June 21st, 2026
Back in January, an Osaka comic con fell on the 25th birthday of Felney. Today, another Osaka comic con happens to fall on the 42nd birthday of ...ME! This is Naniwa BL Shimonogatari, a very small convention that I'd never heard of before, it was mentioned on a piece of furii peipaa that I picked up at Kansai Comitia 76, so I decided to give it a look-in.
I planned to get up at 6, to go over the post office and get packages that were waiting there for me (yeah, post offices in Japan open on Sunday, Imagine that happening in England). So two alarms went off at 6, I hit what I thought was "snooze", but due to muscle memory was "stop".
Then I blinked.
Then it was 8:59
My girlfriend had booked the day off work, and boy was it a mighty struggle getting her to agree to meet up with me, after I vaguely mentioned the existence of a comic event happening on the same day. We'd ended up making prior arrangements to meet up in Umeda at 12:00. What's the first thing I see on LINE? A message saying she'll be at my house at 11:30.
Anyway, with that rearranged, and the package-picking-up knocked on the head, I hastily got ready, hoping to still make it for the opening of the event. At 10:40-ish I left home, got the nice empty train and settled in for a quiet write of the html, on my old phone where the hardware keyboard just works, and can be set to Romaji mode with a quick tap of shift+space. Except no, somehow CX File Explorer got updated (read: fucked up), and now is just as shitty and failed as it is on my new phone, so that was a waste of time. I had to use it in UK keyboard mode, with all the brackets and quotes for HTML writing in the wrong fucking places.
The Loop Line train got into Kyobashi, and I suddenly had a thought, that maybe the con would be nearer Kitashinchi or Shin-Fukushima station, and so I should change trains there. Only, what with balancing two phones and a mini-keyboard on my lap, I couldn't Google Maps it in time. Oh if only I could type properly on my usual phone, with the sim card in it, eh? Oh if only shit JUST FUCKING WORKED, eh? Nah, we're in CX File Explorer's world now, we do shit their way. (try another? Nah, all the other file explorers are even worse - like "20-second-long-video-ads-before-you-can-open-a-file" worse). Anyway, luckily the con is close to JR Osaka station, or Subway Higashi-Osaka station (with which there's underground tunnel connections), so the Loop Line was the right choice anyway.
Anyway the train also suddenly got not-so-empty. I let a lady with a pushchair sit down, after we'd extracted my backpack's straps from the wheels. The weather was sunny, but the news screens on the train were saying it was going to rain, and clouds were rolling in, magical. Luckily it didn't actually rain, in the end. I got to JR Osaka station and started walking, finding my way up to a very familiar big crossroads, nearby which is the rockin'est rock bar in the world, and a bit further up, the gayest gay bar in the world. And also the otaku bars Lapis Lazuli and Claris. Also Cat's Eye, but I'm not giving them the oxygen of publicity.
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Anyway, Act III is a little away from all that, so I carried on following the main road, passing between the end of a shotengai, and the Umeda Batting Dome, an indoor baseball practice thing which the Loop Line runs right next to.
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Once I got there, I realised I actually knew Act III quite well, though I rarely visit it. There's quite a big comic shop in there, selling various mangae, including new doujinshi which people have bought at the big cons, read once, then immediately flipped (well they do it in Genshiken, anyway). It also has a cool-looking bar right in the middle, which I really need to get around to checking out, one of these days.
It also has a Disk Union record / CD shop with loads of cool merch, rare genres (still never found Beyond in there, though. Or the Macc Lads!), and even new sleeves for 10-inch 78s!
I bought a whole "book" (an "album", you might even say) of 78's on a market for ¥300 years ago, and still haven't listened to most of them. Time to drag out the 'ole Columbia!
The con was up on the second floor, in a small conference facility room in one corner of the building. A sign outside seemed to say you have to get tickets off to one side, I followed a woman off to one side, but there was nothing there. I decided to just gaijin smash it in ...and, actually, the ticket desk was just inside the door. The entrance fee was only ¥500, because it's a small event. It still has a catalogue, though!
Those pert orange buns were THIS close to being this con's preview picture on the index page.
With the way the times had worked out, I could only stay there about 35 mins. I took a quick first walk-around, I was literally the only male in the entire convention. After the motored preview, it was time to buy!
Needs moar pop-punk, painting, Buffy, friends who fancy each other like crazy but never admit it, and "Whee! I'm naked!"
One table had a style that reminded me of classic BmB. Of course they'd never heard of it, partly because it's in English and partly because they probably weren't born in 2001. Anyway, the comic is called Wild Full Body, it's about a salaryman called Shigeru Matsuda. He meets waiter Michiru Nasu through a shared love of food and wine. Especially wine, Michiru finds him sleeping it off on a park bench outside. This is only volume 1, I might try to follow the series if I see them again.
This one is called Kompeito Preview Issue, and is quite short, being a preview issue. Konpei Kitahama and Hibari Ito are a stand-up double act with unrequited love. The art style is driving me crazy, it really reminds me of something else... but I've no idea what.
This one also came with an "elseworlds" mini, where instead of stand-up comedians, they're in a rock band.
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These two are from the same table, I didn't have a round amount of coins, so got both just to balance things. The left one is called "Yamashina to Takaiwa; I wanted to fuck you a little while ago, I confess". Nice (paraphrased from awkward translation) title, anyway. And a nice glittery cover stock. A university or high school student is asking his teacher for advice on confessing to the one he loves. Who IS the teacher.
The next one is called A Familar Story. The same boy still fancies his teacher. He finds a shojo manga called "Sensei Loveyou" on the teacher's desk, which some girl had been reading in the class. The boy gets a remarkably wrong idea about it. Later the teacher wonders why students like his boring physics class, concluding "they're just after my ass, aren't they?"
I thought I was ever so clever and head-translated this one to "your right hand is warm", instead it's "Your Hands are Warm" by, er, Aoi Tomato, apparently, even though it clearly says "No Tomato". Anyway, one guy gets sick and needs to keep a mask on, so the other one makes him soup. How cwute.
Another table had a book with some English in it, I asked to see a sample and they were already bagging one up as if I was buying it, shame I didn't actually fancy it.
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I also picked up this one, The Demon King Wants to Become Human vol. 1, by Neumi Takanishi. It came with the usual furii peipaa and business cards, but also a pack of five minis! Anyway, it's a fantasy story with shades of Crimson Spell, I suppose. The Demon King in question is a horned prettyboy who travels around trying to become human, by getting bum-banged by numerous different humans. There's a warning at the start that the "top character will change", and also that the "gameplay" will vary.
Kawaii Wanko ni O-te Oshite. AKA (very paraphrased) "Pet the cute puppy". "Puppy" being "Wanko". Basically I saw these two guys and "wank", and I had to have it! One of the guys has very girlish hair and, the art implies, a little makeup. Yes please! Also he likes izakaya food and unending beers in ice-frosted glasses. Yes please! And he's the top and makes the first move... yes please!! I'm needing a "puppy" just thinking about it. Oh and the cover stock has that "silky" feeling paper the Lost Pages used. Yes please!
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I saw a circle I'd visited at Comitia, where I bought one of their cheaper books. I got a more expensive one from them this time, though part of the same series, Master and Dog. This one came with a couple of minis (one as well printed and bound as the main book), a business card and a sticker. Also one guy has longish hair and glasses... yes please!
It's about Takuya Yamaoka, who is a former bullying victim. He went to a high school in another prefecture, and set himself the aim to "rise to the top of the social hierarchy". He falls in love at first sight with Kanade Yoshida, a quiet boy. He tries to "assert domimance" over the quiet boy by becoming a bully himself, unfortunately the bullying takes the form of blurting out "become my dog!", which just makes everyone think he's nuts. Anyway, awkward romance and eventual bonking ensues.
The hot stuff was at the back of the room, so I picked some of that up.
This one's called Jealous!, by Ringo Chaneru (Apple Channel??). I don't remembering it costing all that much, either, which is unusual because it's full colour! This one's right into the action, with tattooed prettyboys, a long-haired ginger, and neck kissing! Yes please! It came with some mini posters advertising their other works. I need to nab some of them!
This is "With Consent by Mutual Agreement" by Yoda Heights. It's part of a bizarre subgenre of BL which doesn't even hide that it's "proxy straight", with the bottom's pectoral muscles being rounded out like boobs, his nipples getting large and erect. The muscles even jiggle like boobs, but without the guy being fat, sometimes! I do not consent! But it was only about ¥300, so yeah. Also, nice glittery cover stock... which you can't see at all in the scan.
This one's called "An Ordinary Day at the Detective Agency", by Ann-Nui. South Korea has a hot series of softcores about a detective agency too. This one goes all the way, though! Right into the close-ups of the action. Oddly, not a lot of detecting gets done, though.
towards the end I went to a table on the corner, she had some good stuff, but it was ¥1300. Time (and budget) were getting on, so off to meet Keiko
One last look along the row closest to the door before taking off. One table were pushing this comic, "Dark Night" by "Eri Manotii"... Man O' Tea? I had a quick look and decided to get it, despite the dwindled budget. They told me it's freeee, so I definitely grabbed that. It's about Fusao, a "Robin Hood" character who is a Chinchilla (not a mouse). He's fighting a Jaguar (not a tiger) called Jinnoshin, who is the bodyguard of some rich lord. After some back-and-forth bantz they're interrupted by the rich lord, so shank him, and presumably butt-bang later.
I left the con and took a few last snaps around ActIII from the railings. There's some terrible texture alignment in this place, they'd get pulled up for that on the /newstuff/ chronicles... if that was still going. There were posters advertising an upcoming record and CD sale... I might be interested, if I had a functioning hi-fi, and somewhere to put records and CDs. I don't even have a place to put these new comics!
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I walked back to the Hankyu Umeda station (which is semi-joined to the JR one) and waited... and waited... and waited. Then I went to one of the entrances to the JR station and waited... and waited... At least I had comics to read. I read, er, No. 145 of The Magnet, from 1910, the one where Coker "may as well be a fool in the Fifth as a fool in the Shell". Finally I got a message, saying she'd gone hrough the gate on the bridge exit, so I made my weary way up there, and finally we could birthday hug!
We went off to have a ton of yakiniku and beer, giving it the, er, half-send. Last year the full send was the price of this year's half-send! Still, our faces were duly stuffed. The staff even gave us a cute note saying "thank you!". Which Keiko wrote some Japanese back to.
Japan were playing footy against Tunisia, we watched the score climb on her phone. At the end I still fancied ice cream, but Keiko was stuffed, so we went back to my flat. Keiko fell straight asleep, while I finally walked to the post office and got the packages, then I slept too. Well the previous week was very sleep-deprived... time to catch up!
After she went home, I finally actually opened the boxes from the post office (Keiko was so sleepy she didn't even know I'd been out for half an hour getting them). My brother sent me some of the good shit, can't wait to read this lot!
