Guardian Pharmacy House Brand (Hand Cream, Body Butter And Hand Soap)

Normally I wouldn't buy house brand skin care products, I would go for the more "established" brands, expensive or not, it must be in the market for some time. Anyway, I was looking for a hand cream after I finished my Nivea Soft. Initially I wanted to buy the Body Shop Hand Cream, it's around RM20 for a 30ml tube, however, at the same time, I saw the Guardian Pharmacy ads on the newspaper (yes, I still read the hard copy newspaper), Guardian was having sales and one of the items was the Guardian Hand Cream, the offer was buy 1 free 1.

Well, the Guardian Hand Cream was around RM9 a tube (not quite remember the price) and it came in a 40ml tube, and the best thing was the buy 1 free 1 offer. I could get two 40ml hand creams for less than RM10. So, I decided to buy the Guardian Hand Cream, it's so much cheaper. Since there were two types of the hand cream, I got one each, the "Cottony Flower" and "Velvety Rose".

Guardian Hand Cream (Cottony Flower & Velvety Rose)

Guardian Hand Cream (Cottony Flower & Velvety Rose)

Aloe Vera Flower

My house have a pot of Aloe Vera plants. When it started to have little Aloe Vera, my mom would cut the old big juicy Aloe Vera out to make Aloe Vera drinks. So, I never knew that Aloe Vera has the ability to flower. So, I was really surprised when I saw spikes growing out of the Aloe Vera plants. 

Aloe Vera Flower

There were two plants on the same pot. I think both flowered at around the same time. By the time I noticed this, some buds already changed colour, not the earliest stage of flowering. I think the earliest stage must look like wheat plant. Hahaha! 

Plant A: early stage of the bloom (10th June 2015)

Plant B: early stage of the bloom (10th June 2015)

In one week time, all the buds bloomed into red / orange flowers. Some of the petals already dropped too. It's so fast.

Plant A: the flowers turning red (17th June 2015)

Plant A: photo taken from the direction of the ground (17th June 2015)

Plant B: the flowers turning red (17th June 2015)

In one more week time, all the petals dropped and only a stick left on the plant, it's quite sad, life's so short!

end of life (25th June 2015)

petals dropped to the Aloe Vera plants (25th June 2015)

Shiseido DeLuxe Night Cream (R)

I stumbled upon this Deluxe Night Cream (R) when I was window shopping at a discount store Mr. Max in Kumamoto. The reason it caught my eyes was it's a product by Shiseido and it's cheap. It's not sold in the Shiseido counter though, we can only find it in the drug store or supermarket. The retail price on the bottom of the bottle was 800 yen, but I think Mr Max price was cheaper than that, I forgot the exact price. 

deLuxe Night Cream (R) by Shiseido

The package was very simple, it didn't come with a box, just a plastic wrap on the bottle. We can only know it's a product of Shiseido from the bottom label "製造販売元 資生堂". On the label, it mentioned that it's a very moisturising cream "しっとりタイプ" with very moisturising ingredients 潤い成分. 

deLuxe Night Cream (R) by Shiseido

My face was very prone to acne when I bought this cream, it didn't help my acne condition and didn't exaggerate my acne condition. Since it was meant to moisturised, I used it when I felt itchy during the dry winter months. Meanwhile, I keep on using the Shiseido D Program. After that, from early this year, after using a pimple cream recommended by the aesthetician from the facial salon I went to, somehow, my chin acne subsided, I always thought that it was due to the period.

The Ocean At The End Of The Lane by Neil Gaiman

Well, this book was a gift from my brother. After bigbadwolf, I couldn't bring myself to buy books in retail price anymore. This book was sold at RM57.90 at Popular book store. For that kind of money, I could buy around 6 books in the bigbadwolf. But, the perk of buying books in normal book store is I can get the latest book that I want. Still, thanks bro! 

The Ocean At The End Of The Lane

This novel gives me the feeling of American Gods. The story started with a man (the narrator, it's told in first person narrative) driving around his childhood home after going to a funeral, I think. Then, he started to remember about his childhood, his first kiss and a farm house he visited when he was a child and the girl on the farm house. 

He remembered when his parents faced financial trouble, they rented out a room to lodger, The lodger then committed suicide after losing all his money to gambling, and the lodger chose to die near the farm house because it's at the end of lane with few people. Then, the man (was a child then) met the farm house inhabitants, the old Mrs Hemstock, Mrs Hemstock and Lettie Hemstock. To comfort him, the Hemstock offered him fresh cow milk. The one plot I remembered was it was the first time the narrator drank cow milk directly out of a cow, fresh cow milk, not from a bottle. Hahaha!

Sseal : Escargot 24K Gold Cream (The Face Shop)

I bought a snail mucus cream from the duty free shop when I was travelling in Korea a few years ago. I don't remember the price, but I do remember it was cheaper than my Shiseido D program toner. I didn't normally use something I was not familiar with, however since it was not expensive, it was having a buy two free one promotion, my friend wanted two only, so I agreed to take the third one. My friend was very confident with The Face Shop products, she said that a famous Taiwanese beauty show was praising this exact product. 

Well, the box design was quite fancy, the base was black with golden lines and words embossed on the surface. It came in a golden brown bottle with a giant lid (I think the lid alone contributed around 50% volume of the bottle). 

box of the Sseal Escargot 24K Gold Cream