D.Gray-man Gathering 2009~!!

[Hirotona]

Haha ahh well as long as it doesn't inconvience him?

XD thought so. Hope she enjoys her gift.

[yamaneko]

I'll see if he has any work tomorrow xD; Other than that, we're pretty much all go for tomorrow.

[Hirotona]

Alright sweet! See you downtown tomorrow I hope.

[yamaneko]

So, wait, we're meeting at the convention center? By the fountains / main entrance? Then we'll check out Happy Hollow / Japanese Friendship Garden? I dunno if I can be there particularly "early", though. . .

[Hirotona]

Unless you'd like to meet somewhere else? I figured scoping out the con first would be the most logical start since it's the most likely location we'll be working with ^^;;

And x3;; that should be okay. I'd just prefer it not be past one at the latest, I'll probably want to be home by six or on my way home so I won't miss out on dinner.

[yamaneko]

Yeah, I'll most likely be there sometime between 12 and 1 ^^;; And my dad says he doesn't have work until 5, so he can drive us around. ( Just have to hope he still remembers where Happy Hollow is xD; )

[Hirotona]

Okay great looking forward to it C: See you tomorrow x]

And xD;; probably the only place we'd need to be driven is Happy Hollow, it would be alot more simple to walk everything else.

EDIT: Going to wait for Yame to update her post before adding a new post ^^

[Yuu]

I'll be doing homework tomorrow.

I FINALLY finished my mid-terms and what does my instructor say?
" You must really be looking forward to a relaxing weekend. After all you deserve it. But this is law, and in law not not everyone gets what they deserve.  I'm assigning you four case briefs due Monday!"

..and then. she laughed! The crazy bitch laughed!

Death..the death sentence to her..>:(

Aaanyway have fun and return with lots of awesome pictures.

[yamaneko]

xDD; Well, I'm currently waiting for the pictures to upload now; I'll either update this post or post again if someone posts after me before I can get the pictures. ^^;;

[yamaneko]

Okay, I'm actually gonna double-post V.V FORGIVE MEEEEEEE. . . !!

So, I guess I'll just summarize for yesterday. . . Hiro, you can feel free to add anything you think I missed xDD; I will have a link to all pictures at the end of this post.

We met up at the San Jose convention center where Fanime's held every year, and took pictures of the area I was talking about for this year's gathering. You can see where it is in contrast to other things in picture 2 under San Jose Convention Center (why, yes, I does suck at drawing arrows / writing in MSPaint xP) We took a look around the area and took various shots of the forest-y area and the stairs (which actually don't lead anywhere, but. . .) Due to backlighting, some pictures make the place look darker than it actually was @_@ Oh, and they moved the chess table I was talking about D: I think it'll be back for the convention, though; who knows x3;;

We then went to check out SJSU, since we were close by. Most of the shots taken here were reference for possible, future REBORN! photoshoots. Mostly of the parking garage xD; Though, we did go near the arena, and took some shots from the roof of the taller building. (I saw a random tree in the middle of nowhere and took a picture of it xD; (see picture 1) We went into the garage to take shots for REBORN! and saw this epic-looking ray of light on a flight of stairs o.o It was on the next flight of stairs, too (see pictures 7 and 8 ) Though, we'd have to come when that ray of light is actually there, a.k.a. during the day >.<

The next stop was the Japanese Friendship Garden that Aurxlen mentioned. There were lots of people there @_@ So it was hard to take a lot of clear shots, but, well, you get the point ^^;; I THINK we got most of the points of interest in the place; the bridge, mini-waterfall, the water, the mini-tower / monument thing in the middle of the lake that's really impossible to reach without getting wet (plus it's not allowed) and the Japanese gates (stupid fence behind it >_>) Yeah, all that good stuff xD; We could've climbed over the fence by the mini-waterfall to get closer shots of it, but. . . it wouldn't've been worth it if we got caught ^^;; There was a little temple, too, but there were too many people swarming around it, so we decided to just leave it. . .

Next was the San Jose Buddhists' Temple / Church in Japantown, San Jose. There's a really nice garden next to it (pictures 2-3) and a big temple (picture 1). Unfortunately, the place was locked up for the weekend V.V (although, again, we could've just jumped the wall, but. . .) Just a little taste of giant-temple-ness? ^ - ^ ;;

We went to a few places after that, but none of them were actually as good as we'd hoped they'd be, so no pictures were taken.

Anyways, most of these places (I think the buddhists' church or the friendship garden is the farthest one. . . I know SJSU's pretty close) are within reasonable (?) distance of the convention center; the problem is more with time than distance, I think.

PICTURES!! PICTURES!! PICTURES!! PICTURES!!

San Jose Convention Center
1) [link]
Basic shot of the area
2) [link]
The area in contrast to other places / things
3) [link]
A shot of the forest-y area from the top of the stairs
4) [link]
Another one
5) [link]
A shot of the stairs from ground level
6) [link]
A shot of the forest-y area from ground level

San Jose State University
1) [link]
RANDOM TREE! xDD
2) [link]
The shorter building from the roof of the taller building
3) [link]
The roof of the taller building
4) [link]
Stairs up to the middle area (which, unfortunately, no pictures were taken of V.V)
5) [link]
Campus fountains

San Jose State University: Parking Garage
1) [link]
Ground floor
2) [link]
Stairs to the second floor
3) [link]
A wall on the third floor o.o
4) [link]
Second-to-top / fourth (?) floor
5) [link]
Second-to-top floor taken through a fence from the top floor #1
6) [link]
Second-to-top floor taken through a fence from the top floor #2
7) [link]
THE EPIC RAY OF LIGHT! xD On the second-to-top floor, going up to the top floor
8 ) [link]
ANOTHER EPIC RAY OF LIGHT! On the next set of stairs going down

Japanese Friendship Garden
1) [link]
The front gate of the park (dun like the fence in the background, but we can prolly cover it up. . .)
2) [link]
A sidewall of the gate
3) [link]
A taste of the walkways in the park
4) [link]
The bridge over the pond
5) [link]
The mini-waterfall, taken from pretty far away
6) [link]
Closer now. It's obvious the fence has been gone over before, but. . . wasn't feeling that adventurous? ^^;;
7) [link]
Stone steps over a little river
8 ) [link]
Up the little river
9) [link]
Down the little river
10) [link]
The little mini-temple in the middle of the pond which is impossible to get to without getting wet / is restricted anyways
11) [link]
Another little river, with more light
12) [link]
3 GIANT trees o__o

San Jose Buddhists' Church
1) [link]
A shot from the side of the temple
2) [link]
A shot of the garden from the sidewalk
3) [link]
A shot of the garden from the side of the temple

A link to all the pictures: [link]

[Hirotona]

x3;; I think you covered everything. Didn't know you took a pic of the SJSU fountain till now though.

I'd say to sum it up nothing really works well for D.Gray better then the first area we went to since SJ lacks nice Victorian England settings. Some of the other locations would work awesomely for Reborn and Gintama (I still say that having the Reborn one at night might be an idea worth cosidering).

SJSU would be a about a five-ten minute walk from the con center at most and most everything else would probably have to be car pooled, unless public transport that led to the other locations was found nearby.

[ToshiX]

But don't we need somewhat of a permint or permission to go on the property?
since I know SJSU has summer classes and all and the others not really familiar with?

[Yuu]

But don't we need somewhat of a permint or permission to go on the property?
since I know SJSU has summer classes and all and the others not really familiar with?

Yes. You need my permission because I'm going to be whiny little bitch since I don't get to join you. So your not allowed.

Unless there is some sort of bizarre California state law. You shouldn't need permission just to go on campus. Those are considered public domain.

[ToshiX]

and still people may mistaken the group for loitering or something just doing this for precaution

[Yuu]

and still people may mistaken the group for loitering or something just doing this for precaution

Nah, it's only loitering if your standing around doing nothing, or pacing suspiciously. As long your actively taking part in legal activity, you can't get into any trouble.

[Hirotona]

Hmm.. well that's if we do use that location, and I seriously doubt it would be for this paticular group. But as long as were aren't carrying live steel/weapons and aren't causing a bother I doubt they'd mind/we'd need any sort of special permission. And like Yuu said the campus (and I assume most college campuses are since they always seem to have numerous amounts of non students on the campus as well as students) are open to the public. Unless possibly it was a private/indoor instituation, which is not what we are dealing with with SJSU ^^

[ToshiX]

I guess but I still think we should ask for permission maybe some of the student don;t know what we are doing and tell security or something just want to keep out of trouble

[Hirotona]

Well.. it's good to be on the safe side I suppose.

X3;; I really miss having people post and all, and I've hardly seen Yame around either orz ==;; It's tempting to jump into that Bleach discussion I see in the Bleach thread but xD;; it would seem random and I'm not sure if I'm doing Syazel yet anyway : P I am considering it though, espically since it's my friend Iya's favorite Bleach character (besides Mayuri) and this will be her first con and I want her to enjoy it as much as possible.

[yamaneko]

. . . why is it that ONLY when my internet BREAKS DOWN do people post?? DDx

As for SJSU, if we used the parking lot, we'd be on the upper floors, where NO ONE goes D: Why park on the top floors if you can just park on the ground floor? Besides, no one really looks up from the ground floor, either, so chances are that no one would even SEE us there at all.

[Hirotona]

XD you can't even see if you did look up though. And since the con weekend is the graduation weekend alot of people wouldn't be there anyway.

And D: well I hope it works well soon! x3;; I miss chatting with my awesome cosplay pal C: