Girls' Trip Away

This red shoe chandelier was literally erected just minutes before we stepped into the shopping centre in the affluent suburb of Melate.



Girls' trip away... is the best thing for a girl's soul. From May 10th to 20th, my bestie of 20 over years, Irene and I shopped, ate and drank in Singapore, Boracay and Manila. Details of the holiday will be posted in my next blog for those of you interested in a holiday in Boracay.

Boracay is tiny and the shopping there was much of the same sort of generic beach & holiday wear that you get at most beach islands. If you've been to as many tropical islands as I have, you'd find the apparel rather generic and not overly exciting. Therefore I didn't go too crazy buying up stuff but I ended up buying a lovely sundress in two different colours of canary yellow and royal purple and a couple of colourful flip flops with wedge heels.

These fancy flip flops for kids and adults were rather unique and a big hit with my nieces, nephew and kids back home.

It might be winter in Sydney but bright lovely block colours in primary hues is the rage at the moment in our northern counterparts. As seen in ad campaigns and shop windows from trendsetters, Zara to Gucci. There are 7 Zara stores alone in Singapore while the first Zara store opened in Sydney's Westfield Shopping Centre in the city centre last month amidst much fanfare and crowd control. Being seasoned shoppers, Irene and I had rather big expectations in Manila but felt let down. We trawled three major shopping centres and didn't find any noticeable trends and they just didn't come across as fashion forward as their other Asian counterparts such as Singapore, Bangkok, Hongkong or Malaysia. Majority of my purchases were made from Singapore. Loving the beautiful, bright and happy primary block colours.

Orange bandage dress from Spanish label, FNT.

Canary yellow mini denim skirt from Stradivarius, a sister company to Spanish label, Zara.

Green suede strappy heels from Zara.

Blue suede wedges from Zara.

Gorgeous low scoop back fully-lined canary yellow dress also from Zara. Yes, I am a big fan of Zara.

Red strappy suede heels from Charles & Keith, one of our most successful local shoe and accessories boutique. From the birth of their first shoe store in the humble suburbs of Ang Mo Kio to their 23 stores in just Singapore alone and in almost every major city in the world, Charles & Keith only recently sold their business to Louis Vuitton for an undisclosed amount of money. They do have some really cool shoes, boots, handbags and belts. An extremely successful local business story they are very proud of.

Green knit dress with drawstrings from Spanish label, FNT.

Red, white and green shorts from Osmose, well known for their wonderfully soft & comfy cotton tops and bottoms. Again, the very bright, loud and happy primary colours in play here. Match these shorts with practically any colour top and look hip and smart.

Not being blessed with "bodacious ta-tas", I was most delighted to find these beautiful lingerie from local lingerie shops that cater to the "asian size". Not your boring whites, black or nude colour but gorgeous, lacy bras in every conceivable colour with the correct fit. God-sent! What joy.

These lovely shoes were so cheap but so cute! They were less than A$30 each. Gorgeous!

The packaging says it all for this product. I have been losing too much hair lately and if the condition of my own mother's hair is anything to go by, I'd better start looking for a solution to my hair loss or start a good wig collection. This product came highly recommended. It has been in business for almost 20 years and is used in many hospitals and retirement homes - now I feel really old and feeble... and bald :-(. There is also one for advance hair loss (just in case the one I bought doesn't work) and there's also one for adding volume. Each product comes with a specially formulated shampoo and vials of special oil. After shampooing, you separate your hair into four different sections and apply this special oil and massage it through starting from the base of the head and working your way up to the top.

This one's also self-explanatory. I have a little dark spot on my chin - a dark reminder of an acne scar (note to self: never scratch or pick the skin for whatever reason!). Asian girls are fond of having fair, smooth alabaster skin and so whitening agents and skincare tend to sell extremely well. I am not one to try and achieve that because a white face would just so not go with the other darker parts of me. You see, dark spots are very hard to get rid of in people like myself with darker complexion so I am attempting to whiten it with the special whitening lotion, cream and a silicon patch which is supposed to work on the problem spot directly. So far I have been using it every morning and evening before bedtime and I have seen quite a significant lightening. I have to say, the scar is no longer so obvious. Happy days again (well, almost).

I also discovered some wonderful japanese cosmetics. Great quality and wide selection reasonably priced. Available at Watson's. I had a great time spending up to two and a half hours just trying on different products. I found the cosmetics to be up to 25% cheaper than in Sydney. Also, the colour selection is different to Sydney. The liquid foundation from Revlon was not available in the colour that I normally use but instead of that, the salesperson found one that was even closer to my skin colour. It was a darker base colour with a yellow tinge which was ideal for my chinese skin.

So as far as shopping in Singapore, Boracay or Manila, Singapore still comes up tops for me.