Journey to KCON

Heyo heyo! Long time no post~ I wanted to write a quick post about the stuff I'm doing to get to KCON and how much everything is costing so far! I also wanted to say that this is almost a dream lineup for me with Wanna One, Seventeen, Twice, Golden Child, and Chungha going so I'm definitely not doing this every year!

Part 1: Concert Tickets
So concert tickets were the first thing to go online, and they went online July 11 at 10AM PST. That's a little over a month before the con begins and a couple days after they finalized their lineup. ALSO 10AM PST happens to be 12PM in my timezone... On a freaking Wednesday!!! I had work, but luckily, my boss was gone that week and I was able to quickly purchase it during my lunch break;;

Unlike a couple of other people? From reading tweets and FB posts, I was familiar with how AXS ticketing works so I knew more devices = more chances! I had my work computer open to a couple different browsers, my phone, and my iPad open, and I had my friend help me out (I think she had 2 devices?) and they all loaded into the waiting room as soon as it opened. AXS waiting room is seriously all about luck so even if you load it 15min before it opened, you may be behind someone that loads the room 1min before it opened. It took me about 3 minutes until it was my turn to buy tickets, and my iPad was the one that loaded first! I kept on searching searching searching on the computer for seats (I was aiming for P1 seated in the middle area) and I kept getting nothing. My iPad finally loaded some seats, and since it was my first time at KCON or the Staples Center in general I didn't know if they were good seats or not? But they ended up being freaking great seat?! They were in the middle in the first couple of rows, and I hope they end up being good seats when I actually go! My other devices kept getting either P2 or P3 or seats in the corner so I gave all those up, and bought the first seats I got when there was like 1min left on the timer. That's another tip, store your seats until you find better ones!

So quick monetary summary up to this point:

• 2 P1 Combo (Saturday & Sunday) Tickets - $745.20
• Section 111, Row 9, Seats 14-15
• Convenience Fee - Web: $47.64
• Convenience Fee - Web: $47.64
• Total: $840.48

DO YOU SEE THOSE CONVENIENCE FEES??? Each ticket had about $50 in convenience fees. I don't know what kind of conveniences they're doing for me but apparently it costs me $50?! And this isn't even to get mailed tickets or anything! I am printing these tickets out at home! ajlfkjasklfj But looking at it, it's about $420 for 2 concert days in pretty good (or at least I hope so) seats. PLUS the lineup is probably very very close to my dream lineup with 3 of my ult groups going (Wanna One, Seventeen, Twice) and a couple of other favs like Golden Child and Chungha, and when else am I going to get that chance! The only thing that would make it better is Infinite or SHINee or Apink but Infinite is pretty much impossible right now ;__; SHINee and Apink were extremely possible since they just had comebacks but whatever this is close enough!!!

Part 2: Convention and Engagement Tickets

The same week they released concert tickets, they also released the convention tickets! Unfortunately it was on Friday, July 13 at 10AM PST (which again is 12PM for me), and I had a big project at work that day! Because I was so busy working on it, I completely forgot that ticketing was a thing until like 10 minutes later? And when I finally got it loaded at like 12:30, all the A1 engagement passes (1 hi touch, 3 audience passes, 1 red carpet) were gone :'))) Oh yeah, the site took forever to load. I kinda wish they used AXS for that too because then I might have a chance LMAO but it was on the KCON website which kept on crashing and not loading. They also made you create an account with them so you had to fill in your info first and only one person each could buy it. Like I guess you could create multiple accounts too, but A1 engagement is expensive and I'm still trying to repucriate costs from the Wanna One tour lmaooo

Anyways, I didn't get tickets during the first batch of A1s and I was looking at the other options which were A2 (3 audience passes, 1 red carpet chance) and A3 (1 audience pass, 1 red carpet chance) and after looking up people's KCON experiences, I felt just getting audience passes really wasn't worth it. But I DID hear that sometimes they would release more A1s so I spent the next couple of weeks just waiting and checking the site to see if they would release any more.

LUCKILY about 10 days later, they did! I ended up getting an A1 pass during their second wave of sales on July 22 and boy when I heard they released another batch I bought it so fast LMAO

So again here's what everthing costs:

• KCON 3-Day Admission: $30
• A1 (1 hi touch, 3 audience passes, 1 red carpet): $155
• Convenience Fee: $0.99
• Total: $185.99

I'm really hoping I can get good hi touch passes, but everything in KCON is up to chance so WE'LL SEE HUH (WISH ME LUCK LMAO)

Part 3: Plane Tickets

idk if this might be too much information or something but since I was going through costs anyways, here's how much flying over there is costing me! Luckily, I'm staying with a friend during the time so I won't have to worry about hotel or ABNB costs ;o; Bless her soul~

I'm flying Spirit Airlines (and I experienced them only once before when I was following Wanna One around for tour) and it was truly... and experience. Plastic seats! And the only time ever that I could not sleep on a plane?! BUT IT WAS CHEAP SO I GUESS THAT'S MY ONLY OPTION...

• Round trip flight from DFW to LAX from 8/10-8/13: $148

My coworker who is a beast at flying told me flights get really competitive in pricing and start going down about 2-3 weeks before the date and can go down to $150 or less, so I waited until then to buy them. Unfortunately, the cheapest was still Spirit and if I wanted to fly Delta or American it would cost me $250+ :'))) But the tickets weren't bad considering I've paid $200-$300 for flights to LA before ;; The only really sucky thing is that there were two options for this price, one at 6am and one at 8pm (meaning I get back home at 1:30AM with work the next day), and I thought??? I selected the 6am flight? Like I was going to only take a half day from work and go straight to work after, but when I bought it I guess I didn't check over everything and now I have the 8pm flight!!! Like nbd but also very big deal ajkslfjalskj But I guess it's better I fly out late so I can sleep in after 2 days of concerts instead of leaving at 6am after screaming for Seventeen the night before!!! :')))

Summary

Alright so here's what it takes to get to KCON!

• Concert Tickets: $420
• Convention and Engagement Passes: $186
• Flights: $480
• Total: $754 + A WHOLE HECKA LOTTA LUCK

I think I can't stress this enough, but you have to be really lucky when you're buying everything :'))) There's just so much that goes to chance (like your concert seats and whoever you get for hi touch and audience) that it kind of sucks? But I get what you're doing KCON :') If you wanna come along you gotta pay and here I am paying for it!

But will I regret it after seeing Wanna One for the 5th time this year??? Probably not :'D OK thanks for reading if you read up to this point! Feel free to ask me questions if you have any I'm @merongmochi on Twitter, Curious Cat, and Instagram, and I'll try to write about my KCON experience once I go! IT'S TWO WEEKS AWAY AHhhHHH

ALSO sorry if my photos are kind of out of place or if I'm super repetitive, I wrote this kind of out of order;;;