Well. I was homeschooled and what I could watch and not watch was extremely limited. My shows consisted of PBS Kids, Nick Jr., and Playhouse Disney (The old one). It wasn't until about 2008ish when I first found out about anime. I think I was like 13ish. 7th grade.

So anyway, my best friend had just gotten into Bakugan and told me about it. I decided to watch it. I'd come home everyday from school and watch an episode. I loved it! My cousins were living with us for a year and they would make fun of me. Then my siblings made fun of me too. I had stopped watching it for a while and couldn't bring myself to watch it again. My friend would ask me all the time how far I'd gotten. I didn't get that far but she would tell me all about it. Then I decided that I wouldn't care what they thought of me. I wouldn't car about how they think of me. And I continued my routine from before. The making fun of slowed a little but it was still there. I just told myself that it was going to happen, I couldn't do anything about it and I should just ignore it.

My parents never liked it. But that never stopped me before so it would stop me for this.

I don't regret anything. I've made so many people at school who adored anime and I'm still new compared to them. But it's brilliant and amazing. I'm glad there are people I can talk to about it. My own family puts me down because of it but it's absolutely fine with me.

Basically for me, I loved the originals that were on in the morning (aka. Pokemon, Sailor Moon, YuGiOh, Dragon Ball Z and One Piece) it was common for everyone to have watched and loved these, so it wasn't weird or uncommon. Every kid watched Cheese TV.

In year 7 when I first started high school, everyone's mentality changed. It was uncool to watch anime except the ones listed above as they were our childhood. I am ashamed to say I shunned anime after that so I could fit in. (I was too weird to fit in any may lmao)

Anyway, as the years went by and we all matured, majority of my year level were actually watching anime in secret. We were all in our anime closets and well, hit year 11/12. We were all obsessed again.



I'm not sure if it's just Australia or just my region, but we are very accepting of people's interests, and it's very common to find someone who also likes anime. (Alas they're not that into it to buy merch and go to cons, but that alone makes me happy)

Welp, I'm homeschooled, and I never really liked talking to people. I knew of the way people reacted when they learned I watched anime, so I never really told anyone exept for my closest friends. Just a month or two back, I finaly told another of my homeschooled friends, and she watched anime, and has a friend who watches anime, so now the three-to-four people, in that group of fift-to-sixty people, who watch anime are friends.
I've tried getting my sister into anime, but she really doesn't like any of it (exept for Hetalia), but she's very welcome to the idea, and doesn't really judge me for it.

So yeah, in short, I've been very careful who I tell about anime, and I don't really have any merchandise because I'm so stinking poor.

Hmm, well when I was a kid I remember watching Card Captor Sakura and Inuyasha and Sailor Moon and Pokemon. My mom was actually a fan of Inuyasha so anime wasn't a problem with my family.
Tbh, I never really got into anime until like 4th grade. Being a shy kid, most people didn't know I liked anime and only thought I drew anime-style.
My school's pretty strict but my class specifically's pretty chill on what you like or whatever. Jock? Yah, sure. Nerd? Whatever dude, just teach us when a big test's coming. Anime freak? Oh, cool, any good ones I might like?
So yeah, there's only a few anime geeks I can really talk to about anime but everyone's pretty chill if you do or don't like a thing.