.Amani

.Amani
Powered by Blogger.
Friday, November 30, 2012


Holy contrast Batman.

 This is why I don't record myself in my room at night.

 So I recorded this to try and get this out the way before I started my religious fasting for the next 23 days+Guyana+ the New Year's consecration throughout the month of January. Yup, a loooot is about be going on in the next two months.

 I'm working overtime this week, so the actual in-depth post will probably come within a week or two. I'm just really exhausted from all the work... next week I have only 1 day of rest and even on that day, I'll be working on church stuff for Guyana x__x great

In the description section on the video you'll see links to the anon boards where they talked crap about them, the talks about some of them prostituting + the link to one of the fuuzoku sites, as well as a link to the DJ Fukui epsiode and why some of the anons are speculating the same thing from Asano, calling him "Grandmaster Peter Pan" or whatever lmao

 But that's pretty much it for now. I'm trying to figure out last minute things with my tea party outfit. Tomorrow is going to be a long day...
Saturday, November 24, 2012

New Ageha

With my recent surprise paycheck, I decided to splurge a bit and get all the recent magazines I've missed~

Honestly I'm a bit irritated. As much as I like free gifts in magazines? I don't like getting them consecutively. And that seems to be the direction Ageha is going...

Because of that, I haven't been able to really afford to get them, because the gifts boosts the price of the mag from 15-16 to like 20 bucks which is ridiculous. I'm really seriously hating the currency right now!

But anyways, I'm glad I got them~ although now I'll have to hunt for July's  (or was it August?) issue because it's not in stores anymore..

October, November, December 2012 issues~



and the gift boxes that were inside >:3


and the gifties that were inside those boxes~ LOL

So October came with a CECIL MCBEE lash case~
November came with two pairs of lashes (it says "Dolly eye" (bottom) and "Fairy eye" (top). Not sure if this is from a specific brand.. edit: oh wait, it's from their own brand lash collection = A= duh)
and December came with another Liz Lisa makeup bag~

At first I was thinking of giving away the makeup bag because I mean I already had my Liz Lisa makeup bag from the other month this year~ but then I opened this one and gah, it has this silky sort of look to it and the print is sooo cute xD I couldn't help myself. It's much slimmer than the other makeup bag so I might use this as a 'camera' bag or I dunno, a 'glasses' bag for a bit to protect my things from sharp objects like my keys.

The lashes I think I'm definitely going to give away in my giveaway when I make it-- the lashes are cute, but they're shorter than the lashes I typically mess with on my face, so I don't think I'll get much use out of them. I can cut them up and glue them with other things if I wanted to, but eh... I don't think I'm in the mood for that. Especially when I still have my 15-16 pairs of different lashes from Taobao that I barely touch.





The lash case is nice, it's very simple, nothing very special, but I think I'll be putting it to use. The only thing I'll complain about is the little removable lash holder/mold thing being absolutely useless...


 

like the space in this thing can actually fit maybe 3-4 pairs of top lashes -in their mold thingies-, plus a tube of lash glue... but overall I still like it. I'll probably DIY the inside to have it's own section for top lashes, bottom lashes, lash glue, and maybe even circle lens. That's seriously how much it can probably hold. I probably will plan to deco it in the future, too~ it'll be super cute.

I know for God knows how long I've been meaning to do a seasonal fashion inspiration post. I always take pictures, edit the pictures, etc but I never end up actually making the post xD

Also planning to make another video next week~
One being a WIG review, on the half-wigs I get that I wear so often~ maybe from there also a review on my Prisila pieces, and maybe a bit of  styling experimenting along with that~ and maybe a makeup runthrough if I feel up to it...

 I'm thinking of making a "Get Ready W/ Me!" winter Lolita Day edition video but we'll see if I'm not too tired or lazy in the morning to do that xD Besides, my tripod is *still* missing and I want to find the thing before I make any future videos. So hopefully I find it and get it cracking!

Black Diamond/International

If there's one thing I hate the most, it would be a liar.

Lately I've been seeing interviews of Black Diamond and/or their ringleader Tsuyoshi Asano talking about their group, or even more importantly (to me), "Black Diamond International" and/or the gaijin gyaru population in general.

BDI disbanded well over a month ago because Tsuyoshi didn't want nothing to do with us as a group. We werent ever a real part of BDI. No real extension to the Japanese group. Only used as a personal fanclub, centered in a private Facebook group to use our pictures to showcase on TV. Tsuyoshi barely talked to us besides one time when he asked about the BDia store, and then when he wanted us to talk to Hidemi (at 3-4am, Eastern time) so they can record us 'talking' to her.

A part of me is ready to just lay that whole thing on the table, because I really don't like Asano.

I don't appreciate the fact that he tried to make us feel that we were apart of something, when we really weren't. That he didn't see the "gyaru" in any of the experienced members. I'm not even talking about myself, I'm talking about girls like Ramona and Zuka and people, who's aura just screamed gal.

He always had this thing with "well one day you can look gal" but the reality is that gaijins try HARDER than Japanese gals would ever have to do. He puts Japanese gals on a pedestal, but honestly when you look at the Japanese BD members that get on TV and stuff, most of them don't even look good outside of purikura. If they were foreign and they posted on one of the communities, they would be outed for doing it wrong. Their makeup, if anything, is subpar compared to a lot of the gaijin gals in general. Anything as far as style improvement was done among ourselves in the group, without Asano ever being a part. He was only there to record it for TV.


When there was internal drama that needed to be addressed, he pretty much ignored it and just left us with a 'I'm not in your country, I can't do anything about it". But he's the creator and supposedly the leader? He made excuses about 'not knowing enuf engrish' when he has a good understanding of it-- when we used multi-lingual people to communicate with him he never gave direct answers-- he claimed he was 'busy with everything' (even though that apparently didn't stop him from posting all over his facebook, but he could not answer a question or two within a 2-week period? Yeah, okay). And then when he did answer, a lot of his answers contradicted what he let go on.


I do not appreciate the fact that he felt he had some sort of 'power'. Like literally, this dude tried to snark me about his 'power' to give gaijin people Japanese media. I had gotten into an argument with him basically dumbing him down because the gaijin gals NEVER needed some old 30-40 year old man to dickride in order to get media attention. The Dutch gals like Charlotte and Rox never needed a middle man like Tsuyoshi to be on Tokyo Kawaii. Neither did Sara Mari. Neither did the Nijii and Koneko when they made it on Fuji TV and these other sites.


And I do not appreciate the fact that he lies about the numbers of the group. "50 members across 20 countries", really? Make that less than 50 within 5 countries. I do not appreciate the fact that despite me having asked him to take down my image many times off the crooz blog, my face is still up there. I don't want to be associated with that group anymore, period. A lot of the girls don't. We barely talk about it except in private amongst ourselves because we just want to forget the disappointment and the disheartenment we had to go through with his schemes. Some people don't even want to be involved in the gal community anymore, because that last shimmer of hope for them turned out to be a deception.


I can go on and on, and it's  ridiculously easy to make caps of everything he's said, all his bullshit. I'm tired of him publicizing us as if we still exist, as if we still want to be a part of that group, as if we want to be associated with them when it's been almost 1 1/2 months after everything blew up.

No one wants to be a part of Black Diamond. Especially when a good chunk of them turned out to be classless prostitutes (I'm very serious). Plus, overall, Black Diamond is hated by all the real Japanese circles for basically being a lazy attention-whoring group,  and not being hardworking and a good representation like the sa-jin we've always seen and loved.

Take our photos down. For the love of God
Monday, November 12, 2012

Mori Hair Results

My long awaited moriwig post~





Like I explained in the video (end of the page), I didn't record a tutorial mainly because this was a first-run, I didn't really know what direction I was going in, plus the dark/black colors of the wig and then on top of it, I STILL haven't found my tripod (seriously, where the hell did I leave it???). So in the future I'll be getting a lighter colored wig, maybe mid-December, or even January, and hopefully by then my tripod will pop up and I can make some videos. I've been feeling for a makeup runthrough, but I can't make one when I can't even find my stand...


Anyways, instead of video I took a couple of photos of the process. Before, during/in between each process, my first "finish" and then my second "finish" since I wasn't satisfied with what I did with the top.






Old pic-- "before"


The first thing I did was cut layers into it. I didn't really pay attention to how short~ I just started snipping a bunch from the top, and then made my way down the wig~ leaving the bottom part uncut for length.
Then I brushed it, sectioned it, and curled it.







Every curl I did needed about 2-3 minutes maybe, and once I slid the hair off my curling iron, I did it gently so it would be tightly curled still, and then I blew on the hot curls until it cools. Rinse and repeat. This was so time consuming.

After curling the entire head, I teased the hair. Now my process might seem a little strange...



I took all the hair from the crown up, tied it in a loose bun. I pretty much sprayed and teased the center area first. Then I made my way down, and then back and to the top.


Pre-teasing

I felt this was easier because while I was working my way down, the already-done parts were flipped to the other side of the head, to help the spray dry and the teased area to stand up better against it's weight... and then doing the top area last helps it from getting potentially smushed from me holding the wig a certain way, etc. And then WHILE I was teasing the root-area, I was also layering the curled ends with spray, to help them get stiff.

 Tease. tease. tease~






The fluffiness of the center area of the PINK side, once I was done with the bottom half of the wig.


I didn't tease the last couple of wefts from the bottom, since it was styled for length rather than volume. Once I was done with the bottom, I started sort of  fingercombing it to separate some of the girls and make the hair more fluffy.



Some of the sloppy teasing I did to make the top more fuller~

When I was done with most of the curling (save maybe, 2-3 weft layers from the very top), I twisted the very back of the wig up into two twists and pinned it in place to help the beehive-type volume. There's something about the way you twist or braid hair that lets it fluff better...




Super teased, loads of curls, with no direction xD


Now here is my first run... when I got to the crown of the head, suddenly I started thinking like, 'what hairstyle am I trying to achieve?" "How is the top going to look?" If you look at morihair, there's so many things you can do, especially to that very top layer. Me being tired, I just curled it any old way.... it came out like this:






It wasn't too bad. What I -tried- to do was have the two colors layering evernly over the opposite side. This run didn't seem as good and I didn't really know why-- so for the sake of that day, since I had a meet to go to, and I was exhausted after 7 HOURS of hairfixing at that point, I just slapped on some Marie ears.


Now later on, I talked to my girl Shiena about it... She gave me tips on how she layers multi-toned hair and makes it look even.. which is to basically spread each color other across the bump, layer by layer. So with that in mind, I was fortunately able to re-straighten those very-top layers, and tried to curl them into very straightish curls, and layer the hair. Then, I worked on the ponytail curls,  which I use mainly to make the wig look even more lengthy.

Despite it being a bit wonky, since I was only really able to do so many layers since the rest of the hair was already really teased, it came out like this:



I loved this result. I loved it and I honestly can't wait to do it again. sdjahdksdbas So definitely when I get a new wig, it's going down.


Overall, the only thing I didn't like was the bangs... since they were blunt bangs and you could do but so much with them. But I try to manage :3











This is me basically talking for 10 minutes over this hairstyle. Jeez.10 minutes of exhausted babble.

Anyways~ this was a general runthrough~ hope it made some sense. Hopefully in the near future I'll mess with the new wig and actually have video and non-confusing instructions~


Saturday, November 10, 2012

NYC Gal-O-Ween meet ~ 10/27/12




So it's been a long while since there's been ANY gal meet in New York City-- I remember when I was still freshmeat I tried to plan a weekend-long meet with others during the summer of 2008 or so-- which had a pretty good turnout of maybe close to 10 people if I remember. A lot of us were still pretty new to the style, but there was a mix of us newbies, and experienced gals like Ashley (before she moved to Japan), Rio, Usagi, and Xiao (you get some serious candy if you remember her).

After that though? Nothing but flakiness, mostly. Either flakiness or drama and since I was doing and going through a bit with my local lolita community at the time, I really didn't have the time or the patience to even try to make meets. The local gals were definitely worse off than lolitas ever have been. So since then, for the most part, most gal meets within the area have been nothing much more than simple little hangouts among friends, which in my opinion is more comfortable than anything.

So when Usagi made a Gal-O-Ween minimeet before the hurricane, I was glad that it was mostly people I knew-- the only exception being Glee, who I knew from the net but never met in person prior to that day. No derps (me being the exception), no idiots, no annoying ass, fail-shoop queens with nappy weaves. buenoooo

I met up with them maybe an hour or two late because I spent the WHOLE night and morning trying to style my wig (that'll come in another post),  My outfit was barely themed, and pretty much put together last minute because I was so tired... I don't really have a costume, didn't feel like wearing lolita, and plus because of the impending weather at the time I guess the temperature DROPPED so I couldn't dress like a sl00t. I'd need to get used to the cold before I could wear shorts without giving a damn.


From Usagipyon's instagram. Because you know. I'm technologically lacking in the phone dept.


We met at Kino's where there was this random kid who tagged along with us until we went to get food... idk... I get really irritated when random people on the streets decide to drop in on meets and follow you as far as they could. On top of it he called himself lolita when he was anything but and... lord I don't know. I just don't LOL


Anyways when I got there, we went on a hunt for food. We cut through the fabric district, stopping in a store or two, to make our way to Go!Go! Curry which turned out to be completely filled... so we went to the Times Square Gyu-kaku instead for some yakuniku.


Someone is clearly hungry



After a while Usagi left and when me, Paulette and Glee left the restaurant we kind of wandered through Times Square, across to 5th avenue, checked out the Rainbow's near 34th street, made our way to K-town (for some cake and some bubble tea which was watery as hell... I love that bakery in general, but the bubble tea only had enough tea powder to give it a bit of color, basically), down to a makeup store in the 20s and then BACK up to 34th xD

Halfway through all of this I think we all got hit by the "Itis", so visiting the re-done Victoria's Secret 34th st flagship store was probably more dream-like and sensual than it really should have been LOL






The 34th street store used to be 2 floors, but now they made it into THREE. THREE FLOORS. The way they redid it really did make it feel like it was bigger and more spacious than the old layout, but we'll see when Christmas comes along...




Every part of this store was eye-catching. The first floor consisted of  VS Beauty and the special lingerie sets.






While downstairs was VSX, PINK, and Swimwear..







Upstairs was the more regular underclothing/lingerie and I think their supermodel essentials line. Holy crap, was upstairs pink.



 




I think my favorite part of this  Victoria's Secret, which was always a favorite because of the decor and the feel of the store's theme, were the big TV panels and screens, the elegant pink furniture speckled around the store, and most of the prop items that were real books, furniture, athletic gear, etc...









Also, the abundance of mirrors. We were being silly and taking photos in nearly ever mirror  in the store. But for the sake of your sanity, I'll leave most of my shots out.


Even the bathrooms were more sexy looking than usual.



Heading upstairs to the top floor...




 


I really, REALLY wish they sold these boxing gloves! I'd have these hanging in my room.



These swim shorts were some sort of gold crocheted or something, I can't explain it but my god, it was so cute and I'd love to snatch them when I have the chance.


I don't look at PINK like that, I actually usually dislike the PINK line (I always thought it was bland and just lazywear-- which it is but now I'm more open to that looool), but these sweats are so cute. The sequined logo is so glittery and it stands out a LOT. Need these.


A lot of the mirrors also had random little sayings like this...



I wish I could remember to do something like this. How long ago did I try to tell myself to buy a full-length mirror? Now I need to remind myself to not only get one, but to get some sort of chalk marker or something to scribble random shit to it.


You could tell our energy levels were near to none. After a good hour or two in that store, we decided to book it on home. Me and Glee took the same train home and we were knocked out as soon as we got on.


Some extra shots~











Blank books with VS stickers inside. I'm sure they'll be filled with random comments soon enough...

blank perfume bottles filled with pink water







Last camwhore shot~

(Photo credit to Paulette because I didn't think of photojournaling my day until it was almost over = w=)

Follow Me!

Follow on Bloglovin

Twitter~