Planning for the Japan preliminary rounds have begun. This year there will be a 3 rounds, one in Kansai(Osaka) Chubu(Nagoya) and Kanto(Tokyo). The Osaka round will be the first up and is take place next month on April 1st. Entries are being accepted through the Japanese version of the WCS homepage and 15 teams of 2 members will be the maximum limit. This year the event will be a colaborative effort with "Layered" an organization that plans strictly cosplayer events around Japan. The events in Japan always have a different flavor and this year again we can look forward to some impressive performances and costumes!

You may have noticed in the "News" section on the WCS top page that Denmark will be joining the World Cosplay Summit. There has been talk of the possibilities of countries in Europe and South America joining in 2007 and it is great that we will have representation from Scandinavia this year! Who knows, there may be other participating nations announced in the near future, I will post more information about Denmark, its preliminary competition and cosplay in Denmark when I find out. Perhaps those who are in Europe know Danish cosplayers or have been to an event in Denmark, if so please leave a comment!

One of the team members from Sinagapore last year at WCS 2006 - Ferlyn - came to Japan for a visit and we had a chance to meet and catch up. She spent about a week in total and the first few days were spent touring around Tokyo. She met up with Ai and Sakuya, both of whom were members of 2 of the Japan teams at the event last year. They visited a number of places but the highlight was their trip to Disney Land.

The night before she came out to Nagoya we all had a little scare as she had difficulty catching her bus because she couldn't get her suitcase up the stairs and somehow noone was willing to help. You could imagine how something like that can happen in a foreign country and she ended up going to the police who were about to call the Sigaporean Embassy before the Aichi TV staff intervened and sorted thinks out. Quick work there Kato-san!

Thank goodness Ferlyn got here alright. She had a busy day with a number of stops that included shopping, a top class spa facility and a visit to Meiji Mura. (picture included) It was really good seeing her and sharing stories.

One of her main reasons for coming to Japan was to finalize plans for a year of study she is starting in early summer. She checked out the school facilities, residence and got a general idea of what she could expect when she is back for her extended stay.

It is great to see participants or "alumni" of the World Cosplay Summit event taking advantage of the oppertunity to participate in the event. Ferlyn has been very active in the last few months and opened the first Maid Cafe ever in Singapore. While she is in Japan brushing up her already proficient Japanese her family will help maintain operations of the restaurant. We are all looking forward to see what the future holds for Ferlyn!

I attached 3 pictures that I took during her stay. The first was taken by her of TVA staff "Iwan" and her WCS 2006 team Singapore teammate "Julia". There is a picture of Ferlyn at Meiji Mura wearing Meiji period clothes and finally there is a shot of her at TVA headquarters as she holds her Cosmode magazine tight.

It is just about Sakura season here in Japan, I saw the buds on some cherry trees lining the street just beginning to flower. As long as the weather holds up this weekend the parks will be filled with happy revelers enjoying the spectacular view of the cherry blossoms. With the coming of spring the World Cosplay Summit event too will begin to heat up reaching its peak in the stifling heat of August.

I wanted to take the oppertunity to ask a couple of questions to everyone. In the past years we have had performances at WCS events in Japan. In 2005 Uchu Sentai NOIZ and Hironobu Kageyama (Singer of the Dragon Ball Z theme song) performed on stage. In 2006 Hiroshi Kitadani sang and at the preliminary round in Mexico Hironobu Kageyama made the trip to be a part of the show. My first question is "Who would you like to see perform at a WCS preliminary event near you or at the finals in Japan?

My second question is more blog related, we have been getting a lot of spam recently on the blog and I was wondering what you thought about having to write a special security code to prevent spam when writing a comment?

Looking forward to your response!