Another addition to my Inglot family

As the title suggests...

I have another addition to my Inglot Freedom System eyeshadow collection! :)

This all started when I proudly show off my palettes to my aunt. She was really impressed with the quality and price of the products that she wanted to head down to City Square JB to start her own. Two days later, I was in the car with my passport ready to cross the Malaysian-Singapore border.  

I went there with my aunt with the intention to not get anything... but of course after a swatch here and there, I caved and got a really pretty frosty plumish pink (AMC shine 48). 

This frosty darker toned pink would be perfect for adding some color during the fall and winter. 

xoxo,

Rachel

Etude House Haul

Since the 2 months I've been back in Singapore, I've collected my fair share of Etude House products. Every time I go into town, I'll be pulled in by Etude House's cute-ness. SERIOUSLY. HOW CAN ANY GIRLY GIRL NOT BE?! 

If you have not already heard of Etude house, it is pretty much a cosmetic and skincare store that started in South Korea and has expanded into Asia. Korean products are such a big trend lately! With many Koreans being widely admired for their beautiful, clear and radiant skin, of course we'll want to buy whatever they use to get the same results. 

A month ago, I did a little research and found out that Etude house was having a big sale on their past collections, I did what I had to do and rush down there to check it out. 

Needless to say, I came back with a bag filled with make-up and less-cash in my wallet. 

Here's what I got

It has literally been over a month since I've gotten these products and have yet to use them as I wanted to blog a Haul before I destroy the prettiness (-.-) - I know right? With that said, I honestly do not know how much each items were except that all of it costed me 50SGD which was really cheap.

So starting from the left:

• Pink Tonic Lip Glass (#2 Sweet Pink) 
• Dear Darling Roll Roll Gloss 
• Be My Love Crystal Shine Lips Special Set (I bought 2 sets) - 10SGD each
• Dear My Blooming Lips-Talk - Christmas Collection (#2 Holiday Pink)
• Dear My Blooming Lips-Talk - Christmas Collection (#1 Christmas Red)

Lying on the floor in the center

• Bling Bling Eye Stick (#05 Silver Milky Way)
• Bling Bling Eye Stick (#04 Purple Aurora)

I don't think any of these products are still in stores since 2 of the lipsticks I purchased was from the Christmas 2012 collection... but definitely sure that there is a similar color in it's permanent line.  

A Review will be coming soon. I have bought quite a bit of lip products from Etude house, so I'll do a full review of those that I gotten. 

Meet Harrous. This little kitty was definitely a naughty one! While I attempt to photograph, he would run in and completely destroy my layout and give me this innocent "I didn't do it" look. 

Thanks for reading and have a great day/night where ever you are! :) 

Love,

Rachel

INGLOT Eyeshadow Freedom Palette

Hey Everyone,

I have something really exciting to share with you all today!
There's this make-up brand that I've been trying to locate and try out for a couple of years now, but I've never been in an area that has that particular brand near by. However, this all changed when I found out that they have a store right across the border in Johor Bahru! Upon learning that, I immediately jumped upon the chance to head to JB with my grandparents.

The mysterious store is... INGLOT!

Alright, I was interested in this brand mainly due to their freedom system. The way it works is pretty simple, you pretty much pick out the colors and design your own palette. You can form different eyeshadow palettes in combinations of 2, 4, 5, or 10 square pans. They also have round pan options. You also have the option to build your own bronzer, blush, concealer, and lipstick.

It was so hard to not go overboard with the picking, but I finally decided on 8 colors to bring home.

I decided on 2 palettes of 5 squares as opposed to a palette of 10. I thought it would be easier for traveling should I just want to bring my self-created neutral palette.

Here are my Neutrals:

Here are the colors in my neutrals - matte white (373), pearl finished champagne (395) , shine finished rose-gold/taupe from noble collection (153) , matte soft brown (337), and matte black (63)

Next, I got an incomplete palette. It's mostly for colors... but as you can tell, I stuck to the pink/purple range.

I got the AMC shine light pastel pink (29), double sparkle light purple (493), and a pearl finished eggplant (446).

The color pigmentation of these shadows are amazing. They were really opaque and smooth to the touch. Even those with glitter-finishes were really blendable! In general, I find the quality of these shadows comparable to MAC.

The pricing of the individual pans and empty palette were surprisingly affordable! Each pan went for 30 Malaysian Ringgit (~ 11.50SGD & 9.3USD)  and the empty palette was 35RM (~13.5SGD & 10.83USD). I believe that items sold in US outlets are a fraction cheaper.

Here's my review of everything in general: 
Pros:

• High pigmentation
• Affordable
• Able to be personalized
• Quality is on par with MAC
• Cover is magnetic and the palettes are stackable and held together by magnets. 

Cons: 

• Not many Inglot stores can be found around the world. In fact, Malaysia has 5 outlets and they are the only ones in South-East Asia. 
• There were not alot of colors to pick from compared to a MAC store
• Colors are identified with numbers, quite hard to remember compared to names
• It's pretty hard to remove the pans once it is in a slot. The sales-lady demonstrated it with a penknife. 

This is a place that I definitely recommend! 

The outlet that I went to was in Johor Bahru City Square, which is right next to the woodlands causeway point. 

Below is a link showing all the Inglot outlets around the world. Hopefully there will be one close to you :) 

Inglot Locations 

let me know if you got any Inglot products and whether you love/hate it! 

Love,

Rachel

** Please note that the currency conversion is as follows: **
Currencies change daily. So the converted currencies may not be the same when I bought it compared to the future. 

1 USD = 3.23 RM and 1 SGD = 2.5RM

Hong Kong Haul!!

Back in the states, refrained myself from buying too much as I knew that I would go crazy here in Asia. I finally broke the my cosmetic-fast when I was in Hong Kong last month. I didn't buy too much there, I had to make sure to think-twice that I would use the products before handing over the money.

There were so much to stop in Hong Kong! The week that we were there, we would start out at 9am and walk around till midnight! The night life was amazing, with stores opening later in the day and closing at around 11pm. 

Nevertheless, here's what I manage to grab!

I know, it looks like alot, but most of the items are polaroid films! Here's a closer look at what I got plus the prices of each of the items. 

Skin Care:

For Skincare, I got it all from SaSa, which is a cosmetic store you can find EVERYWHERE in HK and in many places throughout asia 

1. My Beauty Diary Face Masks  x2  (on the sides)
   Ginseng Repair (on the left) and Bird's Nest (on the right).
   Each box contain 10 individual masks
   @ 58HKD per box --> 7.5USD // 9.5SGD
    
2. My Beauty Diary Life Stretch Mask (in the middle)
   Gold + Marine Collagen 'flavor'. Box contains 8 masks
   @ 58HKD --> 7.5USD // 9.5SGD
3. My Beauty Diary Dark Circle Intensive Care Eye Mask (on the top)
   Box contains 5 pairs of eye mask
   @ 45HKD --> 6.2USD // 7.4SGD
4. SaSatinnie Snail Rejuvenating Face Mask
   Pack of 20, split between a friend, so we each took 10 masks
   @ 90HKD per pack of 20 --> 11.5USD // 14.7SGD

Make Up: 

Yes, only 2 items! 

1. Etude House - Dear Darling Tint
   Lip Tint in #2 Red Red (RD302)
   @ 48HKD -->  6USD // 7.8SGD
2. Majolica Majorca Last Expander Edge Meister Mascara
   @ 138HKD -->  17.7USD // 22.6SGD

Polaroid:

I suppose you can say that I went crazy and splurged. It was definitely something I've considered for half of my HK trip before making the big purchase. HK is known for selling their Polaroid items cheaper than other places, but that is if you go where the locals go and bargain. If you do that, there's always a risk that it's a counterfeited, but you got to take the risk.  

1. FujiFilm Instax mini 25 Limited Edition Rilakkuma Polaroid Camera
   @ 900HKD --> 116USD // 148SGD
2. Plain Films x7 packs
   Each pack contains 10 films
   @ 39HKD each --> 5USD // 6.4SGD
3. Various Theme films x9 packs
   Each pack contains 10 films
   The price varies, but less than 90HKD per pack

That's all the stuff I got from HK! I'll definitely do product reviews for some of the items. 

If you have any questions, feel free to ask! :) 

Love, 

Rachel 

Disclaimer: The exchange rate I used was 7.76HKD for 1USD, and 6.1HKD for 1SGD. Exchange rates changes all the time. The rate that I used for this trip may be different from now, so do check the rates before you make any plans. :) 

Travel Adventure: Hong Kong

Here’s the Hong Kong post I’ve promised! : ) Though I don’t know if I’ll be back here, my 6 days journey in Hong Kong was nothing short of amazing. This will be a photo and words-heavy post, but if you are going to travel to HK, this will be helpful. I took close to ~500 pictures throughout the trip excluding those on my phone, needless to say, it was really hard to pick which to add!

Day 1:

Arrival date! My friend and I arrived and met each other at the arrival hall of HK international airport. It was really easy as we both managed to get connected on the airport’s free wifi and communicated through what’sapp. We then spent 33HKD (~4USD, ~5SGD) on bus# A21, which took us straight from the airport to our hostel in Tsim Sha Tsui.

• New Tokyo Hostel Review:
  Our hostel was located in Chung King Mansion, somewhere I definitely will not recommend. This complex is located right on the famous Nathan Road and is walking distance to harbor city, the MTR and the bus stops. However, soon after, I found out that this place is famous for it’s crime – rape, drugs, you name it. The moment my friend and I stepped off the bus, there were people coming to us ‘offering’ to bring us to our hostel. It was sort of sketch and I really felt unsafe. The complex itself was also pretty scary and confusing. It had many different blocks, with many floors and each floor was a different hostel. Our hostel was on the 16^th floor, meaning that we had to line up (yes, line up) to get into a stuffy 8-person-max elevator. Our hostel was alright. I didn’t felt it was safe as there wasn’t a real lock and there was always a group of guys throughout the day right outside our room. The room itself consisted of 2 double bed, a shared side-table in between and an en-suite shower/toilet. I didn’t take any pictures of the hostel as… I didn’t really want to remember it.  In all honestly, the only thing wrong with this location would really be the safety aspect. The cleanliness and all is really what you expect a hostel to be. Each of us paid 1150 HKD (148USD & 189 SGD) for 6 Nights, which was really cheap. 

After dropping off our belongings at the hostel, we met 2 other friends and headed off to the famous Tim Ho Wan, which is a Michelin-starred dim sum restaurant! There’s a couple of outlets around Hong Kong, we went to the one near Prince Edward MTR station. It was so yummy and really affordable, I wouldn’t be able to tell you the price per pax, but amongst the 6 of us (4girls, 2 guys) we ate about 300HKD worth, which converted to 39USD, and 50SGD! Here’s a picture of their famous baked char siew buns. OMG. Delicious won’t even describe how amazing it tasted. It was crusty and sweet on the outside, & warm, sweet, and salty in the inside. I can totally taste it as I describe this.

After all that eating, we burned it off by walking to MongKok instead of taking the MTR. It was shopping heaven! We pretty much just explored around Mongkok for the rest of the day.

Hello Kitty Exhibition at Langham Place shopping centre. 

Sign-filled streets in Mongkok

The famous Ladies Market

Day 2: Victoria’s Peak

This was a walk-intensive day. We literally walked from 8am-11pm. The first thing we did was head out to Victoria’s peak, by taking the MTR to Central and walking to the bottom of the peak. En-route we walked into an urban park and the view was beautiful. Greenery with loads of high-rise buildings in the background. I just love the contrast!

At the bottom of the peak, we had to take the tram up. OH BOY, no one told me about the steepness of the route! It was so thrilling. At a certain point, I was so sure we were inclining at a 60 degrees angle to the ground. When we arrived at the peak, we decided to wait a while before heading to the view deck as the level 3-typhoon weather brought on a bit of a fog. When we did head to the top, the fog has died down a little. The view was incredible!

View from the Peak

We then headed to try out the famous Mak’s Noodle. I’ll just say that the quantity and quality food they served was not worth our money. We had better tasting wanton noodles the day before for a fraction of the price.

After leaving the peak, we took a walk around SoHo, Lan Kwai Fong (partying district), and central before heading out to Harbour city for another Cantonese, dim sum dinner and dessert.

Day 3: Macau!

In order to go to Macau, you can either take a 1hour ferry or a 15min helicopter ride… I think it is pretty obvious that we went for the ferry :P To get to the ferry terminal, we literally had to cross a road and walk 2-blocks to Harbour City. There are many ferry companies, so we went to the one with the reasonably cheap price. There were guys coming up to us selling us ferry tickets for almost half the price, but we thought it was too good to be true. In the end, we bought one-way ticket each way, and spent a total of about 300HKD (39USD & 50SGD) on the round trip. **I suggest buying one-way tickets so that you won’t feel rushed to head back to the terminal to catch your ferry, also, remember to bring your passport!**

The ferry trip wasn’t very exciting. Due to the typhoon, we had to battle against the waves due to the strong winds. I got a little seasick, but it subsided about an hour after we left the ferry. Since Macau is known to be the Las Vegas of Asia; we thought we had to check out a casino. From the ferry terminal, there are free coach buses you can catch to many different casinos. We decided to go to the famous Venetian. If you have been to the Venetian Resort in Las Vegas, you’ll find this very similar. I definitely prefer the one in Last Vegas, for its grandeur.

In the Venetian, we found Lord Stow’s Bakery!!! They specialize in making Portuguese egg tarts. It was so so so TASTY, I could easily have ate 10 of those egg tarts! Fresh from the oven, it was served warm, and flakey on the outside and so creamy and NOT too sweet in the inside. It was incredible. We then walked out of the casino and headed out to explore the rest of Macau! En-route to the tourist famous Rua Do Cunha, we went into a park to take some pictures!

EGG TARTS!!

My first impression of Rua Do Cunha? There’s SO much to EAT! There were about 2 large outlets of Koi Kei Bakery, famous of their peanut cookie made in Macau. I got my grandparents some of the Almond cookies, and they were so happy, the cookies ran out in less than week! We head to Seng Cheong to try their famous crab porridge. The porridge was alright and the crab was fresh, it wasn’t something I was really into to be honest, but glad I tried it! After all that eating, we headed off to the old and famous A-Ma temple followed by the Ruins of St. Paul. Til this day, it the ruins was my favorite landmark of the trip. I suppose it was the unexpectedness of how we found and that really made it memorable.

Entrance to the A-Ma Temple

Ruin of St. Paul 

After all that walking, we had a little street food and head over to the ferry terminal to head back to HK! Once at HK, we headed to Mongkok area to meet my local friend, which look us shopping! It was CRAZY. We went to a building with 5 floors selling nothing but women’s clothes. It was the type of shopping I wanted to do in HK, but due to being a little overwhelmed and claustrophobic, I didn’t buy anything.

Day 4: LanTauIsland

We head out of Lan Tau Island, an island right off the coast of mainland HK. It took us a while and a couple of connections to get there (it was near the airport) via train followed by another 30mins or so of bus/ cable car. We wanted to take the cable car, but the line for it was about 1-2hour wait time, so we went with the bus instead, which drove us up the mountain to the peak where the Tian Tan Buddha Statue (big Buddha) and Po Lin Monastery is located. The main hall of the Po Lin Monastery was under renovation. I’ll let the pictures do the talking : )

steps leading to the Big Buddha

Incredible view from the peak

Signs leading to the Wisdom Path

At the end of the Wisdom path, we gain strength of practice... YOGA! :)

After everything, we head to the Ngong Ping Village to have a quick Taiwanese lunch and loads of dessert. One of my favorite places to have dessert was at Honeymoon Dessert. It was so so so yummy and not too sweet. We then took a bus from the village to Tai-O, which is a small fishing town within the island.

Salted fish drying under the sun

From Tai-O we met a friend who brought us to Cheung Chau, another island off mainland HK. It was pretty awesome as we got to see free roaming cows as we made our way towards the ferry terminal.

View from the Ferry Terminal

View of Cheung Chau from the ferry

Here, we got to enjoy a variety of fresh seafood dishes! For 5 girls, we spent a total of 440HKD (57USD / 73SGD), which wasn’t bad for all the food we had. We then rushed back to Mongkok to do some Polaroid film shopping!

View of some of the skyscrapers in HK at night. 

Day 5 & 6: Shop, Eat, Relax

These two days were the most relaxing days we had compared to the beginning of the trip. We did some last minute eating, shopping, and aimlessly walked around. We spent half of our 5^th day in Causeway bay. It is another shopping district, where you can find international brand outlets, and departmental stores. It wasn’t my cup of tea as I wanted something more uniquely HK. For the rest of the 1.5 days, we met up with some local friends and were brought on an eating spree. In those 2 days, we ate about 15 different times.

I suppose when you head back home with BOTH your suitcase and tummy full, you did one heck of a vacation! : ) #YOLO

I Hope you enjoyed my post.

Have you been to HK and which was your favorite part?  

A HK haul will be coming up soon!

Love,
Rachel

Disclaimer: The exchange rate I used was 7.76HKD for 1USD, and 6.1HKD for 1SGD. All prices listed above were estimated. Exchange rates changes all the time. The rate that I used for this trip may be different from now, so do check the rates before you make any plans. :)