Paraben - Do you know what it is?

I was talking with my colleagues today, we talked about hand creams. Then some how "Paraben" came into our conversation. I was surprised that not many people know about paraben.

As far as I know, paraben is used as a preservative in skin care products and cosmetic. It is said to be a cancer-causing ingredients. Thats why the new skincare product Nutox claims itself to be paraben-free. Besides, it is also a thing that can affect human reproductive system by "changing" our hormones.

However, most of the products in the market contains paraben. I looked through my skin care products. All of them contains paraben. Even my favourite and expensive dermalogica exfoliant cream., from hair range, body lotion and face products. Except for the Botani that I bought for my mum.

I think it cant be avoided. Else, I will have nothing to use. Haha!

Review - Dr. Jart Black Label Detox Healing BB Cream

Blemish Balm Cream a.k.a BB cream, is popularised by Korea. The Korean style make up has always emphasized on natural look, that look like dont have any make up on, this is also the so-called nude makeup.

This is the first BB cream that I got due to curiosity. I have read many about BB cream, about how miracle it is. It has always been a debat that, whether BB cream is a kind of cosmetic (it can be used as makeup base) or a skin care product (it takes care of skin depends on its functions). For this BB cream, it acts as a sun block (SPF 25 ++), and it also has whitening and Anti-Wrinkle properties.

The texture of the BB cream is something like a liquid foundation. And it is brown color. The BB cream actually smells very nice.

The BB cream blends very well into the skin. I have applied on half of my hand. The right half is brighter.

Applied it on my face. Cant really tell the before and after. Face looks brigther after application. The cream is light, however the coverage is so-so. It does make my skin looks "healthier". And I think the color is quite natural for my skin tone.

So far, this BB cream has not cause break out for me. I had a minor break out after the first application, but I think it was due to improper cleaning. A makeup remover is needed to strip off the BB cream.

And another thing is, I learnt that we need to apply BB cream on our neck as well, so that we dont look awkward, as we have a white mask on.

Weekend Getaway - Hiking at Pantai Keracut with the Gang

So, my friend Zheng Ghee was here for the weekend. Since nobody wanted to go to Kek Lok Si, we went hiking at Pantai Keracut. Pantai Keracut is located at Penang National Park.

Beautiful Pantai Keracut Wharf in the morning.

Our pass to go in to National Park

Hiking.It took us around 2 hours to finish the track.

We reached the beach.

A crab is sun-bathing on the rock. (note: you need good eyes to see the crab )

We were so worn out. We took the boat back to the wharf. The gang posing in front of the sign board.

Review - Ecco Cafe at Chulia Street, Penang

OMG. I am so f***ed. It is 4:15am in the morning and I am still alert as hell. I couldnt sleep! I have hiking later at 7am in the morning, I will be so dead after that, help! help!

So, today my friend, Zheng Ghee came from Johor to visit us for the weekends. Zheng Ghee is my course mate during my university days, our gang is having a reunion this weekends.

We watched Angels and Demons in the evening, The movie was not bad. Kind of interesting and thrilling too.

Then we went to Georgetown for dinner. My friend Kevin introduced us this authentic italian restaurant, Ecco Cafe. The owner of the restaurant is a foreign lady, she is an Italiano I guess. She is also the waitress of the cafe, a very friendly person.

First, we have Herb Butter Bread. It tasted okay. RM4

Another bread, this is Garlic Butter Bread, my friend Hooi Hooi said that the garlic is not cooked enough., RM4

Eleanor Pizza. Slightly spicy, the black things are olives. Tasted not bad, but portion was rather small. RM16

Chicken Hot Pie. The highlight of the dinner. Under the pie, there was gravy with chicken and potatoes. The gravy tasted very nice, and it was piping hot. RM16

Pasta. Not quite remember the name of the pasta. It looked like pan mee. The sauce is a garlic cream sauce, slightly runnier than carbonara. The pasta tasted not bad as well.

Finally, our dessert - Coffee Cream Caramel. I am suspecting that this is the culprit that make me sleepless tonight! Oh, I am so regretted having this, though it tasted very nice. On top of it, there is toasted caramel.

Overall, thus restautant is quite good. Good food with not too expensive price.

These pants are adorably cute!

High-waist is back! I came across these pants when I was browsing through Korea's Gmarket, they have very nice clothes there, korean style. These pants actually look like skirt. I used to have this kind of pants when I was young. And now, they are back. They are so cute!

Review - Dermalogica Gentle Cream Exfoliant

This exfoliant is actually a facial scrub, a very gentle one. I got to say, I love this product!

Unlike many other facial scrub, you actually have to clean your face first, before using this exfoliant cream. Then apply a thin layer over face and throat. As you can see from the picture (sorry, blur again..), the cream is actually very watery, it is dripping over my fingers. The cream is kind of brown-ish. something like horlick. This cream does not have strong smell, I dislike artificial fruit smell.

Leave the cream on face for 10-15 minutes. I usually feel a mild stinging effect when the cream is still wet. The cream will dry, then we can wash off the cream.

Kind of hard to believe that this is an exfoliant, because I cant really see the granules. I also doubted that it would exfoliates, since the scrub is so tiny. However, it did clean up my face, leaving it fresh. And the best thing is, the mosturizer I apply after exfoliating, seems to absorb real well into my face, as I can feel my face tighter when I wake up in the morning.

Belated Mother's Day Gift

I am the kind of consumer that is easily to be persuaded. After looking at the Erica Yuen's youtube video introducing the Botani Squalene Olive Serum, which I have also blogged about this video before in here. Since then I have been thinking about getting it. And it was so happened that this website was having a promotion in conjunction with Mother's Day.

So, I bought it. I am also so into organic products nowadays. The parcel is nicely wrapped:

The Mother's Package that I bought consists of 4 items :

1. Botani Smoothing Olive Cleanser RM139

2. Botani Soothing Facial Mist RM55

3. Botani Olive Serum RM95.50

4. Botani Boost Balancing Mosturizer ~RM70

For these 4 items, the package was sold at RM259, which is a saving of about 28% discount. For me, I think it is quite a steal for natural organic products.