EF Wrap Up

Eurofurence 17 is over *sadface*. I had a great time, with only one major disaster.

Wednesday

The story begins at 04:30 - far too early to be conscious - but the great day had finally arrived. The weeks of preparation and months of stress-induced sleepless nights were at an end.
All my packing was done the night before. I just had to double, triple and quadruple check that I had my case, my bag, CZ, and my tickets and passport. I was good to go! My brother drove me to the station and left me to catch the 06:00 train to Manchester Airport. This was going to be a complicated journey with many changes. After the car ride I took three trains to get to the airport. I boarded my flight at 11:00 and flew to Munich, then boarded a second flight to Hannover. The flights were both OK, although on the second one I was a seat away from some fat woman that didn't cover her mouth when she coughed - that was annoying. At Hannover there was a long wait to collect my bag. I waited and waited... eventually I looked up and everyone else had gone, I was all alone, and they conveyer belt was empty. Uh oh. I was directed to the lost baggage office where I was instructed to fill out a form, given little in the way of apology, and even less in the way of information as to what might have happened or when I might expect my baggage. I left the airport and made my way to the train station, where I had to wait an hour and a half for my train. Standing on the platform for that length of time and wondering about the fate of my bag and my precious fursuit was very stressful, and left me feeling slightly sick. To make things worse, I got confused and missed my train, meaning I had to wait another hour for the next one.
By the time I reached the hotel at Magdeburg I was a bit of a wreck. It was 9pm and I was exhausted from travel and the stress of my missing luggage. I got checked in by a woman that I am going to name Cold Hearted Bitch. I had received my EF card/room, placed it on the counter along with my documents and passport. I told her that I would like to check in, and she said to me "only the card". I hesitated for a moment because the card was right there on the counter... maybe she just hadn't seen it. "Only the card", she said again. I slid the card a centimetre closer to her. "Only the card", she said for the third time. I stood there in utter confusion about what she wanted. After a moment she picked up the card and removed the lanyard from it, and gave me a look like I was an idiotic three year old. Why that was too difficult for her to do in the first place, I don't know. I had been travelling since 4:30am and clearly had no idea what she was talking about, whereas she had probably been checking in people all day and I'm sure I can't have been the first person to hand her a card with the lanyard still attached. After completing the check-in form, I told Cold Hearted Bitch about my lost luggage and was met with overwhelming indifference. She could not care less that my bag was lost, she didn't show a hint of sympathy, didn't offer any form of help, in fact she didn't show the slightest shred of humanity. In fact I don't think she said much more than 'ok' when I told her of my plight. This did very little help my mental state, in fact it made things worse as I was now bitter about her attitude and wondering if this year would be a repeat of the rudeness the people of Magdeburg showed us all last year.
Soon after I was checked in, I was told that Lufthansa had called the hotel: my baggage had been found and was on its way via courier. This was good news indeed and lifted my mood a bit, although I still didn't know what state my bag would be in when it arrived - maybe it got chewed up by the conveyer system and all that would be arriving would be a few shredded remains of my fursuit. They told me it would arrive in three hours, at around midnight. I was exhausted from travel and all I wanted to do was get to bed, but I forced myself to stay awake. My roommate HozzieHozzbourne had met me in the lobby and helped me to check in, then we retired to our room to await the arrival of the bag. At 11pm I got a telephone call from reception... but not the one I had been waiting for. The courier's car had apparently broken down, and my bag would not be arriving until 10am tomorrow. There was nothing that could be done, so I thanked them and went to bed. The room was very hot and sleeping was difficult. I think it was also this day that there were some drunken idiots shouting outside. I think they were British, too. It was quite embarrassing. I think there were several complaints about them, and rightly so.

Thursday

I woke up after a fitful sleep and made my way to the reception for 10am to see if my bag had arrived. It hadn't. This time I was told to check back at 4pm. This was very frustrating as it was starting to cut into my fursuiting time, but again there was nothing I could do about it, so me and Hozzie decided to go to the local supermarket Kaufland to buy some food and supplies. I bought us some bread, salami, cheese and mayonnaise for sandwiches; three boxes of tea (black, green, chai); some snacks; and some china mugs for the tea. We went back to the room and had our lunch (with plenty of jokes about "pre-dinner mayonnaise, it's good for you"). Shortly after lunch I was informed by the hotel that my bag had arrived! Yay! I went to the reception to collect it and was extremely relieved to find it in one piece. I hauled it up to my room and unpacked, then it was time for fursuiting! I put on my fursuit and headed down the the lobby, where I ran into three good friends from last year: Chibi, UV, and Balorkin! I gave Chibi the little metal stick-taur I had made for him as thanks for the doughnut he gave me last year.
There were lots of hugs and photos with all the furs in the lobby, including a pretty little wolf who said she really liked my suit and wanted to draw me, but didn't have her pencils. More on this later...
I wanted to go outside a bit so I walked in my fursuit to the nearby park, with Hozzie taking pictures. The weather was hot and sunny but I have tons of energy so I was running around all over the place and having my picture taken with lots of the locals.
In the evening I went with Hozzie and his brother to a Chinese buffet, where we ate much good food. After a bit of a rest to let it all go down, Thursday night was the fursuit-friendly dance. I put on the LED shirt and halter I had made for this EF, and danced and danced until 3am. Hozzie took loads of video with the camcorder I'd borrowed, so expect to see some of that soon.
The fursuit lounge was excellent, again. There was a big array of fans and ductwork on which to place heads and paws (although slightly too few, there were SO many suits there). Who knew that a whisk stuck in a piece of PVC pipe made the perfect paw-airer? They also provided cans of antibacterial spray, perfect for looking after the suit as it always got absolutely drenched in sweat. There were cold drinks with long straws, and snacks including the sour gummy worms I like. There was also a good array of power fans that you could stand in front of to cool off without having to remove the suit. Removing the suit was something I never did during breaks - I would just use a long straw to take a drink, stand in front of the fan for a bit, and head back to the dancefloor - none of my breaks were more than a few minutes.
As 3am came I left my suit in the fursuit lounge and headed up to bed. Sleeping was difficult again due to the heat (and a certain horse's snoring).

Friday

Friday morning arrived with the promise of a full day's fursuiting, and so that's exactly what I did! Suit suit suit, all day long. I went to the dealer's den to say hello to UV, Balorkin, Tybalt, and everybody else. They were of course all very busy with their commissions so I didn't stay for more than a minute or two, but it was good to see them. It was there however that Balorkin gave me a beautiful gift: one of her signature dog-tags with me drawn on it :D I will post a photo in my gallery, it's so lovely and I was so excited and happy to receive it. I had hoped to make a gift for her and all the folks I met last year... I tried, but I failed :( I think I will keep trying though and if I do get a result then I will post them.
By this time, unfortunately, Hozzie was starting to feel a little unwell with a sore throat. I tried to make him feel better by keeping him supplied with food and his favourite chai tea, and I also took him to Kaufland and the pharmacy to find some medicine (wearing my suit, of course). After a bit of difficulty explaining what was needed, he was given some pear flavour Strepsils. I've never had that flavour but I presume they taste as nasty as the other flavours, and we spent much time making Dr Whooves quotes about "don't let me eat pears, I hate pears!"
On Friday night Hozzie and I met with Balorkin, Tybalt, Nimrais, Andraste, and a couple more whose names I don't recall, and we went to a Greek restaurant. A quick survey of the table revealed that 6 out of the 8 of us were equines, an unusual concentration to find in the fandom, but we do love to herd together. Conversation ranged over a variety of topics, including of course the hot topic of the year: My Little Pony. I'm a huge fan of MLP and Balorkin and Hozzie are also fans. Balorkin's study is in film critiquing, so we had a good discussion about the finer points of brightly coloured ponies. (In swift summary: The stories are good but the lack of worthy male characters is a little troubling.) I had a dish of "rice noodles" (pasta in the shape of large rice grains), lamb and cheese - it was tasty! After dinner we stopped by an ice-cream place, where I had yet another cup of tea.
In the evening we went to the artist's lounge - Balorkin and the rest had commissions to work on, and I tagged along to repair my fursuit electronics. The LEDs are surface mount and have very tiny pads, therefore I had to use very thin wire, and some of it had snapped due to my energetic dancing on Thursday night. The repairs were easy though, and I sat quietly on the floor and soldered while everybody else drew. Once the repairs were complete I added some extra glue to the end of each wire to provide strain relief and keep everything in place.
The artist's lounge was quite noisy and it was getting on my nerves a bit, so I left there and headed to the lobby. I met Blacksnip in the lobby and we had a good long discussion about various points of furrydom. The Bitter Lake movie screening had finished earlier and the movie stars were getting a bit mobbed, so we ruminated on the position of stars in the fandom. The conversation ranged over various subjects such as therians and otherkin, religion vs spirituality, and why we felt an affinity with our chosen animal from both a personal and psychological viewpoint. It was all very civilized, although I could have done with a cup of tea and quieter surroundings. I think it was about 2am by the time the conversation wound down and we decided to call it a night.

Saturday

Another full day of fursuiting! Late morning was the group photograph, followed by the fursuit prarade through town. We thought that the parade was cancelled because it was raining outside, but after about 10 minutes it was un-cancelled and we all set off. It was a bit of a shame because some people had already changed out of their suit by that time. The walk was a lot of fun, and I had my photograph taken with many of the townspeople again. Although I was being spoken to in German and I understand very few words, I did comprehend that one lady was telling me she'd seen us on TV, so I guess the local news had been covering the convention.
The parade took a similar route to last year, around the parks and architectural highlights of Magdeburg. The weather was ok for most of the time (better cool than blazing sunshine!), although it started to rain a bit when we were about half way around. We sheltered under some trees until it had passed, and continued back to the hotel. After lunch and an episode or two of My Little Pony, I went out fursuiting again with Chibi and with Hozzie taking photos. We had a great time wandering through the streets and greeting all kinds of people. At one point we came across an group of teenagers sitting on the grass in the park, we went up to them and one of the girls screamed her lungs out. They were still there when we returned so I sneaked up on her and she screamed again!
In the evening I again went to dinner with Balorkin, Tybalt and co, while Hozzie stayed at the hotel to watch the Pawpet show. We went to the Qilin chinese restaurant which has good food. I had sushi, which was nice but much smaller than I expected - I think I was expecting California rolls (which makes sense since the only place I've really eaten sushi is California). Sushi is so tasty though, with lots of soy sauce and a touch of wasabi.
After dinner the Pawpet show was still only half way through, so the group of us went back to Balorkin and Tybalt's room where they proceeded to get wasted on absinthe, growing progressively louder as the evening continued. Balorkin and I were very civil and drank tea ^.^
Once the Pawpet show ended it was time for the main dance to begin, at around midnight! I got my fursuit on, including my LED shirt and halter, and hit the dance floor. Hozzie joined us there, and good times were had by all. Tybalt especially was enjoying himself due in some part to the large quantities of absinthe he'd consumed ;) He dragged us up onto the stage and we all danced there for a while. They disappeared after a while but I carried on dancing. A couple of hours into the dance I was pounced by a *very* friendly wolf... I wasn't entirely sure who it was, and they had no badge on, but I had a good guess. A break in the fursuit proved my suspicions to be correct: it was Haku, who had pounced me in the lobby on Thursday! We spent the rest of the night dancing very closely together ^.~ By 5am we were tired and exhausted, and decided to call it a night. After one last goodbye cuddle in the lift (surprising a couple of people when the doors opened) we went our separate ways, I had a quick shower and hit the hay. Hot hotel room and snoring roommate be damned, I slept like a log.

Sunday

The final full day, and the final chance for MORE FURSUITING. I got up around 10:30 and suited up just in time for the second unofficial fursuit walk. I met Haku again and we walked around town paw-in-paw, having a lovely time. I spent the whole day suiting again. Sadly Haku had to leave in the afternoon, but before she did she drew a lovely picture of me. She's a good artist and drew it in only a few minutes while we were sitting in the lobby. We hugged and cuddled some more before she had to leave... I wish she could have stayed longer.
On Sunday evening we went to an Italian restaurant - the food wasn't great and the service was extremely slow even though they weren't busy. We had some good discussion though, with Balorkin again kindly translating all the German for me.
Nighttime brought the Dead Dog Dance. I hit the dance floor but only managed to stick it out for an hour or so - it was incredibly hot, and I was exhausted from the week's partying. The fursuit lounge had already been dismantled, and although there was a mini-lounge beside the bar it was packed solid and I didn't much feel like going in there, so I took the suit off and sat in the bar until about 2am. At that time I thought I'd better go to bed, because my train was at 11am and I hadn't even started packing yet.

Monday

Hozzie had to leave at 8am, so he was up early getting ready. I slipped in and out of consciousness while he did his final packing, then we had a goodbye kram and he was gone. I did all my packing and headed down to the lobby at about 9am or so. There I hung out with Chibi and waited for Balorkin to come down so I could say goodbye, but she was too busy packing and I had to leave. EF was over and I was on my way home. Leaving behind all your friends and a place where you had so much fun is difficult, especially if like me you don't actually have any RL friends.
Still, the journey home was uneventful (except at one point the train got packed with Manchester United supporters and I could hardly get off at my stop). I got home, had a snack, and went to bed x.x

Post Con

Now I have to upload some pictures, look at everyone else's pictures and videos, and edit together the video that Hozzie took using my dad's camcorder! I am so happy to have seen all the friends I made last year, and to have made some new ones. I also hope that now EF is over, my sleepless nights will end and I can sleep properly again. It's only been a few days, but so far so good.

Take care, I miss you all.