My First WisCon

[oyceter]

This was my first WisCon and my second con in general.

Madison, WI

(prepare to throw eggs)

I was rather dubious about going to Madison, which was helped by people asking me where I was going and raising an eyebrow when I said, "Wisconsin." A large part of this is my nidginess about the Midwest; I expect to feel very Asian and very foreign.

I did feel very Asian and very foreign on the shuttle ride to the hotel. The landscape was green and leafy, the houses were of wood or brick, and everything looked very Norman Rockwell.

But then, after people showed me around State St. a little, I fell immediately in love with Madison. I love that it has East African, Nepalese, Mexican and Indian restaurants in the space of four blocks. I love the farmers' market. I love A Room of One's Own, the indie feminist bookstore that I went to a few hours before my flight. I don't know if I get the impression that the town is liberal and multi-cultural because WisCon landed there or what, but I loved it. Granted, it wasn't that multi-cultural in terms of people of other races.

I keep talking about the feel of cities, and Madison feels fun and intimate but not "traditionally American," whatever that means. I would move there, except for the whole snow thing.

coffeeandink laughed when I was surprised by the greenery.

I'm from California. Things aren't supposed to be that green unless it's winter.

Race and ethnicity

I counted about 15 Asians (around 2 Southeast Asians and 13 East Asians) and about 6 black people. I was pleasantly surprised, given my experience at Norwescon, in which I was one of maybe three Asians. All the same, that's about 2% minorities at the con, which I found somewhat ironic, especially when the first Carl Brandon awards were given out.

I kept apologizing to everyone when I upped the Asian or the black count. I do feel bad counting, but on the other hand, I felt so very, very Asian when I was people-watching while registering that each additional minority spotted was a relief.

I think I met nearly all the Asians at the con.

Gender

Given that I've only been at one other con before, this is not a good comparison by any means.

WisCon felt much more female than Norwescon, by far.

Obviously, this is partly because it is a feminist con.

But I still like it, and it made me feel safe and comfortable.

Common ground (lack of)

I felt incredibly uneducated during the panels. I haven't read Joanna Russ or James Tiptree, Jr. I haven't read most of the things that the previous Guests of Honor have written, including but not limited to Samuel R. Delaney, Carol Emshillwer, Suzy McKee Charnas, Pamela Sargent, and etc. I was extremely embarrassed and felt rather unqualified to be there.

I also felt rather out of place during the parties; it seems as though half the people at the con were writers or aspiring writers, or people in the publishing business. I am not a writer, nor am I an aspiring writer, nor am I in the publishing business. I contemplated it once, but I decided it wasn't actually my life's dream.

Fans and pros

The line between fans and pros is thinner than I had thought. I do realize that authors aren't people that have descended from the sky, but on the other hand, I am still nervous when approaching people who've been published.

My knees were shaking when I met Justine Larbalestier and Scott Westerfeld, and I was very scared that everyone could see them shaking, given how short my skirt was.

I never really thought of SF/Fantasy as a fandom prior to this; my definition of "fandom" has usually been contained to media fandom and encompasses episode analysis, fan fiction and fanvids. But it is, and it's a small community.

Fooding

Fooding at the con was excellent. I had Nepalese and East African and Indian and a ton of ice cream. The Nepalese was somewhat like Chinese food (the bread-y skin of the momocha) and vaguely Indian with regard the the spices. The East African was vaguely Ethiopian, though jinian and I got a spicy lentil stew type thing and peanut chicken stew, both of which were delicious. It was served on injera. And we also had fried plantains, which just rock. I also had fresh bread, fresh scones and homemade preserves thanks to aforementioned farmers' market.

The only thing I missed was fruit.

Social life

I was actually social with people, albeit with much nervousness. I generally clung to coffeeandink, yhlee, rushthatspeaks, and heresluck, though I met a ton of LJ people. Despite knowing that people have my journal friended, I was perpetually surprised when people mentioned that they actually read the thing.

"Adjust," said heresluck. I attempted to, but probably never quite lost the deer-in-headlights look as I desperately tried to recall if I had written anything very dumb in the past few weeks.

I identified bluepencil by her icon from across the room.

This is probably my own paranoia and insecurity speaking, but there were definitely times when I felt like everyone knew everyone else and that I was the sole outsider, gasp!

This was, of course, quite silly, and everyone was extremely nice and approachable. And I even randomly talked to people on the shuttle on the way to the airport on Monday!

Organization

The con was beautifully organized, with the programmers realizing that people would like breaks between the panels and breaks for food. At times, the panels drifted off topic, and there were some that I was extremely frustrated by, but I enjoyed the programming much more than the programming at Norwescon.

This was probably a given, since nearly every single panel I went to discussed feminism (duh), but also issues of race, ethnicity, and class.

Comments

[hysteriachan.livejournal.com]

Despite having been at a con of my own all weekend, I'm more than a little envious of the WisCon experience. It sounds like a really good time. ^_^

[oyceter]

It was awesome!