Otaku Dan: The Life of an Anime Fan

I got a question from Ken Lee the other day on when was my first steps into the otaku world. That question got me really thinking how, when, why, and what got me to become an otaku.



I have been an anime fan my entire life since I was 6 years old. My first anime series were Saint Seiya, Dragon Ball, Fist of the North Star, and Space Adventures Cobra, in that order. An uncle of mine would send me fan dubs of these series on VHS as presents after he was done with them.

My first true step in to the otaku world was when I bought the 2003 July issue of Newtype USA magazine. I remember seeing this magazine on the rack at my local Gamestop, I was going to buy a game but at the last minute but I changed my mind and got the magazine instead. This magazine opened my eyes to a whole new world that I had never seen. I read the whole magazine from front to back about 3 time in a week, but this opened another door to the otaku life.

There was a little column in the magazine listing every anime convention in the U.S. for the month and I saw that the local college was having their first one, it's called Yasumicon. I went with a friend to this anime con because we both like anime and we had nothing to do that weekend. It was a great experience and I met a lot of other anime fans that like the same things as me. I attended yasumicon for every after at until I moved for college.

I ended up moving with only one semester left of high school and I did not make any friends because I felt that it was not worth it. Anime was the one thing that kept me happy during a time that I was very depress. However, when I started college it all changed for the best and at that same time I discovered DannyChoo.com. DC was the main why I started to build Gundam model kits and collecting anime figures. Then one day I started to watch Genshiken and I figured out that I'm an otaku. So, what steps did you take to become an otaku?