The convivial voice actress Jessica Callvelo told a joke: "What did one Penguin say when he pushed another one off of an iceberg? Chocolate Milk." Pam Lauer followed this esoteric quip. "How do you get a witch pregnant? Fuck her," she explained.

Though a tad mature for younger convention goers (and a tad immature for usual professional appearances), indulging in the seedy underbelly of the anime industry's most notable figures boosted the liveliness of Aka Kon's auroral official launch.

Confronted with compounded disasters (par for the course at any convention), the driven team at Aka Anime Productions pulled off a successful anime happening. Already planning for next year, Amanda Tomasch of Aka Anime hopes to make Aka Kon a staple of the anime circuit.

"But it's still a business," she reminds. One of the draw backs of this year's convention was the amount of one-day attendees. "For 2001 we're planning a three day con - Friday through Sunday." This, of course, opens the door to more events, more guests and, well, more bar tabs.

Leaving the convention, ascending over a bridge toward the airport, I look back at downtown Vancouver, booming with an entertainment industry emigrating from the Los Angeles to which I am returning. I can't help but attribute at least part of Aka Kon's success to the vivacity of the town. Tomasch's own Aka Anime Productions independently strives for prominence in a field dominated by the likes of Disney and Warner Bros. So perhaps it's this fusion of work and play divorced from corporate conglomerations that lends this dynamic city it's creative heat, a heat that draws forward-thinking projects and creators to it's glass towers.