It's Skin: Cookie & Hand Cream Mint Review

So, the It's Skin Cookie & Hand Cream, perhaps my most favourite hand cream to date. Mostly because of its delicious scent. It's just so damn delicious smelling that I want to take a lick of it. But I shall hold back, because from a foolish past experience, where I took a lick of the Skin Food Black Sugar Mask, I realised that no, skincare products will never taste nice - unless you mix up your own facial mask concoction. If only...

'The Standing Desk' (+Downsides)

In hopes to lead a healthier lifestyle in 2015, I had gone and bought myself a laptop stand off eBay for £9.99 that can elevate the laptop from a desk so that I can use it whilst standing. Because standing is said to be a lot more healthier than sitting for it reduces the chances of heart problems in future, and ever since I came back from Korea it felt weird and uncomfortable for me to remain stationary and sitting for long hours on a daily basis.

My work space.

However, this particular structure (and possible many others) comes with a couple of setbacks that I believe everyone should be aware about.

A/W 2014: Evening Skincare Routine (Mini Reviews)

A continuation of of my A/W 2014 Morning Skincare Routine post!

My evening routine tends to be longer than my morning, which is a given since I need to remove my make up. It can be even longer if I plan to use masks.

The evening arsenal.

John Frieda Precision Foam Colour: Lightest Cool Almond Brown 6.5PBN Review

Hope you all had an amazing festive holidy and a happy new year (extremely late I know).

Apologies for my absence because, being a final year student and all, I had a load of university work to do so I had little time to really write a detailed blog post. Luckily, since it is the beginning of a new semester, I do have time now to try my best to not only blog but edit videos!
Take note that this 'activeness' will probably only last for a few weeks more before I'm drowned in university deadlines again *groans*

I am going to kick start the first post of 2015 with one of my 2015 goals: darker hair.

No, I really am 22! (ft. spot patch, moustache mask, and Rilakkuma kigurumi bought from Japan)

A/W 2014: Morning Skincare Routine (Mini Reviews)

You'll probably be surprised to see that my skincare routine doesn't comprise mostly of Korean products! This is mostly because I decided to swap stuff around for university, and plus most of my newly bought Korean products just arrived back home from Korea.
My night routine will feature more Korean products, so stay tuned for that!

Products will be listed in order of application.

Say hello to my new coworker.

The Canon Powershot SX50 HS!

Tada!

In a situation where I am low on money and in dire need of a new phone - that doesn't take a minute to load up appplications, a new bridge camera was purchased instead.
Take note that at the same time of needing a new phone I was also in dire need of a new video recording device to replace my 5+ year old Sanyo Xacti, which produced below average video quality compared to the standards of today, and was clumsily dropped by my foolish hands numerous times throughout the years. Additionally, the constant change of colour tones most noticeable in my videos agitated me greatly.
Although I dislike the sudden invasion of the American Black Friday sales in England, it was admittedly a great opportunity to scout for my muchly needed discounted technology. And that was how I discovered the new camera.

October Music: Korean R&B

I have been terribly out of the Korean music loop recently.
Occasionally I see the odd update on my Facebook feed, but I haven't been solely actively seeking everything out.

I've been busy with university commitments, watching The Return of Superman (슈퍼맨이 돌아왔다) and The Apprentice. The former is so damn time consuming because of it's 1 hour 30 minute episodes, and the previews always makes me want to crave for more baby/toddler action! Meanwhile the latter has been making me double think about my career decision to dabble into the world of marketing. Earlier this month I attempted to do some job hunting at the graduate fair but unfortunately they're all very London/city based which isn't ideal since I live in a small town. I do have friends living in said cities, but it's actually quite burdensome to ask someone if you can stay at theirs for a long period of time. I'd rather start out small and then move onto the bigger things.

Anyway, enough of that depressing future career stuff. Let's sit back and admire these two new recent releases:



As One: For the Night
This is an incredibly sexy soft tune for the evening. Their voices are so lovely and light that it makes me wonder why I haven't attempted to actively search for their other releases after falling completely in love with their Awkward Love track -gulps- last year... Wow, time really does fly!
The MV is like something out of a softcore porno, rich muscular business man and a voluptuous maid. I very much enjoy oggling over the male lead's body though, yes. Apparently he's a member of TROY - I only know of Bumkey and KANTO in that group.




Crush: Sofa
Crush, my boo. Although I do like this track, I still very much prefer the older ones because they make me want to body roll and break out singing. Only the chorus makes me want to body roll and yell "SOFA!" so far. Haha, sofa, so far...
-ahem-

Alright, I'm off to do some readings about Lacan, Zizek, and Baudrillard for the rest of the day.

The Great Korean Make Up Haul

I think I bought less make up products than I did with skin care. Then again, make up products look smaller than skin care, maybe that's why *shrugs*
Additionally, it appears that I've garnered a handful of Japanese imports too, because sometimes the prices are very decent and not crazily overpriced.


The list of products I bought in Korea/featured in this video is listed in the description box on the YT page.

The Great Korean Skin Care Haul

Filmed the video in Korea, editted a month later in England.

Made me miss browsing skin care stores in Korea. It's always fun because almost every product in store had a tester for you to try out before buying, which was amazing. Ever since I got back I've been grimacing everytime I wanted to test a product out at Boots or Superdrug, to find out there is no tester.
The struggle is real.
Korea's skin care culture has spoiled me.

The list of products I bought in Korea/featured in this video is listed in the description box on the YT page.

CLIO Lipnicure in #3 Crime Pink Review

CLIO Lipnicure #3 Crime Pink

Up until now I never had a bad lip product experience. That's right, CLIO's Lipnicure disappointed me a lot.

During Autumn, CLIO released a line of lip laquers titled 'Lipnicure'. The packaging looked sexy, and so did the colour range. The price was not so sexy, retailing at 16,000₩ (almost £10). 
Not knowing much Korean, I guessed that its selling points were that it offered vivid matte results and long lasting colour. 

Clio Gelpresso Pencil Gel Liner Review

During my first few weeks in Seoul, I passed a small Clio store whilst shopping around in Myeongdong. On that day, I didn't take my 'Korean cosmetics shopping list' with me, but I did vividly recall wanting to try out the Gelpresso liners after reading numerous positive reviews of it online. So I went straight in and headed for the eyeliner section.

The staff there didn't know much English. So when I asked one of the female assistants if they sold any non-glitter/shimmer ones she had no idea what I was talking about. My friend helped out by saying "Bling Bling" and that was then that they understood! I should of said matte because then one of the male sales assistants proceeded to loudly say "MAT-TAY! MAT-TAY!". The female SA then started plucking out all the brightly coloured matte pencils and started making swatches on my hand. Unfortunately, there were no matte black liners available in the Gelpresso line, only Golden Black which was a black liner with gold shimmers.

CLIO Gelpresso Mini Liners in Beige Shine, Golden Khaki, Star Purple, Dark Choco, and Golden Black

John Frieda Precision Foam Colour: Extra Light Ash Blonde 10A Review

Late hair dye review post, but I think it's necessary that I tell you all about my lovely experience with John Frieda's Extra Light Ash Blonde foam dye. In short, I love it just as much as Prettia's foam dyes!

John Frieda: Extra Light Ash Blonde 10A. Mini picture on the right is the foam solution.

I bought the box from Boots back in early June 2013 when it was on sale for around £6, and ended up using it in early August before my 1 year-long study abroad adventure in Seoul, South Korea.

Freshlight Hair Dye: Melty Cherry Review

I thought I was going to die just hours into my birthday because of this dye's fumes! Yes, I was dying my hair when the clock struck midnight, marking the beginning of my 21-year-old years. I began my 21st by dying my hair with Freshlight's Melty Cherry foam dye.

Originally I wanted to try out Rose Macaron because it was a lighter pink, but unfortunately it appears that Korea does not sell it. I've tried browsing numerous Olive Young and Watson branches in Seoul, before I dyed it and even after dying it, but still I can't find it. I think the Korean market prefers having medium/darker hair colours, and if they really wanted a light colour it would be blonde.
At one point I was searching up other brands' reviews online, one of them being Palty's foam dye. I was deliberating between the Palty's Raspberry Jam and Freshlight, but chose the latter in the end because people online had said that Palty foam tends to fizzle out quickly and you are left dealing with a pile of gloop when you're halfway through application. In Korea, they only sell Beautylabo, Palty, and Freshlight dyes from Japan. Beautylabo had mediocre reviews also. I also ventured into looking at Korean foam dyes, but reviews online were limited and I never heard anything special about Korean foam dyes anyway. Plus, a Korean friend did NOT recommend trying out the Mise en Scene Hello Bubble dyes since they dried out her hair big time.

CLIO Waterproof Pencil Liner in Killer Black Review

Hope you all had a great new years! *laughs nervously*

So I may have accidentally abandonned this blog for a long while since my last post in early October. This is because I wanted to focus on updating my Korea blog more as well as be able to balance a social life and uni work. I know, I actually have a social life in Korea *le gasp*
But now that it's Winter break, and a majority of my newly made friends have now left me forever since they only came to study for one semester (*cries*), I now have time to update you guys on my latest experiences with Korean cosmetics! Huzzah!

So let's start off with a product that I have a love-hate relationship with. The CLIO Waterproof Pencil Liner in Killer Black!

CLIO Waterproof Pencil Liner in Killer Black. The black end of the pencil is the sharpener.

Etude House Membership Card

The haul!

If you're a student studying abroad in Korea, who is also a skin care fanatic like me, get your ARC (alien registration card) ASAP so you can pop into Etude House and set yourself up with an Etude House membership card!

With the Etude House membership card you can take advantage of their random sales.
Etude house sometimes sets up a large 'up to 50% off' poster outside their store, meaning that a majority of their products are on sale. Inside you'll see sections and shelves marked with stickers on them tellng you how much % is being taken off. The 20% and 30% stickers are more frequently seen.

Of course, this discount sale is only available for membership card owners. Visitors without a Korean ID card or ARC unfortunately cannot set  up a membership account.

This membership card is going to be like the Body Shop card for me, fantastic but lethal to my bank account.

Itaewon Skin Food Experience

So I headed down to Itaewon today to try out Wolfhound Irish Pub's fish and chips (I was craving for some and they weren't really worth the 13,900won...), as well as to explore the area when I ended up finding myself chatting to a sales assistant in Skin Food.
I do love it when the sales assistants in Korea can speak in English, you can ask so many questions about skin care products and they can recommend you certain stuff. This has only happened so far in a couple of stores in Myeongdong, the Etude House in Anam, and including this one!

I didn't end up buying anything since I was down to around 15,000won. I was doing a bit of browsing to familiarise myself with what products Skin Food had to offer. I felt bad when I told the sales assistant that I was low on money today and couldn't really afford anything, but I said I will return once I got my Korean bank account sorted!

Andrew Barton Designer Curling Multi Styler Set Review Pt. 2 (Curling Wand)

I was VERY close to selling off my Andrew Barton curling set to fund my study abroad year. But during the Summer, on those days where I stayed inside doing nothing practically dying of boredom, I decided to play around with my AB curling set again before I decided fully on whether I should sell it or not.
Thank God I didn't to be honest.

Korea Summer Haul

Unfortunately the laziness kicked in again and I didn't mange to post new reviews up in time before I left for Korea.
I shall try my best to find time in future to type them up!

Here's a sneak preview of what reviews to expect in the next few weeks ;)

So far I'm loving the Clio Gelpresso liners, Etude House Wonder Pore Freshner, and Nature Republic Aloe Vera Gel (not pictured)!
Yet the Clio eye make up remover and Nature Republic Lemon Cleansing Water (not pictured) is not pleasing me so much...

My wallet continues to weep because this is only 1/4 of what I've bought in total.  

The BWCW collab store is deadly.

New side blog and future posts forecast!

Since I will be studying abroad for a year in South Korea starting from September I've decided to open up another word blog to document my time there! I've also opened up a photo blog on tumblr as well where I will post most of my pictures.

Please check them out: Word Blog | Photo Blog

Also, follow me on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube for more updates!

As for this current blog, please stay tuned for a wave of Korea skin care product reviews! After all, South Korea is famous for their skin care and cosmetic products. I have a strong feeling that most of my money is going to go towards skin care for the next year. Well, skin care and food.

I have 4 days left in England before I leave for South Korea on 12th August! Shall try my very best to publish more posts that I've been too lazy to type up during the past week cosHannibalandtheMortalInstrumentserieswoops;;;

Upcoming posts features:

• Dip dying hair (Directions Colour Hair Dye review)
• Andrew Barton Wand review
• John Frieda Extra Light Ash Blonde Foam Dye review

I have also filmed 3 skin care product review videos during the past 2-3 months. I think I'm going to do less product review videos when I'm in Korea, it's just easier to type up a review these days.
I will be reviewing

• The Body Shop Vitamin E Night Cream (needs editting)
•  OMG Perfect Gel (almost done editting)
• Naruko Oil Out Cleanser, Toner & Serum (needs editting)

All 3 videos will hopefully be uploaded onto my YouTube soon. I'm hoping to edit them all in the next few days on top of everything.

This is what happens when you procrastinate all summer /sigh.

L'oreal Mousse Absolue Review

On Sunday evening I decided dye my hair with L'oreal's Mousse Absolue in Very Light Frosted Blonde 1021. In short, the experience was very disappointing.

After: Mousse Absolue 1021 under dimmed sunlight

Before: faded Prettia Cassis Berry under strong sunlight