Kolours Hair Dye

One of the things I definitely wanted to purchase from the Philippines was some hair dye specifically made for Asian hair. I'm sure a lot of other Asians can sympathize with me about this. I know my hair, though not very thick, is very stubborn and resistant to any type of manipulation, whether it be styling with hot tools or hair dye. Most hair dyes here in the U.S. don't last very long for my hair. I don't know if it's just not absorbing the color or whatever. I always hear that Asian hair is different from Caucasian hair but all the hair dye seems to be for Caucasian hair. I don't even know where to find Asian brand hair dye in my area so I stocked up on hair dye in the Philippines.

This brand Kolours is one of two brands of hair dye that I brought with me from the Philippines, the other brand being Syoss. I bought this at the Watsons in the Megamall. Sadly, the selection of hair dye in most places was not very large. I don't know, I may just not be looking in the right areas.

This brand claims to be especially for Asian hair, which is the reason I bought it. The color is in black. In the selection available, it did not seem like they had other types of black (ex. blue black, jet black, natural black/brown black). The brand claims to have a "non drip rich cream format for long lasting and vibrant colors with added vitamin E & B5".

The box came with tube of the creme color, a container of color developer, 2 color safe conditioner packets, a pair of huge gloves, and an instruction manual. I don't know whose hands fit in those gloves but I don't think the majority of people can fit in them. Instead, I use my non latex gloves, size small. The instruction manual said to have a comb but I'm not sure what I was supposed to do with that comb.

In terms of what I did extra, I had a black shirt around my neck so I don't stain my skin. I also put a lot of thick lotion on my neck and hairline and especially my ears so they don't get stained black. I had a clip to separate sections of hair. Having a towel that you don't care for the quality of is good too. I have a towel I use only for dying hair so it looks like a tye dye towel right now.

I didn't think my hair was light but wow, it was a pretty noticeable change (for me at least) when I washed the dye off and saw my hair dry. I mean, my hair is really black now and I love it. Not a hint of brown anywhere. I do think it's pretty harsh on the hair because my hair felt dryer than usual after washing the dye out and it took a lot of conditioning (in my opinion, at least) to get my hair back to its previous softness. After a week, I'm still washing out a bit of color every time I shampoo but the color has stayed. Definitely this is a dye that I would buy again.

"Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons" Linked Game Secrets

Instead of doing school work to prepare for the upcoming school year like I had planned over the summer, I ended up just playing video games with all my free time. Not exactly the type of productive that I should have done but I did finish  Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages. At the end, it gave me the secret to Holodrum that allowed me to start a linked game in Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons. There was a lot of back and forth with the secrets between the two games but definitely having a linked game made getting all the weapon upgrades so much easier. So, here are all my secrets.

Secret to Holodrum

Fairy Secret

Tingle Secret

Symmetry Secret

King Zora Secret

Troy Secret

Mamamu Secret

Tokay Secret

Plen Secret

Elder Secret

Library Secret

My Rings

• Blue Ring
• Friendship Ring
• Power Ring
• Armor Ring
• Pegasus Ring
• Toss Ring
• Light Ring
• Snowshoe Ring
• Roc's Ring
• Discovery Ring
• Octo Ring
• Like Like Ring
• Spin Ring
• Slayer's Ring
• Whisp Ring
• Zora Ring

Real Nature Mask Lemon from The Face Shop

"A brightening mask sheet containing fresh lemon extract with vitamin C to densely penetrate the skin and brighten dull skin tone while maintaining its translucence"

Surprisingly, this will be the first mask I've ever used in my lifetime, though probably not the last. This product is obviously a Korean product, as seen by all the Korean writing on the packaging. I bought this from The Face Shop in Megamall. The packaging has a description and instructions on the back, written in Korean in the top half and an English translation on the bottom half. The mask claims to contain 1000mg of fresh lemon extract. I've seen from other website that lemon extract or lemon juice is very effective in getting rid of dark spots and brightening the face.

So when I first take the mask out, it is folded into a little square. It is definitely soaked with the solution. I mean, this mask was drenched. The solution is very thick, reminds me a lot of syrup. Interestingly enough, the solution does not smell like lemon despite being made of lemon extract. I thought that was weird.The mask itself is very large, large enough to fit everyone I guess. They eye holes were very large. The hole for the nose was kind of weird. There was a flap of some sort but the flap was much bigger than my nose but the hole for the nose is pretty big. Since the mask was so large, there were quite a bit of flaps of overlap. Even the lip hole was very wide, but maybe I just have tiny lips.

The instructions said to keep the mask on for 15 - 20 minutes. Since the mask is so drenched with solution, I left it on until the mask became relatively dry. That took way longer than 20 minutes, more like 45 minutes. I didn't want to waste the mask which is why I did that. So the question is did the mask do what it is supposed to? I do think it brightened my face and with the amount of solution in the mask, it did penetrate my skin very well. I don't think it made my skin oily unlike I thought it would. I do think my skin looked better and brighter. Would it have had the same effect if I kept it on for only 20 minutes? I don't know. But keeping it on as long as I did, it definitely worked!

Soothing my Sushi Craving

One of my favorite foods that I don't think I will ever get sick of is sushi. Ahh if I could live a life on sushi and chocolate, that would be so wonderful. However, sushi is kind of expensive and not very friendly to my college student budget. Whenever I get to have sushi, it's always a treat because it means I didn't spend as much as I allotted for and I am able to spend on food much more than usual. So here are some of the sushi places that I have been to recently because I have just had a really bad sushi craving these past two months.

MoCA Asian Bistro
I go to this restaurant a lot when I'm at home. Not only is it the closest to my house, since it is actually inside my neighborhood, but it also is super freakin delicious. I always try to get my parents to bring me here when I have a craving for sushi. They are easy to convince because they love sushi too and luckily, so does my little brother. A lot of children nowadays don't seem to like sushi and raw fish so I think we lucked out on him. So yeah, this place has a nice ambiance. It's pretty small and doesn't get a lot of people except for the weekends. I always go during weekdays or the middle of the day so I don't encounter many people. They are pretty fairly priced and I always get their "Sushi and Sashimi for 2" or "Love Boat" (shown above) when I'm with someone. It's a pretty good deal for how much food they give you. Check out their store here!

Sumo San
This place is my favorite sushi place to go to when I'm at school. It's located in downtown Richmond and I'll admit, it might be a little sketchy for some people to handle. I remember when I took my parents there, they were giving me this look like "where the f*** are you taking us?" It's a tiny place and you have to park on the street. But gosh, this place is good. Not to mention, they have pretty awesome prices for their sushi. On Wednesdays, they even have a sushi happy hour where certain rolls are only $3 each! Now that's a great deal. Check out their site here!

I usually get their caterpillar roll (shown above) and it has great plating and presentation. Some other sushi shown above is the california roll, salmon roll, tuna roll, and eel roll. During the sushi happy hour, those three rolls are $3. The place is pretty cool with a whole art piece by the sushi bar made entirely of paper cranes. It even has this delicious dessert with some fried bananas and ice cream!

Kanpai Japanese Steakhouse and Sushi Bar
So I've only been to this place just once and that was very recently. My roommate and I have been looking for alternatives to Sumo San because, although we love the place, it is just so far now from where we live. It was much easier when I lived on campus but now it's kind of a hassle to drive all the way down there. This is much closer to us, located by Short Pump. Now, this place looks pretty darn fancy. The outside looks like some Japanese building and the entrance is large wooden ornate double doors and just the whole environment is so fancy schmancy Japanese. However, don't be fooled. Their sushi prices are actually about the same as Sumo San's, which is very reasonable. They also offer hibachi and other things. They come with complementary soup for anything you order and this place is great for large groups. Check out their site here!

Other Places
Another place that I liked up in North Virginia is Hooked in Sterling. That place is pretty good. Some other sushi places I've tried in the Richmond area are Sticky Rice by Carytown, Carytown Sushi, Sakura by VCU, and Kenji. After all those, Sumo san is still my favorite. Sticky Rice is more hype I think since all the students seem to love it (but it is more accessible to them than other places). Carytown sushi was ok, not the best. Sakura was cheap but not the best either. Kenji is mostly a steakhouse and although they do advertise that they sell sushi, it's a very limited menu and it tastes just ok. A place I would love to try in the future would be Umi by Short Pump. They are kind of expensive though. Perhaps when my parents visit?

24 piece brush set

I have been looking for a brush set for forever. I just wanted a cheap starter brush set since I am just a beginner makeup user but most brush sets I cam across were expensive and I just did not want to dish out that much money for brushes that will barely get used. So, of course I looked for a set in Divisoria. Most places there were selling 24 piece sets for around 700 php or so. My aunt managed to haggle with this one store owner so that I was able to get my 24 piece brush set for only 500php while she got two 12 piece brush sets for 250php each.

It's quite nice that the set comes with a black carrying case that keeps everything together. I do like how everything is black. It definitely looks more expensive than it actually is. Because of that top flap, the brushes don't fall out when upside down except for that one big brush to the right that is not under the flap. That brush tends to fall out if held upside down. It looks leather but the bag is more of some leather plastic blend, I think. Anyway, it doesn't feel like real leather.

The brushes themselves are all black with black plastic bristles. The brushes say MAC on the side because they are MAC knockoffs. But believe me, you would never be fooled by these knockoffs. The bag is one indication of it being cheaply made. If you feel the brushes, they are definitely not as soft. The little details like how the bristles are attached to the brushes and you can see how things are glued together also give it away.

Being so cheap, the brushes do shed a lot at first. Though it didn't shed so much that I pretty much lost half the brush so I would say it did a moderate amount of shedding. Also, some of the brushes were not well glued together, as you can see above. Four brushes broken out of 24 is a pretty significant number. It was nothing serious though that my glue gun couldn't fix.

All in all, for the price I got this set for, I'm pretty content with the quality. It truly is hard to find anything cheaper. In Divisoria, there were some 32 piece sets being sold but they weren't as cheap as this set when you do the math of how much per brush. Plus, I didn't need 32 brushes anyway. So yes, though the quality isn't all that super great, the price can't be beat. Overall, I'm content with it.