Otaku wait 25+ Days Outdoors in Taiwan for Rie Kugimiya
Rie Kugimiya fanatics have been waiting for over 25 days for the idol to make her appearance in Taiwan for the first time ever. For what you may ask? Well they are waiting to get her autograph at the exhibition which will be happing in Taiwan, the International book exhibition. The autograph’s which will be on a ceramic plate’s were sold online; but all the plates were sold in about 30 seconds online when 80,000 order attempts occurred, which almost also crashed the server. Now desperate fans who want to get Rie Kugimiya autograph are already in line almost 1 month early to be the first ones there. With less then 100 autographs for all competition will be fierce.
Three fans in line, who identified themselves as “Pony,” “Zi Yu” (literally “violet melancholy”), and “Fire Inamitsu,” agreed to be interviewed by ANN. All three came from the Taipei area, although there is another fan who is driving back and forth from 367 kilometers (229 miles) away to take shifts in the line. Pony has been in line since January 3, but there were actually people in line before he arrived. Due to the authorities’ discouraging of overnight lines, the fans in line have been looking for different sleeping spots to avoid security patrols.
Pony and Fire were introduced to Kugimiya’s work via Zero no Tsukaima (Fire has the autographs of the light novels’ creators Noboru Yamaguchi and Eiji Usatsuka), while Zi Yu’s part-time co-worker showed him Shana one day. Zi Yu said that he spent more than NT$220,000 (US$6,929) on Kugimiya merchandise in the first year he starting collecting, and he has now been a collector for three years. Fire acknowledged having all the Zero no Tsukaima novels, manga, anime, and Louise figures, while Zi Yu has every single Shana mug, the title character’s uniforms and casual wear, and life-sized pillows. Pony collected the limited-edition Shana bed sheets and Kugimiya’s moe bubble-wrap-popping keychain (“The tsundere version of course!”).
How far would you go to get your favorite stars autograph?
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