ISLAMABAD: As hundreds of young Japanese pop culture enthusiasts, cosplaying as their favorite fictional characters, gathered to celebrate their love for anime and manga in Islamabad on Saturday, attendees said such events provided “geeks and nerds” a chance to express themselves and make friends. 

Anime refers to a specific style of cartoon produced or inspired by Japanese animation and is one of the world’s most popular types of entertainment. While they are not new, they’re growing in popularity among Pakistani youngsters, predominantly among those who grew up watching animated series like Pokémon and DragonBall Z. 

Titled as AniCon, short for an anime convention, the colorful event took place at Islamabad’s FAST National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences and comprised cosplays, e-gaming competitions, anime quizzes, karaoke, rap battles, art contests and Japanese food stalls. 

Several participants, who wished to be identified by their first names only, revealed that they were not interested in anime and manga comics for the fear of missing out, but because anime characters brought forth “traits like self-acceptance, confidence, determination, and a positive attitude” among them. 

“I like this culture of anime growing in Pakistan because it gives [the] antisocial geeks like us [an outlet] as we are studying STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) subjects, we don’t study arts and humanities [so] we don’t have a [nice] social outlet,” said Safa, who came to the event cosplaying as the character, Griffith, from the anime television series, Berserk. 

“So, this is a nice place to make friends, socialize, dress up, and have fun,” she told Arab News. 

Hasaan, another participant who cosplayed as the character Guts from Berserk, said he chose the get-up because he really liked the character. 

“Guts is a very strong human being. He makes mistakes, but he chooses to be on the right side. I identify with his personality, so I feel really confident and happy being dressed up like him,” the 18-year-old said. 

According to the organizers of the event, up to 800 people, including university students, took part in the event to show their love for Japanese pop culture and prove to the worldwide anime community that Pakistan was not lagging behind. 

“Although these events are unconventional by Pakistani standards and we also have to stick to our religious and cultural values, anime conventions are healthy because they provide geeks and nerds to come to one place and make friends,” said Usaid Azeem, one of the organizers at the event.

Azeem added that aside from Islamabad, people from other cities also traveled to the capital to take part in the event. 

Usama, who came from Lahore and cosplayed as the American superhero Flash, said he chose the attire because it suited his physique and accentuated his personality. 

“I love this character from the DC universe and I chose it because this getup suits my physique,” he told Arab News. 

“The best thing about anime conventions is that you can recreate any character you want and cosplay whether it’s a Japanese character or an American, no one judges anyone and that’s why I think the anime culture is all about accepting others for who they are.” 

Through cosplaying, he said, people live their favorite fictional characters and put in a lot of effort to design and assemble the outfits. 

“So attending the AniCon was a better choice than going to a musical event or just hanging out with others at a restaurant,” Usama said. 

Muhammad Albab, another organizer of the event, said that it took a lot of hard work and more than four months of planning to create the event. 

“Since such pop culture conventions do not happen very often, there was a lot of uncertainty surrounding the AniCon as most organizers, despite being anime enthusiasts, had no experience of organizing an event,” Albab said. 

“But we got immense support from many amazing cosplayers and anime fans who came forward and strived to [participate] in the event.” 

Most participants at the event said they designed their costumes themselves, with some saying that it took months for them to create the perfect cosplay. 

“We had to go to Saddar in Rawalpindi to purchase the materials and it took us weeks of constantly staying up [at night] to create these costumes,” said Zahra, who came to the event with her friends, dressed up as Darkness from the animated series KonoSuba. 

“My friends wanted to do the entire group [of characters from KonoSuba] and I decided [that] Darkness fits my personality the most. She’s a little clumsy, but she’s determined, she might mess up, but she has a good heart.” 

Syed Abul Barkat Hashmi, who came to the event to take part in an e-gaming competition, said that cosplaying and anime were not common in Pakistan, adding that people, in general, may not even like it. 

“But as you can see, there are hundreds of people here and many of us got bullied for being nerds and geeks in schools. The anime culture is certainly growing in Pakistan, so I think such events should be held more often,” he said. 

“This convention has given us an environment to express ourselves without any shame as we can talk about the things we like and do things we want that we couldn’t do earlier because of the constructs of our society.”