Sorry for the lack of pictures from here on. Jim pretty much did his own thing for the rest of our time in Paris, so there's not many more pictures of us. Paul Elliott took lots of pictures at MM events, though, so I'll at least have something to work with for those...
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After arriving at the con center, we paid the taxi driver (way too much actually, but what can you do...) and made our way into the convention grounds...but there was a problem. That big tunnel that led to the con center, which I talked about in my post for the day of the concert? Yeah, turned out that tunnel was gated off in the middle of the night...and thus began the process of figuring out a different way in >.>
Other fans had been tweeting about lining up inside the convention grounds, so we knew they had to be getting in somehow.
We looked around for a bit to see if there was another entrance, but it looked as if the entire train station was blocked off from any kind of entry. Ended up running into a few people who had the same idea...this included another guy from the US (who I, for some reason, thought was from Bolivia until recently? I don't even know...), two people who spoke Spanish and a little English (and therefore talked mostly to Carlos - maybe they were from Bolivia and I got confused :P), and one other guy who seemed to end up near us all the time but I never really figured out who he was lol
There was a tall concrete fence that ran off in either direction on each side of the train station...we weren't sure what was on the other side, but it seemed getting over that was the only option we had at the moment. To the left of the entrances for the train station, the roof of the train station was really low to the ground and led up to the top of the fence...so somebody (I want to say Ed?) went and scoped that out...but the drop from the wall was much too far for Carlos to make with his knee like it was, so we began the search again.
Eventually we found an open gate on the other side of the train station entrance that led to the other side of the fence...which brought us to the train platform where people got on/off for this station. On the other side of the tracks there was a set of stairs down into the train station itself (and therefore to the con center), but there were cameras EVERYWHERE, and we definitely didn't want to be recorded crossing railroad tracks in the middle of the night haha
And thus, we dug around some more and decided after a while that we might as well just camp out by the entrance to the long tunnel and wait until the gate was opened in the morning (the guy from the US and two Spanish-speaking folks ended up going off somewhere else, we found out later they just crossed the railroad tracks lol...the random guy stayed with us for a bit but eventually left to do the same thing).
The tunnel itself was actually underground, so there were two sets of stairs leading down to a little sunken area with an overhang next to the tunnel entrance that, as I said, had a gate over it at that time. So...we got out our towel, laid down and used our bookbags as pillows to sleep under the overhang for the night.
BUT...within a few minutes we heard footsteps from within the tunnel and a completely random Japanese dude walked up to the gate. We all looked at him, then he said to us..."Morning Musume?". We all went "Yeah..." and he said "OK!" with a big thumbs up and a smile. Then he YANKED the gate up hahaha, and motioned us through. We all kind of looked at each other surprisedly, shrugged and waltzed on in. The Japanese guy (who was actually kind of a cool-looking guy, definitely not nerdy enough to be a MM fan) walked over to the other side of the gate, closed it for us and gave us another 'good luck' thumbs up before walking away from the train station. We all thanked him and went on our way.
I asked Carlos if he knew the guy (since he's friends with so many Japanese fans), but he said he had no idea who that was hahaha...definitely one of the strangest things that happened the entire trip O.o
Inside the con center grounds, it was pitch black EVERYWHERE haha...the place is seriously abandoned at night. Finding the line of MM fans took a little bit, as they were up near the entrances to the con center itself, past where all the con-goers would line up in the morning (lining up at this time, obviously they were at the front of the line :P). Eventually we found them haha, maybe 30 or 40 fans lined up in a row of barricades set up to guide lines right next to an entrance to the con center...one group at the front had actually grabbed a big Japan Expo sign, laid it across the barricades and camped out under that (it was supposed to rain the next day...). They removed it in the morning before Expo staff showed up (or at least it was gone when I woke up the next morning).
We hopped in, got our place in line and set up for the night :P
I think it was maybe 2:30AM at this point...I went ahead and tried to get some sleep, basically just rested my eyes until maybe 5AM or 6AM. When I "woke up" the line had easily doubled, and a member of con staff was talking to some of the French fans near the front of the line. Seemed liked there could possibly be problem (100+ people breaking into the con center in the middle of the night and making their own line? Sounds like potential trouble to me...)...but eventually he walked away and it seemed like he wouldn't do anything. We asked one of the French fans, who told us that the guy said we definitely weren't supposed to do this...but since some of us had lined up since like 1AM he'd let it slide. Again, people being way way nicer than they needed to be ;_______;
And, as always, thus began more waiting. Pretty much smooth sailing, other lines started filling up and vendors, etc started making their way into the con center. Then, suddenly, at 9AM it started POURING rain. Everyone in our line ran over and got under the tiny overhang over the con center entrance nearest us...security opened up the doors and let us crowd into the entryways but not the actual con center itself. To say it was cramped would be an understatement haha, and everyone was a little a little wet (some soaked)...so it got VERY hot very fast, and smelled pretty much like a big wet dog -___-
Security eventually created a barrier inside the con center on the other side of the doors and let us inside so we didn't have to just roast in the entryway. Luckily we ended up pretty close to the front, but it was still pretty worrying to see piles and piles of people, all of whom could easily line up for the MM sign session tickets, walk right past...
Soon more people started piling in the entryway...I don't think they realized this was technically the "Morning Musume line", but at this point I suppose it didn't matter. These people were VERY loud, yelling and cheering and whatnot...obviously they were excited to be at Japan Expo but we were all on edge about being let in to line up for sign session tickets >.<
After a good while, con staff showed up with their ticket scanners and started prepping to let us all in. Once security gave us the go ahead, everybody flew past the barricades, got their tickets scanned and RAN. Anybody who knows me is aware that I'm not a very athletic person...definitely not built for running to say the least, but for a good two or three minutes here I ran with every last bit of energy I had within me. I remember, at one point, seeing Steve and another guy I kind of knew up ahead and just pushing forward...my body said no, but I had my eyes set on that ticket, and eventually I passed them. Steve pretty well kept up, actually...and about 2/3 of the way to the ticket booth I could feel my pace slacking off and just forced myself to run even faster...I had no option but to keep going. Finally we reached the ticket booth and hopped in line, maybe 20-30 people from the front...not bad, considering there were a good hundred others trying for the same thing. Steve and I ended up standing together, actually...I felt fairly safe believing we were likely to get tickets.
Of course, my body immediately started paying me back for what just happened, I kind of half-coughed for a couple minutes trying to recover. I hadn't pushed myself so hard (or gotten any exercise at all, really >.>) in a decade or more, at least...
After no more than a minute or two in line, the bad news hit...all the tickets were gone. After exhibitors, vendors, people with early entrance tickets etc who had lined up before us, there were only 3 tickets left. Lots of people who had lined up were REALLY upset, for good reason I suppose...but I knew this was a possibility, shrugged it off and made my way over to get a good spot watching the sign session...
Continued in the next post~
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