Monday, September 24, 2012

Miss Universe 2012 is Miss China....


I think my blog roll have collected some cobwebs since I have been super busy with a million and one things to do on a day to day basis. From patients to management issues, to children and bffs jumping off the plan for an unplanned holidays and the so many events after fasting month, oh yes, I have my plate pretty full. 

Anyways, last couple of months Miss Universe World pageant came to an end with Miss China crowned as the Miss Universe World for 2012. She also won the Miss talent award and she is actually the 2nd person from China to win such a title in the whole 61 events in the past. Congratulations to Miss China.

Personally I love watching Miss Universe pageants. I caught the last bit of it recently as they were crowning Miss China. Its a show full of glitz and glamour and not to forget the pretty girls. Looking at each of the girls features, you can see similar traits that signifies beauty - flawless skin and symmetry. Although for these beauty queens it is actually loads of make-up to get the flawless effect. But proper skincare and supplements can also help you achieve that effect. When dealing in the aesthetics world, we need to have a good eye for beauty, and what better way to train yourself than watching and appreciating beauties.

Coming back to Miss China, she is definitely beautiful and talented. But perhaps the more attention is that she is Asian, and yes the Asian look is becoming more appealing to a lot of people. (think K-Pop). Semi slanted big eyes, with dark hair and eye brows, yellow tinged skin, full lips and a high nose. Despite Asians typically having a flatter nose bridge, the advancement of fillers have made it possible for Asian's to have a higher nose bridge thus enhances the look. Skin fairness is often sought by most Asians - seriously I am wondering why Asians are so obsessed in being fair? Hence so many supplements claiming to help improve skin tones and fairness are being sold like hot cakes. My personally opinion on it - I'm cool about it as long as it does not cause any harm. Some skin bleaching products were taken off market due to risk of cancer and other more harmful conditions. Some of the beauty supplements have unknown ingredients so a proper evaluation of their safety is impossible.

Skin fairness depends on a few factors. The first is of course genetics. You cannot expect to be Korean fair if your family comes from a line of dark tanned people. Nor would you get Caucasian pink skin if you were a pure Asian. Some may argue about this, but unless you are an albino, you would be as tan as your parents were. The second factor is of course sun exposure. You cannot expect to be fairer is you are exposed to the sun most of the time. The sun in the equator tend to be most consistent and thus people near the equator tend to be tanner than those living in the Arctic. Vitamin C supplements, glutathione etc are just temporary measures. As long as you take the supplement you can maintain the skin tone. Pretty expensive investment for something unnatural perhaps. But everyone's perception of beauty is different, hence why we hear the proverb beauty lies in the eye of the beholder. So what do you think is beautiful?



Monday, September 10, 2012

September October Promotion....


I remember a senior colleague of mine who whenever he conducts training... he will always tell us, " You know, for every Asian who walks into the clinic, definitely will look better with a nose filler in," Initially I laughed at his remark, but after a few years, I realized he did make sense. Traditionally Asians tend to have a more flatter nose bridge, hence makes the distance between the two eyes more far apart and appear smaller and less attractive. But by inserting a filler at the nose bridge, and even elongating the tip slightly, it helps reduce the distance and automatically makes the face more appealing. The eyes become more obvious and bigger (relatively). Nowadays with advancement of injection techniques, you can even do it as a lunch time procedure without much bruising or even being noticed by your colleagues. But there is a certain accepted norm for Asian nose, thus you need to go to a well trained practitioner in order to get a natural looking  nose. The most common comment you will get from your friends is that, you look different - but most wouldn't realize that you had your nose done unless pointed out or if you really had no bridge at all. The immediate improvement is superb and it really helps with self confidence without feeling fake. Besides, it is only 1 injection away.


Interested to try out our promotion? Do call us at 03-21440080 or email to info@faceworksclinic.com for appointment. See you there.

Sunday, September 2, 2012

Oppan Gangnam style?

Taken from Wikipedia

     I have always been amazed by the K-pop culture as it has a lot to do with medical aesthetics. From being a reserve country now over a couple of years K-pop culture has actually disseminated to almost every part of Asia if not the world. The most recent craze of K-pop culture is the Oppan Gangnam style. At first I was like... What? Initially hearing the name Gangnam I was thinking of some Hindustani movie or song, but I heard it air on Hitz Fm the other day and realized it was K-Pop. I asked my suppliers and my friends about it, and everyone was familiar with the Gangnam style except perhaps me. I guess I must have been too caught up with work to realize the viral hit sensation and I thought aging was getting to me, but apparently, the Gangnam Style was only aired on July 15th of this year. Pheewww.... and I thought I was losing my touch to the world.

So I decided to take a look at the infamous Gangnam Style on YouTube. The original video has 87 million views since July (not bad). And it even has its own entry on Wikipedia. Definitely super viral. And I would say that the you tube is pretty interesting and entertaining. His funny dance actually looks cool when it is done by so many others at the same time and it is a different view of K-Pop culture where the singer is usually super 'lencai'.

But despite the singer's common look - I did notice he had his nose done which is really common in Korea. My colleagues in Korea tell me that every single Korean will get a nose filler done by the time they are 18. It is so popular that on 1 small street there are 30 different aesthetic clinics and they can still make a good living. (And I thought 30+ clinics on Orchard street in Singapore was overboard). In fact medical aesthetics in Korea is so common that they have actually developed machines and techniques which initially I was pretty resistant to the idea because we had a private joke that Korean machines only lasted 2 years but nowadays with their advancement and technology, it is almost at par with the American or UK produced machines. They have also come up with mini thread techniques which looks promising and less invasive compared to traditional threads. On this 16th I will be attending a training introductory course and hopefully from there if it is really safe with minimal complications then perhaps I will introduce the technique to my clinic to tackle sagging issues of face, breasts and buttocks.
More solutions for my patients.

Going back to Gangnam style, Mr PSY rapper is pretty good and he does have a pretty contagious song. The Gangnam moves are simply hilarious but with the tune it looks cool and I wouldn't be surprised if it becomes an aerobic routine soon (or perhaps already is). How safe it is to your joints in view of the twisting movements of the knee? I'd have to get an orthopedic opinion on that. In the mean time, let's enjoy the shuffle movements while we can. (Reminds me a bit like poco poco craze). But I do recommend some child monitoring for the video, some of the scenes are not so proper.


Oh, for those wondering what is Gangnam....
According to Wikipedia :

"Gangnam Style" is a Korean language colloquialism that refers to a luxurious lifestyle associated with the Gangnam district,[4] an affluent and trendy area of Seoul.[5] The music video depicts Psy dancing at various locations in Gangnam.[6] The song's theme is about "the perfect girlfriend who knows when to be refined and when to get wild."[7]
In Korean colloquialism, "오빤 강남 스타일 (Oppan Gangnam style)" may be translated as "I love the Gangnam style" or literally translated as "Your big brother is Gangnam Style". The Korean word 오빠 (oppa) means "a female's elder brother" but can be also used as a first-, second- or third-person masculine pronoun to designate a male who is elder or older than a female. Based on more recent cultural norms, the term has typically been used to refer to a boyfriend or male spouse. It is used as a first-person pronoun in this phrase. 오빤 (oppan) is an abbreviation of 오빠는 (oppaneun). 는 is a topic marker, which in this case means the implied subject of the sentence is the singer (오빠). The verb "to be" is omitted, as is often the case in such short Korean sentences. Thus the literal translation of "Oppan Gangnam style" is "Your big brother [is] Gangnam Style".
The lyrics are by Psy, music by Psy and Yoo Gun-hyung, and it was arranged by Yoo Gun-hyung, who is a well-known producer in South Korea and also collaborated with Psy in the past.


Cheers.