Red and yellow and pink and blue!
Now what possibly could these 4 small narrow cylindrical objects be?
Why, my latest collection of eyeliners of course! (And latest attempt to get endorsement deals from famous brands 
)
From left to right (in the order they were acquired): some of you may have met Turquoise already (he leaves quite an unforgetteable impression apparently), and next to him: Purple, Dark Green, and Navy Blue (nearly looks like black, so unexciting).
I recently also bought purple pencil eyeliner from Maybelline which I’m using to line my lower lashline – liking it! (you guys are just going to have to meet me in person to see how the look looks. If you’re pining to see a close up of my eyes, please scroll down to see the scary zoom in of my turquoise eyes.)
After Monday…
“After Monday” has been my mantra and response to every one for about a week now.
- Makng plans to meet up with people for lunch? – “After Monday”
- Restarting pilates classes? – “After Monday”
- Sorting out my room? – “After Monday”
- Work on my website/resume cooking experiments/baking stuff? After Monday!
What is so special about this Monday anyways? It is THE day I take the GMAT. Yes, THAT test that I need all because one day out of the blue two months ago I decided that I’m going to do my MBA. After some research I realised the *last* deadlines are in March, and then I shipped myself off to Pakistan for 2 months. So now here I am, in February, “after Monday”ing everything except for this exam (unfortunately).
In the meantime, I have only done the essentials in the past week, which include
- Studying
- Manicure and Pedicure (need short nails to ensure I can type the essay portion fast – very important!)
- Waxing appt (so I dont scare away the examiners and thus avoid an automatic fail because they won’t let me in the examination room)
- Swimming – to build up stamina to sit through the exam
- Spent one day meeting with friends so I re-remember what it’s like to converse with people who I’m not related to
- Cafe trips – to ensure my caffeine tolerance has not been messed with during my time away
Which has all lead us to today – the day before the exam! And what am I doing to prepare for the big day? Tons!
- Listen to retro music on class95 FM (music is relaxing!)
- Gym session to make sure the body can last through the gruelling 4 hour session
- Outing to Holland Village with parents (they are going to help pay for the tests and the degree after all, must keep them in good humour)
- Slathered on mud mask on my face and hair mask on my…well…hair – ensuring I dont suffer undue stress from lousy skin/hair
- Made a ton of sweet potato fries and ate them dipped in Thai sweet chilli sauce (Sweet Potato fries are supposed to be youthfulising, KJJ said so!)
I also took out some time from all the above prep to think about what to give my parents for their birthdays (both in the next week or so). Being on frugal budget, I’m trying to think of something that not only can I make decently, but that they will also like. I think this is in fact more stressful than the exam itself!
Wish me luck!
Rusty
This is what I’ve spent the latter part of my holiday doing…oiling the creaky cogs in my brain and doing lots of 9th grade math sums. All during this gorgeous weather, sigh.
MehFrosties!
Check out this little fella!
Earlier in 2009, Felicia and I were at Kinokuniya just killing time (actually, I believe we went in there for a specific purpose but got sidetracked), and spent a good half hour poring over a couple of books by Jillian Michaels, our new fitness guru (whose workout plan only Feli followed and succeeded on, I cheered her on from the sidelines).
What does this have to do with cute little snowmen? Not much. However, the inspiration behind this idea came but a few steps down from here, in the desserts aisle of the cookbook section! After much ooh-ing and aah-ing, we concluded that cute bakes were the way to go for this year’s Christmas presents.
Now let’s fast forward to December 2009, where after my “retirement”, I’d expected I would have plenty of time of devote to properly preparing and packaging this year’s gifties.
Silly and naive Mehreen.
So in the one and a half hours I had to spare between a GMAT course and meeting friends for dinner, I mixed together the cake batter (orange cake!), poured it into ice cream sugar cones, popped into the oven and ran up to get ready. (My maid very tactfully said nothing all while giving me rather concerned looks as I put the ice cream cones into the oven)
Decorating began upon my return at 1am, which was a rather messy, sticky, and not-safe-for-electronic-gadgets affair. After dressing and accessorising the little snowmen, I placed them into a ready baking pan to cart off to their new homes the next day.
Hi Ho, hi ho, it’s off to work we go!
Having already set up a lunch meeting with miss koh, I also asked her to bring along her fancy shmancy camera to take some pics. And it was at this photoshoot that the snowman cupcake cone were dubbed MehFrosty! (by the photographer no less!)
I managed to grab a couple of behind the scenes shots, with the maestro hard at work!
…which all led to the sad demise of poor MehFrosty
Showing off
**Warning: the following post includes lots of shameless showing off/blatant attempts to obtain product endorsement deals**
Hi peeps! This is my first hello from my wordpress for iPhone app! And while we’re at it, let me also share with you yesterdays list of achievements:
1) Hair washed and blowdried at a salon
2) Manicure, in Christmas ornament red
3) Teeth polishing and whitening by a cute dentist 
And you can see it all below, thanks to the iPhone camera and Photoshop mobile app for iPhone!
(bonus question: which company am I trying to get an endorsement deal from?)
Karachi!
After more than 3 weeks in Karachi, I realised I had only taken the following picture:
A serving of mocha mousse from a restaurant called Pompei, an Italian restaurant. However delectable the dessert was, I didn’t think you guys would appreciate it as a representatation of Pakistan, by any stretch of imagination.
So for you, my faithful (and very patient) blog readers, I have made a dedicated effort to actually take (relevant) photos.
After having had more than enough of the brunches, lunches, teas, dinners and post-dinner coffee meetings, mom and I made a food-free trip to the Mohatta Palace Museum (built in 1927 by Mr. Mohatta, then occupied post-partition by Jinnah’s sisters, and recently converted to a museum).
Just to give you an idea of how fabulously rich Mohatta was and how much living space the guy needed, here are trusty shots from my iPhone (forgot to bring along our digital camera from Singapore). Here’s the building:
…and the grounds:
(there’s more around the back, but this is enough to give you an idea)
And a stone tablet by our beloved President, Asif Ali Zardari (tickled me too much not to include here):
We’d heard good things about a current photography exhibition at the place, There and Then, a collection of photos of different scenes across Pakistan by some 12 acclaimed photographers. And man! Some of the images were simply breathtaking! (and also then made us wonder where in Pakistan these places exist!! Must go visit!) As a bonus, we also got to check out their permanant exhibition, Tales of the Tile, chronicling pottery and ceramic arts from 7000BC! Unfortunately there was no photography allowed indoors, so no iPhone 2.0mega-pixel photos for you. But we got all this for just 10 Rupees! (approx 60 Rupees = SGD1).
Next on the agenda: food! We trooped off to the new Butler’s Chocolate Cafe!!
Yum yum yum.
We started off by sharing a Chicken Salad (mom doesn’t abide to the replace-all-meals-with-desserts philosophy), and then got down to the real stuff.
I ordered an Americano with 2 pieces of dark chocolate
And mom ordered a tea with another 2 pieces of dark chocolate
While the menu wasn’t really anything to shout about, and the restaurant had lousy accoustics so it was VERY noisy, I was just there for good chocolate to enjoy with a cuppa, and this place hit the spot perfectly! I’m all for going back for more chocolate, but I think mom will take some more convincing.
Speaking of chocolates, I’ve also been keeping a stock of chocolate truffles at home (for my consumption only and 99% of the food here is wheaty), and have stayed away from physical exertion (my blowdried hair will get ruined), so despite my whining here, life can’t be ALL that bad, eh?
I’m blue da ba dee
BOO!
I apologise for the major close up of my brilliant skin (above you can see the scar of where I randomly managed to scratch myself too), but I walked into Tangs at VivoCity and on a whim asked the good people at MAC to try out a hideously bright eyeliner (that’s right, not eyeshadow, but eyeliner).
It’s ELECTRIC bright! And I totally fell in love with the very bright look that I grinned at the salesperson and said “YES! gimme gimme!” (paraphrased here slightly). I tried it again yesterday, and scared quite a few folks awake (they’ll thank me later, I’m sure). The colour makes me happy happy happy!
The only issue i have now is, this colour is from MACs LiquidLast range – this makes it more than a little difficult to remove my makeup without having bright blue bits still stuck to the base of my eyelashes!
Happy birthday Pakistan
Pakistan is 62! They all grow up so fast *wipes tear trickling down face*
(didn’t have a chance to take a better photo of the national green and white, unfortunately 
)
Welcome to Karachi!
For those of you who don’t know, I’m in Karachi until the 19th of August, where my boss has kindly allowed me to work remotely (also for those of you who don’t know, I’ve been very efficient in using up all my leave for the year – using up my full allowance by March).
In the meantime, I’m rather impressed with my schedule here – pulling in a full day at “the office” (more on that below), and then piling in a full evening of Karachi stuff, which includes:
- Checking out materials
- Going to boutiques
- Visiting family
- Going to weddings
- Going to tailors
- Arguing with tailors
- Visiting the salon to get beautified
- Getting materials dyed
- Going back to the tailors
- Tea parties
- Dinners
Sometimes all of the above in one day! I know it sounds like a very atas, tai-tai* lifestyle, shame about the office part, eh?
My office, FYI, is a corner of the sofa in my grandmother’s TV lounge, with the power cord sprawled very inconveniently (for everyone else) across the white tiled floor (highlighted in yellow below). Unfortunately, the rest of the area NOT being an office, I still have to contend with granddaughterly duties such as having to answer my grandmother’s random questions, running between the lounge and the kitchen, and answering the phone. I’ve found a great way to get over this though – “I’m in the office!” To this however, my mother “visits me at work” by gleefully and deliberately leaning over the yellow line to poke me.
Having nothing better in life to do (hey, I’ve had enough time to think about reviving this blog (again) and then dig out its password and actually upload photos!), I’ve actually been taken some photos (albeit from my camera phone), so you folks have both blog posts, and photos to look forward to!
*Singlish definitions
- atas – (ah-tahs) – Malay for “upstairs”, it describes someone as snobbish, hoity-toity, affected or arrogant.
- tai tai – applies to citizens of the world with an Asian viewpoint who have bounds of time and money. A Tai Tai is a privileged lady of means.
fly me to the moon!
Having done nothing except to sleep, eat and sleep some more, o Sunday, the Singapore contingent of the Hasan family decided to get its act together at 8.30pm and do something to mark mother’s day.
So we pile into the car, and the car pushes off. And we were still deciding where to go. Then mom says: “wow, look at how big the moon is tonight!”
Dad’s head whips to the left and he says, “are you thinking of going there tonight?”
Mom: “well it certainly looks closer than usual”
Dad: “True, it looks like its just above Changi Airport”
Mom: “you figure we can just take a shuttle over from there?”
Dad: “I figure they have some going from the budget terminal”
Me: “it’s probably peak time now anyways, seeing how the moon disappears during the day and all…”
The Hasans: *contemplatively* “Hmmmmmmm”
We ended up going to Vivo City instead. Pity.
