Tracy Anderson - Arms exercise

Watched Fashion Police on 4 June 2013 with Tracy Anderson as the guest celebrity.

In the show she taught one simple step to firm up your arms.

So the next day, I found this video on YouTube and challenged my colleagues to a 2 weeks exercise program at 530pm daily in the office.

We have been doing it for 3 weeks and I can see results in my arms =D

Before and After 3 weeks

Picture on Left was taken on 11 June 2013 and Right on 26 June 2013 (15 days). Notice how the arm is firmer at the bottom and you can see a more prominent curve at the top.

TONED ARMS BABY!! Yay!!

I must say I am very impressed by Tracy Anderson's method and hopefully in time I'll get the "ballet arms" which she promised! >.<

YTL Cameron Highlands Resort

Two words to describe YTL Cameron Highlands Resort - RUSTIC CHARM.

Well rustic not in the sense of country or rugged but rustic in the sense of comfortable old world.

Examples are the working fire place in the library and the christmas trees which lines the courtyard. Enthralling!

The warmth of the fire place plus the live piano playing in the lobby is so soothing especially after you come back from a walk in Cameron Highlands weekend night market. Such a contrast.

For the avid photographers, there are so many nice angles in every nook and cranny of the resort.

My favourite part of the stay are listed below (in no particular order):-

1) the toiletries supplied
Though not directly from Crabtree & Evelyn but they are licensed from Crabtree & Evelyn's La Source range. Refreshing!!

2) the rooms
Rooms are limited in quantity (only 56 rooms) on 2 floors and all rooms faced the golf course so you are guaranteed a wonderful refreshing view from your balcony!

Double bedroom

Twin room

3) the breakfast!
Amazing breakfast and I suspect it had to do with the "mat salleh" restaurant manager. Service was impeccable and the food fresh and tantalizing.

Bear in mind this is YTL so there is no usual breakfast buffet spread. Instead there is a menu and you place an for the food. Meaning you have to wait for the food to be cooked for you.

TWO EGGS ANY STYLE

notice the sausages hidden under the bacon?

OMELETTE

lurve the combination of salmon and eggs.. yummy!!

WAFFLES

BUTTERMILK PANCAKES

FREE RANGE EGGS

nicely poached eggs!!

NOTE:-

a) there is no wifi in the bedrooms.. Only in the library area.

b) the christmas trees lights are only turned on during weekends and once a year, they changed the lights and when they do, they actually commemorate it with a special lighting event.

c) the hotel does offer complimentary mineral water... but on my arrival, I couldn't see it when I open the fridge.

So I drank the Evian instead cos I thought maybe luxury star hotel will offer luxury water... thankfully we only drank 1 bottle.

Later we found the complimentary bottles tucked on the upper part of the fridge... Sigh.. too late..

You cannot see the water bottle right?

Ah.. but when you bend down you can see it..

Drinks price list - RM14 for water??!!!! Ok it's not water.. it's Evian =D

Hong Kong prepaid SIM card

When expecting to receive or make calls during travel, it is always wiser to get a local prepaid SIM card.

I learnt this the hard way during my trip to Bali when I incurred RM10 even though I immediately hang up when my call to a Malaysian number went into voicemail. It's RM10 for 1 second!! :O

This was partly because I was not on the "preferred network" with Maxis - Telkomsel.

I also learnt that if I used a 120 prefix (for Maxis) when calling from overseas to Malaysia, I can get cheaper roaming rates. All these information are not publicized by the telco companies so you have to go to their websites to get more information.

Anyway I just want to highlight that the SIM card in Hong Kong is such value for $$ as the card comes in dual size. How clever!

I would think that it is cheaper for telco to have this design so that they do not need to produce and keep stocks for 2 sizes of  SIM cards right?

But Malaysian and Indonesian telco seems to think otherwise. Duh..

So most of the time some mobile phones vendors will just use a "puncher" to make the SIM card smaller for smart phones.. How primitive :(

Let's hope that our country will catch up with all these advanced countries soon.

Dual size SIM card

comparison between Maxis and Hong Kong SIM cards

Ma Cherie Perfect Shower vs Liese Juicy Shower

What's there to like about Ma Cherie by Shiseido? The smell of course!

I remember my first encounter with Ma Cherie was when I tried the Perfect Shower sampler available in Matsumoto Kiyoshi drugstore in Japan cos my hair felt like wire during winter.

Instantly my hair is softer and easier to manage with the added benefit of a pleasant fruity smell.

I tried to find similar products in Malaysia but the ones here is Kao Liese Juicy Shower. Even though they are marketed as the same type of product, it is disappointing to note that Liese Juicy Shower does not work for my hair.

Recently I washed my hair without using conditioner so my usual straight hair was a bit unruly. I squirted a few times the Ma Cherie Perfect Shower and voila! At the end of the day my hair was straight again.

This straightness even lasted after my sleep as I woke up with straight hair the next morning.. This was truly amazing as normally without washing my hair in the morning, my shoulder length hair would somehow curl outwards.

So I am really ecstatic when I saw Guardian Malaysia selling Ma Cherie's products. The price may be higher than normal, but even in Japan Ma Cherie is marketed as a higher brand than Tsubaki. Worst still, Tsubaki sold here is now made in Thailand.

At least Ma Cherie is still made in Japan. So you pay premium price for this and also the cute packaging it comes in =D

Also note that for most japanese hair products moist means for straight hair and air feel means for curly hair.

Enjoy!! =D

Tampon - is it for you?

As you know I recently went for a trip to Redang Island (click redang-vs-lang-tengah). Enjoyed my first day of snorkeling then I found OMG.. I gonna have my period...

Was praying for a miracle but bam! It came in full force during dinner.. What am I do???

I don't want to miss out on the 2nd and 3rd snorkeling trip for this trip but then I'm a regular sanitary pad person..

So I was battling between tampon - snorkeling.. when I ultimately decided that I do not want to miss out on the snorkeling since I come all the way to Redang.

And I was pleasantly surprised to see that the design for tampon have advanced a lot compared with 10 years ago.

How to insert a tampon

The tampon actually came in a plastic applicator. Trust me it is much much easier to insert plastic applicator than a plain cotton tampon. Less friction.

My notes on tampon:-

1) I was under the misconception that I can used ONE tampon for both snorkeling trips cos I thought with the tampon in, it will be sort of like "waterproof" but turn out water can seep in.. making the tampon full.

* * * * *

2) tampons comes in a few sizes. You choose yours depending on your flow. If you have heavy flow or during first few days, you use the LARGE (or SUPER for Playtex brand) ones but note that larger tampons means larger plastic applicator as well.

Which means it will be slightly harder to insert and remove than the smaller ones.

* * * * *

3) it is uncomfortable to remove too. I didnt know this. I expected it to come out easily.. hehe.. Anyway, the manual says find a comfortable position to insert it.

One position which works for me is putting one leg up the toilet bowl. This I find really helpful! Same goes for removing.

* * * * *

Being the only person in our group of 8 ladies who have not used any tampon, I was asked many times by them since I have used tampon before, WILL I CONSIDER using tampon in the future?

Well initially I was quite happy with the tampon until I found:-

a) I tend to have like a nagging discomfort in my stomach whenever the tampon is in.. this feeling goes away when I remove the tampon.

When reading the manual in detail, it state that certain users may also experience TOXIC SHOCK SYNDROME (TSS). Symptoms generally are rise in body temperature, low blood pressure, rashes, seizures, headaches (see toxic-shock-syndrome).

So maybe mine is a lesser syndrome. Not sure.

* * * * *

b) I don't like not knowing whether the tampon is full or half full inside. I mean with a normal pad, you just look and you can see whether you need to change it.

But this is not the case with tampon. You cant like pull it out and see and insert it again if it's not full ;p

Because I had a terrible case of overflow on the first night of using tampon! Not that I did not take precaution by using a panty liner.

Even the panty liner was soaked (ok ok.. too much detail, I know). I only used it for slightly more than 2 hours but the box clearly state that a large/ super tampon can be used for like 5 hours.

* * * * *

VERDICT for me:-   I'll only use tampon during trips which require swimming.

But it is interesting to note that there is an app for Apple to keep a monitor on when to change your tampons (click tampon-timer-iperiod-companion) cos seriously.. you have no idea when to change that thing!! :(

Candy Crush Saga eye supplements

Wow!! Candy Crush Saga (CCS) recently updated another 15 levels for phone version making it a total of 350 levels..

There seems to be no ending to this game! Just when you thought you have reached their Sugary Shores, they create more levels for you to beat.!

Anyhow being a Candy Crush fan, I recently found my eyesight blurring.. maybe because I only play the game on my medium sized screen android phone and I am turning 40 soon.

So I started consuming eye supplement such as Lutein
.

Previously I took USANA’s visionex and I find it very good. Example is I notice less dry eyes even when I did not get enough sleep.

But problem with Usana was that it was too costly. RM123 for 56 tablets = meaning RM2.19 each with 10mg of Lutien each tab.

So I looked around for alternatives.

1) LIVE WELL Occu Sharp

Cost about RM1 each and works just as well. If my math is correct, should have 10mg of Lutein as well.

So far I have finished my 2nd bottle and I notice the patch of red blood clot which I have on my left eye is less prominent now.

current left eye

I developed this after my Lasik surgery to correct my short-sightedness in 2010.

blood clot after Lasik surgery in 2010

I’ll continue to monitor to see if there are any further improvements.

2) GNC Natural Brand Lutein Plus.

It's GNC new Lutein supplement which contains 20mg of Lutein. Pricewise.. RM203.90 for 60 tabs.

More expensive but if purchased during birthday month as GNC VIP member, it will mean the RM132.55 which means RM2.20 for each tab. Considering there is twice the amount of lutein, this will make the price slightly higher than Live Well's.

Will keep you posted!

Malaysia's Facial Cotton Pad vs Indonesia's

If you follow my blog, you would know that I travel to Indonesia frequently.

My recently buy from our neighbouring country is facial cotton pad.

In the photo you can see the difference in quality between our local ones and the one from Indonesia.

Left is from Indonesia. Right is Premier brand from Malaysia

I have stopped buying facial cotton pad from Watsons as I find them getting thinner and thinner by the years and worst yet, it leaves cotton residue on the face :o

Indonesia on the other hand is much cheaper (about RM2 for 50gm pack) and thicker.

Yes you may argue the Premier brand ones are the sealed type, hence it could be thinner, but I have used Watsons' before and it is getting thinner and thinner by the day.

There are only 2 brands at this particular supermarket but upon closer inspection, I realised they are from same manufacturer. Just that blue one is produced specifically for Value Plus supermarket chain.

So when my personal stock for this Indonesia cotton is finish, I will use The Face Shop cotton pad. Much more expensive @ RM5.90 for 80pcs but well worth it because on 1 piece there are 2 surface - cotton and cotton net.

The net side is great for removing mascara etc cos when it's all black, you can remove it the net and you'll get a cleaner cotton surface beneath.

So I am hoping that Watsons will improve the quality of their cotton pad, otherwise there are many alternatives available like Muji, Daiso and even Shiseido which are available @ selected Parkson outlets.