Feature - The Volks LA Opening

Feature - The Volks Opening Weekend: More Than Just Pretty Dolls

Since the rumors first started circulating about the possibility of Volks opening a store in the US, I had been watching the news intently. And when the date and place were finally official, I knew that -- whatever it took -- I couldn't miss this once-in-a-lifetime event. After all, I'd made two pilgrimages to Japan to Tenshi no Sato and Dolpa, so a weekend in Los Angeles was a relative lark.

Of course, I had all sorts of expectations about what the weekend would entail. I expected to be tempted to spend whatever funds I could raise on dolls and clothes. I was looking forward to a pleasant party, as well as being able to see Shigeta-san -- the President of Volks -- once again. I knew that I would be totally overwhelmed by not only the Volks one-offs and limited dolls, but also by all the dolls brought along by their owners. And I suspected that there might be the similar line-up stress at the opening as I experienced at Dolpa. Well, all these expectations came true, but strangely enough, they were not the most memorable events of the weekend for me. What proved to be the most enjoyable and memorable was meeting and being able to spend time with so many wonderful BJD people, and it is upon them that I would like to focus in this article.

My weekend of new friendships started off with my travel companion, roommate and fellow party girl, Liz Dean (lizzegirle). We had only met once before at a local meet-up the previous month, but when we realized that we were both planning to go to the opening, we decided to coordinate our trip as well as have our hotel room be Party Central. For being almost half my age, we hit it off well, but as I would discover over the weekend, age makes no difference when there is a shared love of BJD.

Once we reached LA and were settled into our room, I decided to go check out the hotel lobby for BJD people, and I was not disappointed. A huge group of them had recently returned from sightseeing, and had taken over a corner of the lobby. Most of these lovely women are members of the Yahoo group "Our Silent Friends" and, although I am only a peripheral member of that group, they couldn't have made me feel more welcome.

I have a terrible memory for names, so the best that I will be able to do here is to use a mix of real and online names. Among the many women there were Am and her sweet dog Theda, Patti (who sells the gorgeous Kanis-Augen eyes), the glamorous Mia Peterson, Valerie (valtoys), Vicki (CrashVicki), a very sweet woman who I can only remember by her eBay name, dolldogfan, and Liz's and my honorary aunt for the weekend, Sandi. The whole group planned to go to dinner down the road and even though Liz and I had eaten already, we decided to join them. However, by the time we went back to our room to get our purses, everyone but Sandi had left. She drove us to the restaurant where the rest had supposedly gone, but apparently they had decided not to stay. Sandi was so hungry after her long trip that the three of us decided not to go searching for the others, and instead had very pleasant conversation over iced teas and chicken salad sandwiches. It felt more like a meal with distant, but loved family members than with relative strangers.

By the time we got back to the hotel, people were already waiting for Liz and I to start our Friday night, "informal" party. Within an hour the room was packed with about twenty-five people, and at least that many gorgeous dolls. Naturally, our room didn't have a Volks-only rule, so we were able to meet some fabulous dolls from a variety of companies. Once again, I'm sure that I'm forgetting someone, but a few of the lovely people who came to this gathering were PamSD, Am with Theda (who stayed close to her mommy so as to keep from being stepped on), Julia (green_judy) and Kiya (Kiyakotari)--who had just arrived from their drive down from the San Francisco Bay Area, Donna and her lovely Megu, the very nice Taiki who was still waiting for her first doll at the time, and a sweet mother and daughter who brought a super-sexy Bishounen House doll. For me, the best parts of the evening was when my friend Leslie arrived. We've exchanged emails for months and she is my partner-in-going-bankrupt buying "Baby, the Stars Shine Bright" outfits for our girls, so it was wonderful to finally meet. We wrapped up this first evening at about midnight, but it was difficult to part, with so much still to share.

The next morning, we all gathered in the lobby for breakfast. There was definitely the feeling of a convention in the air, and no doubt the other guests were perplexed by this group of mostly women with their dolls. I had arranged to meet another online friend that morning--Corinne (milk_eye). Due to an altercation with a blueberry, I had to go back to my room for a few minutes and when I came back down, Corinne was waiting for me. I couldn't have been more stunned by what a lovely, graceful and gracious person she proved to be, and meeting her was certainly one of the high points of the weekend.

Just before it was time to leave, my friend Devon (aznbutterfly) arrived at the hotel with his roommates. James (dollfie63) had made an offer on the message board to give a ride to the Volks mansion to anyone who needed it, and Devon, Liz, Laura (jibrille) and I were glad to accept. It was a thrill for me to meet the person I consider to be the father of the BJD movement in the US and, whatever exalted personage I expected, James proved to be a very sweet and down-to-earth person who simply loves this hobby as much as the rest of us.

People often say to a bride-to-be that in the whirlwind of activity, she will never remember her wedding ceremony. Well, while I remember my wedding quite clearly, the Volks reception is another matter. I remember being stunned by how beautiful the setting and the mansion were, and walking up the marble steps to where they had the registration area, but when I turned to the door and Shigeta-san was standing there with his hand outstretched, my brain turned to mush. I managed to mumble the proper Japanese phrases of greeting, which seemed to please him, but from then on, my mind was foggy with clouds of bliss.

After I entered the mansion, the first room I went into was for the displaying the one-offs which would be raffled off later that day. Corinne and Devon were already there and we spent a few minutes commenting on the beautiful dolls, as well as admiring each others dolls, including Corinne's stunning Sasha, "Eulalia", and Devon's exotic Cyndy, "Anouk".

I had brought three girls with me, because any one of them would never have forgiven me excluding them from this momentous event, but it was difficult to figure out how to carry all of them. I finally gave up and, noticing that people seemed to be settling around the pool, I went out to try to find a safe place to leave two of my girls while I explored. It was a like a who's who of the US BJD world out there. There was our beloved DoA founder, Aimee, a couple of her mods, Suzuka and Kallisti, plus Mr. Kallisti, the model supportive BJD husband, Kat (kittytoes) and Mat (whom we had met briefly the night before as they foraged for food at the meager hotel snack bar), Annette, my Yaoicon friend, Mercy and Tom--those early proponents of artistic BJD photography, Paul, who proved to be as interesting and eccentric as his stunning dolls, small_gecko from San Francisco and her sweet girls, and Richard (nathankatt) who was one of Devon's roommates. I hope that I will be forgiven for all those I haven't mentioned, but there were well over a hundred wonderful people and more than twice that many gorgeous dolls, resulting in sensory overload.

Although I mingled and tried to introduce myself to as many people as possible, I've since learned that there were a number of people who I would have loved to have met but somehow missed, including Tabletopphantom and her Lawrence, my favorite F-16, and AmnesticAngel with her Tsubaki, Eron.

Corinne and I settled ourselves and our girls in a few chairs and continued our conversation from breakfast. It was wonderful to meet so many people, but it was also nice to have a chance to get to know a few of them well. After a while, Volks started the one-off raffle and lottery. This is where the caring nature of the BJD community really shown. We all are used to supporting each other online, but who could have known that this good-will would extend into real life? We were all crossing our fingers for each other, cheering for those who won or comforting those who didn't, but all-in-all, we felt like winners just being together.

Not only was there great kindness among the BJD collectors, but the Volks employees could not have been sweeter to us. One young man from Volks approached me each time that I carried a different girl, and made it a point to complement them. Another gentleman from Volks actually remembered me from the Dolpa and asked if I had managed to get the doll I had wanted there. When a girl with a very similar name to mine won the one-off I had also wanted, my disappointment must've been obvious, as Mrs. Shigeta and her daughter came over to apologize and comfort me. Then of course, there was the kind gesture of Shigeta-san asking us to allow him to let one of the one-off dolls go to Laura, our car mate, because she was going to have a dangerous eye surgery in the near future; an offer we all supported enthusiastically. If anyone could have seen how incredibly happy Laura was on the ride back, they would have no question that they had done the right thing.

All too soon, the event was over and we had to part -- at least for a few hours. Liz and I had a pajama party to run, so we decided to skip the dinner gathering that Aimee had planned, although I regret not being able to do both. If we thought that Friday night's "informal" party was big, this one put it to shame. It was standing-room-only in our rooms and, at one point, I counted at least forty people packed in there. I'm not even going to attempt to list all who were there! I spent much of my time by the kitchen area, trying -- mostly unsuccessfully -- to encourage people to eat their share of the huge amount of snacks so many had generously brought. This also proved to be a good location from which to placate the hotel manager, when he came to complain about our noise.

After everyone had had a chance to play Liz's hugely popular "Pin the wig on the doll" game, we took the festivities down to the lobby to continue with Pictionary and more doll talk. While the old lady in me wanted to make an early evening of it, so as to be rested for the store opening the next day, I don't think that any of us got to bed before 1am.

With all the activity of packing and checking out, there wasn't much time in the morning to have a social breakfast, but we knew that we would be spending the next few hours in line together. While Julia, Kiya and I had planned to walk the two miles from the hotel to the Volks store, after a few minutes out in the hot sun, we decided against it, and they generously gave me a lift. We joined a line of about fifty people who had arrived before us, but soon Volks was herding us -- and "herding" is the appropriate word, since we were all like sheep and they, our shepherds -- around to the back of the building for the dreaded line lottery. This is where the true spirit of cooperation and mutual support among BJD people truly shone. Those with low numbers helped those with high numbers to get the dolls they wanted, and those at the back comforted and entertained each other for the up to four-hour wait. Shigeta-san himself carried around water for us, and people shared parasols and patches of shade.

One particularly pleasant exchange happened once the Volks employees with the tickets for the dolls reached us, and had just a few tickets left. The girl right in front of me had had her heart set on a Sweet Dreams Lucas and was heartbroken to find that all his tickets were gone. However, after a little while, Annette came running back towards us, asking who it was who had wanted a Lucas, because an extra ticket had been turned in. The girl was overjoyed! It was this kind of mutual support to relative strangers that set the tone of the weekend.

By the late afternoon we had all broken our banks and exhausted ourselves, but I didn't get the sense that many were disappointed. Certainly we were hungry and tired, but it seemed that we had all gotten something or someone that we loved, and no was to leave empty handed. I was so happy to hear that Sandi had gotten the Toppi that she had her heart set on, Julia had gotten a Shizu to turn into a sexy boy, and Kallisti had ordered her FCS F-16 dream girl. I heard many joyful responses when I asked people "Who did you get?" In many cases, we came away with more than we had planned, but of course it was worth it.

After regrouping at the hotel, PamSD gave Liz and me a lift to Mitsuwa, a huge Japanese grocery store and food court, where we met with more BJD people for a much-needed lunch. With us were the nice mother and daughter who had come to our party the first night, mayuka13 (who had worn a lovely kimono to the reception) and Sandi. It was a delightful way to end the weekend: getting to know people better, and sharing our experiences.

Finally, it was time to go to the airport, and Sandi very kindly offered to take us there. It was sad to part, like saying goodbye to a beloved aunt after a holiday visit. Liz and I decided to have one final splurge on cocktails on the flight, to toast one of the most memorable weekends of our lives. It had its ups and downs, plenty of stress and a bit of disappointment, but it was also a weekend of much love, both for our dolls and each other.