Gripevine

Somethings don't change, and that's the perennial quest for fairer skin. Yup the history of cosmetic whiteners goes a long way back. The  ancient Greeks  and Romans applied lead paint to whiten their skin in the face of dangerous health hazards, and many women and even men today continue to lust after this beauty ideal, especially in Asia. Here in Malaysia the quest for fairness is well and alive. Walk into any pharmacy or Watsons outlet, and it would be difficult not to find some amount of whitening substance in most of the beauty care products. From facial foams to moisturizers, the promise of fairer skin screams out from the product labels. Like honestly, do these products really result in naturally fairer skin? call me a cynic, but I think white is just an overrated fad which for some reason is not dying out the way it should. As far as I am concerned, moisturizer and sunblock will save the day for me. Plain and simple. Whitening a Devil of a Culture Not surpri...

Does being beautiful mean having a long glossy mane? I don't know about you, but I am sick and tired of seeing shampoo advertisements where the models sashay about with sleek long hair. It's already the 2000's, get with it Shampoo manufacturers, such hair is no longer the Asian beauty ideal.  And realistically, not all of us can have hair like that, no matter how many bottles of said shampoo we pour on our heads! Well I digress, this post is not a rant against shampoo manufacturers, but about hair straightening or better known as rebonding in this part of the world. Rebonding is an interesting breakthrough in the hair care industry that enables those with wavy, curly or frizzy hair to have straight hair. I say interesting because it gives us options. With rebonding, those with frizzy manes can actually experiment with the straight look. However too much of a good thing can be a bad thing. And that seems to be the case with rebonding. The advent of this method of h...

Dorian Gray had it good. He stayed young and golden while his portrait aged, tucked away in an attic. The rest of us unfortunately must contend ourselves with the very REAL fact that age we must or perhaps not... Almost every skin care brand in the market today touts some kind of anti-aging benefit. From erasing wrinkles to providing non-sugerical facial lifts. All from a jar of cream or a tube of serum and at pretty affordable prices too. Do these products really work? will mature women regain the elasticity of their sagging skin, will laughs lines disappear? will younger women retain their youthful looks with prodigious use of anti-aging products? I am a cynic, I don't buy the whole anti-aging ballyhoo. I am all for skin care ranges for mature skin, considering that the needs of our skin changes as we mature. However I do not believe that the promise of youth lies in a bottle or a facial mask packed with anti-oxidant properties. The most these products can do is to alleviate the ...