (as a spectator, although I’d love to cosplay). So that time, I decided to grab my lovely コマジェ and head to Nanba (or Namba). And guess what, it was totally worth it! Not only was it sunny (I can’t complain enough about the shitty weather we’ve been having lately, and WTF is wrong with the forecast predicting the weather as properly as Madam Irma??!), but it was full of cosplayers! I think I had a smile on my face most of the time.

First things first, let’s talk about the event.
Basically, it happens every year, within the first 2 weeks of March (the second Saturday, I guess?), or around that time. I’d rather have it in April, March still being chilly, but hey, logic ain’t for everyone my dear Ma’am.
I don’t know who or how it’s organized, but a few streets are entirely closed to vehicles (including bikes), the traffic lights off, fences/barriers set on, from morning until 15:00 or so. And it’s ALL FREE! That’s very important to emphasize, in societies where the smallest service costs money… There is a lot of staff, the cops, and everything goes smoothly despite the incredible number of people.

That event, named 日本橋ストリートフェスタ (Nihonbashi Street Festa) or ストフェス, is held in the district of Nanba, also called Denden Town. You could compare it to Tokyo’s Akihabara, although it’s obviously not as big nor trendy (but it kicks ass anyway, I love going there). Needless to say it was super crowded, and it was a pain to find somewhere to leave my scooter (basically, parking a vehicle is an effing bother in most places of Japan, even for a simple bicycle. Easy money for the cities and government, right…).
Just while finding my way, I started seeing some Gundam cosplayers. Oh boy could I already feel some crazy excitement!
OK, let’s cut to the chase and have a look at some astounding cosplayers. The photos were taken with my Galaxy S9. I really wish I had brought a good camera, but ours has its auto-focus half broken, what a shame…

Will you be able to guess who those characters are and what game/manga/comics they are from?

That’s it for today. I hope you enjoyed those photos. More to see in the second part (then third, etc.)!

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