So a lot of people have been asking me lately about kcon, and a lot wasn't covered. I originally wasn't going to do this due to the amount of posts already made, but yet here I am. So in this blog post, I will thoroughly go through the events on August 24 and 25th. I was a VIP 2 ticket holder, so I can only speak from my view. (I do know this is a long time after kcon but people have been curious, so I guessed that I should do it anyways.)

 

Anyways, I got up at 3 or 4 am to get ready and leave the house at around 5:30 or 6 am. I went with my friend and sister, and we arrived at the convention at around 7 am. Most people arrived around 8-9, so there wasn't that many people, but still a considerably long line.

 

Just outside the convention, there were several lines for VIP 1, VIP 2, and all of the other ticket holders. There was a bit of confusion at first, but we ended up asking the guards just outside and they told us which line was which. My friend and sister and I basically waited in line for three hours, and we also met a bunch of new friends that we ended up talking to the entire time and exchanging numbers.

 

There were some food trucks already going in and preparing and parking and whatnot. There were also cameramen who were most likely recording for the KCON recap or the official video. Some people were passing out fansite banners at this time, and I had already collected a few myself.

 

So basically after three hours, the line finally got moving. The line stretched all the way down to the road and down the public sidewalk, which made me pretty grateful that I had gotten there earlier and there was only a few people in front of me.

 

There was a short gate seperating the lines from ticket holders and we presented our tickets to the staff sitting in front of a long table, and they had all three scratchers laid out in front of the table in groups so that we could choose ourselves.

 

Now, before I start saying anything else, let me just say that KCON had said that there would be a VIP 1 merchandise gift pack and a seperate one for VIP 2. But nope, that wasn't the case. Every ticket holder got the exact same merchandise gift pack, which was good for the other ticket holders. But I had paid $200, and I expected a bit more from KCON.

 

Back to the check-in. So basically they make an initial on our tickets saying that it was already checked and they gave us our gift bag and told us to choose our scratchers. I quickly chose a group  and left the line to stand in front to wait for my new friends. I peeled my stickers off and ended up not getting anything.

 

Now this is where everything starts going awry.

 

There were lots of screams and cries of disappointment, but that wasn't the issue. So let me start off simply. Almost everyone (excluding people like me who got nothing) got either a GD hi-touch/artist engagement session. A few people got the red carpet audience session pass here and there.

 

But the thing was that the scratchers were not shuffled at all, so basically all of the people in front of the line got GD, the next group of people Teen Top, Dynamic Duo, Crayon Pop, 2PM, and so on.

 

It was really disappointing and some people had asked why this had happened but the staff had just shrugged and said that they didn't know.

 

Everyone was kind of disappointed or pissed off at this point, and even more when almost an hour had passed by the time KCON had said that they would open the gates. Eventually they did, but it was really hot and many people were bothered. woah and there was this girl who was holding a sign saying that she was willing to be $100 for a GD hi-touch session and i believe a red carpet session

 

The security had released us into bag check in groups, due to the amount of people rushing to get in. I was in the first group, so I had my bag checked by security and went through a metal detector and yeah yeah yeah.

 

After that, it was just do whatever you want. The end of bag check immediately opened access to KCON.

 

The first thing you would see would be the fanclub booths. There were several, and they were all selling merchandise. My group and I bought some shirts and quickly made our way on, not wanting to get stuck in the hoard of people that was quickly coming in.

 

The bathrooms were portable toilets with sinks that let out water using pumps on the bottom to step on. I immediately went to the restroom first, because I had been waiting in line for hours and plus I wanted to go before everyone else crammed it.

 

There were many booths that sold merchandise and a ton of food trucks. There was ice cream (fluffy ice), lemonade, drinks, burgers, potato swirls (? they have these in Korea but I only know the korean name for it), etc. The booths were selling phone cases, socks, hats, shirts, accessory (bracelets), clothes, albums, posters, magazines, and a whole bunch of other things I can't remember at the moment.

 

In order to actually get food from a food truck, you needed a food coupon. These were sold almost everywhere; there were probably around 5+ stands. There was a snack ($5), meal ($12), and meal+drink ($14) combo. These were kind of annoying but I guess it was okay.

 

On August 24, the first day of KCON, it was only the convention along with some artist engagement sessions and whatnot. It ended around 6pm, and then there was an afterparty which I didn't go to. So since my friends and I were there at KCON since the very start, we had around 8 hours to do whatever we wanted.

 

Now let me tell you guys what was in the merchandise gift pack. There was a couple of badges saying things that dealt with KCON (ex. to kcon and beyond!) and the official KCON lightstick. They had also provided you with a booklet that had the schedule of everything and who the artists were. A thumb-held fan (? I don't know what to call it) was provided along with some card for a personal driver (? I really don't understand about this; I think there was a tiny booth on it but nobody really went, including me.) deducting $20 or some crap on our first ride.

 

Now there was the SMTOWN official merchandise booth, and jesus christ that line went down all the way to the fanclub booths the entire time at KCON. Next to that booth, there was a booth for MNET and a booth that sold clothes. I'm not going to go into much detail about the MNET booth, which was basically leaving a message for the idols, taking a picture, stamping your hand (?????????) in some red , etc. But at the stand, there was a sheet that had the official lineup for the artist engagement sessions, so I took one. And , if I didn't get that, KCON would've been hell for me.

 

Now at this point a lot of people were coming in and trading passes (a ton of people were trading for Exo, but nobody really got the cards until the next day, which was honestly ing unfair to the people who had come earlier or on August 24 instead of the 25th.). Staff were walking around passing balloons for Bibigo (Psy, anyone?), MNET+KCON, etc. there were a ton of ing balloons bloody hell

 

You could do whatever you wanted from here smh. There was the dance all day booth, panels 1, 2, 3... etc., Bibigo, Shin Ramen (top leading ramen brand in Korea), Honda (?), Verizon, anyone can cook Korean food, dramas, VIP 1 only lounge, soft tofu eating contest, etc. Several contests were taking place where if you entered, you had a chance of getting a different/new pass or switching your seats to VIP 1 during the concert. I didn't participate in these tbh

 

I also ended up going out and eating Subway and coming back in because honestly the food there wasn't that amazing, the service was terrible, and it was a rip-off. Why pay for that when I can pay five bucks for a 6-inch subway and a cookie? yep.

 

I was really, really glad that I had packed an extra water bottle because the drinks there were overpriced and hey, you can just bring your own water.

 

and yay we go home after ing around at kcon and eating overpriced food and drinks (will be talking more about the convention on August 24th in a seperate blog post if you want me to. there is still a lot to talk about [ex. cosplays and booths] but honestly it wasn't that important compared to the second day.)

 

So after the convention, I got picked up and we went to sleep blah blah blah yeah and stuff you don't care about

we did the same routine for the 24th as in wake up at 3:30/4 am and yeah but this time I had arrived at KCON at like 5:30 am.

now bloody ing hell this was where everything started going wrong.

 

When I arrived at the convention, I expected seperate lines again (because the day before, they had let all of VIP 1 go in first, then VIP 2, then the others. Although it really didn't make a difference because of the bag checks and ) but nope.

 

The guards from yesterday were there again and told us to form one single line, which was already pretty long. Then 7am rolled around when I noticed that there were two lines and I just stood there like what the is happening

 

So I went to the second line which was waaaay shorter than the line I was originally in and asked a staff walking by why there were two lines. She left to go ask someone else and came back because apparently she didn't know. I should've taken this as a warning for the massive hell I was about to go through, but nope.

 

The lady came back to me saying that the first line was for the concert lineup, and that it was unofficial (it just started in the middle of nowhere. not even close to the check-in.) and to just stay in the line I was in already. So I called over my friend and sister and we waited in that line. The staff had told me that the first line was eventually going to have to go into the convention and not wait outside for the concert which started at 6pm. I honestly think more people were confused than wanting to wait 8 hours in line for the concert.

 

I ended up going into the convention first and yay time to around like yesterday

 

If you guys do want videos of the convention and booths (like dance all day and juncurryahn and others), then please do tell me and I'll make a seperate blog post for that. But for now, I'm just going to skip everything.

 

I ended up needing $60 for both days, although some people had gone overboard and brought $500+ while I was just standing there like i want that drink but it's ing $6 should I buy it i won't have enough money for ice cream then but i'm so thirsty it all

 

A lot of people were desperate for exo passes now, and one guy was willing to pay $300 for his sister who wanted to go. but nobody really got it and the people who did end up getting it just suddenly got it like what the happened

 

woah and I also saw amber's sister, jackie and she was really nice omfg. henry was really attractive in real, too.

 

oh and don't kill me for this but I ended up trading my chance to see exo for a crayon pop hi-touch and artist engagement session pass. my new friend got to go see exo though please don't kill me i swear i didn't do anything wrong

 

But the thing about KCON was that everything was delayed. Artist engagements, booths, everything was pushed back an hour after its original time. I remember being really pissed because of this, because I could have easily spent 5 hours at KCON waiting in lines.

 

Remember how I said that the concert started at 6? Well I asked around and the staff told me that they would only allow the line-up to start at 4pm, which apparently she wasn't supposed to tell us but yeah. Crayon Pop's hi-touch clashed with the time my friend and sister and I had originally planned to line up at, so my friend and sister decided to go wait in line while I went to the hi-touch and came back.

 

I waited for the hi-touch for literally two ing hours from the said original time and then it turns out that wow! crayon pop canceled?? amazing!

 

Everyone in line for crayon pop was beyond pissed at this point and one person went as far as to curse at the staff, asking why the hell they weren't better prepared and "what the is this? do you acutally call this a convention or a pile of you can waste your money in? jesus ing christ".

 

I went for a quick bathroom break and I got a call from my friend saying that I needed to meet her in the line because everyone was being ing crazy and pushing and shoving like wild animals or something. The guards had settled the situation down slightly by the time I got there, so it wasn't that bad. They ended up splitting the lines into VIP 1 and 2, then the other ticket holders.

 

I waited in line there (eventually everyone sat down after getting over the initial fear of being trampled again) for a couple of hours and a guard went around passing wristbands to people after being shown their ticket. After a few hours (I just talked to some fan boys and girls next to me... yes I still remember his name. alejandro) the staff/guard started letting in VIP 1 first. (Because if they didn't and let everyone in at once, all hell would break loose.) It was quite a long wait, but I was glad that I lined up early because if I hadn't, I would've been in the way back while watching the conert.

 

Once the security guards scanned my ticket, I ran inside the building where the concert was being held and holy . Everyone was screaming and running and shoving and it was just hell. The staff was screaming stuff like, "No running!" but to be honest, nobody really cared. We ran down this long ing hallway that was kind of like a staircase in a way (without the stairs) and there was like 10 loops we made and we finally made it to the front door of the arena. They scanned our tickets once again and then we were ing inside after like 4 hours of waiting??

 

I ran to the middle of the VIP 2 section in the very front directly in front of the stage but my friend called me back and I moved all the way back into the corner (i regret this action greatly) and we waited for some time for the other ticket holders to arrive inside of the arena. A guy (i forgot his name sorry) came out and introduced it and odjnojdn . The concert started and I kind of forgot the order, except for the fact that Exo and GD were the last two. Possibly.

 

the concert ended and yay okay I went piss and whatnot and we left and it was over. there's a lot that happened between this time but I feel like this blog post is becoming too long so I'll save that for another day (maybe). and idk man. I feel like I skipped a lot in this blog post, but if you want more details (like how I waited for an hour for my food as people went in front of me, how people got the exo passes, gd's artist engagement session, etc.)

 

To wrap it all up?

 

It was confusing and a mess. Although I did get to meet new people and it was quite an experience, I don't think I'll be going next year.