Geekfest 2018: My First Big Fan Convention Experience

So this past weekend was Geekfest and I can’t believe I haven’t attended one of these before now! Well, at least nothing this big.

Geekfest is a two day event that’s hosted, I believe, once a year at Monte Casino in Johannesburg, and it’s a place where fans can congregate and socialise for a while…think of it like a mini-comic con. Now, I was only able to attend for the first of the two days, but I think I can provide some sort of interesting info here so let’s get started!

Entering the Enchanted Geekdom

We arrived at Monte Casino around 9:30 and joined the queue to enter the festival area. My sisters and I had some fun guessing cosplayers' identities (admittedly they did better than I did). Going into the festival was quite a surprise; we were given tags to let people know we were attending the event and then turned loose to wander around.

What was at this place? Same thing as most festivals; music, food, flea market, the usual. The standouts (at least in my opinion) were the cosplayers. There were dozens of them roaming around the grounds; taking photos with attendees, dancing and singing, and just looking cool. I should also mention that this was the biggest flea market I have ever seen—and I’ve worked at a number of big ones

Some of the other stuff they had included: tabletop gaming (Warhammer), console gaming, as well as Robo Wars and what I think is supposed to be medieval fighting – and this was all on the first day.

Roaming the Market

Wandering around this place was crazy! There were people all over the place so I got turned around (lost) pretty quickly; I walked around perusing jewellery, artwork, comic books, games, and so on, all while bumping into various cosplayers and chatting with vendors.

The stalls there sold everything I just listed and more; t-shirts, mugs, mousepads, hoodies, fudge, the list goes on and on, so as you can imagine, I wandered around for quite a bit before I needed a break and hit the food court.

I downed a soda in the food court and sat for a few minutes guessing cosplayers—probably got most of them wrong—before returning to the stalls for a while.

Fun and Games

Around midday, there was a game of chance on stage where players had to wear a hat with a wheel on it; the wheel had various things attached to it— chili, worms, marshmallows, headphones and...something else. I forget what. You spun the wheel three times and whatever it landed on you had to take and/or eat.

I, thankfully, did NOT volunteer for this game; it wasn’t worth it in my opinion. Still fun to watch though.

After that there was a sort of Robo Wars tournament, which was a lot of fun to watch; particularly with the sort of ongoing commentary of the announcers. We headed off for the medieval fighting next, and before you ask, no, I didn’t join the melee…my sisters did.

It was…interesting to watch. I didn’t think people would take this kind of thing so seriously, but they did, so it made it even more enjoyable to watch.

Final Thoughts

The only other convention I've attended was a Supernatural mini-con a few years ago. That event was, I believe, only a single day thing. It was much smaller and, by comparison, there wasn't as much in terms of stuff to do, though that'd be pretty obvious.

Even though I was only there for part of the first day of Geekfest, it was a lot of fun and I’d definitely go back next year. I’d also love to attend similar events when they come up, if I have a chance. Maybe I’ll actually join a couple of games or do a cosplay or something.