Healthy Living in Singapore

#95 holler because it’s the holidays! | A beauty day out

Ahhhh… term break.

Music to a teacher’s ears. Finally that one morning you don’t have to wake up once your alarm goes off. When I was relief teaching, I used to set my radio as an alarm and it was hilarious because once it sounded, it would play Majulah Singapura which in any case, was rousing and inspiring for like, the first day and that was it. Is it disrespectful to say that after awhile the sound of the national anthem made me squirm and protest a little inwardly about how ‘it’s too early. bejeezus- this is inhumane!’.

I don’t teach in a goverment school now but term time is no less frantic so when the holidays roll around it’s time for some R&R! Every end of term I treat myself to a day off. That is FOUR days off a year T.T to eat good food, get a hair cut maybe and definitely, definitely get a massage. This time, the plan was to indulge in something healthy and great tasting, get a massage, go to the dentist, get my hair trimmed and.. get a facial.

I know this sounds weird to you guys but my experiences with facials (I can count them on one hand) have never been amazing. I usually go because a girlfriend of mine wanted to go. It’s like taking rollercoasters- said friend always promises that it’ll be great! It’ll be awesome! You’ll feel so good after! It’ll be fun! C’mon! and I always agree because.. maybe, this time? Only to walk out of the place feeling meh. At best I feel meh. On my last trip to a facial salon however, I walked out feeling absolutely traumatised. The person doing the facial had found a small, tiny pimple on my face and instead of cooing over it’s adorable baby-ness, she proceeded to attack it with such viciousness there should have been baby pimple laws written to protect them. ALSO, the thing I dread most- the EXTRACTION process. I HATE IT HATE IT HATE but everyone says it’s a necessary evil and the road to smooth skin is full of bumpy little white and blackheads that need to be aggressively removed. Suffice to say, I left my very last facial a couple of years ago absolutely traumatised and with a pimple scar that lasted almost 2 years.

Anyway, I decided to schedule a facial this time because (1) my face is insanely clogged. There aren’t any pimples or anything and it looks clear if you see me from far away but late nights and poor hygiene (eep!) have left much room for improvement. I don’t know how to explain it but if I look into the mirror under strong sunlight, the surface of my skin is bumpy 🙁 and (2) I had a voucher for a discounted first trial at a new facial salon called Le Queenz that just opened at Tanjong Pagar Plaza. Haha, yes I’m very cheapo.

I wasn’t intending to blog about it because quite honestly, I was just hoping for some blackhead removal and crossing my fingers the beautician wouldn’t scar my face and please please please be gentle with the extraction BUT GUYS, this was such the bombdiggity that for the first time in my life, I actually signed a package with them.

Since I wasn’t intending to blog about it, I don’t have any pictures so I took the following off their facebook. I love it when beauty salons are new! Everything is so gorgeous and pretty and I love the colour palette of the place. Some beauty centres make my head spin- everything is so pink! 

Doesn’t it just look so inviting and pretty?

The process is quite standard I guess. When I arrived I filled out a form (area of concern: dry skin, BLACKHEADS, BLACKHEADS!! CLOGGED PORES!)  and was then ushered into the room above to have my skin ‘analysed’. It was quite embarrassing to have to tell the beautician that I don’t do anything with my face except to wash (sometimes without a dedicated facial wash) and I uh, also don’t put sunscreen. But! She did say my skin was in very good condition despite my horrendous neglect (yay!) and said I must have a very good diet with a lot of fruit, veg and water. YES! I DO *bows* hahaha.” Pity eating well doesn’t clean my skin :/

The beautician was a fountain of knowledge though. She smoothly answered all my question, talked me through how to take care of my face while she cleansed, exfoliated and whatever else beauticians do (I was falling asleep).

Then she said the magic words!

” I don’t believe in extraction because it actually harms the skin and introduces bacteria into the pores. So what we do here is that we use a special machine that ‘scraps’ off the black/ white heads and unclogs the pores”

AND THE MACHINE IS AMAZING I TELL YOU. It’s quick and painless and afterwards, she actually shows you all the stuff that comes out (ew).

But seriously, NO EXTRACTIONS! I didn’t care what she did after that man. This place is my new favourite!

Okay, I’m going to show you guys something- I was half asleep so when she was zapping away with the machine and she actually missed a small spot- I suppose it’s easy to miss coz it’s the spot under my lower lip and you actually have to stick your tongue there to be able reach the skin in that area. If I was awake I could have told her but hurhur, it was too comfortable and I was in zzzland. Anyway, good thing she missed coz I could take a photo of what my skin was like before the facial.

Prepare for something really gross though..

Hahaha. It looks like a whale’s jaw but that’s okay coz everybody looks like that when they do that 🙂 But do you see all those little bumps! That’s what I had around the sides of my nose, on my nose and my face in general!

And after the extraction my skin was smooth like a baby’s bottom! No redness too! You can see that the skin surrounding it is totally free from all the bumps. AMAZING. I need to remember to stick out my tongue in that place next time haha.

After everything was over she brought me to a chair to get my eyebrows done (she says she can’t do it when I’m lying down because it wouldn’t be as accurate as when I’m sitting up) and this was the only part that I didn’t really like because I was so zenned out by the facial that to have to sit through the eyebrow plucking was sheer torture T.T I rather ć…ˆè‹ŠćŽç”œ you know?! Plus for the eyebrows, she shaved a little of it for me which I also disliked because shaving makes it grow back much faster but the good thing is that whatever it is, you can just tell the beautician. She customizes everything to what you say and what your skin is like so when I vocalised my concerns, she was quick to switch to plucking it entirely. Also I heard that she’s had almost 10 years of experience and used to work at this really well known eyebrow embroidery place. It’s amazing she has 10 years of experience though. She looks so young! But when she speaks, you know she is definitely worth her mettle.

The salon is new so package prices are going at great promotional prices. I bought a package of 12 sessions for only $1000+ I can’t remember the exact price. A session is usually $168. I’m trying to  slowly move away from chemical laden skincare too. Le Queenz uses Babor which is a German skincare brand that is preservative free and uses ‘natural plant derived substances in their most concentrated form’. I’m going to start with preservative free skincare followed by partially (?) chemical free then hopefully organic. Still very new to all these! (Is there such a thing as a organic facial spa in Singapore?)

Alright, I just wanted to share my experience here because I’ve finally found an extraction free facial place in Singapore that actually works. I’ve been to facial places that offer no extraction as well but my face has never been this clean. So if you are looking for a place as well, definitely give this place a try. Since it’s new, first trial is only $68!

Hahaha. Can’t believe I wrote so much about about a facial salon. Anyway! The next place I went to for a quick hair trim was Organic Hair Professional. It’s located in the same plaza as Le Queenz and I am in love with the place. Seriously, if you want to pamper yourself, don’t spend 3 hours stuck in some hair salon filled with chemical smells! I used to not notice how strong the chemical smells were in hair salons till I went to Organic Hair Professionals. Now I can never go back! Seriously, even if you don’t go for a hair cut, at least walk in to smell the salon. It smells so lovely!

I ended the day with a tuina massage at XinHua TCM clinic located at 100AM. I love deep strong massages and honestly think shiatsu massages are a waste of money haha. Just as I was paying to leave, I noticed they offered a ‘tummy detox slimming massage’. Curious, I asked what they did. It’s about $80! The woman replied that they basically massage your tummy for a while then they WRAP you up for the remaining time. $80?! To be wrapped in shrink wrap for an hour?! I think the only way it helps you detox is by preventing you from eating anything for that hour.

With my $80 safely tucked in the depths of my bank account, I hot footed out of that place and headed back home with a considerably cleaner face, neater hair and a less tense body.

T’was a good day.

xx

p.s I feel compelled to say that I wasn’t in any way compensated monetarily or made to write the review for any of these places. I just like to share good things. 🙂

// EDIT

WOW GUYS! Lequeenz has generously offered to give all my readers their first trial at only $48! Quote vegsmoothiebunny when you make your appointment with them: 6244 0228. Offer valid till 31 December 2014. Males welcomed though they don’t have the shoulder massage segment but I guess that’s okay because you still get a really clean face? Haha.And as usual, for FIRST time customers only! Enjoy! 😀

10 Healthy Living Resolutions for 2014

Hi everyone!!!

It’s New Year’s Eve! How brilliant is that?? I’m so excited for 2014 and I hope that you are too!

As the year wraps to a close, I thought I’d share a couple of new year resolutions! So here are 10 healthy Living resolutions for 2014 you might want to consider!

1. Redefine Health. 

Health to most people now seems to be just centered around healthy eating and regular exercise but health, as I’ve come to know, is really so much more that that. Health is first and foremost, in the mind. A life characterized by the fear of food, or constantly counting calories or protein percentages and whatnot, of lying in bed desperately coveting a model’s body, of planning and scheduling every single morsel that passes through your lips and feeling like a failure each time you fail to keep to that self imposed perfection- is not health. You may be eating really healthily, you may look like a million bucks, you may not be fat, you may be at the gym at the stroke of 6 every morning, people may think you are healthy, look up to you in awe and admiration but that’s not health. Health is not debilitating obsessive behaviors. True health is mental freedom from all of these fears and worry that you don’t look like an airbrushed model or that you aren’t fueling yourself on 100% nutrition from every bit of food that you eat. Health is not in bulging muscles or a modelesque body or a life lived in fear and restriction. Health is a personal awareness that the food you eat is nourishment for a body that will help you to live life to the fullest in gratitude and to love those around you.

2. Personalise Health

Health means different things to every one. Maybe you feel that the best for you is a vegan diet. Perhaps you feel that paleo is the way to go. Whatever it is, take it, experiment with it and don’t be afraid to modify it. Your body is unique and entirely yours. Only you know everything about it and how certain food makes you feel. How would the best selling author of some diet book know what works best for your body? The basics of healthy living is easy- more real food, more water, more movement.

3. Stop living in restriction

Perhaps you always tell yourself ‘no’. I can’t do this, I can’t eat that, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t. If you are trying to break a sugar habit, why not remove the adam’s apple of temptation and tell yourself what you CAN. You CAN eat a beautifully buttered brioche bread (or dark rye!) with smoked salmon and scrambled eggs instead of the pack of chips because mhmmm, they taste so much better. You CAN eat a warm comforting bowl of oatmeal stirred with sweet bananas topped with silvered almonds instead of plain nutella and bread for breakfast. It’s not that you can’t eat the chips or you can’t eat carbs or you can’t eat a million and one things you always tell yourself you can’t- you can, if you wanted to (and yes, you can!) But life is beautiful and filled with so much good stuff. The chips will always be in the supermarket beckoning you in glossy packaging from the shelves. Why not nourish yourself with an indulgent grilled fish and salad for lunch instead?


4. Invest in the eternal not the external. 
What are things that will still be around when you pass away? Your family maybe- through your children? What would you like to be remembered post posthumously for when all is said and done and you are no longer around? I don’t know what you might want to leave behind when you pass on but I’ll tell you what you can’t leave behind- your body. All the time you spend worrying about your imperfect jaw line, your nose bridge that isn’t high enough, the tummy flab that wouldn’t go away after 2 kids, the money used to rectify all of these- what would come out of investing your entire life on your body? All the time and effort that you invested into creating an adonis body of art would be for nothing. Suffering through starving yourself to fit a social ideal- nothing. Worrying day and night about what to eat, what to wear, how someone thinks about your body- nothing. One day, your body will be gone, buried six feet deep for decomposers to work on or cremated into little unrecognizable shards of bone but what you CAN live behind- WOW! You could leave behind children who are a reflection of what you once were- responsible, respectful, a heart for social change perhaps. You could teach your children (daughters) to believe in themselves, live healthy, live large, break the cycles of fat talking about physical stereotypes that have hurt and discriminated for generations. You could leave behind social institutions built to feed the poor or empower the downtrodden in society for generations to come. You could leave behind the budding seeds of new inventions for future generations to work on and make life easier for all. Teach, empower, invest your time and energies into things that would last beyond you and your years. At the very least, you could leave behind the memory that you were more than just a pretty body. This doesn’t mean you don’t bother about your health and work yourself to do the bone or eat drink and be merry excessively. Nourish your body for the NOW. Take care of it wisely, not obsessively so that it is strong enough to enable you to invest in the eternal.


5. Stop the Fat Talking.

6. Be brave, empower others

It is all too easy to be swept up in the current of popular opinion. To stand out there and bring your lunch to work perhaps, to refuse another slice of cake, to not take part in fat talking as a social bonding tool, to bring up the topic of healthier eating- it all takes a lot of bravery especially when you don’t look like a fitness model (screw society and its singular definition of good health). You WILL be open to jibes. People will mock you. When you eat healthily, they will taunt you. When you don’t, they will jeer you (“I thought you very health conscious one?”). But secretly, deep down inside, everyone wants to be nourished even if they declare with much swag that they would rather DIE than eat a salad for dinner. I’ve lived past all the jeering and the taunts (mostly lighthearted and goodnatured) and discovered that if you just keep being true to yourself, one day it’ll all be okay. People will start asking you for advice to eat healthier, or to live better. When you don’t cave in to social pressure and choose instead to eat the healthier option (seriously, what is with this glamorization of unhealthy eating. Is it some YOLO thing I’m missing out?), you are empowering someone else out there to muster up the courage to do likewise as well next time. When you make healthy eating a natural conversation topic, you empower others to speak up with their doubts, fears and insecurities as well. When you are brave enough to eat out of a lunchbox at the office, you empower others to do the same as well. Don’t bother criticizing what you hate in life. Just be brave and empower others such that the good you believe in becomes the norm instead.


7. Cut out the diet mentality
When you are on a diet, you fail to see food/fruits as it is- whole,
real, natural and bursting with nourishing vitamins and minerals.
Instead, everything is judged by the ‘allowed’ and ‘disallowed’ list that somebody wrote up.
It doesn’t matter anymore whether the food infront of you is a banana
or a potato chip. You eat it and your mind races the same way, your
heart palpitates and you are overcome by an overwhelming guilt for
having done something you shouldn’t. What happens then after the week is up or the month? Who’s going to write up your next diet plan? Healthy living is a lifestyle change, not a 2 week thing.

8. Stop judging other based on appearance. 
If you stop fat talking about judging your appearance, it’ll help you stop judging others as well. To cut it short- you don’t know A THING about other people. You cannot tell EVERYTHING about a person’s health based on how he or she looks. You cannot tell if the person is struggling with an eating disorder, or a thyroid condition. You don’t know if he/spent the day writing up yet another diet plan and the nights crying to sleep locked up in a mental prison of despair and fear. BODY SIZE TELLS YOU NOTHING. You can never know everything about the person but you do know yourself. Just take care of yourself and leave others to take care of them as well. Offer advice if needed but never from a moral high horse. Everybody is a work in progress at different stages in life with different circumstances to battle with. I really want to build up a society where the body means nothing but if you really must look I want you to look at the person and think of not of the lack of perfection so far from the standard of an airbrushed model but to just look at the twinkle in a person’s eye, the funny way the person throws back her head to laugh, the soft roundedness of tummy indicating the joy of several good meals shared in the company of loved ones. The tiny muscles a physical manifestation of a determination to be better than the day before.

9. Stop measuring your self worth by numbers
The scale- throw it away. Now. ’nuff said. You are defined by how much you can love those around you, how the strength of your mind inspires others, your determination, your resolve, everything else but those damn numbers on a machine you stand on every morning.

10. Live simply, passionately and joyfully/ It’s okay to be a cogwheel in a great and purposeful plan.
Never mind about the car or the condo or the whatever. Life is not in building up an empire for yourself now but it’s in what you would leave behind for the future. Live simply, live happy. DO you really want to spend another evening catching up with old friends talking yet once again about how much your investments have made? Or what’s the best bonds to buy? Does catching up with old friends seem like a prideful discussion on who has made the most money or come the furthest in life? How about sharing about your passion instead? Or your hobbies? (see: Be brave and empower others) My generation especially, the terribly privileged one has been brought up to believe that we can achieved (somewhere a long the lines, it’s turned into we MUST achieve) we are the university grads, the white collar workers but somehow we’ve forgotten that it’s okay to be part of a team to build a life for future generations to come. We are so obsessed with the fact that we must succeed, make a name for ourselves that we no longer believe in working as a team in causes worth working for. It is OKAY to not get to the top of the working world. It is OKAY to never have your name written down in history books. As long as you go to work and do your best, with the all the passion you have, with much sincere joy, your contribution will go a long way as well. Live simply, acknowledge that you are planting seeds for trees you would never get to enjoy the shade of and take care of the earth you are in now. Your children will inherit whatever you are careful with now.

Okay! That’s my 10 for this year! I didn’t write any about the usual drink water, sleep more etc etc etc because I’m sure everybody knows that already. Those are all just steps to truly live a healthy and fulfilling life! What’s more important is a positive mindset so here’s wishing you a healthy and happy 2014! May it be a year of love for you! 🙂

Ending off with 2 pictures I really like 🙂

Go Live life!

Lots of love and all of God’s blessings,
Grace 🙂

What is healthy living?

Hello everyone! Wow! I’ve just been really overwhelmed by all your support and love! I’ve been getting lots of encouragement from everyone around and it’s just been incredible! So thank you thank you all of you 🙂

I’ve been getting a lot of questions recently about health and nutrition in general. Most predominantly, everyone definitely wants to eat ‘healthier’ but are confused about what healthier means. Most of the questions centered around “can we ever eat… (ice cream/ milo/ cakes) ever again?”. “Just fruit and veg? Omg, that is such a sad existence! Are you serious?!”, ” THEN WHAT TO EAT?!” coupled with resigned sighs and a lot of frustration and and the eventual ” I rather die early but happy than live life like that.”

I’ll be doing up posts soon to answer your questions so hold your horses!

But first, let me reiterate that I’m not saying you can NEVER have a cookie or cake, or Char Kway Teow, or Fried Carrot Cake or anything ever again and that you must eat only fruit and veg. In fact, there is absolutely nothing you cannot eat.

It’s not about never having cake again during a birthday or having a mid week blow out meal with the pals, I am more concerned about the day to day.  Every day, for breakfast, lunch and dinner- what will you be having and how good would that be for your body? I’m worried about people like my parents who grew up eating rice and dishes and noodles and all these cheap, yummy hawker centre food and who suddenly face confusing information that suddenly it’s all not good for them. I’m worried about young children whom I come into contact with each day whose parents are so busy working that it’s much easier to buy back dinner from the hawker centre (cheap and tasty!) than to slough it out at the stove after a hard day’s work only to have your lovingly prepared food rejected and abandoned in favour of chicken nuggets and potato chips.

Healthy food does not mean bland. It may be a little rough in the beginning because your tastebuds are so used to factory made, chemical laden foods and are so desensitized that it takes a lot of fat, sugar and sodium to consider a dish flavourful but if you just scale down and try cutting back on these three, you’ll find your tastebuds sharpen, along with all your other senses. I used to drench my meals in different sauces last time but since eating healthier, my tastebuds are so sensitive that food that is lightly spiced tastes amazing and hawker centre food in Singapore just throws me off whack. I’ve really come to appreciate food in it’s natural form- the sweetness of a crisp apple, the slight saltiness of eggs, mhhhm 🙂

Also, there is not one-size-fits all approach to health and nutrition. I am 25 and lead a largely sedentary life. I’m out of the house from 8:30am in the morning till 11 at night. I work 7 days a week. I drive to most places instead of walking. My work largely involves me sitting/ standing and talking. I’m trying to fit exercise in in the form of stair climbing and walks but I don’t exactly move that much in general. I am also extremely sensitive to carb products and sugar and I don’t move around that much so I don’t eat grains that often. Eating a hot fudgy cake or even rice out of proportion to the rest of my meal would send me craving for more food. I’ve experimented different combinations, high carb, low carb, high protein etc and found that what works best for me is tasty, hot food that spans the entire spectrum of food available. I omit nothing from my diet but my daily diet consists largely of carbs in the form of vegetables, light protein and a lot of plant based fat like coconut and nuts. My meal ratios are usually a large percentage of fat, followed by protein and carb. Experiment and find out what works for you. We could all do with less animal fat, sugar and salt but how much of carb, protein, fat, minerals and vitamins you eat is really specific to your daily life.

Secondly, I honestly do not care about body size. You can be ultra skinny but malnourished and you can be really big and malnourished. You could eat really healthily and still be malnourished, one would never know right? My acid test for health is strength and vitality. It doesn’t matter how you look but how you feel going about life. Is waking up hard to do? Do you often feel lethargic and uninspired? Do you feel breathless after walking up a couple flights of stairs? Do you eat really ‘healthily’ and exercise frequently but hate what you see in the mirror and secretly pinch your tummy rolls. Do you cry in bed at night? Wish life was different or you were somebody else? Does the weighing scale indicate how you would feel for the rest of the day? Do you need a 3pm afternoon nap after lunch? Do you need coffee to keep you going? Are your children lethargic, always looking for sugary products and unable to concentrate in school? Does life just feel too hard and too stressful for you? If your loved one was hanging at the edge of a pit would you be strong enough to save him/her?

I have a long way to go to build up strength but it pains me to see girls around me shying away from exercise and proper nutrition because they are afraid to bulk up. I know the look they are going for, I’ve seen their thinspiration photos.

The collarbone, ribs, the thigh gap, the legs. I know girls who are obsessed with every part, believing that they will never be perfect till then whittle themselves down to bone.

Strength and health > body size, absolutely. You may still have bits sticking out here and there and you may not be a size 00, but really, who cares? (Then again, if you are a size 00 or a size 24 and can pull yourself out of a burning pit and don’t do the junk, whoohoo, that’s great too)

I really dislike putting up pictures of female bodies because I think that just makes us objectify them even more. I don’t want you to swing the other way and look at the previous pic (shown above) and compare it with the bottom pic shown here and think ‘Oh the first pic is so gross! She’s too thin!’ Your reaction to anybody’s body shouldn’t be she/ he’s too – something. If you feel compelled to say anything about the person’s health, get to know that person a little more, talk to that person, learn that person’s mental state and see what you can work out from there.

Please don’t look at these kinds of pictures and say things like ‘fit in the new skinny’. NOTHING is the new skinny, okay? Exercising is for your heart, the lovely blush colour in your cheeks- never solely for calorie burning ‘to get a certain body’. There is nothing worse than over exercising and putting your body under such terrible strain.

To be honest, wating right and exercising
wouldn’t make you super skinny, if that’s the look you are after. But it
will give you greater energy, make you happier, live life fuller. It’s
hard to live life and be excited about things when you are afraid to
meet up with people because you have so many food items on your
restricted list or it clashes with your gym time. Go out and live! Try new things!Blend up a smoothie today! Be adventurous! Be the amazing person you were born to be. Go out and love somebody today 🙂

I can’t wait to hear about the person you would soon become 😀