Nihon ni ikitai! [日本に行きたい!]
Posted by ilyana | Filed under Food & Nosh, Make-Up & Beauty
Yet again I’m put in a spot where I have to spontaneously declare my love for a country I’ve never been to but have heard/read about it so much (all this with a slight tinge of envy) that I have embraced its culture as though it were my own.
Everything about Japan fascinates me, it’s a nation obsessed with attaining perfection in a sense that everything they do is done with careful grace and everyone is well-groomed and dressed to the nines.
You can pick out plenty of fashion styles in Japan, some are so chic (it just stabs me in the heart to think I live in a country where flip-flops and shorts are the norm) while the others look like they were from an entirely different time/planet/dimension/the space between spaces which amazes me sometimes because all of them are so immaculately dressed despite their slightly warped kooky sense of fashion. Now that is just made of epic fashion win.
I have to keep reminding myself that this blog isn’t entirely about my terror-inducing beauty-related spending habits and my knack for playing pretend chef every once a while but also to document the many things I find intriguing from fashion (dude, I’ve not blogged about fashion in the longest time!) to design-related stuff. So today I bring you a couple of photos of Tokyo from one of my favourite photographers on Flickr, Chillhiro.
img credit: chillhiro@Flickr
There is a certain elegance and beauty to his photos which I love and it’s strange because his photo compositions are so simple yet he manages to capture the rare stillness of a fast-paced metropolitan city like Tokyo. If you like what you see, check out Chillhiro’s photostream here for more visual splendor ;D
*cough* k back to my ridiculous spending habits. (What? You can’t expect me to talk about artsy stuff 24/7, can you?) A colleague of mine, Jas, went to Japan over the Christmas holidays so I gave her a shopping list of stuff I was interested in and she came back with a bag full of yummy goodies for me YAY!
Milk tea is my fave drink in the world and Japanese milk tea is the absolute best!!
Chocolates! Meiji Matcha chocolate, Matcha Kit Kat and Royal Milk Tea Kit Kat (MILK TEA KIT KAT O.M.F.G!!!!!) Of course, you can’t leave Japan without buying some oddly-flavoured Kit Kats. They have different seasonal flavours each year, ranging from the brilliant (milk tea Kit Kat, MILK TEA KIT KAT /o/ /o/ /o/) to the downright bizarre lol (ginger ale Kit Kat anyone?) Honestly I won’t be surprised if they came up with a clam chowder flavoured Kit Kat lmao. Only in Japan guys, only in Japan.
BENTO GOODIES ♥ ♥ ♥ I have pretty technicolor soy sauce bottles to fulfill my wild bento fantasies! The flat plastic thingum you see on the far left is actually a sandwich box (no more soggy bread for me whee!) Jas actually got me a two-tier bento box too but er I kinda left it in the office so I couldn’t take a photo of it, sorry.
Bihada Ichizoku masks! I’ve heard so MUCH about these masks, I think the girly manga illustrations on the packaging’s amusing lol. I’ve not tried them yet but when I do, I’ll write a short review.
That’s all for my Japan haul! But I’m not done yet haha, I’ve got some past purchases I’ve not shown you yet so here they are:
VOV masks! I’ve tried almost all of them and I’m pretty happy with their quality. From L to R: Volcanic Ash Wash-off mask, Black Charcoal Peel-off mask and the Apple AHA Peeling Gel mask. I like the Black Charcoal mask the best so far, i think it’s comparable to the KOSE Seikisho Mask White, works the same way and costs a fraction of the price.
Did I mention I’m officially swamped in masks? Yep. I’m up to my neck in sheet mask nirvana. Here’s the queen of all masks, the SK-II facial treatment mask I bought on a whim at Sephora the other day. I’m just waiting for this little pimple on my chin to evacuate off my face before I try this one out; there is no way in heck I’m going to waste an SK-II mask on a stupid clogged pore.
The Body Shop’s Christmas LE Nutmeg & Vanilla body scrub! I got this during their post-Christmas sale when everything was at 40% off! Not that I need another body scrub but…
Doesn’t it look like a yummy smoothie? It’s got honey, nutmeg and ground walnut in it, I used this yesterday and came out of the shower potentially smelling like a French bakery. That. is. just. so. AWESOME. All my life I’ve wanted to smell like freshly-baked croissants and cream-filled crepes and the body scrub leads me one step closer to my dream. God bless Dame Anita Roddick, RIP. (Ok I’m kidding about the wanting to smell of croissants and crepes lol but the scrub really has a lovely scent!)
I think I shuld end this entry now before it gets any longer than it already is and people start throwing rocks at me lol. It’s TGIF! Have a great weekend and I’ll catch you soon ;D
Tags: bodycare: The Body Shop, food: chocolate, japan, skincare: bihada, skincare: SK-II, skincare: VOV
I’m 21
Posted by ilyana | Filed under Misc
I turned 21 two weeks ago on the 27th of June. This is prolly going to be very cliche of me to say this but it was indeed the best birthday I’ve ever had. I was stowed away in a car in the wee hours of that saturday morning and was driven to the cinema where we caught the new transformers movie. I had lunch at Barcelos Grilled Chicken where my closest cousins surprised me with a cake, a giant balloon and a lovely card!
Nadz gave me a bagful of presents which I struggled to carry because it was just so damn heavy! In it was the best DIY card I’ve seen in years, The Body Shop spa goodies, some vouchers from my favourite book store and a pressed powder compact from Majolica Majorca.
I had another mini post-birthday party at my house with 3 good friends; I cooked up 60 takoyaki balls in the sweltering heat and we drank green tea while snacking on chilled macaroons. Twas good, really good.
I’m sure a lot of you have been wondering where on earth have I disappeared to? I’m really tired of saying this but my day job has been stealing me away, not only from blogging but a lot of other things as well. I had to work over the weekend just last week, spending 10 hours at the airport doing up a presentation for the following monday!
I don’t have time for myself anymore and lately I haven’t been able to take good care of myself even; my skin has gotten so bad from work-related stress and you won’t believe how much I’ve been bingeing on food! Sucks, I know but things are kinda slowing down over at the workplace (which is why I’m blogging now) so let’s hope I can get everything in control again.
Tags: birthdays, bodycare: The Body Shop, life
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