Time spent with my CG

Dear BCG, what can I say about you?

Despite my hectic worklyf you're a group I always have time for, a group I don't get sick of even though I have to see them twice every week, a group I'm happy to give up double pay and many social/family events for just because I feel the need to commit to.

I do so many things together with these guys it's ridiculous. From NYE to Australia Day, from camp to any other day we decide to get together and just... chill.

It's amazing just how much more connected you are (haha geddit cuz it's connect group) to people who share the same values and vision as you, to fellow brothers and sisters in Christ who also aim to dedicate their lives to the Lord.

But before I could even relish in all the great times we had together, we're going under a split. It's for the greater good, of course. We are looking to expand our network and reach out to new people, some of us look to finally pursue their calling, and others may just feel like they were thrown in the deep end because they're just good at what they do.

I will be leading Wildlife this year, and while a part of me feels excited and fulfilled, the majority of me only feel... well... feels.

We've had about 3 farewell events now and the whole idea of everyone being apart from one another still feels shocking and unfamiliar. I will no longer be seeing all these friends I've just grown closer to over the past year, and people change, and often it is hard to cope with that especially if you weren't there to witness their change.

Let's take a look at two of these farewells:

CAMP
The moment we combined with Wildlife we knew they were preparing us for this split. Although we had liek 17 people squished into one tiny house without air conditioning in 40 degree weather we had so much fun bonding with one another. Waking up every morning with your entire outfit damp from sweat was unpleasant, and so is lining up for the shower and realising you're like 10th in order. But everything else was so amazing... The sessions, sports at the park, walks by the wharf... Many things that will forever be engraved in my memory.

AUSTRALIA DAY
This was an event I organised spontaneously because I feel like that before leaving I should at least get the OG crew together to have fun again. Pretty much everyone was able to make it which was cool. My parents actually offered to cook for us and it was such a pleasant surprise because I was ready to feed these guys anything I could dig up from my fridge. We played our regular games like Deal and Bridge and also Tekken and Youtubing weird stuff. Time passed so quickly I hadn't even realised we spent 8 hours sitting in the same spot just spending time together.

FAREWELL SOCIAL
Everyone actually made it this time! I brought Jimface along in hopes of him being able to become a part of our group. I had internship beforehand but was let off early so I met Barrel for a nice chat before the actual meetup. We went to eat at Arisun (mum showed me this article where they found worms in it and I had to check it again only to find it being taken off typical Wechat BS) and then crashed Whale's place for some intense Wii gaming. It was kind of feelsy at the end but

SPONTANEOUS CARD SESH
I bumped into Radad and Koe today during work and asked them to wait for me afterwards because I'm foreveralone and all. They actually waited for me! Radad offered his place for us to chill at and I was taught how to Bridge and we were joined by Whale and Boi. Somehow we spent 3 hours playing just cards and Radad's mum even made garlic bread for us :') I also finished writing the farewell cards too!

Tomorrow we'll be having our proper farewell dinner and all I can say is my body will never be ready for the feels to come.

#juststeamthings

P1: will you play gat out of hell with me?
P2: O/////////O
P2: I-I need to think about this
P1: ok i understand if you need some time to think abt this
P2: Idk man I mean we just finished SRIV
P2: i think it's moving too fast
P2: gotta slow down
P1: ok ok i completely understand
P1: i too want to take things slowly
P2: this is a big commitment
P1: yea, im just really nervous you know. in the past things didnt work out so well :(
P2: yeah I know how you feel, my last co-op experience ended badly too
P2: he just couldn't handle the pressure, ya know?
P1: yea for sure
P1: i felt like as if i messed up
P1: and i cant forgive myself you know
P1: just dont want to get hurt again
P2: Yes, indeed, I guess we will have to forget the past and move on, but I'm glad you brought this up.

P1: ahh good good

P1: just wanted to get it off my chest

...

And then I spat out my drink.

Super-delayed Melbourne Post

In fact this post was so damn delayed I almost forgot I event went to Melbourne before. But in the spirit of going there again and being awkward if I post that first I will post this anyway so read on if you're interested it probably won't be that interesting anyway since there are almost no pictures.

DAY ONE

Jes and I got to the airport at 6am. Yep, 6 freaking AM and our plane was at 8. We had plenty of fun in the airport eating lots of food and taking photos of random stuff. It wasn't long till we had to board our plane which was crowded, uncivilised and generally peasant compared to international flights. But that was ok, it's got the bogan spirit! It took less than an hour for the plane to arrive and the excitement was real as both of us prettied up in the airport. We managed to get a Skybus ticket too but decided against their hotel transfer service because we wanted to walk from Southern Cross (their Central) to our hotel and eat lunch on the way. Jes only wanted to take photos so I was stuck with the suitcase =_=, but that's ok lose weight 4 more gainz!

The Hardware Societe was our obligatory first stop since both of us were super excited about Melbourne coffee. It didn't amaze us THAT much, but I can see where it gets its hype from. I ordered a mocha and herb-roasted mushroom toast while Jess had chai latte with her pork belly. From there it was easy to walk to our hotel which was surprisingly close to town center. Then Rib finally responded to my calls and texts and told us he'd come to the city to give us a tour. So the two of us unpacked and freshened up in our nice studio apartment for a hotel. I even got a complimentary drink because of my mum's silver membership hehe!

The weather was super hot and cold at the same time as Rib took us on the fastest-paced tour ever around town. He showed us all the major shopping districts and tourist attractions, somehow, we remembered! After he left our first goal was to find the casino because it supposedly had a huge indoor arcade. Took us the longest time ever but we ended up finding it! Too bad we literally did nothing in it because despite its size the arcade had no variety =_= Afterwards both of us became quite exhausted and after I stopped by H&M on the way back we settled back at the hotel. Jes had homework to write and feet blisters to heal (I made her a home remedy involving tea bags and the kitchen sink) which took forever and I was hungry and tired so I dozed off... only to wake up feeling the sickest I had been in years.

Feeling bad Jes encouraged me to go out and tempted me with food. I felt better after but the place we were planning on going to (Asian Beer Cafe) had costume night so we ended up walking around town finding a cheap place to eat. I still feel headachy and nauseous this time and had to take a billion toilet trips because somehow I have diarrhoea as well. We stumble upon Gyoza Gyoza in their longass Chinatown which had super cheap nice food and awesome drinks. Too bad I was so sick on the top half and diarrhoea-ing on the bottom half (which was soooo embarrassing sigh) to enjoy the meal properly. I suspected food poisoning from the donuts this morning. After making like 50 toilet trips I finally felt better and we are able to go back to the hotel and rest up for the big day.

DAY TWO

Day 2 is PAX-DAY! We woke up early enough from the night before to get dressed in cosplay and take selfies. Taxis are so cheap here and we were lucky enough to score a taxi even though it was a race day and it's apparently impossible to hail a cab (we stood out cuz of our wigs I guess?). We were super excited upon arriving and seeing all this nerdy goodness (and collecting all the freebies of course!) I also got texts from Hika and AL asking to meet up later in the day.

Surprisingly I don't have much to say about this convention, it was all about going around stalls getting freebies and occasionally posing for a photograph. The highlight of the day would probably be Jes winning an SSD from the MSY lucky draw and us going round and round the LoL booths to grab free skins. We didn't end up having lunch however and I was really dehydrated the whole time while Jes is full on a Cactus in human form. She's got so much stamina it's amazing.

Because we're friendly people keen to make more friends, Jes and I invited AL to stay at our hotel since he had nowhere to go... BIG MISTAKE MUCH REGRET LATER IN LIFE. This guy pretty much turned out to be a sleazy asshole with no respect for women. We went to ABC and the food there was nice (except their gross Long Islands). Jes and I tried to put it nicely by calling him Anti-fun but acting super snobby and going around (after Melb) telling everyone how he totally 'scored' was just retarded. Since we always combined our beds together he decided to move from his rightful place on the couch to the middle of the two beds, putting aside how freaking sleazy that was both Jes and I had our personal space invaded so we obv shuffled outwards but he kept on rolling from side to side and since both of us are practically gonna roll off the bed we kicked him into the crack. He asked us if we wanted to hang in the morning and we're just like NAGTFO. Luckily Jes and I fixed the rumors that (thanks Turtle :D) he later made up and now everyone knows what really happened.

DAY THREE

Since both of us had like 0 sleep the night before we weren't all that keen to get up and having to pack up because of the checkout curfews. I felt like poop with a hangover and all and the hotel staff were nice enough to give us abit more sleep-in time :'). They also let us store our luggage until the Hotel Transfer Service arrives (which they also booked for us), super service <3 I felt better once we're out in fresh air though. We went Victoria Markets across the road from our hotel and checked out their fresh organic produce. I bought my parents organic coffee while Jes bought... BLUE CHEESE? She's later gonna regret it because it ended up stinking so much hahahaha. We also had some street food nearby like sweet Cannoli and colourful pot stickers, they were very nice.

We tried to find alleyways with good street art and came across this really nice lane with some amazing art pieces. Apparently Flinders Lane had all the good stuff but the one we found was amaze! We left the artists there a note so maybe they'll see it and feel wubbed :3

I later got very hungry, I needed lunch real bad :( Our plan was going to Giraffe Cafe but it was closed :( So we then went Koko Black Royal Arcade but it only sold desserts so we took a raincheck on that. All cafes are closed on Sundays for some reason so we had to settle for this place which I forgot the name of but it didn't have much to buy we ended up sharing a brioche. Funny story though we found a fruit fly in it and had to get the dish swapped... they were full judging us and it was so awks... Reminds me of communitychannel's video 'they gonna spit in yo food'. At Koko black we both ordered desserts but my sickness struck again OTL. I couldn't finish my food and we had to get it taken away cuz no time to eat we got a bus to catch D:

So in conclusion, although there were a few mishaps in our Melbourne trip, Melbourne is such a chill, laid-back artsy city with nice, friendly people and awesome culture- both from the many things you can do there to the much foodporn such fat you can get :) I totally experienced the last two hands on during the USANA conference but I'll blog about that later :D

[MAKEUP REVIEW] Part Six

This set of makeup reviews includes the first half of my ridiculous amounts of purchases over the Christmas period (and some products I accidentally left out of my previous reviews), and this doesn't even include the craptons of skincare I bought for the lulz (sry USANA). Also I want to address the reason why most of the product I've tried have such good ratings- because I don't buy something unless I've done research beforehand! Also no product have received a 10/10 yet (the closest would probably be the MAC mascara/chubby stick)

MAC Studio Finish Concealer 6/10
I've probably already said previously that my Dior concealer was more of a luxury eye treatment than a proper concealer, so I've instead decided to purchase this. Due to the unique condition of my skin I had to get 2 colours: NC30 to target redness and NW25 to get purple. But the result was amazing because the thick consistency of this concealer was able to cover all my blemishes, albeit sometimes it looks slightly cakey. However lately (hot weather) I've noticed that my pots have become oil-like and gross, cleaning it with a paper towel does not fix this problem either so I end up creating alot of wastage. Luckily each pot contains a generous amount of product so it'll probably last me a few years anyway.

MAC Superslick Liquid Eyeliner 8/10
I obvious own this in 'On The Hunt' and I finally get why this is such a cult favourite now. The liner dries in a 3-D manner so it looks really awesomely pigmented... even on my crappy hooded eyes! The brush is really easy to work with too whether you want a nice, thick line or a thin flick for an easy cateye. I thought using liquid liners would be hard but this product has proven me wrong! There is also a nice gloss look to the finished line so you look even more fab as a result.

Clinique Chubby Stick Intense Moisturising Lip Colour Balm 9/10
Before purchasing this product in the 'Plushest Punch' (which looks red but is actually a nice dark pink) colour I wasn't too sure about using lip crayons since they are generally very opaque in application... oh boy was I so wrong! The new Intense line really pulled a good one because the colour is so pigmented and beautiful! The best part? My lip managed to stay moisturised for the whole day without re-application! Simply amazing! The stick itself is easy-storage as well and the lid fits on the end of the stick so I don't lose it. It's small things like this that really draw me in. This product does not get full marks because of Clinique's heavy use of harmful chemicals in their products. Sorry chubby stick :(

Chi-Chi Glamorous Eyeshadow Palette 8/10
I own this product in "O.M.F.G" and "Pretty". Again, a friend told me about this hidden gem and how it rivals all the high-end palettes. I did not believe her till I tried it! The OMFG purchase was actually an impulse buy because I was dying to own bright eyeshadows so I can play around with the colours... this caught my eye immediately! This product is highly pigmented, easily blendable and long-lasting! If the packaging and brushes included weren't so crappy I'd give it full marks easily... but hey, what can you expect from something that's only $20??

Too Faced Chocolate Bar Eyeshadow Palette 9/10
I was dying to purchase a proper neutrals palette due to how failed my UD dupe turned out to be, so this palette was obviously my first choice (that I can actually buy in Australia). And man am I so happy with my choice. In my honest opinion I like this palette better than the NAKED simply because it's more bang for the buck. You're getting the same amount of colours and pigmentation for 30 dollars less (since you can't get UD in Australia so that's shipping costs too!)... c'mon guys. The best of all? It uses natural cocoa and as a result the palette smells so good! Like real chocolate! I just wanna eat it! Unfortunately compared to NAKED, the downfall of this palette is its bulky magnetic packaging that flings open real easily, plus you don't get a brush (not even a spong-tip). But that's not really a problem for me because I have plenty of brushes to spare.

Too Faced Bulletproof 24-Hour Eyeliner 8/10

This product was a surprise find when my workmate and I decided to loiter about Mecca Maxima. She saw this product, tried it on for fun and when she tried to wipe it off it did not budge one bit! I needed a silver eyeliner and no other brand had this shade so I bought this in 'Silver Lining'. I strongly recommend you to get it in 'Black Out' or another everyday shade because this is just amazing. Once the product sets you're good to go for the whole day! It even comes with a smudger and sharpener which I thought was cute because I wasn't a big fan of how thick the pen was. Turns out it's so you can also use it as an eyeshadow stick if you smudge the line sparingly... ideal for an easy smokey-eye!

[MAKEUP REVIEW] Part Five

Finally, this series can continue (just like my collection, lol)! This post will begin with my StrawberryNet haul then finish off with my various miscellaneous purchases. There should be one more post after this about my holiday makeup haul so stay tuned!

Lancome Hypnose Doll Lashes Waterproof Mascara 6/10
Um is it just me or is Hypnose just overhyped? I really like the shape and smell of this mascara but the application just doesn't give enough drama. I shouldn't complain since I got this off Strawberry Net for like 30 bucks and it could even be fake. The good thing about a fibre wand is that it doesn't clump your lashes together, however there is visible (to your own eye close up to the mirror) clumping of the actual product in the middle of my lashes which is just plain awks. The tip of the mascara which is designed for precision brush strokes often gets clumped with product as well so I feel like they should have made the opening more narrow. The good thing is it sits relatively well on the undereye lashes and doesn't smudge all that much.

Giorgio Armani Waterproof Eye Pencil 9/10
I have this in the Copper colour, and it is beautifully amazing on the waterline. Super natural alternative to a rose-gold shadow to just give your inner eye corners a natural highlight. In fact you probably can't even tell there's product on your undereye until you stand far and realise your eye is much more bright. This liner is beautifully pigmented and applies on super smooth, plus I only got it for like 20 bucks online (thanks strawberrynet). However, I'm personally not a big fan of pencil liners that you have to sharpen (twist ftw) but that pet peeve aside (and the fact that you can only get this online now and quite exp too) this liner is perfect for everyday wear unless you're too cheap to buy it and prefer just using eyeshadow.

NARS Bronzing Powder 8/10
Like other normal people, I own this in the shade of Laguna. This is a very natural bronzing powder that is easily buildable and also has multiple uses. Use it for bronzing! Use it for highlighting! Use it as a blush! Use it as an eyeshadow! It looks really good on Asian skin and you can either create a natural or dramatic look. Now onto the downsides... NARS has beautiful packaging and all but it gets dirty so freaking easily with my filthy fingerprints and nails! Also this product doesn't include a brush so investment time bois. I'm also not a fan of how shimmery this is. There are also complaints about how this product can make you look patchy easily if you don't blend well so watch out guys.

Benefit The POREfessional Pro Balm 9/10
I recently found love in Benefit after I went to see what the hype was about (got forcefully dragged to try out their stuff by a fan friend). This brand really is innovative in their products because the moment I tried on this primer my world has been changed. It actually made me holey crappy face skin baby smooth... BABY SMOOTH. This product absorbed like magic and as a result my super runny Guerlain foundation applied perfectly and after applying powder the end result is amazing. I know alot of people are put off by how small the tube is (only 22mls!) but my suggestion would be for you to only use this on problematic areas of the skin and using an SPF moisturiser as your primary base instead.

Benefit Benetint 8/10
Another cult favourite that I managed to snag after buying their Sugarglam fairies set... then going on to buy the full-sized product LOL. Benefit has alot of tints and it took me a while to decide on which one to get. I must say that I am very happy with my choice because out of all of them this one is most runny in consistency and is therefore the easiest to blend, for my yellowy skintone this is also the most natural because idk why but my skin does not have pink tones to it at ALL like I'm sick all the time. I do have complaints about it though, the packaging and applicator for example makes this product super intimidating for noobs (it looks like nailpolish dammit) and like all tints can look REALLY dodgy if you don't apply it properly... then becomes super hard to remove LOL. It also dries out your lips really quickly and feels very funny if you use it as a lip-dye which I don't because it's just not my thing. But once you learn the tips and tricks I guarantee that you'll like the results- a healthy, natural glow to your skin!

What started as a harmless comment...

Step 1: Don't think about it.

Step 2: It's just another phase.

Step 3: Crai evertim.

Just stop smiling at me.