The Revamped Face Shop Shangri-La in Pictures

The Face Shop in Shangri·La is back with a new look and hopefully with new stocks and promises of skin care miracles.

Omg, Kim Hyun-Joong is just Adonis personified. He must be one of the million reasons why Faceshop brand is so widely, or must I say globally used?

I noticed that Natural Story is added under the clean and simple The Face Shop signage

Oh, and they're celebrating their 10th anniversary!

How about giving away these uber chic carry-on cream/lotion to celebrate a decade of cleansing, beautifying, moisturizing body and skin the natural way? ;-)

How to go to Shenzhen from HongKong Airport by Train

Early this year my planned trip itinerary was Shenzhen-Hongkong-Macau. Four days in Shenzhen by myself and another four days in Hongkong with my travel buddy slash colleague, Rainby. While in HK we did a day side trip in Macau and that may probably claim another page in this blog one of these days.

Meantime, let me tell you how I navigated my way from HK airport to Shenzhen.

*  Take the Airport Express line and get off at Tsing Yi station. You are now at the Tung Chung line (orange in the map). If  my memory  doesn't fail me, the fare might be from HKD42-48.

*  From Tung Chung, the next stop will be Lai King (Tsuen Wan line, the red line in the map). It is only one station away as well but the travel time is less than that from the airport to Tsing Yi.

*  Next stop from Lai King is Prince Edward (Kwun Tong line is in green) and guess what -- yes, get off at Kowloon Tong.

*  Finally, you reach the blue line, East Rail line which ends in Lohu and you're on your way to Shenzhen.

I believe there might be a simpler way to reach Lowu from the airport but personally this the most cost effective and 99% free of the probability of getting lost especially if one is a firs timer.

The best things in life are free

Today, I received a gift from Apple, my niece. It was a Marc by Marc Jacobs earrings. I suspect that Apple thought that I will definitely adore it because of the design. She probably remembers that I love stars.

My seemingly ordinary day suddenly  becomes extraordinary because of this present. Actually, this is one of the two things in the bag that she sent me. The other one is a Trader Joe's Organic peanut butter, which I have been salivating about but could not find the time to  buy.

Oh, my niece. She could be so sweet and so generous at times.

And it's not even my birthday. Her generosity made me happy. That happiness did not cost me a cent although it made her Kate Spade wallet more than a hundred bucks lighter.

No Sweat Fruit Salad

All I did was to throw in 3 kinds of fruit -- apples and mandarin cut in bite size pieces plus seedless grapes. Then drown it with spoonfuls of DelMonte pineapple juice with a drop of honey to sweeten it up a bit ...

 Easy to prepare healthy snack, right? Let's give our potato chip bags a rest once in a while and load up on these. It's your choice. :-)

Beating the cold weather with 7-11 Hotpot or Oden

According to Wikipedia, Oden is a Japanese winter dish with lots of ingredients like boiled eggs, daikin radish, konnyaku (whatever that is) and processed fish cakes stewed in a soy-flavored dashi broth. I so love hotpot because I have an uncanny predilection for hot soups.

Our neighborhood 24-hour store, 7-11 is now offering hotpot which I had been planning to try out for some kind of eons now. That simple dream came true today. It was just the perfect time. Stormy, cold and windy weather.

My receipt showed that the noodle costs P12 and you can add like 3 ingredients with a price starting at P10 to P15 each. So if you keep it to just 3 toppings -- enjoy the hot meal for less than P50!

Beware of adding extra toppings though because you might go beyond your budget. I was so overwhelmed with the variety of fish cakes and assorted meat balls that I went out of 7-11 with my wallet P153 lighter. I don't regret it though. It's good to cave in to your greedy appetite once in a while. You can never buy that kind of satisfaction.

The hotpot is not exceptional though. The soup is a bit on the sweet side and the taste of one of the toppings -- a block of sweet corn, is overpowering. The processed fish cakes and meatballs are of good quality and worth the price. There is a sauce that go with it labeled Oden sauce which is forgettable.

 

Sunflower Beauty Oil by Human Nature

Human Nature products boast of 100% No Harmful Chemicals which is a big come on especially for people who care about what they apply on their skin. I have tried their lip balms before and some of their lotions and I must say they might be good. For some reasons I forgot all about their products when I see something new that I want to try. I stopped using plain lip balms a long time ago. It might be around that time when I discovered lip tints or lip balms with a hint of color. As for lotions, I got lots of generous relatives who send me Victoria's Secrets  and Bath and Body lotions at the time.

So much for human nostalgia. I am about to run out of facial cleansers so I thought of swinging  by Rustan's on my way home. I don't have a particular brand in mind, I just want something like a cream to pat on my face and tissue those dirts away.   Just like the work of Pond's cleansing cream, my elder sister never runs out of this precious cream eons ago to cleanse her face with before toning and moisturizing.

Months ago, I have been eyeing this beauty oil by Human Nature which I was thinking will work fine to cleanse my face before I hit the sack. It was not available in small bottle then and quite expensive for me to try. Look what I got now, yey! Finally 50ml bottle now is available for something like P149. Not bad.

At the back of the bottle, it actually tells you that this oil helps in lightening dark under eye circles, dark spots, pimple marks,  lighten underarms. It also claims of minimizing stretch marks, adds shine to  your dull hair as well as moisturize your skin.

The manufacturer refers to this product as their gold elixir that works magic for you.

And all I want is to clean my face which is not really listed as one of the numerous things the happy flower could bring to your life. I am ending this post humming 'Got to Believe in Magic'.

Mochiko Day!

As a treat for working hard five days straight, I usually give myself a reward -- big or small to cap my productive week. This time I find myself buying in Mochiko, one of those stalls you pass by in Shangri-La Mall. I always thought that this is a Japanese franchised store but I was wrong. From their website, I learned that this is wholly owned and managed by a Filipino couple. Anyways, I digress, I am supposed to tell you about my take on the Mochiko product.

Those cute little colored balls (looks more like the size of the regular hand stress balls) are made of mochi. A mochi is a Japanese sticky rice pounded finely and shaped into balls usually filled with red bean paste.

Instead of the common filling, Mochiko filled it with different delish ice cream flavors. The ice cream that they are using has real milk and fruit ingredients in it, not the commercialized one. This explains why you get that tiny thing for P75 a piece. Personally, the ever sweet tooth that I am, you would definitely catch me tasting all the available flavors which are shown in the photo below:

They also kept on updating their flavors -- as of this writing they have the very popular Speculoos Cookie Butter! So let us all declare our very own yummy Mochiko Day!