On November 14th - 16th, 2003, those cats at HobbyStar held the Montreal Comic Book/Sci Fi/Anime Expo. It promised to be a smaller, Frencher version of the Canadian National Expo held in Toronto every summer. Several people who often hit the Toronto convention scene planned to go, and so somehow I was brought along too. I had never been to Montreal, and so I knew that going there would prove to be an adventure in more ways than one.

The adventure started even before I got there. I traveled with my good friend Rin, who originally hails from Montreal. Rin's probably reading this. Hi Rin. Word up, sistah! We left Toronto via bus at 5:30 p.m. on Friday, missing the first day of the convention due to the annoying commitment known as school. I had never been on a bus ride of this magnitude before, so that in itself was an adventure. Here's the real kicker, though. We should have arrived in Montreal at around midnight, but the fates were conspiring against us. The roads were completely coated in a thin layer of ice, causing accidents up ahead and bringing traffic to a stop for over 2 hours. That's two hours in a bus that did not move an inch. I whipped out the GameBoy and played Street Fighter 2, and for the first time in my 10 years of playing the game, I actually broke all of the barrels in the 3rd bonus round using Ryu. I rock. We finally arrived in Montreal at about 3 a.m., and preceded to wait for our pickup. Outside. In the cold.

We're off to a rollicking start here, folks!

Saturday - A Sick Ninja's Cheesy Quests.

After a visit with Rin's crazy family, we were off to the convention, taking place in a strange, fruity coloured structure known as the "Palais des Congres". Now, far be it for me to judge, but right off the bat I'm given the sense that Montreal is a little weird. That's not the only sense I'm feeling, however, as I began to be overcome with a sore throat and cold-like symptoms. Ugh, it's going to be a tough weekend. Time to switch to convention mode!

We hit the dealers' room first. It was pretty small, much smaller than a Toronto con, but there were some gems there if you were willing to look. Some of the prices were outrageous, but there were a few tables offering DVDs and the like at better prices than I've typically seen. I picked myself up a copy of "Mazinkaiser" Vol 2, a new version of Go Nagai's revolutionary giant robot series, Mazinger Z. I got a great deal on it, but things didn't quite go my way, as I searched everywhere for the first volume only to find that it had sold out the day before. So now I've got the second part of this great anime that I can't watch until I've seen the first part.

While walking around randomly, I saw a number of Star Wars costumes, which are always cool. I recognized several of the dealers as also being regulars at the Toronto conventions, and as I walked around the room, I got the feeling that several of these dealers recognized me. Honestly, there was something in the eyes of some of these people that told me "What the hell are you doing in Montreal?" Call it paranoia, or the cold starting to affect my brain, but I swear this was what it was like. I also met up with a guy that I met at TransformersCon in Burlington, Ontario, last spring. He was involved with that show and we talked about the next one coming up.

There were a few anime cosplayers, but not many. Several of the Toronto convention people who made the trip there had officially christened this convention as "Ghetto con", which became a running gag throughout the weekend. Why Ghetto con, you ask? Well, probably because nothing special really happened and there wasn't really a whole lot of anything to do. It really was a much more "ghetto" version of a typical convention. The word on "Ghetto Con" got out pretty quickly too.

Vancouver voice actors Kirby Morrow, Brad Swaile, and Scott McNeil were amoung the guests at this convention. During an impromptu chat session with fans, I went over to Scott and said "Hey, I know you!", and he said "I know you! I was wondering when you were going to show up!", so I said "You're that guy everyone likes!". Everyone laughed. He shook my hand in a behind the back fashion.

As the show started to wind down, several of us assorted fans, some from Toronto, some local residents, gathered to sit and talk in some sort of lobby. It was here that I saw this horrid display of bizarre opulence. This so-called lobby was "decorated" by these massive bright pink organic-looking sculptures. They looked like giant pink veins, and there were lots of them. They were so strange that I had no choice but to take a photograph to document the weirdness firsthand. However, soon after the picture was snapped, our group was told that photos were not allowed. Why not? What are they trying to hide? Well I don't care if they don't like it, because the truth needs to be seen by the world! What are these strange pink monstrosities? Alien incubation chambers? Cloning vats? Some sort of mutated carnivorous plants? What? One thing is for certain: Good God, they are ugly!

It didn't stop there, either. We continued to sit and chat until someone else involved with the building came over to talk to us. It looked like we were in trouble, so he was told that we were just about to leave before he could say anything. He said that it didn't matter if we stay or go, but that we are not allowed to sit. That's right, no sitting allowed! One of the dealers was walking by and overheard this, and he was pretty upset by that, but they told him that, since this is a government building, it was an "image" thing. Yes, a building covered with annoying multi-coloured windows housing a system of giant pink veins is worried about how people sitting is going to tarnish their image. Come on, this is a convention. People want to sit and read their comics and talk with their friends. This just ain't right.

We left and walked around Montreal for awhile in the cold November air, looking for places to stop and eat. I got to see some of the sites and, in all its weirdness, it is indeed a beautiful city from what I saw. There was a big church and some shiny lights, and, uh, that's about all I can remember right now.

The Peel Pub wound up being my destination. My compatriots and I arrived shortly before things really started to pick up, and it got really, really busy. Now, comics and anime and the whole convention experience is all well and good, but their was one main reason why I decided to make the trip to Montreal. I was very tired and sick, as the effects of my cold had been worsening throughout the day, but nothing was going to stop me from achieving what I wanted this night.

POUTINE.

Fries. Cheese. Gravy. A winning combination if there ever was one. I needed it, and I wasn't going to be denied. While this particular plate was a bit cold and my condition at the time prevented me from enjoying it all, I can still be happy enough to say that I have eaten real poutine in Montreal.

Sunday - Voice Actors from a Distant Past

While walking around the dealers' room early in the day, our group once again ran into Scott McNeil. His fan club presented him with a brand new shirt, which he draped onto Rin's ever-present Mini-Scott, making it look quite gothic. During our conversation Scott went into this hilarious little tirade on modern art, refering of course to this absurd looking building we were in.

Since I still couldn't find Mazinkaiser Vol 1 , I was determined to leaanywhereve with some other hardcore giant robot action, so I picked up the Shin Getter Robo complete box set, another of Go Nagai's revamped Super Robot shows. It has lots of destruction, so I was quite pleased to walk away with that. Other than that, nothing really happened. Which was perfectly fine by me, because my head was spinning and I really needed to sit down.

We went and got a front row seat for the voice actors' discussion panel. While waiting for the action to start, our group talked with these two kids, Mike and Emily, who were really enjoying being at the convention. Mike was dressed as Kaiba from Yu Gi Oh and Emily was dressed as Sakura from Cardcaptors. Their mom, who was sitting behind them, had made their costumes and did a great job.

The panel was really great. Easily one of the best voice actors' panels I had ever seen. Really made the trip worthwhile. There was none of the pandering to the yaoi fangirls that dominated other panels in the past. There were actually some really interesting questions asked and great responses. Some of the funnier quotes were:

"I'd be a super hero in loose-fitting, comfortable clothes." - Scott, when asked that if he were a super hero, which super hero he would most want to be.

"I have visions of you in the bathtub saving G.I. Joes.... I don't really have visions of him in the bathtub." - Kirby, referring to Brad's answer of Aquaman to the same question

"I'd live off a nice lean diet of Santa's elves." - Scott, when asked why he'd prefer to live in the North Pole

"42." - Scott, when asked the answer to the meaning of Life, the Universe and Everything.

"Yes honey, I'm wrong.. you were right." - Kirby, when asked the answer to the meaning of Life, the Universe and Everything.

"I had this turtle named Humphrey..." - Scott, making up a story about pets.

"Je suis un grand pamplemouse!" - Brad, when asked if he'd learned any french while in Montreal (It means "I'm a big grapefruit!").

"Arrete manger moi... or don't." - Line request for Scott, which had been a running gag amongst the Toronto fans for most of the weekend.

"And we can all go nuts in a booth.." - Brad's detailed description of voice acting.

"No more Dinobot, no more paycheck?" - Scott recalling his reaction to one of his characters' deaths in Beast Wars.

"You'll have to ask my wife about that." - Scott responding to a question asking if he was gay that someone was put up to asking.

I asked them what they did when they had to go to work and they were sick. They said that they went to work anyway. Pretty similar to my philosophy on convention-going.

The panel was supposed to end at 5 p.m., but, of course, things ran a little bit longer as convention events tend to do. The problem was that the convention people had booked the voice actors' flights home back to Vancouver for 5:30 p.m., and since it took a half hour to get to the airport from the convention building, that was a huge blunder. Even if things were running exactly on schedule, it wouldn't have worked out. They had no chance of making their own flight!

There were some lengthy goodbyes. Scott wanted to shake my hand, but I politely declined due to my cold, and knocked fists with him instead. "Unclean! Unclean!" he exclaimed. He said that he still wasn't used to me not having hair anymore. Well, I suppose it was pretty distinctive back in the day.

As things were winding down, there was a discussion going on comparing Hobbystar's conventions like this one to Anime North. Anime North was the clear winner, and the conclusion was that there just needs to be more fun stuff to do at these things.

I was interviewed by a guy who was recording a radio documentary about super heroes. He asked who my favourite super heroes were. Who else but the Ninja Turtles? I recounted my story of how I became a fan for life when I first heard the name advertising the first episode right before it aired. I think I was pretty entertaining, if I do say so myself, and I'm curious as to what will come of it.

And so ended the convention. After a nice home cooked meal with Rin's family, I was on my way back to Toronto, where I arrived in the rain at 3 a.m. Monday morning, sick out of my mind.

I drew this on the trip to Montreal based on a previous conversation with Rin that I don't remember having.

Conclusion

I had a class that morning at 8:30, and I was thinking that I'd just stay downtown until then. I sat down and began to write a few notes detailing the events of the weekend, which I have consulted for this report. Eventually I realized how stupid it was for me to stay there. So as soon as the public transit started running for the day, I was on my way back to Ninja HQ, where I crashed immediately. I woke up 13 hours later. I wasn't even medicated and I slept for 13 freakin' hours. I felt the dizzying effects of this cold for several days afterward.

But that's ok. Even though the convention itself wasn't all it was cracked up to be, I'm really glad that I went. I got to spend time with some great people, and the few good moments of the show made it worthwhile.

But most of all, I was in a, shall we say, interesting city with a lot of, shall we say, strange quirks. Something about Montreal just seemed really weird to a Toronto ninja like me, and that's part of what made it fun. I can now actually say that I've been there, thus now I have this story to tell. And that, my friends, is worth its weight in cheese and gravy.

Sayonara