Project 10 lush items 1&2

First 2 items completely used. I did the "apple cider" bath cocktail. You use so white and cinders bath bombs and it literally looks and smells like apple cider. I decided I wanted bubbles (I usually do) and so I also used half of holiday bubble bar which went really well. This was one of my favorite baths ever. It smelled so delicious and my skin was so soft I stayed in the bath until the water was cool! I am very disappointed I didn't buy more of these products. I have enough left for 1 more cider bath. This year I was not prepared for the sale and didnt know of it until a few days in when stuff was gone. Next year I will be more prepared.

On to the individual item reviews.

So White bath bomb-lush project 10 pan item #1

It's normally completely white but as it was in the gift box with holiday bubble bar..it got a little stained. This is one of the smaller sized bath bombs so I used the whole thing, you probably could get away with half but i find the small bathbombs are more difficult to break so I don't bother. I ended up with 3 from the boxing day sale, I have 2 left.

Claims: to smell like fresh apples and create a frothy blanket of "snow" on your bath due to having bubble bar pieces in it.

Reality: I wouldn't say it smells like "fresh apples" but it does have a distinct, yummy apple scent. It smells absolutely amazing. This bathbomb didn't fizz like a normal bath bomb, it defiantly frothed. There was a layer of "snowy" froth on the water which was fun but you still need a bubble bar to have "real bubbles". It also dissolved very slowly, it took twice as long as a large size bathbomb typically takes. Also it floats. An added bonus, I found it kind of silky and moisturizing. The scent lingered on my skin (along with cinders) for about an hour.

Rating: 5/5 There is nothing I dislike about this bathbomb at all, except that it's a holiday item.

Repurchase?: YES!

This is my favorite bathbomb. I'm typically more of a bubble bar rather than bathbomb person, but I love this. I wish I would have grabbed up more. 2 will not last me until next season!


Cinders bath bomb-lush project 10 pan item #2

I ended up getting 2 of these from the boxing day sale, I have 1 left. This is also a smaller sized bath bomb. It has poprocks on the top and throughout the whole bomb.

Claims: To have a sweet cinnamon and orange fragrance. Is supposed to make your bath "crackle" like a fire.

Reality: It does smell like sweet cinnamon and orange. However eventhough I do like how it smells it can be sickening if I smell it for too long. So I'm not sure I would really like to use this alone. Also it turns the water the color of....pee. Because I added in the holiday bubblebar, my water was darker and literally a cider color. It dissolves much faster than so white, but probably what I would consider normal for a bath bomb. It sinks. And yes, It really does crackle. I've heard mixed reports about whether or not it really crackles. Well mine did. It started about a minute after i put it in. and lasted for about 3 minutes. It's actually really cool.

Rating: 4/5 because of the pee colored water and the scent being a little sickening after awhile (to me anyway).

Repurchase?: Yes!

Very fun bath bomb. I wish I had bought more. The "cider cocktail" really is nice.

Although I also used holiday bubble bar, i'm not going to post my review of that yet since I only used half.

In future, I think I might try to post a picture of the tub after the products have dissolved.

Lush storage+boxing day haul

I store my lush stuff in a plastic bin, each item (or groups of the same item) in a ziploc bag...in some cases double bagged for strong items...with the name written on it. This cuts down on the smell quite a bit, however if I open the lid I can still smell it, but it's not sickening.


I have the items separated by cheesy ripped cardboard. Soaps on the left, bubblebars in the middle, bath bombs on the right. It's kind of organized chaos.



I didn't take a picture of ALL of the items I got in the boxingday sale, like the individual items. But I did take pictures of the boxes while they were wrapped, and cute.

Lush

I know i've been neglecting this blog (not that anyone follows, that's okay) but to be honest I forgot it existed. Until I decided recently I wanted to post some product reviews and found I already had a blog. I'm just going to post random whatever stuff here. Some will be Japan related some entirely not. If anyone follows this, you'll just have to deal with the posts not all having a common theme or being of interest to you. I know that some posts will be japan related, some beauty related, and some neither.

I am really obsessed with Lush. I have been for about a year. In addition to the items I pick up here in tokyo, I've also made several UK lush hauls and 2 huge boxing day sale hauls in the US. After the boxing day hauls I realized I just have way too much, it's kind of ridiculous. Not that I don't love it. I bought a decent sized bin which i thought would be plenty big for all of my lush stuff but when the christmas haul arrived It became completely full.

So I've decided to start project 10 lush. Project 10 pan is a blog/vlog shopping ban project for people with too much makeup. You have to use up 10 items before you buy something new. The idea is to help you use up your items and also to "shop your stash" and rediscover items you forgot about. Eventually i'm going to go on makeup 10 pan, but not right now since I haven't desired to buy makeup lately it would be kind of pointless. I still have lush UK order i'm waiting to arrive but since i've ordered that i've bought no lush and so as of that order 10 lush has started. This isn't for all lush items, because some items like masks and shampoos etc I use constantly and constantly have to repurchase. It's going to count for soaps. bath bombs, bubblebars, showergel, and lotion.

I took pictures of all of the items as of right now, so when I use them up I'll have a picture to post with a review. Keep in mind, I do cut up most of my items because they are just too strong to use all at once, most of the time. Also I cocktail items often, using 2 or 3 items in a bath. So it usually takes between 1 and 4 baths to use an item. That aside I suspect this ban will go pretty quickly, so I may allow myself to by 1 or 2 items (depending on how long it takes) when I finish before starting again. I might also post up reviews of items i've used before that are not counted in 10 lush.

Also I just want to mention that I have items from Japan, US and UK. Although the items are exactly the same in looks, scent, and function, the name, packaging, and size may vary (for example, normal US and UK bubble bars are 100g, in japan they are all 80g.) I will use the english names on the US website to refer to items, even if they have an entirely different japanese name.

Living in Tokyo/Japan-The things you didn't expect.

I've lived here long enough now that I no longer really think about things which I originally found odd, they've just become "normal" to me. I don't mean the kinds of things you hear about on all the websites and blogs like trash nazis and no driers, those are all things I expected and was prepared for, I mean the things that I didn't expect. Recently i've been reading some blogs from foreign women in Japan who have been here far longer than me that brought up some of these forgotten oddities.

1) You will accumulate much more trash living here than in the states. And as you've heard everywhere, dealing with it is a constant burden. The noticeable increase in trash is due to several factors:

-Items in Japan tend to have more unnecessary packaging. Sometimes this is for the presentation of the item and sometimes it just seems totally useless. Check out this packaging for some yummy cookies. You have main outer wrapper, a plastic tray, AND individually wrapped items. IMO they should have it individually packaged without the tray or have them not individually packaged and keep them in the tray, you don't need both.

Now I know items in the states have such unnecessary packaging as well but it seems much more common in japan and Japan just LOVES to individually wrap stuff. If you go to the konbini to get meals you'll notice how much waste 1 bento produces. You have the bag it came in, the plastic wraping on the chopsticks or spoon/fork, the shink wrap on the item, the lid, and the foam or plastic tray/container. Thankfully my ward has recently started collecting foam trays as recycling, so I don't feel so bad about the waste anymore.

-You will get tons of bags for everything. Now this can be reduced by using an eco bag, which I highly recommend as it's more comfortable to carry and some stores have incentives for using them. But somehow you will still gain massive amounts of plastic bags. Store clerks will give you a bag for even a tiny mundane little item, and they even have tiny little plastic bags just for that purpose. If you go to the konbini it's even worse, not only do they have tiny plastic bags but they will separate the hot and cold items into different bags (which okay, it actually kinda is necessary but still.) And then even if you use an eco bag at the grocery you will probably end up using little plastic bags for your produce and any wet drippy items like meat so it doesnt make a mess. Also the clerk will RARELY ask you if you want a bag, they will usually just give you one. The amount of plastic bag waste I used to have was so insane I'd have 2 large trashbags at the twice weekly pickup. Now i've made an effort to refuse a bag if I already have one which the item will fit into. Also i've made an effort to save every plastic bag I get and use it as a trashcan liner (the small ones are the perfect size for bathroom trashcans), to seal up items which will rot, or any other use I have for them because I get so many here I just feel guilty to throw the bag away after one use.

-Probably the number one reason for the excessive trash is items are just packaged in smaller containers. People here have smaller homes and storage areas, plus they mostly walk to the store and need smaller items that are easier to carry home. So obviously this results in more waste than using one larger container. Also it's very difficult to find large value sized items here unless you go to a wholesaler like Costco or a specialty store.

Now before I lived here I never thought twice about my garbage, It never occurred to me that I was producing an excessive amount. This can be partially due to having to pay more attention to my trash for sorting but I think it's mostly because there is just so much more of it. I never would have reused a plastic bag or taken notice of unnecessary packaging before, but now I think about it in the back of my head every time i'm shopping.

Understanding apartment size terminology

Understanding apartment size terminology

Many of you have probably already come across this but in case you haven't, I have explained it in detail followed by very typical floor plan examples.

Apartment sizes and layout are often referred to with abbreviations, a number followed by letters, for example: 1DK. The number represents the number of main rooms the apartment has and the letters represent the layout.
Most commonly seen are:
L-living room
D-dining room
K-kitchen
R-room
S-storage
+L-loft
the bathroom is not included in this, it's just assumed there is a bathroom. (though not always in very cheap places)

So a 1R is a studio, or sometimes called a "one room" it means there is 1 main room and kitchen is in that room、it cannot be separated or closed off.
example:

A 1K is 1 room with the kitchen distinctly separated, it could be in a whole separate room or just separated by a sliding door as seen in this example. It will be very small, usually in a hallway or a space under 4.5 mats size, there is not enough room for a dining table.
example:

A 1DK is 1 room with a separated kitchen and dining area. The kitchen is usually over 5 mats and you can probably fit at least a small table.
example:

A 1K+Loft is 1 room, separate kitchen, plus a loft area. You can usually sleep in the loft area in a futon (usually not big enough for a bed) but alot of people use it for storage instead because the heat/aircon usually doesn't reach that area.
example:

A 1LDK is 1 room, separate kitchen with dining area and living room. Sometimes it will be more like 2 rooms and sometimes it will just be a large dining/kitchen that can fit a couch.
example:

A 1LDK+S is the same as above but has a small storage room. Sometimes the room will be large enough to be a bedroom but because it has no closet they call it a storage room. If the room was a bit larger though they would probably just consider it a bedroom. This layout is relatively uncommon.
example:

A 2DK is 2 bedrooms with a separate kitchen and dining area. The rooms do not have to be the same size.
Example:

The combinations are endless, but I think you get the idea.

While this is often a good indicator of the apartment size, it's not always true.
These 2 apartments are both 1K but the first one is 15sq m and the 2nd is 32sq m so although they are both a 1k, the 2nd one is over twice the size.

In addition to the abbreviation, the apartment will have a sq meter size and probably a number on the floorplan.
The sq meter size is the size of the ENTIRE apartment (including kitchen, closets, entry and bathroom) except for the balcony. And the numbers on the floorplan (usually just on the bedrooms and dining/living rooms but sometimes kitchen as well) indicate how many tatami mats fit into that space. Regardless of if it actually has tatami flooring, the rooms are always measured in tatami sizing. 4.5 mats is small, 6 mats is average for a bedroom, and over 6 mats is pretty decent, over 10 mats is very large. So the 2 example foorplans directly above show that the first apartment has an average 6 mat living space and the 2nd has a large 10 mat living space.

Apartment info intro

Recently i've been doing a several part informative blog series for Greg's unofficial TUJ info site: http://tujinfo.ning.com/ about apartment hunting in Japan. I've moved 3 times in Tokyo and done EXTENSIVE apartment research as well as helped several friends move, it's a subject I feel quite knowledgeable about and enjoy talking about. I also get tired of surroundings really quickly so i'm constantly looking at other apartments, even just for fun.

Alot of the information I will be talking about is out there all over the net. But the problem is most of it is very vague, doesn't offer any real opinions or advice and doesn't really answer the 2 biggest burning questions of "what's average?" and "how much will it cost?" And if it does answer those questions it will either be on the extravagant expat scale or the frugal english teacher scale rather than informing you of whats really out there. Also most places just offer information on what to expect, not how to deal with it. For example, most places talk about how difficult it is to get a typical japanese apartment (which I won't lie, it's not easy) and they don't give you any advice on how to handle it.

What has kind of spurred this is numerous questions which I get asked on the subject or I see posted in various forums around the internet. I also can't believe how many foreigners I see who are WAY overpaying for crap apartments because they don't know whats actually out there and what they can really afford. And well, the gaijin targeting apartment companies take complete advantage of this naiveness. Though i'm sure not many foreigners (especially men) care quite as much about their apartment besides it being functional as I do, with all of my female senses about aesthetics and interior decorating obsessions.

What i'm hoping to do with this series is give you a better idea about what to expect, and what's really out there and the market value for it.