San Fransico 1998


Report send it by Rigel Apolinar

NOTE: Anything in parentheses are my own thoughts. When Garrett speaks it's in BLUE. Audience questions are in RED. Also I'm still working on developing those pictures I took from the convention.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 1ST 1998

I headed up to the convention early that morning because Garrett was scheduled fo be the first guest of the day. I also needed to meet up with Christina, Jay, Annie, and Marie. I got there around 10:00 a.m. and people were already in line. I finally met up with Christina and Jay just after Marie and I got ourselves stamped and ticketed. Christina showed us what she was gonna have Garrett autograph for her. It just happened to be the 1997 People's 50 Most Beautiful People Issue. She wanted him to sign his page. ( Why didn't I think of that? Hmm...) We had a whole hour to kill before Garrett would go on stage. We all headed for the Dealer's Room to find some goodies. I ended up buying two new pictures of Garrett. One was in his uniform in a new pose and the other was a blow up of Garrett's face from a previous convention. When it came close for him to appear we all headed up to our seats. I have to say Marie and I had the worse seats out of us 5. Christina and Jay got to sit in the middle of the auditorium in the sixth row. Then Annie got to sit just two sections away in the 8th row. While Marie and I sat on the far right of the auditorium in the 12th row. It was either that or sit in the far back rows. Adam Malin, the one in charge of the whole con, came out and introduced Garrett, but first there was a salute to his character. They played a music video. It had clips from the first 2 seasons of Voyager. I don't recall the song, Christina or Annie, might remember it. Anyways, Adam came back out and introduced Garrett. Of course I was at the front of the stage with my camera all set and ready so was everyone else. Garrett was wearing a black Chinese dragon type shirt, and blue jeans. The camera flashes were blinding from my point of view, it's ever a wonder how he doesn't bump into anything onstage. Garrett began by saying,
"Ok now this is your photo-opportunity. I always start at my left." ( Incidently that where I was taking his pictures. He was only 5 feet away!!!! ) As he poses he can't move his lips so he says, "Look I'm a ventriloquist, hehehehe." Garrett continues to move all the way to the right until everyone has at least taken 5 shots of him.
Garret: Howz everyone doin?!?!? The audience yells out fine. Garrett looks back at the screen, where he sees one his pictures from season one. Garrett asks, "Anyone know what's different about me now and then?" People from the audience yell, "your hair, your hair!!!!" Yup, I had to beg TPTB to let me cut my hair. I like my hair as it is now. Anyways...what's been going on? We've just finished filming episode six of season 5. Wow, can you believe we're filming Season 5 already? ( Sorry, to say but I can't recall what the first six episodes were about. I guess you could say I was distracted by Garrett,
sorry. )
By the way we're going to shoot our 100th episode very soon and LeVar Burton is going to direct it.
Among the audience were many oohs and ahs about the episode.
All I can really say about the episode is that it revolves around Harry, Chakotay, and Neelix in that order. And that it's gonna deal with Harry from the present and than Harry 15 years in the future. This Harry has a lot every single of emotion you can think of. This Harry can stand up to Seven and not get his butt whooped. Garrett pretends that Seven is coming up to talk to him. He does the speak-to-the-hand-and-to-the-face motion and says, "Seven I don't need to deal with you right now."
The audience is estactic by the notion.
A man in the audience asks, "Is there still going to be a Kim/Seven relationship?"

Garrett: What relationship? She beats Harry up!!! The audience is roaring in laughter. Look the only way Seven and Harry are gonna get together is for two things to happen, ok? The first thing is for Seven to stop beating the crap out of Harry. (By this time I'm holding my stomach and trying to breath, because I'm laughing so hard) The second is that she has to be able to have respect for Harry. If you think about it, the two go hand-in-hand. But seriously, I think The Powers That Be would like to keep one main romance going on per ship or show. So Torres and Paris are the main item for now. But I wouldn't rule out the possibility.
A boy, about 13, asks, "Do you like getting twiped across the floor by Seven?" Everyone starts laughing again. Garrett looks straight at the boy for a good few seconds and says, "You know I've learned to not be taken by questions like these from kids 15 and younger. The laughter gets louder and Garrett has this big smile on his face. The answer to your question is "no." Harry doesn't like getting wiped across the floor by Seven. Ok, I'm sure you all have your own little nicknames for Seven. The men in the audience start whistling and howling. I remember
listening to this one guy from the East Coast said that we've nicknamed her "2 of D."
( At this point I couldn't contain myself, I know it was mean, but it was also funny.) Please try to keep these names to yourselves. But if you're bold enough try telling Jeri that. Ok next question....
A kid asked, "Will you ever go get home?"
Garrett: I've said it before I'll say it again. If we would just stop looking and inspecting every single little rock that we pass by we would be home by now!!!! Forget all the aliens we encounter, just go, go, go. Don't look back just look forward.
A man in the audience asked, "What's your background?"
Garrett: "My theatrical background or my cultural background"
Man: "No, where you've lived?"
Garrett: "Oh, ok." I was born in Riverside, CA. Someone starts clapping. Garrett looks at the person and says, "Aw you weren't born in Riverside, stop clappin." Then I moved to Indiana for 3 years. Then moved to Bermuda for 6 years. Then moved to Memphis for 6 years. You know I went through a lot of
racism in Memphis. I didn't do any so-called "Asian accents" because I felt it was a wrong against my people. If you listen closely you can hear the differences in a Japanese accent to a Korean accent. Oh yeah, see you're making me get of course here. After Memphis I moved to Los Angeles where I went to school at UCLA.
A college student yells and claps. Garrett looks at her stunned and then says,
"You go to UCLA? The girl nods. Garrett whispers in the mike and says, "Sssh, you know we're in enemy territory. Yeah Bears, go Cal, go!!! I love Berkley!!! We all start falling out of chairs laughing so hard. I made Marie ask what the "Running Man" was. I couldn't ask myself because I was coughing.....really I was. Garrett tried demostrating it, but he didn't have a chair to do it on. So the whole concept of the joke was lost. It's hard to explain so you'll just have to ask him what it is yourself.
Garrett: Speaking of impersonations, let's play a game. Guess who I am. Garrett starts impersonating George Takei in his deep voice only he could do. Garrett's facial expressions while impersonating George is hiliarious. You have to see it to understand. When you guessed right Garrett used a heavy Chinese accent and said, "you get egg row, you too!!! You know now I'm going to put this Chinese take-out and laundry on my routine." Garrett goes on to impersonating Tim Russ. He takes it farther by doing a little comedy stage work by impersonating both George and Tim and both heading to Tim's trailer. George wants to feel Tim's ears and you can figure out the rest, just use your imagination. You couldn't find a person not laughing at this point.
Somone in the audience asked, "Are you athletic and what sports do you enjoy playing?" Garrett looks at the person and says, ok. Puts the mike on the floor and drops and does push ups for everyone and then shows off by clapping before having to hit the ground. Everyone is enjoying the show he just put on.
Garrett: How's that? Uh...sports. I use to play soccer or should I say English football when I lived in Bermuda. You know it makes sense that you call soccer football, cuz you use your feet. But American football you don't use your feet. We should call it handball, or cradle ball, anything but football. Oh, I also use to play tennis. Nowadays I try to play any sports where I don't get injured, like chess. You know Tim Russ got a sprang ankle from playing a pick up ball of basketball. He had to wear like a brace looking thing. So all the scenes that required him to walk in any shape or form had to be cut out. So in the episode all you saw Tuvok in was behind his console on the bridge. You know can't have Tuvok hobbling around the ship (Garrett demostrates Tim limping and saying his lines in a straight face manner) it just doesn't work. Oops, times up folks. I'll see you all next time.
Garrett signed alongside, Rene Auberjonis, and Armin Shimmerman. He was the first one in line. He liked the pictured I picked out for him to sign. I also told him I was going to watch his movie HUNDRED PERCENT the next night. He told me I hope I liked it. I said no doubt about it. Then the lady helping him out took our picture together. He had to lean over the table. What a perfect way to end my day
with Garrett, but to have my picture taken with him. That's all for now. Reporting from San Francisco, I'm Rigel Apolinar, have a good day or night which ever it is.

If I happened to leave anything else out I'm sorry.






Thank you Rigel for your Report.


To View some pictures of this Convention Click here
If you have any question please contact Rigel at
Rigel14363@yahoo.com