Fill in the gap...

It seems I have managed to develop a bad case of writers block, thus the lack of posts lately. This is really just a filler post until I can somehow un-block myself. Nothing exactly -life-shocking- has happened to me as of late so the only big news I have to share this week is that I got an iMac. Yaaay! I’ve joined the bandwagon… and all I have to say is that it’s not as spectacular spectacular as everyone hypes it up to be. Sure it’s nice and quiet and it looks pretty, but so far it’s been a real bitch trying to adjust to all the different features considering I come from a long history of PC-using. Bah… it puts me into a bad mood just thinking about it so I’m going to stop. But as I have now obtained this piece of aluminum I shall have to deal with it, in the end it is just another computer after all. And now I shall leave you with some pretty pictures, as I have nothing more to really write about. Cheers…

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New nails, new lipgloss

Nails of the week

My morning routine

My anime collection, I've added more since this photo...

My dvd collection, which also has grown since this photo was taken

Latest fashion ensemble

Love Like Winter....

As most people have probably noticed it is now May and in the land of Oz the weather has finally changed from sunshine, lollipops and rainbows to windy, dreary, cold and wet and with the seasons my wardrobe has also changed. This winter I have left my skinny leg jeans to hibernate and instead have gone with the soft velvety feeling of patterned tights against my pale alabaster computer tanned legs, while paired with knee high boots and skirts of varying shortness.

Now before y’all get out your -you-must-be-crazy- faces and start throwing comments like 'I must be freezing...’ I would like to drop a reminder that I live in Melbourne, and the temperature here varies between somewhat nippy and fuck it‘s cold... and not forgetting the days that aren’t even cold despite being already fully clad in a big black coat designed for northern hemispherical winters.

And if I don’t point this out enough, I am Chinese, more precisely I’m from Beijing and it gets really fucking cold in winter. It’s so cold that I’ve avoided going back during winter since I was 11 until last year when I went back for Chinese New Year during March and my god I thought my blood would crystallize and this was with two layers of stockings underneath my über tight super skinny leg jeans.

That’s another thing; despite every other person’s opinion I find jeans are incredibly poor insulators of heat during winter. Especially super skinny leg jeans, which is the only kind of jeans I own and I absolutely loathe having to drag my legs through those steel cold tunnels in the morning.

So to save myself the drama and my boyfriend the whining this winter I have decided to opt for a more agreeable substitute. Thus I choose stockings. They give me the slimming effect to create traffic-stopping legs without the temperature drop, and this season, it’s patterned and or colored stockings that are the hip thing out on the streets, which is the perfect way to personalize any outfit and they don’t cost me an arm and a leg and that makes my bank account look happy too.

Okay, my eyes are starting tear up from sleep deprivation so I shall wrap it up.

Au Revoir my lovelies....

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Fashion Tip Of The Day: When the weather does get cold enough, pull on a pair of thigh-high or over-the-knee socks over your tights or pantyhose even for added warmth.

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Shirt & Cardigan: Portmans
Skirt: Shibuya
Stockings: The Sock Club
Makeup: M.A.C. Cosmetics & Dior

Retail's a bitch...

You know there is one thing I utterly loathe about shopping sometimes. Snotty, ill-mannered, bitches of sales assistants. I can’t stand them. The amount of times I have walked out of a shop because I have been treated beyond poorly by a sales assistant is just unjustifiably phenomenal. Like yesterday I went to Boxhill Shopping Centre in search of an anime store and while on the lookout for the store I poked my head into a few Asian run clothing stores just to have a look at what they had to offer and I came across one store that took my fancy. Admittedly the clothing wasn’t terrible but they were severely over-priced but I spotted a pair of shoes that I had been trying to chase down for a while now but every time the store didn’t have my size. So I picked up the shoe and carried it over to the sales assistant who was busy on the phone jabbering away in Cantonese to her invisible friend on the other end of the line. I stood there for a good fifteen minutes waiting for her to acknowledge me. Then another girl and her boyfriend came in and the sales assistant immediately gets off the phone and walks over to help her... Dude that’s just so uncool.... So I just put the shoe down and walked out. She just lost $100 in sales that day because she was being a bitch.

Other places that have made their way on to my blacklist are:

Rosemin (Chapel Street Store)

Versace (Used to be in Crown)

Gasp Jeans

Most Asian clothing stores

Gasp Jeans has a notorious reputation for employing the worst sales assistants. They’re all overly pushy and if they think you don’t have the money they will kick you out. I was once got told by one of the sales staff, indirectly of course, that I was basically too fat to fit into the dress I was going to try on. Ironically I worked there for a month, out of pure desperation of course but at least I wasn’t a bitch and they fired me for no apparent reason anyways. Asian clothing stores are the other I have problems with. Despite sometimes having the better selection of clothes and they usually fit me for a change, sometimes I just want to smack the sales assistants in the face with a snow shovel. They are just so rude I can’t stand them, and they think I can’t understand them while they mutter away in Chinese right in front of me. Well I’ve got news for you kids... I’m actually Chinese believe it or not.... if my face doesn’t give it away then I don’t know what does. So yes I do understand you when you’re talking amongst yourselves. And telling me that it’s just retail and I should just accept is not going to fly either. I work in retail too, and have so for a good 3 years now and yes I’m tough if you try to fuck around with me but I can safely say I am not a bitch and I work in one of the most demanding retail positions out there so there is plenty of potential for me to be one.

Well there’s my rant for the week. Don’t mind me... I’m just sleep-deprived and grumpy.

Brain Stew

I apologise for this extremely delayed entry... I have been rather tied up the last few days, ever since my mother flew in from China about two weeks ago. And let me just say... O...M...G.... It has been one sleepless mind-fuck... She has this crazy habit of going to sleep in the wee hours of the morning like at 2 or 3am and then wakes up again at 6 or 7am. So now I’m sleep deprived, overworked and brain dead and can’t string together a coherent sentence but I shall do my best, just forgive me if it all of a sudden doesn’t make sense, now on with the blog. This week I have been forced to go hunting for a new wallet. I am wallet hunting because my current wallet decided that it would like to irritate me by producing a hole in the coin compartment. This is probably the worst possible thing I have ever had to go through in my entire shopping experience (the second being shopping for a new diary). And I’ve now done it twice. Last time as sheer dumb luck that I just happened to find the perfect wallet in the 20th or so shop that I walked into, which just so happened to be a Guess wallet.

For me a wallet has to be something super special because of how much I will be using it and I will always see it so being exceptionally visually appealing is a must but without being too gaudy and tacky. It needn’t be a major designer label I just needs to look good, and amusingly enough there was only one out all the Gucci’s and Prada’s and Burberry’s that was worth even a second glace was a hot pink patent leather purse by Louis Vuitton. The wallet was cute and I would have bought it if it wasn’t going to cost $1090... Might as well sell a bit of my soul with it too.... It’s not the price I have issue with; it’s the price for that particular sweat shop manufactured piece of cow’s hide that put me off. Sure it looked wonderful but nowhere in my headspace could I justify shelling out one grand for it.

So after running around all afternoon from shop to shop to shop to shop... you get the picture... I finally returned to Guess and chose another one of their wallets that showed some potential. Now most wallets come in three sizes, small, medium and large. At first I purchased the longer one out of the three but after careful scrutiny I came to realize that it was really ugly and so after staring angrily at an unwilling sales assistant I changed it to the medium one. It wasn’t until I was sitting down to and sipping at a cup of tea that I tried to transfer over my stuff from my other wallet and to my shock horror nothing fit. The word frustrated comes to mind when I try to think about how I was feeling, but somehow that doesn’t quite cut it.

Old wallet on the left, new wallet on the right

So today I ran around all the stores in Melbourne to see what else was available and finally came across this little red patent leather wallet sitting under the glass in some Korean clothes store in Melbourne Central. Of all places... It’s a bit fat for my liking but it’s cute at least, and everything fits in very comfortably so it will do for now until my bid on eBay for that awesome Chanel Leather Cambon wallet goes through.

My new beloved wallet

Christ that was such an ordeal just to find a wallet. I don't understand how something that potentionally was so simply turned out to be one of my worst shopping nightmares. So I decided to spoil myself and bought a few other things to tickle my fancy.

I love Pucca ^^

Awesome Japanese Magazines that destroy all remaining pieces of a disheveled self-esteem

Anyways my brain hurts and my eyes feel like they might bleed so I shall head to bed.

Auf Wiedersehen

Tschüss!

Hey Vanity... This Vile's Empty....

The other day I went to go about doing my makeup for the day and there I am sitting in front of my once pristine white dressing table now littered with smudged eyeliner shavings and used cotton buds, about to dispense some of that miracle skin smoothing goop we girls call foundation. And to my shock horror it dawned on me that the reason nothing was coming out was not because the bottle was clogged due my careless ways of preserving the stuff as I had thought, but because it was empty. Thus this week I had the joys of searching for a new foundation.

On Monday I went to Myers in search of my new foundation and was drawn to the Dior counter, for no other reason than it’s my favourite designer. I talked to the sales assistant, told her what I was after and the problems I had with the Lancôme and she suggested something from the Dior Skin Nude range. She gave me a little to try on my face and I was really impressed how light it felt and how smooth my skin looked, even after I took a walk around to all the other counters to see their selection and got battered by sales-assistant bullshit, it still felt like I was wearing no makeup at all. So in the end, with a little help of eeny-meeny-miny-moe I decided to settle with the liquid Dior Skin Nude which cost me $75 and a matching concealer stick costing me $69. It is a bit pricy for what it is, but I don’t mind paying up knowing that it does what it’s supposed to do thus worth my money.

My last white lie of choice was a bottle of Colour Ideal by Lancôme that cost me about $60 which I bought from Myers. Now the one good thing about the Lancôme was that it never made my face feel dry. When first applied it seems as though you have flawless Photoshop-like skin but after more or less four hours or so my skin starts to feel greasy again. I used to conquer that by delicately brushing on some Clinique Clarifying Powder over the top of the foundation, it costs about $48 and you can pick it up at most department stores such as Myer or David Jones. It also allows you to re-touch yourself to picture perfection whenever you begin to feel self-conscious during bathroom visits. Despite from being that tad bit too greasy for me, it is a good starting point for first time foundation users. It offers good coverage and very close colour matching so the skin looks smoother but not unnatural.

The Lancôme would probably have been the third bottle of foundation I have bought over my makeup wearing days, my first being a $29.95 tube of Maybelline’s Pure Makeup I picked up from the local pharmacy because it was cheap and I was sixteen and didn’t know any better. It felt like padding mud on to my face every time I used the stuff and then after an hour or two it felt like it would start dripping off my face at any moment. In short, stay clear of cheap supermarket brand makeup unless you desire to look like you’ve just slathered on a jar of peanut butter all over your face.

When I decided it was finally time to upgrade my foundation, my mother took me to Myers where I was taken to the Estée Lauder counter because she liked that brand. Not knowing any better I had a bit of a poke around and was spotted by one of those overly happy sales assistants with lipstick drawn too far away from her actual lips and pale blue eye shadow a hooker wouldn’t even consider wearing...
Just on a side note, what’s with makeup girls and their incredible inability to apply makeup themselves?
Anyways, after explaining what I was after she picked out the Individualist Natural Finish Foundation which was okay I suppose, but to be honest I couldn’t really tell the difference at all. And after a few uses, I discovered it felt rather flaky and it would dry my skin out around the cheeks but made my nose really oily. The fact I was only seventeen when I was using it might have some part to do with it. I think Estée Lauder is really designed for the more mature woman as opposed to the everyday-to-day sort of girl. Therefore it’s probably not the best one to go with unless you fall into the category of the ‘mature age group’.

On another note, I do realise that not everyone can afford to just shell out $100 on makeup on a whim like that, which is understandable I mean being able to eat is usually a good thing too. A good alternative I’ve come to really favour is using a tinted moisturiser which can be found in most leading retailers, and then dusting all over the face with a decent powder foundation. For myself I like to use Dove Protective Tinted Moisturiser, which I just pick up from the supermarket and then I use the Clinique Clarifying powder over the top. This particular technique is ideal for those on a tight budget and for people like me who enjoy sleeping in that extra half an hour instead of flustering over doing makeup. Although the tinted moisturiser alone can feel a little sticky and a little greasy because it is mainly a moisturiser, so the powder foundation helps to dry it out a little and also give a little more coverage. You don’t have to use such an expensive one like I do, with the wide range of different brands out there to choose from, it’s easy to pick something that is more suited for yourself and your wallet.

In the end the best advice I can give is having a play around with different brands to see what really suits you. Another tip is try to stick to the one brand at a time, meaning use the same brand concealer as the foundation or powder as different brands tend to have slightly different formulas which might sit well with each other when used together. But then again, each to their own I say, it’s all a matter of trial and error when it comes to make up anyhow.

And so there you have it, a noobs guide into buying foundation. I hope it was somewhat amusing to read if not a teensy weensy bit helpful.
Well, until next time.

Adieu.

Half Empty Bottle

I came up with a thought yesterday, as to why people have mid-life crises. People suffer from mid-life crises because they spend half their lives pursuing the perfect life and then all of sudden they turn around and realize shit... my life kind of sucks... and then they go and splurge all their money that they’ve spent so many hardcore years nauseously working for on some mechanical box with four wheels and a most awesome custom paint job. Well if my life decided to spit the dummy at me and commit suicide at least I can safely look down at my time pool and feel that despite my unconventional ways of living, I have lived my life to the best of my ability.

Okay... enough negativity for one post, I promise my next one will be extra girly.

We're Only Good For Latest Trends...

So the other weekend I went down to Bendigo to see the Age of Couture exhibition. In all honesty Bendigo is actually surprisingly quite a lovely town, with its old Victorian style buildings that have escaped from being demolished and reformed into an awesome block of “modern style” apartments. The word ‘quaint’ comes to mind if I had to describe it in one word. Being there for half a day and a night didn’t leave much time for me to wander around (It would have been a whole day if Melbourne transportation actually ran as accordingly like it’s supposed too... but that’s for another time.) But from what I saw and this coming from a pampered middle-class city chick, I will admit it is quite liveable.

Anyways back on track, the couture exhibition featured many works of famous haute couture artists such as Dior, Balenciaga, Fath and many others from during post war Paris & London during the 1950s. Now I had been looking forward to this exhibition for some time now after spotting a postcard for it many months back. What caught my eye originally was this particular dress that was featured on the postcard.

For yonks now that dress has been a personal favourite of mine and a lot of inspiration for my own work has come from that one dress. So here I was darting around corners hoping to see this fantastic piece of art but after scouring each room I came to the sad realisation that it was not there... what a bummer... but putting that aside it was still worth the trip down. It was interesting to see how much thought and detail was put into each piece of work, something that is somewhat absent from today’s clothing, and it all looked oh so incredibly elegant and well refined... it was kind of depressing. *Le sigh...* Oh well what can one expect from a city that thrives on over mass produced clothing. Seriously though, I walked around the CBD the other day and walked into four different shops and they shared almost the exact same stock, just with a different price tag. But that’s again another story.

In short the exhibition was most awesome.

Short Fast & Loud

Someone said to me that starting a blog would be a good idea, an outlet for my self-conscious and conceited bullshit that should not be spoken aloud and would make the ears of the innocent and genuine bleed.
That and I should disperse my impeccable vanity about fashion and make-up upon the world because I am a closet shop-a-holic and I have a perverse love for the material world.
So here I am, let's see how I do.