I'm back from Norway! (Patreon)

This was a whirlwind trip! Since Josh works at a school now, he can't take time off as liberally, so my parents accompanied me to Norway for my appearance at BanzaiCon in Larvik. We came about a week early so we could do a little tourist-ing and meet up with some local cosplay friends for a location photoshoot!

We started off by traveling north to Tromsø, a city known for being a great place to see the famous Aurora Borealis, also known as the Northern Lights. It was such a charming town, and we did end up being able to see the lights thanks to our tireless guide Johann, who drove my family and one other family around the coast for hours trying to find an area where the cloud cover was clear. Apparently the lights have a bit of an ebb and flow over the years, and we happen to be in a low point this year, so it was honestly very lucky that we were able to see as much of them as we did! Interestingly, the lights don't appear vibrantly green to the naked eye (at least, not the ones we saw!) but the color shows up brilliantly when you take a long-exposure photo.

After Tromsø, we went back to Oslo for a few days to see friends and meet up with Starbit Cosplay (Ida), Woodsmoke and Words (Tilda), and Maker and Muse (Imogen) for a Witcher photoshoot and some sorely-needed in-person hangouts! As awesome as it is to have friends all over the world, I do wish I could just... sit around and hang out with them more often. It was my first time meeting Tilda in person and they were an absolute delight, and I'd seen Ida and Imogen in person only a few times, so we had fun talking cosplay community news and discussing TikTok and making Mean Girls jokes. (That whole group is doing amazing things in the ACOTAR fandom with their Starfall Court project — make sure to check it out if you haven't yet!)

Finally, it was time to head south to Larvik for the convention itself! BanzaiCon is one of Norway's main conventions, despite having under 1,000 attendees. The local cosplay community is small but passionate, and attending Banzai made that passion totally unmistakeable! The closing ceremony got me completely choked up — it's so clear that this convention feels like home to its attendees, and the level of effort and love that went into every single piece of this con was completely mindblowing.

I wish American conventions would look to cons like this for ideas on how to make their events more participatory, more rewarding, and more community-oriented. They had a photo studio where cosplayers could pay to shoot with a professional photographer and get on-demand prints of their photos; the opening and closing ceremonies featured live dancing, singing, and staged fandom performances that took weeks of rehearsals to prepare; they had contests not just for cosplay, but for gaming and AMVs and all kinds of things... I was amazed at everything this little con was able to achieve!

I also had the absolute pleasure of judging the Masters Craftsmanship cosplay competition alongside Tilda and Hermannen, the winner of which would go on to represent Norway in the Nordic Cosplay Championship. To be totally honest, normally I don't love judging cosplay contests, even though I do it at almost every convention I guest at. It can be frustrating to have to hand down a judgment that matters so much to so many when cons often fail to provide enough information or enough organization for judges to truly feel like they're fully informed. But once again, Banzai blew me away with their preparation and dedication, and the participants turned OUT.

Every entrant did an amazing job, but Sahara Sara Cosplay's Eowyn, which we chose as the first place winner, was legitimately one of the most impressive costume builds I've ever had the privilege of seeing. We spent the morning of pre-judging turning up people's hems and examining fit and asking after techniques, and no matter how deep we dug into Sara's work, we couldn't find a single thing that could be called a flaw. She went above and beyond on every single aspect of this costume, from handcrafting her own metal chainmail (something the original film didn't even do! they used plastic) to tooling every strap and belt, even pieces that were concealed by other costume elements, to creating fine worbla rivet details on the inside of the helmet where nobody but we judges were ever likely to see!

Then it was time for the long journey home! I collapsed into bed as soon as I got back and now I'm trying to shake the last of the jet lag and get myself back to reality for all the things I need to do this month. All in all, an exhausting but SO rewarding trip!