I was also at Anime Expo 2006 and I made to the Toru Furuya panel. It was a lot of fun getting to meet him and listen to the panel, particularly since I'm also a huge Universal Century Gundam fan. (Toru Furuya was also the voice of Amuro Ray, the main character in Gundam.)
He was also at the opening ceremonies, as he was one of the guest of honor. Unlike the other Japanese guests, he gave his opening speech in English and did a fun little "quiz", where he asked the audience to guess which of the many characters he's voiced he was doing. I took a video of it and have put it on youtube, but I was pretty far back in the audience so the video quality is iffy:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=gyW-3c8I0KM
The panel was mostly question-and-answer from fans. He was a very energetic and fun guest to listen to. (Much more interesting than the Clamp panel, to be honest, but that's another story...) Most people asked him also had line requests for him to do, which was fun. He even stayed extra long until we had to leave (since something or other was scheduled in the room afterwards).
Most of the questions (and line requests) were about Gundam, but a few were about Sailor Moon, Saint Seiya, and Dragon Ball Z. He noted that he will absolutely do the voice of Yamcha in any upcoming DBZ video games. Here's a video I took of him doing a Yamcha line:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=UBWHkNQgXVc
One fan asked him to say a Yamcha line in English. (The fan had asked Ryo Horikawa to say a Vegeta line in English last year.) That was fun. Toru asked the translator to translate the Yamcha line he'd given during the opening ceremonies. Here's the video I took of it:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=7YiVu397Th4
Afterwards I went to his autograph session. I went down immediately to get in line, but still ended up near the back of the line. It was fun to meet him in person. I had him sign a 20th anniversary Gundam poster featuring Amuro. (Don't get me wrong, I like Yamcha, but as Amuro is the Goku of Gundam...)
The guy in front of me in line had just found out that day that Toru would be at the con and as Yamcha was his "favorite character in ALL anime" he was very happy to be there. He had bought a little Yamcha figure in the exhibit hall that morning (the kind that are in the bubbles and you get out of machines). The funny thing was that Toru really liked the figure and asked were the fan had got it. After finding out, Toru wondered aloud if there was time for him to go downstairs and get one.
Anyway, overall it was great to meet him. Sorry you didn't make it!
