London report: Part two
This is the long overdue second London/TFF post. :oD
So where was I..? I think I was up to Friday afternoon, just arriving at the hotel. Well, as I said we stayed at the Wembley Plaza which was very very close to the Conference Center = big yay! I'm lazy, so if I only have to walk for five minutes to get somewhere, I'm happy. :oD Plus it was convenient that you could just pop up to your hotel room during they day, if you forgot something or whatever. Very nice!
I had only just sat down when I got a txt message from my German friend Anja, saying that she just arrived at the same hotel. So I went by her room to say hi, made plans for the evening, a bunch of us was gonna go out for dinner. Then I got another txt from Maria, saying she was down in the lobby with Ulrika waiting for us. These two are also from Sweden, didn't know them until just a few weeks before the Festival when we made contact at the Fellowship Forum and we of course had to make plans to meet up. I love things like that, how you can instantly connect with people because of this shared interest. I absolutely love it. We got along great, we went to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, since it wasn't out in Sweden yet. Went to a quite remote cinema, which was a bit of an adventure. LOL But it was just a prefect little thing to do, it was not like you could have gone back to central London anyway. So just going to see a movie was great. :o)
We pretty much just got back to the hotel when it was time to meet up with the girls at the Conference Center. We went to eat at a Chinese restaurant quite close by, they had a nice buffet, quite cheap too. I think we were about 15 of us in total.. :o) It was a very lovely evening and the whole day was just a great start to the weekend. :oD
This is me and luvara at the restaurant:
(See the t-shirt? That was the other t-shirt I bought in Camden. Says "Spot the freak". Someone said it had something to do with Star Trek, dunno about that. I just thought the freak looked just like me. LOL)
Maria and Ulrika, also at the restaurant:
I think we ended up in the bar at the hotel after that, and had quite a few Bacardi Breezers.. :oD I'm starting to confuse the days already though. But yeah, that must have been they night with the oh too many Bacardi's. LOL
The next day was the start of the Festival. Yay! We went there quite early to sort ut tickets, since we didn't get them in time before we left for London. Went back and forth and talked to about every member of the staff, and so it seemed. Was also worried about or Feast tickets for that night, since our names wasn't on the ticket, tuvali ordered them for us. But we ended up with the answer "Louise knows you, so it's not gonna be a problem." LOL And we got our entry tickets too, so everything was cool. Went to see the Opening ceremony, which started with a few music videos and such, and we all got to see "They're taking the hobbits to Isengard" for the very first time. That song got to be sort of the unofficial song of that weekend. Absolutely brilliant. If you don't know what I'm going on about, have a look HERE.
Then we were of course introduced to the genius MC's that are The Parkers. Hilarious as ever. And all the guest were brought up on stage, this time they even got to say a few words, Ring*Con style. What I probably remember the most was when Shane Rangi got up on stage. What we found out later, was that he had no idea he had to talk and he got so nervous, bless him! I never seen a big man like that giggle so much in my life! If anyone was remotely nervous about meeting him, I think those feelings were gone at that point. (He is also one of the sweetest men alive, but I will probably go on and on about that later.) Seeing Alan get up on stage and getting what seemed like endless amounts of applauds, warmed my heart as well. The applauds got even louder when Richard and Tania came on.. and wow, it was really cool having them there. More about that later also.
I have a few pics from the Opening Ceremony. But first I have to apologize for the quality of the pics I took on stage. They ended up very dark, and I've done my best to get them to look better in Photoshop, but some of them are very crappy still. I do want to share them however, and I want to post them here so that when I go back and look at these posts I will have all my pics here.
Ok, here we go:
Craig and Mark:
Jonathan Harding:
Paul Norell:
Daniel Falconer:
Sandro Kopp: (they have my e-mail on them because I posted them at his board earlier)
Thomas Robbins:
Richard Taylor & Tania Rodger:
What came next? *looks at event schedule* I was clever enough to mark everything I attended in the schedule this time, it's silly how easy you forget these things. Ah, there was a Q & A with Jed and Bruce that I saw after the Opening Ceremony, with a guest appearance by Kiran Shah. Actually, I stayed in the Hall of Fire for most of that day. There were also Q & A with Craig, Mark and Joel, the Radio Play and finally a Q & A with Richard and Tania.
I have to admit, I wasn't overly excited about Richard and Tania coming to the festival to begin with. It probably has something to do with the hype before they got announced, I ended up being a tad disappointed because I was expecting Sean Bean or something. LOL But once I was there, and they were there.. And esp after I saw this Q & A.. I was just blown away by the stories they told! Both of them are so incredibly down-to-earth, and passionate about what they do. They spoke so warmly about the time spent working on Lord of the Rings, and before that as well, how they got started and how they worked their way to where they are now. It was amazing to hear. They have to much to tell.. I don't mind hearing John Noble's bum story for the 15th time, but it's nice to hear something new as well. ;oD
I'll finish up this post with the pics I have from the Saturday Q & A's:
The ever so lovely Bruce Hopkins:
Jed Brophy, showing us what Bruce looked like in his ballet dancing days:
The Parker's, from various MC moments:
Q & A with Joel, Craig and Mark:
They did a poem entiteled "The day Pippin got covered in Cheese Whiz". This is the moment when Mark made Joel rhyme with the word "Venus" (I believe it was) LOL:
They also did the "Human Puppets" thing, where two people from the audience has to be their arms, in this case:
I think I will post the pics from the Radio Play in my next entry, as this is getting a bit long already. Will also tell you all about the Fellowship Feast then. :o)
So where was I..? I think I was up to Friday afternoon, just arriving at the hotel. Well, as I said we stayed at the Wembley Plaza which was very very close to the Conference Center = big yay! I'm lazy, so if I only have to walk for five minutes to get somewhere, I'm happy. :oD Plus it was convenient that you could just pop up to your hotel room during they day, if you forgot something or whatever. Very nice!
I had only just sat down when I got a txt message from my German friend Anja, saying that she just arrived at the same hotel. So I went by her room to say hi, made plans for the evening, a bunch of us was gonna go out for dinner. Then I got another txt from Maria, saying she was down in the lobby with Ulrika waiting for us. These two are also from Sweden, didn't know them until just a few weeks before the Festival when we made contact at the Fellowship Forum and we of course had to make plans to meet up. I love things like that, how you can instantly connect with people because of this shared interest. I absolutely love it. We got along great, we went to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, since it wasn't out in Sweden yet. Went to a quite remote cinema, which was a bit of an adventure. LOL But it was just a prefect little thing to do, it was not like you could have gone back to central London anyway. So just going to see a movie was great. :o)
We pretty much just got back to the hotel when it was time to meet up with the girls at the Conference Center. We went to eat at a Chinese restaurant quite close by, they had a nice buffet, quite cheap too. I think we were about 15 of us in total.. :o) It was a very lovely evening and the whole day was just a great start to the weekend. :oD
This is me and luvara at the restaurant:
(See the t-shirt? That was the other t-shirt I bought in Camden. Says "Spot the freak". Someone said it had something to do with Star Trek, dunno about that. I just thought the freak looked just like me. LOL)
Maria and Ulrika, also at the restaurant:
I think we ended up in the bar at the hotel after that, and had quite a few Bacardi Breezers.. :oD I'm starting to confuse the days already though. But yeah, that must have been they night with the oh too many Bacardi's. LOL
The next day was the start of the Festival. Yay! We went there quite early to sort ut tickets, since we didn't get them in time before we left for London. Went back and forth and talked to about every member of the staff, and so it seemed. Was also worried about or Feast tickets for that night, since our names wasn't on the ticket, tuvali ordered them for us. But we ended up with the answer "Louise knows you, so it's not gonna be a problem." LOL And we got our entry tickets too, so everything was cool. Went to see the Opening ceremony, which started with a few music videos and such, and we all got to see "They're taking the hobbits to Isengard" for the very first time. That song got to be sort of the unofficial song of that weekend. Absolutely brilliant. If you don't know what I'm going on about, have a look HERE.
Then we were of course introduced to the genius MC's that are The Parkers. Hilarious as ever. And all the guest were brought up on stage, this time they even got to say a few words, Ring*Con style. What I probably remember the most was when Shane Rangi got up on stage. What we found out later, was that he had no idea he had to talk and he got so nervous, bless him! I never seen a big man like that giggle so much in my life! If anyone was remotely nervous about meeting him, I think those feelings were gone at that point. (He is also one of the sweetest men alive, but I will probably go on and on about that later.) Seeing Alan get up on stage and getting what seemed like endless amounts of applauds, warmed my heart as well. The applauds got even louder when Richard and Tania came on.. and wow, it was really cool having them there. More about that later also.
I have a few pics from the Opening Ceremony. But first I have to apologize for the quality of the pics I took on stage. They ended up very dark, and I've done my best to get them to look better in Photoshop, but some of them are very crappy still. I do want to share them however, and I want to post them here so that when I go back and look at these posts I will have all my pics here.
Ok, here we go:
Craig and Mark:
Jonathan Harding:
Paul Norell:
Daniel Falconer:
Sandro Kopp: (they have my e-mail on them because I posted them at his board earlier)
Thomas Robbins:
Richard Taylor & Tania Rodger:
What came next? *looks at event schedule* I was clever enough to mark everything I attended in the schedule this time, it's silly how easy you forget these things. Ah, there was a Q & A with Jed and Bruce that I saw after the Opening Ceremony, with a guest appearance by Kiran Shah. Actually, I stayed in the Hall of Fire for most of that day. There were also Q & A with Craig, Mark and Joel, the Radio Play and finally a Q & A with Richard and Tania.
I have to admit, I wasn't overly excited about Richard and Tania coming to the festival to begin with. It probably has something to do with the hype before they got announced, I ended up being a tad disappointed because I was expecting Sean Bean or something. LOL But once I was there, and they were there.. And esp after I saw this Q & A.. I was just blown away by the stories they told! Both of them are so incredibly down-to-earth, and passionate about what they do. They spoke so warmly about the time spent working on Lord of the Rings, and before that as well, how they got started and how they worked their way to where they are now. It was amazing to hear. They have to much to tell.. I don't mind hearing John Noble's bum story for the 15th time, but it's nice to hear something new as well. ;oD
I'll finish up this post with the pics I have from the Saturday Q & A's:
The ever so lovely Bruce Hopkins:
Jed Brophy, showing us what Bruce looked like in his ballet dancing days:
The Parker's, from various MC moments:
Q & A with Joel, Craig and Mark:
They did a poem entiteled "The day Pippin got covered in Cheese Whiz". This is the moment when Mark made Joel rhyme with the word "Venus" (I believe it was) LOL:
They also did the "Human Puppets" thing, where two people from the audience has to be their arms, in this case:
I think I will post the pics from the Radio Play in my next entry, as this is getting a bit long already. Will also tell you all about the Fellowship Feast then. :o)