Kawaii Kon
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Kawaii Kon | |
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| Location | Ala Moana Honolulu, Hawaii |
| Years in existence | 2005 - present |
| Attendance | 2,610 in 2006 |
| List of events | Video rooms, AMV contest, costume contest, artist's alley, dealer's room, videogaming, panels and workshops |
| Official Website | |
Kawaii Kon is an anime convention geared towards Japanese animation and comics held in the Honolulu area.
Kawaii-Kon was formed and is organized by three chairmen, one a Hawaii native himself, who were at the time based out of Atlanta, Georgia. As for why they brought an anime convention to Hawaii, taken from the website: "Being a transplanted local boy living far away from home for a better part of a decade or more, I'm very proud to be hosting this show in my home state. You ask why? A number of reasons but to simply state it.... I love anime!"
Local support for the convention by fans, who had recently had no such 3-day event like many places in the continental US, made for a surprising first year attendance that surpassed the staff's expectations.
Kawaii-Kon as an event holds many of the usual staples found in other western anime convention, including video screenings, panels, anime music videos, video games, art show, costumes, and others.
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[edit] History
[edit] Kawaii Kon 2005
The first Kawaii Kon, and also the first anime convention ever to be held in Hawaii, was on April 22-24, 2005 at the Ala Moana Hotel. Due in part to relatively low pre-registration numbers, organizers were somewhat unprepared to handle the large numbers of people that attended, at times even being forced to deny entry to avoid violating room occupancy limits. Despite the overwheming crowds, the convention was a success, with a total paid 1,903 people attending. (First-year anime conventions rarely exceed 1,000 attendees.)
[edit] Kawaii Kon 2006
This was the second Kawaii Kon at the Ala Moana Hotel. Held on April 14-16, 2006, guests of honor included singer Yoko Ishida, local comic artist Stan Sakai (creator of Usagi Yojimbo), manga artist Jin Kobayashi (creator of School Rumble), and voice actors Jennifer Sekiguchi (who also appeared at the 2005 event) and Vic Mignogna. See website for details.
The convention significantly expanded in terms of both size and attendance from the previous year, increasing to 2,610 paid attendees across all three days.
[edit] Kawaii Kon 2007
The third Kawaii Kon is currently scheduled for April 27-29, 2007, and will be held at the Hawaii Convention Center. A list of guests of honor is on the convention website. List
