Week 9: Fandom, Friends, and Plastic Bags

Back in September, I went to a live show put on by YouTubers Andrew Bravener and Andrew Gunadie (aka Gunnarolla) as part of Toronto's Nuit Blanche. I had watched their channels casually for a little while, and was also a fan of some of the musical guests they had announced for the show. It being the beginning of the semester, so I had no other weekend plans. As someone who grew up several hours away from Toronto, I was excited to use my new-found uni student freedom and visit it myself. I didn't really know anyone else who was attending (at least not IRL) but I figured there would surely be other like-minded nerds.

I had absolutely no idea how much the decision to go to this show (dubbed YTTO for the Twitter-verse) would end up affecting my life in a lot of weird ways.

The show was a selection of videos, exploring the funny, random, and just plain weird side of YouTube, and it went on all night. Yep, twelve hours of lip dubs, mash-ups, kids after dentist, and horrible how-tos, with some great musical performances scattered throughout. Oh, and of course, sing-alongs and impromptu dance parties.

The majority of the audience stayed for an hour or two and then moved on to see the rest of Nuit Blanche - which I'm sure contained some amazing exhibits. But, for reasons that I still don't fully understand, I ended up staying for the entire twelve hours. Joining me in this craziness were a group of girls, many of whom didn't know each other, but who all shared a passion for the same fandoms and online communities.  We very quickly bonded over our shared interests and a certain so-bad-it's-good Katy Perry parody video. At the end of the night  (morning?) we had all become friends, and over the last five months we have stayed in touch and become even closer.

This past weekend, several of that same group (and one new recruit) make the trek to Montreal to see the Andrews put on their show again, this time for nine straight hours. We took cars and planes, ate too much junk food, and got very little sleep. By any sort of logic, we went too far, spent too much money, took too much time off, to go watch a show about YouTube we had already seen - for nine straight hours.

But here are two wonderful things about the fandom/nerdfighter community so many of us on the interwebs are part of: 1) We will do anything to party with our online friends, and 2) we don't give a flying fanged frisbee if the muggles don't understand. Often, we are the people who grew up being different, excluded by our peers for caring too much about a boy with a lighting scar or a certain movie franchise. Eventually, we stumbled upon a corner of the internet where caring too much was OK. And no matter how long we have been here, we all realize how lucky we are to have found this place. We don't take our online friends for granted, because we know what it's like to not have anyone that understands us like they do. And when we get a chance to see them, to dance, sing, be silly and just BE with them, we don't turn it down.

So when people ask me why I drove seven hours to Montreal this weekend to spend nine hours watching YouTube videos, I might not be able to explain it properly, but that's all right. Because I had a great weekend with great people - people who aren't afraid to be silly, crazy, passionate and nerdy. Because I was celebrating a website that has had a huge impact on my life, and supporting creators I admire. And above all, because plastic bag.

Goodnight, bloglings.

PS: If you are interested in reading more about the show and hearing from the Andrews themselves, check out this article on LeakyNews.

PPS: If you somehow missed it, Let's Talk Nerd Culture Magazine published our second issue this past week. I wrote about some of my favourite web series, and if you aren't interested in that, there is also a recipe for apple pie. So really, you can't go wrong.