The first Gundam experience I can actually remember was watching an episode of V Gundam way back in 1993, while visiting my family in Japan. I had no idea what the heck a Gundam was, but I watched the episode and loved it. Back then though I wasn't even an actual anime fan and was a complete and total newbie, and had no idea how to find more of the show I had watched. I later saw some V Gundam toys in a store that same trip to Japan, but did not have the money to buy it.
My next experience was the Gundam Wing model magazine a few years after my encounter with V Gundam. The magazine was a present from my Japanese family, and I was fascinated by the mecha depicted in it.
Sometime after that, I got the 1/144 scale Wing Zero model from the Sakuracon. I still had no actual idea what the show was. At that same Sakuracon event though, I saw the last 5-10 minutes of the Endless Waltz movie version.
Then finally, several years later again, I rented Gundam Wing VHS Volume 1 edited version from a Hollywood Video store. I was immediately hooked, and bought the unedited version from a Suncoast Video.
Thus were my first couple encounters with Gundam leading to my addiction. Sometime later again on another trip to Japan, one of my cousins lent me the Gundam 0079 movies to watch, after they saw I was addicted to Gundam from my model-buying spree.
