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I admit it. I am concerned about my looks since I’m losing them so rapidly as I age. (sigh)
Although I’m not as vain as some others are, I will admit that I don’t like looking in the mirror and seeing lines under my eyes and that my skin is not as nice as it used to be.
Today my friend sent me a link to a story about women “flocking” to get bird poop facials… EW!
Now for everyone who got grossed out like I did, the stuff isn’t administered “fresh.” The bird droppings are “hygenically collected” and treated with UV radiation to kill the bacteria.
Uguisu no Fun is a Japanese powder made from the droppings of the Japanese Bush Warbler (Japanese: 鶯 uguisu) or nightengale and is rich in the amino acid guanine, said to brighten and cleanse skin. In the 18th century geishas and kabuki actors used the powder to clean heavy white makeup off their faces. It was also used to remove stains from kimono… awesome stuff!
I did some research and at naturaljapanesebeauty.com, a small (15gm) bottle of 30 applications is priced a very reasonable USD $10. The site says:
Uguisu is the name of the Japanese nightingale. Apart from being known for its beautiful song, its natural droppings are also used in Japan as a traditional application for silky white skin.
The powdered nightingale guano is a fine almost odourless powder that is mixed to form a paste and applied as a face pack. It is mildly lightening on the skin while smoothing the complexion and leaves the skin feeling soft and nourished.
The uguisu no fun is safely sold and hygienically collected for cosmetic skin purposes. The fun contains certain ammonic properties that appear to gently bleach the skin while smoothing and toning the complexion. For use as a natural face pack treatment for blemishes or smoothing the complexion. Non-fragranced 100%natural product
Well considering that the “Geisha Facial” at Shizuka salon is charging $180 for a facial with this stuff, $10 for a small bottle of bird guano sounds like a good deal!
Immortal Geisha chronicled her experience with the “fun” in great detail and describes a positive outcome, but left readers with the following:
Also - please keep in mind that it is a specific type of “fun” that is used for this product - so any old “fun” from the bottom of your bird cage, top of your car, or from your local pigeon colony just won’t cut it!
Now I was initially grossed out by all this poop talk, but after reading more about this “fun” stuff, I am curious. But according to “The Japanese Way of Beauty” by Michelle Dominique Leigh:
* It cleanses, lightens, nourishes, tones, smoothes, moisturizes and exfoliates.
* Not suitable for sensitive or allergy-prone skin.
* Suitable for aging, oily, blemished or rough skin or for those looking to clear their complexion
And unlucky me, I have very sensitive AND allergy-prone skin (hence my recent blotchiness). So I won’t be trying this anytime soon.
Will you?
Hoohokekyo… hoohokekyo… hoohokekyo!
Image taken from IEA
6 Comments | Posted in: Lifestyles, WTF
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I don’t speak tagalog… I’m not even Filipina, but that’s what the good ol’ Tagalog Dictionary is for, right?
taba
tab´a’ adj. stout, fat · tumaba’ (-um-) v. to become stout
I was reading my friend Darleene’s blog and she had a post entitled: Even NBC’s Elita Loresca gets the ‘taba’ comments from her relatives. She’s referencing a recent L.A. Weekly article about local newscasters and there is a section which goes:
Yet at the family baby shower she went to this weekend, the prevailing comment was, “Oh my gosh, you look so skinny in person. On TV you are so taba,” which means “fat” in Tagalog.
“I was blessed with a full moon,” she countered with a happy sigh. “A little round face. You have to love what the Lord gave you. If I look 10 pounds heavier on television than I do in person, so be it.”
“But why you diet?” said the aunts, imploring her, in that Filipino way of saying hello, to eat, eat.
“Thank you,” said Loresca, yielding to yet another photo with the relatives, who love to take pictures. “But I can only have one fried chicken, not 10.”
Have you heard of Elita Loresca? She was only voted FHM’s sexiest newscaster in 2006 and was photographed wearing a rain-soaked negligee. She even had a blog devoted to following her fashion choices.
And her family thinks she looks fat on TV?!
Dang. I’ll be her kind of taba anyday.
Which brings me to a another point. I’ve had my share of (legitimate) fat comments from my family, but then again, I’m also clearly the fattest of all my cousins. I have four girl cousins who are roughly my age. Three of them modeled professionally or semi-professionally. The fourth one was a television news anchor. (This is emotional baggage I could use lots of therapy on at another time. The point is my four cousins were all pretty and skinny, and I decidedly was not.) A couple of these very skinny cousins used to get “fat” comments from my aunties from time to time… and they were no where near fat! (To my Mom’s credit, since her daughter was the “real” fat one, she never commented on the supposed “fatness” of my cousins.)
One of my cousins has a very nicely “filled out” butt compared her her “flat butted” sister. My grandmother and aunties would frequently comment about her “big butt” when she was trying on clothes. Because of these comments, she began to get self-conscious about her perfectly nice butt. And by the time she was a teenager, she was really, really embarrassed about it and truly believed she had a huge ass when in reality, it was perfectly proportioned for her body.
WTF, Aunties! We already have the freakin’ television and movies and magazines telling us that a size zero is normal and America’s Next Top Model telling us that a girl who is a size 10 is “plus sized.”
And another thing… does you Mom do this to you, too?
“Ai-yahh! You so fat! Why you so fat?!” and then in the next breath you get “Here! Eat this cha-shu bao! I just made it! Have two or three!!!”* What is up with the “You’re fat!” comments followed by the “Eat! Eat!” comments!? Talk about mixed messages!
*Credit for this line given to Andrea Apuy, who wrote and delivered a line similar to this last month at Chinese American Stories: My Mother
Image of Elita Loresca from FHM
5 Comments | Posted in: Lifestyles, Observations, WTF
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I was surfing around when I found this slideshow on the LA Times site: Buddha in home decor.
A related article entitled “Buddhamania” goes into detail about how the religious symbol of Buddha has become “decorative” and is used by interior designers as a “visual shorthand” to exemplify “zen.”
The article describes the popularity of buddha-shaped items like bars of soap, table lamps, and wind chimes.
The trend has even spawned the inevitable spoofs, including the sage dog in the classic contemplative pose — paws poking out of its monk robe — for $25 at the Pilgrims Way Community Bookstore & the Secret Garden, a Carmel shop that sells mostly serious items representing world religions. When a Japanese Buddhist monk saw the concrete canine, he laughed out loud, store owner Cynthia Fernandes says. “So I figure it can’t be offensive.”
Indeed, Buddha has become such a ubiquitous element in living rooms and on patios, the questions are inescapable: Has Buddhamania gone too far? What is the proper way to showcase such pieces? And at what point is the religious symbol reduced to a decorating tchotchke?
I don’t consider myself to be religious, but I am definitely more Buddhist than anything else. Personally, I am not interested in “decorating” my house with Buddhas, save for maybe one or two very special pieces. And even so, I know that I would place the Buddha very purposefully and respectfully, but that’s just me.
I guess other people can do what they want in terms of decorating their own houses, but being a non-Christian, I could not imagine putting Jesuses around my home, but it sounds like a lot of non-Buddhists like having Buddha in their homes. More power to them, I guess.
What do you think?
(Coincidentally, I.M. Chait Gallery/Auctioneers, the Asian art gallery/auction house I work for part time, has a couple of items included in the slide show and article.)
Image by Bonnie Dain for the LA Times
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I was flipping through my beloved O Magazine this month, and a familiar face appeared — Margaret Cho! There was a very touching series of short stories about shocking comments parents tell their daughters, and Margaret’s story began the series. Margaret tells the story about loving ballet class when as a child, but her father told her “You’re the fattest ballerina” after a recital, turning Margaret away from ballet forever.
Her story made me so sad. I grew up in ballet class, and saw so many girls become so affected after one off-hand comment from a teacher; “Your thighs look big” resulted in a fellow student to starve herself once. I’ve written previously about the absence of Asian ballerinas, and it just makes it more difficult with critical comments from parents in addition to the social pressure for women/ballerinas/Asian-Americans. But sadly, it happens way too often.
Although we may have missed Margaret becoming a prima ballerina, I’m glad she’s still dancing, finding her own individual style, rhythm and confidence, which is what dance is supposed to be about.
Cindy Cheung’s story is also an interesting read from an Asian-American perspective.
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Left: Sam Yoon. Right: Jun Choi.
This past Friday night, instead of catching the premiere of Sex and The City, the movie (which I saw Saturday night), I wound up attending the Asian Americans for Good Government (AAGG) PAC welcome reception and dinner for Mayor Jun Choi (Edison, NJ) and Boston City Councilor Sam Yoon, with Yul Kwon serving as the host.
Choi discussed his background and how he ran and upset an incumbent mayor, but also discussed the Jersey Guys’ (radio shock jocks) insulting and making racist remarks regarding Choi and Asian Americans on their show over a few hours, back in 2005 when he first ran for mayor. Personally, I had not heard of this case before. The on air apology by the Jersey Guys’ directly to Choi is quite interesting. What Choi had a problem with most of all was the Jersey Guys’ calling Asian Americans not “real Americans” or un-American - perpetuating the belief that Asian Americans are not real Americans.
Sam Yoon also talked about his run for Boston city council member and about he was the first Asian American to ever run, let alone get elected to city council, and how Boston politics was traditionally dominated by the Irish and Italian American community, even though they did necessarily represent or reflect the diversity and interests of Boston citizens.
Both Choi and Yoon were very impressed with the attendance of the reception and dinner, given the fact that Asian Americans are so much more in the mainstream on the West Coast than on the East Coast, and that we have an embarrassment of riches of Asian American representatives. And we were. In attendance was a real who’s who for Asian American politicians at the local level in the San Francisco South Bay and Greater San Jose area, including:
My point when going around the dinner table is that although California overall makes up 12% of the Asian American politician, when I go to any political events in the San Francisco Bay Area (which is overall around 20%), there are definitely not 20%, or 12% of 5% - maybe 1 %? - in attendance that are Asian American. If Asian Americans want to be taken seriously politically, we need to get involved - either through running for office, volunteering, openly supporting candidates or simply donating money. It’s a real pleasure to have seen Jun Choi and Sam Yoon, along with the local Asian American politicians and hear how they are making a difference not only for their communities, but also for Asian Americans overall.
No Comments | Posted in: Current Events, Discrimination, Food & Drink, Lifestyles, Observations, Politics
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In SFGate today, Jeff Yang talks about the clashing ideas of Asian American identity among generations, namely my generation (people born in the 70s) and older, and those who are in their teens and 20s. He brings up issues that have dominated, and continue to dominate dialogue among Asian Americans of my generation (and apparently, of a very small portion of the generation younger than me): our foreignness–or that we’re seen as the perpetual foreigner/outsider (because of our accents and mainstream American society’s apparent inability to really see Asians as Americans); and Asian women as sex objects (without any agency on their own, of course, to want to be sex objects).
To that end, Asian Americans of my generation (GOD, I hate saying that term!) especially those of us who are academics or otherwise involved in popular culture appear to be stuck. Yang also talks about how mainstream American perceptions of Asians has changed, slowly–being integrated into mainstream shows; and how we’ve started to complicate our own perceptions of how we, as Asians, belong in America as both Americans and Asian Americans. But at the same time, Yang also talks about how we’re missing out on other Asian voices, who are reaching teenage and 20-something Asian Americans in ways that “we” never thought of, especially on YouTube, such as HappySlip, and nigahiga.
For me, that’s one of the things that was really frustrating about being in Asian American studies, and looking at the media. I got sick of people looking at both mainstream American society and Asian American identity as these monolithic things, identities and subjects that can’t or won’t change. While people are ranting on and on about the topics that I’ve just mentioned, it’s great to see people taking the dialogue of what it means to be Asian in American society to different places, especially to see how Asian American identity is evolving, and to frankly see how mainstream American culture is evolving with it to integrate Asians as part of the American landscape. It’s nice to see that we’re not just obsessed over constantly looking at Asian women as sex objects lacking agency, somehow needing an Asian man to see the error of her ways (roll eyes), or that we will always be “exotic” or “not belonging”. If anything, it’s showing how the ability of people to be able to access new forms of media and to provide new voices into the dialogue of Asian American identity that we couldn’t see or hear before–and to finally develop some new ways to see Asian America.
And frankly, it’s nice to see other Asian Americans who aren’t neurotic or hung up about their identities.
29 Comments | Posted in: Lifestyles
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After the decision by California to allow same-sex marriages last Thursday, hundreds of queer couples are planning to get married, including George Takei and his partner, Brad Altman.
In his announcement on his web site, George Takei notes parallels in the struggle for same-sex marriage to the struggle for redress for Japanese Americans who were placed in concentration camps during World War II, noting that it took the federal government nearly 60 years to finally compensate those who were placed in these camps. Japanese Americans were seen as the scourge of World War II simply because of their race (and despite strong evidence to the contrary that they were the least likely to betray the American government); the queer community is likewise seen as a scourge by different populations because of who we love, and like him, I hope such discrimination is simply seen as lessons to be learned and to wonder what the hell people were thinking.
On a tangent, I still find it quite hilarious that it took Takei until 2005 to formally come out, even though his presence and support as part of the queer Asian American community was well known for decades beforehand. I remember being on the board of directors of Los Angeles’ Gay Asian Pacific Support Network back in 1997 and seeing him attend all of their major functions with his partner. George was known as a strong supporter of GAPSN and other queer Asian organizations around the country, so it was a bit of a surprise that most people didn’t know that he was queer when he actually came out 8 years later.
One other hilarious thing happened when he was inducted into the National Japanese American Hall of Fame about a month before George Takei came out in ‘05, and for a musical dedication, a girl sang “Over the Rainbow,” causing stifled snickers and outright laughter from us queer folk, and confused looks from everybody else, since George Takei wasn’t born yet when The Wizard of Oz came out.
Congratulations to George and all the other queer couples who are planning their marriages!
2 Comments | Posted in: Current Events, Discrimination, Entertainment, LGBT, Lifestyles, Observations, WTF
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She’s one of the most recognizable Japanese faces in the world, and I think we’d all agree that she is super, super cute. Now, at age 32, she’s breaking into high-fashion modeling for luxury brands.
No, she’s not Utada. It’s not Ayumi either. I’m talking about the famous Miss Hello Kitty.
In the current issue of the Japanese edition of Vogue magazine, Hello Kitty gets decked out in Dior’s new fall and winter designs, strutting her stuff while posing in Paris.
Cute factor aside, it’s interesting to guess what this says about Dior’s marketing strategy in Asia – a market obsessed and fanatically loyal to big brands. Unlike the US or Europe where the luxury goods market is dominated by the middle-aged upper class, Asia’s high-fashion consumer market consists largely of young, 20-something, brand-obsessed women. I suppose these are the same women who would know and love Hello Kitty.
This is the first time in history that the Christian Dior brand has used a cartoon character to model an entire fashion line. Minnie Mouse, Daisy Duck – eat your heart out.
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