Watch: Qatar’s cosplay creator levels up the geek scene

euronews (in English)

When Ayat Salim, a longtime anime and geek culture fan, took the plunge into cosplay, she entered a world of endless possibilities.

Transcript

00:00People think it's strange.

00:04It's very childish for a grown person to be dressing up as a video game character.

00:09Cosplay to me is a great hobby.

00:12It's also a fun challenge.

00:15It makes me just glow

00:18and made me happy when I was not able to be happy.

00:21When I dress up in cosplay,

00:23I can feel myself completely transform into another person,

00:26into a different world.

00:28My name is Ayat Selim.

00:30I'm a hijabi cosplayer and I make my own costumes.

00:42Cosplay comes from combining the words costume and roleplay into cosplay.

00:48Anybody can get into cosplay.

00:51It's very accessible these days to find costumes that are cheap online.

00:55For me, the part of cosplay that I enjoy the most is the creation.

00:59One of the unique things that I do is hijabifying the characters.

01:04I take a character who's not necessarily very covered up or modest in her dress,

01:10but I modify the character to fit my belt.

01:15I love the inventiveness of it,

01:17the ability to try and make something

01:20that is sometimes defying physics into reality.

01:25The more limitations there are, the more creative I can get.

01:29It's an amazing avenue for me to explore all of the different talents that I have.

01:35At the end, I can make something

01:37and it kind of gives me a very positive feeling of like,

01:40I can actually make things.

01:45Before I started cosplaying,

01:47I was very shy, extremely introverted.

01:51Just either playing video games by myself or reading books.

01:57But all of that is very, like, individual hobbies.

02:02I was living a very isolated life.

02:06I was always feeling very negative about myself.

02:10I used to feel like I didn't deserve to have friends.

02:14Days and weeks could pass without me interacting with anybody outside the house.

02:19And that was very depressing.

02:23In 2015, when the first big convention was going to happen in Qatar,

02:27I saw it and I'm like, oh, maybe I can cosplay.

02:31I wanted to prove to myself, like, I do have it in me.

02:34I can make it.

02:37I was angry at myself for how closed off I was.

02:43I was very chatty when I was young, a very bubbly person.

02:48I knew that part of me could flourish.

02:52I was really determined to just seize the moment and participate in that event.

02:58Just do it and you may never get another chance.

03:03My first time doing a cosplay competition basically flopped.

03:08But it's giving me confidence.

03:11Cosplay has really helped me come out of my shell.

03:15This is the social butterfly that has been stuck in a cocoon for almost 30 years.

03:21Cosplay really works as an icebreaker.

03:24It opens conversations.

03:26It's just like a signal.

03:27It's like, hey, I'm okay to talk to.

03:29I'm also a geek.

03:31I started seeing a part of myself that I thought was not there.

03:35People tell me, it's like, oh, my God, you were amazing.

03:39Sometimes external validation really heals.

03:44It wasn't like, okay, now I'm cured.

03:47It was like a step in the right direction.

03:51I found my future.

03:55Introducing new events, we start offering a way to connect with other cosplayers.

04:00We have the main event, which is Geekdom, that happens once a year.

04:03Every two to three months, we have the smaller one, which is Geekin,

04:07from the name that happens in the weekend.

04:09We have multiple activities.

04:11We have the board games tournament.

04:12We have the esports tournament.

04:14We have multiple cosplay competitions.

04:16I have been in the cosplay scene for quite a long time.

04:20She competed multiple times.

04:22People, they're starting to look at her, and they started to have the courage to actually participate as well.

04:29I'm really loving the fact that nowadays, more and more people are embracing the possibility of cosplaying,

04:37being able to have the conversation with them.

04:39I learn from them. They learn from me.

04:41In Qatar, the cosplay scene, the geek scene, is still in its infancy.

04:47You can mold it however you want.

04:50Try to gear it towards inclusivity.

04:54Since the community was small, it was a little bit easier for us to manage it

04:58and to give enough attention to everyone,

05:00so we can actually help them to grow and to express themselves the proper way.

05:05We are trying to offer them a face for them to show us their talent.

05:12I know that my craftsmanship level is high,

05:16but I want to go to further competitions,

05:20let loose, and actually just get into character.

05:23I'm trying to work more and more on practicing to get the posture correct.

05:28Try to imitate the tone of voice.

05:32I'm Captain Rose Skyward.

05:34In February, there's going to be the big Geekdom event.

05:37It's going to be my first time doing something on a higher level than anything I've done before.

05:42I want people to see the work that I've done.

05:46I want to prove to myself that what I'm doing is good enough.

05:49It takes a lot of courage to dress up as a character.

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