I was passing through Bangkok and happened to learn about this recurring event and decided to check it out and write a couple of lines about it. I know pretty much nothing about card collector lingo but I do enjoy the collector aspect of several cardgames, not only within the Mobile Suit Gundam sphere. The Int'l Card Show is a recurring event and its most recent event took place over the past weekend at the Mitrtown galleria in Bangkok's Sam Yan district, near the Chulalongkorn University. The event was held in a functional space on the fifth floor atop various shops and restaurants below. The venue is easily accessible by underground the train.
I didn't walk around taking a million pictures of everything on display but here is the general ambience of the venue. There are many more images of displays on the show's own facebook account, although for some reason they seem to be heavily slanted towards sports collectibles which was certainly not anywhere close to dominating the floor. In fact, I'd say about 60-70% was Pokemon (several languages exist, Japanese is generally favoured by many Thai sellers) followed by sports cards (I don't know what types) and the One Piece TCG. There were also smaller showings of things like Lorcana, Riftbound, Weiss und Schwarz and the Gundam Card Game.
To get a better size of the event, this is the floor and vendor chart for the event. There was also this event pass that they gave you as you signed up (entrance fee 250 THB, about USD 7.50) where you had to collect stamps at several stations. These stamps entitled you to a mystery TCG card pack in plain silver foil packaging (I already forgot the name of it sorry). It was not something I wanted to bother with myself.
Initially I was a bit overwhelmed trying to take it all in. There was a heavy focus on graded cards sold in sealed plastic "slabs" and the individual prices did not seem to have any upper limits. Five digit prices (above USD 300) were everywhere, probably some six figures-cards I did not see as well. You could also find sellers sealing booster boxes, individual packs and even in some cases cheap lose cards in non-descript boxes. I was primarily hoping to stumble on someone selling singles or packs for the Gundam Card Game but pickings were slim and the only such cards I found were graded and well out of my price-range. I didn't see anyone selling booster packs but a few sellers had the occasional booster box such as GD03 and EB01. One seller from I believe Singapore brought a case of GD05 with a price tag of around USD 1200, probably the Japanese edition.
I didn't want to leave the venue without a memento so I decided to pick up some Thai language Pokemon card packs for the 30th Anniversary set (about USD 3.50 each) and some Thai promo cards because those packs are just so colourful.
If you are interested in this event the 2027 edition is planned for March 6-7 and will be held inside the enormous Queen Sirikit Convention Centre just a stone-throw from the busy Asok-Sukhumvit junction. You can keep tabs on the event through their facebook page which posts frequently and also in English. The event also has its own website.
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