A long overdue post on the blog! If you follow my Instagram, you would’ve noticed the flood of Japan pics. I don’t use tumblr as much as I used to anymore but I want to get back into the groove of blogging. I was in Japan for 2 weeks in March and April, and those were honestly some of the best weeks of my life. Luckily I documented quite a lot in photos so I’ll always get to relive these memories until the next trip.
First meal in Tokyo!
We wrote a wish!
Spent the morning exploring Meiji Shrine. The rain can’t keep us away!
Since it was cold, wet, and dreary, we popped in to a cat cafe in Harajuku to hang out with some cats in the afternoon! Everything was so adorable and well-decorated, but a lot of the cats were sleeping in the perches high above so we didn’t get to play with many of them. But when it’s feeding time, it’s a massive stampede to the whoever has the treats.
Tokyu Plaza at Omotesando in Harajuku. This mirror tunnel is located in a really pretty shopping mall. Definitely makes for an aesthetic photo!
The bright lights at Shibuya crossing at night. It’s always so bustling and I miss it so much already. Part II will up soon!
The short second installment of my Seattle trip. On the last day, we woke up super early to go to Pike’s Place Market mainly to go to the original Starbucks without waiting in line.
Pike’s Place is so serene and beautiful in the early morning, and the atmosphere is so different from the hectic crowds that swarm the market in the afternoons.
Hello, first-ever Starbucks store! As a gold rewards member, I keep accumulating free drinks so I used my points on a green tea latte. Also picked up a cute special edition Pike’s Place mug as well as an exclusive bag of Special Reserve beans.
Couldn’t leave without taking a basic af picture with my Starbucks drink hahaha.
Next up, we visited the Fremont neighborhood and the Fremont troll, located on a street aptly named Troll Ave. Literally a troll under the bridge! Apparently, this sculpture was made as part of an art competition and to also rehabilitate this area under the bridge, which was becoming a hangout for drug dealers. Now it’s a popular tourist attraction. I’m a sucker for public art displays like this.
Met up with my friend Mina who lives in the area for brunch. We’ve known each other since freshman year of college! It was so good seeing her again. Apologizes for the blurry basic bitch dog filter snapchat screenshot lol.
We went to Gasworks park in the afternoon. It was super windy and cold! Here’s the monochromatic Seattle skyline on a typical cloudy grey day. Is it weird if I said I prefer this to sunny California?
By the time we got back to our hotel, it was getting dark and we had to leave for the airport. However, we managed to catch the beginning of the protest that was rapidly forming downtown. The weekend we traveled was when the first anti-immigration ban started, so it was quite a hectic few days as we observed protests everywhere we went. Democracy at work!
I had a great time in Seattle and would definitely come back to explore more of Washington state in the near future. Missing those beautiful evergreen trees already!
Seattle, you have my heart! I visited this city for a 2-day trip on the last weekend of January, and it was my first time in the pacific northwest. The area is beautiful and has a very different vibe from California, which I really dig.
Since my boyfriend had lived in Seattle for a summer, he was already familiar with most of the city and in a change of pace, I did very little planning for this trip except book flights and the hotel!
We stayed in Hotel Max, which is a super cute hotel with strong hipster vibes. It’s conveniently located right in downtown so we could just go back and take a break/drop off our shopping whenever we were nearby.
There was a dog park nearby that had an amazing dog mural, so naturally, I had to go take a picture (or two... or three) there.
First stop on our self-guided walking tour was Chihuly Garden and Glass, which is right next to the Space Needle. I probably see more pictures of those iconic glass flowers than than of the Space Needle itself.
Mandatory artsy shot in an artsy museum lol.
Chihuly is a master genius with glass art.
Seattle Public Library is one of the most fantastic and grandiose public libraries I’ve ever been to. Turns out they get a lot of their funding from Microsoft, which makes a lot of sense. No wonder Seattle is the one of the most literate cities in the country!
Grey days make for perfect library days. Imagine being curled up with a good book and watching the rain from here. Pure bliss~
Seattle really reminds me of San Francisco, with its hills and coffee shops everywhere. Had to walk quite a while uphill to get to the Starbucks Reserve Roastery & Tasting Room, which is a really, really fancy Starbucks with a completely different menu.
I think I died and went to coffee heaven. *_*
Hazelnut Bianco latte for $7, which before you judge me, it was sooo delicious. Literally the best latte I’ve ever had. It was like a rich caffeinated Nutella drink.
Celebrated Chinese New Year in A+ Hong Kong Kitchen, which is a popular but small Hong Kong-style cafe in Chinatown. We ordered so much that I was about to explode at the end of the meal lol. Can’t ever say no to congee, turnip cakes, and ho fun noodle soup though!
Made our way back to the hotel and walked around the empty streets for a bit to digest our feast. Yay for the Space Needle being so visible! Last photo of the day - I took this on my iPhone while standing in the middle of the street during the pedestrian light lol. I think it has a vintage feel to it, no?
After about a year-long hiatus, I’ve decided to return to blogging! 2016 was a whirlwind of a year that made it difficult to add Tumblr to the mix. Some of my highlights include:
- Jan - Feb: Studying and interviewing for jobs
- March - April: Getting a job offer at a startup and ACCEPTING :)
- May: Flying back to NYC for a wonderful friend’s wedding
- June: Went to Sequoia National Park
- July: Celebrating 4th of July in Los Angeles
- August - September: Played a lot of Pokemon Go...
- October: Stayed and hiked in Yosemite National Park
- November: Traveling to London & Paris for a week
-December: Home for a week. Went to Orlando for Disney World, Universal Studios, and NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. Flew to NYC for New Year’s Eve weekend.
I’m going to write posts about a lot of the above-mentioned trips, as well as document my future travels. It’s always a good idea to keep these memories alive in the form of pictures and words. Aside from that, I hope to do more personal lifestyle posts as well and practice my photography.
Sequoia National Park is one of those gems in California that as soon as you enter, you just can't help but stand for a moment to take in the beauty and wonderful forces of nature. Welcome to the land of giants.
Happy to announce that I finally started my first job as a software engineer at a startup in the Bay Area! It’s my third week so far and I’ve been loving every moment. As of now, work is still less stressful than when I was working on my coding projects and preparing for interviews, so I’ll hopefully be writing some new posts soon and updating more regularly here. (After all, my life will no longer be filled with monotonous studying!)
I went to Big Sur the weekend before my birthday, so it was a small getaway and full immersion in nature. I honestly couldn’t wait to post photos as soon as I got home from the trip. Everything was so beautiful, and I couldn’t believe this place was so close to home. Close as in a 2-hour drive. But Big Sur makes for great day trips!
McWay Falls, which is an 80-foot waterfall that hits the beach rather than the ocean. It’s classified as a tidefall instead. In love with the seafoam ocean color with the waves.
On the other side of the falls. This part of the ocean was much more blue and had a two-tone color. It looked more cerulean near the shore but it contrasted with a deeper blue farther out.
Obligatory pic at the falls.
Bixby Bridge, one of the most photographed bridges along the Pacific Coast. I’m usually not scared of heights, but thinking about how they built the bridge is scary! Engineering is awesome.
Since I had to wake up early, I was feeling pretty sleep-deprived and was getting tired even though I wasn’t bored of the view at all. The coastal drive isn’t very populated, with no cell signal or Starbucks, so it was tempting to just fall asleep in the car as my boyfriend drove, lol. Luckily at the bridge, there was a coffeeshop truck! It was owned by a Canadian couple who was driving from Vancouver down to Mexico, making coffee at stops with a pay-what-you-want concept.
Really delicious Italian espresso!
We went hiking in the afternoon at Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park. Got to see redwoods!! One of my favorite trees. They’re so tall and majestic, the skyscrapers of nature.
One 5′3″ girl for scale.
Still couldn’t photograph the entirety of the trees on my camera even with the wide-angle lens. But it’s crazy to think that we hiked over the tops of these trees after 3 hours!
We actually had to cross multiple creeks on our hike. It was a struggle to not fall in the water haha. Had to improvise by balancing on lots of logs. Also there were lots of these fallen tree-bridges over the creeks which were fun to climb on.
One of the mountain trails we hiked up with that ocean breeze right there.
Cattails! Haven’t seen these in a while. This was about halfway up to the top.
I actually don’t have many good pictures at the top of the mountain. The most scenic pics came from the bottom to mid-way part of the hike, but the pictures at the top looked like a generic ocean view. It’s one of those moments where pictures don’t do it justice. The sun was beginning to set when we got to the top, so we chilled up there for a little bit and made a beeline down the mountain, running whenever we could. It was terrifying to know that we could be stuck in the forest without light at all. I played too much Slenderman back in the day haha.
The ocean just as we came out of the forest. Luckily we made it literally 30 minutes before it was completely dark.
Can’t wait to explore more of Big Sur in the future. Excited for the next adventure!
Can’t believe I’m actually 23 now! My birthday was last Monday - exactly a month from Christmas. Sometimes it’s either a blessing or a curse. By that, sometimes I either get more presents in the short span of time from Christmas to now, or some years it’s just a regular present combined into both occasions..
My little sis from my sorority sent me a 3DS game (Happy Home Designer!!) and flowers ahhh. Such a surprise when I got a knock on my door that morning!
My best friend from the east coast ordered a cake all the way from a local bakery near me and had it delivered! Again, another huge surprise I wasn’t expecting at all.
For dinner, a group of friends and I went to a Japanese tapas place.
Thin crust pizza with mushrooms, tofu, eggplant and sweet miso sauce
Mushroom risotto stuffed monterey squid with plum-olive sauce
Vermicelli noodles in spicy cod roe & shiso leaves
THE TAPAS WERE SO GOOD OMG. There were some more that I forgot to take pictures of but they were all very unique dishes with a twist. We got to sit on tatami mats at a low table. Wish I had gotten pics of that too... \
Cake after dinner. Haha no real good pictures of me that day.
Friends and I went to Dave n Busters afterwards and it was pretty dark so got no pics of it. Unlike college days where there was a 60+ person turnout, it was a very low-key, small gathering of friends. Maybe this is a sign I’m getting old...heh. I’ll enjoy 23 as much as possible!
First post of 2016! The hiatus has been too real...
I usually love the holiday season - my birthday is exactly a month after Christmas. Coupled with Valentine’s Day only a few weeks after, it’s a continuous steam of gifts for me heh. Although, that does leave a long stretch of no gifts until the end of the year lol.
I recently found out about Sephora’s Beauty Insider program...where have I been all this time?! By signing up, I can get a free gift on my birthday month. There’s a choice between the Fresh skincare and Marc Jacobs makeup, and I chose the Marc Jacobs set because makeup products are just more fun than skincare imo. It comes with a sample set of lipstick and eyeliner.
Le Marc Lip Crème Lipstick and Highliner Gel Eye Crayon Eyeliner. Haven’t had the chance to try the eyeliner yet but looking forward to testing it out!
Le Marc Lip Crème Lipstick.
This sample is pretty tiny (about the size of my thumb) but it’ll definitely last me for a while. I prefer lip tints over lipstick for a daily look but I tried this lipstick out and it was amazing! I’ve only used drugstore lipsticks before and have always had problems with my lips looking super dry/chapped after applying, so using a high-end brand was quite a change. It’s very moisturizing and pigmented, but gives off a very natural look. Will definitely wear this around to nice occasions, and I’m definitely considering getting the full version once I’m out.
Aside from that, I also purchased the Club Clio Pro Eye Layering Palette online. I saw some swatches from reviews and the colors looked gorgeous! I love reddish-brown and pink eyeshadow tones for daily makeup so I’m glad I invested in this. I can already see the Holly Burgundy (4th color) being the most used shade.
This isn’t really a review, but I’ll probably write a more detailed post on the makeup palette another time once I have a chance to try all of the colors. Other side projects include designing a new layout for my blog so high-res pictures can be displayed. Recently got back from NYC over winter break so I’m super excited to write travel posts again. Some of my pics are already up on Instagram, follow follow hehe~
Taken from a Land’s End coastal hike in San Francisco about two weekends ago! We stopped for a break as the sun was setting, and I got this shot. I have a huge thing for soft lighting and cotton candy clouds. <3
On a side note, I just finished the second week of class already and it’s been surprisingly more intense than I imagined. Computer science is way more interesting than I thought! But since class is from 9am-6pm every day, I barely have time to do anything else. So forgive me for the lack of posts in general. I really need a shopping spree soon to combat the work stress....
Happy Halloween! I survived my first week of classes but in the little downtime that I had, I carved some poképumpkins. Pikachu and umbreon, one of my favorite eeveelutions. :D I carved these several days ago but sadly a bunch of fruit flies moved inside so they were thrown out yesterday... :< l’ll be carving another pumpkin tonight before trick or treating starts in my neighborhood. Open to any suggestions for a pokemon design!
Sorry for craptastic iPhone quality and disheveled appearance but I recently started volunteering for a bunny rescue group at the local animal shelter and LOOK AT THIS FLUFFY BUNNY. He’s an adorable lionhead bunny but he looks like a tiny dog from some angles.
I wish I had more time and more stuff to blog about, but I only really go out on weekends. My daily weekday routine is to just go to a Starbucks or the library and study until class starts in a few weeks...heh. Might write some beauty reviews once I get the chance. ^^
It was my boyfriend’s birthday 2 days ago, so I surprised him with a cake from Paris Baguette. They make some of the prettiest (and yummiest!) Korean cakes out there. This was green tea chiffon cake. The cream was so fluffy and light! I prefer Asian cakes over American ones any day, with the exception of ice cream cakes. Idk what it is about American cakes, but the frosting is always too thick and sweet and I always have to end up scraping it off... >< Then again, I’m not really a fan of cupcakes so I can’t tolerate high amounts of frosting. Anyway, the birthday’s not complete without a good cake. :D
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