My weekend at Malkieri Con 24
The mad scramble to get all my con merch together right before leaving to get my plane. The trepidation before meeting everyone in the community again. The deep joy upon realising that people are just as lovely as last year (and there are more of them!). The satisfied excitement of chatting about books and (especially) the Wheel Of Time with folks who are just as obsessed as I am and whose eyes won’t start to wander away in boredom after 15 minutes of discussing the fine points in a scene from the third episode of season 2. The laughter during our evening revelry. The incredible relief when the journals I had ordered (and that should have arrived on Friday) actually came in on Monday morning - and most people were still there to get their hands on them.
All of this is Malkieri Con. And then some. I can’t remember all that happened in detail, a lot of it is starting to become a blur, like what remains after you go through the arches in the Tower - but Malkieri Con is small enough that I got to chat with pretty much everybody and that’s such a boon in this community.
An accurate summary of my weekend
All of it is made possible by the incredible work of Rob (Malkier Talks) and everybody else on the organising committee: they are the true stars of the show… and then there are stars from the show like Guy Roberts (Uno Nomesta in the Prime series) and lovely Hailey Macready (Costume crowd supervisor) and Rob Goodwin (Couture leather maker) who were kind enough to host panels, sign autographs and sit as judges in the cosplay contest - which… let’s talk about it, it was fuc*ing spectacular.
My haul this year
My personal highlights from this year have to be (in no specific order and I’m definitely forgetting something because I’m a scatterbrain):
Getting to know people better and meeting some new lovely ones
Chatting and chatting and chatting (it’s like a constant book club/therapy sessions on those couches)
‘Broccoli and buttholes’ IYKYK
The lovely WoT game cards from Koala Sedai
The cosplay contest
Am I coming down from a serotonin high and getting mildly depressed now? Yes
Will I be attending next year? Also yes.
Until then, I will inhabit #TwitterOfTime to keep connecting with that lovely (and unreasonably attractive) community.
Much love,
Memo