Anggie Lian

The Story of My Hair

I've been wanting to dye my hair blonde since years ago. Having a thought of it always makes me satisfied. Dyeing hair also means a step further to look stylish and cool from head to toe. I know it's the matter of personal taste, but I always find someone with light colored hair, or even crazy colored hair, looks way more awesome than other people.

However, having light hair color needs a lot of efforts. Achieving light colored hair is not an easy job. Moreover we also need to maintain the color. It will need extra extra cares. And it won't be cheap.

Back then, I thought someday I would go to hair salon and get my hair bleached there. But then, I watched many tutorials in youtube about how to get blonde hair, silver hair, white hair, and many more, my confidence grew and I thought I can do it by my self.

I went to Pasar Baru with my sister and purchased these.

Surprisingly, they are not as expensive as I thought. I forgot how much exactly they cost, but for 250g bleach powder, bottles of developer, and a box of hair dye, I think it only costs IDR 200,000. Compare it with going to salon!

But still, please note that I won't recommend to bleach your own hair at home! The result can be shocking, unpredictable, and damaging, so the safest way is just let the experienced hands do it for you. One more thing: please make sure that you go to the most expensive and recommended salon you've ever found. I once dyed my hair at a not-expensive-but-still-expensive salon. Even though they were doing good, I was not satisfied by the result because it wasn't what I wanted. Don't expect to get blonde or ash hair at salons like that.

For bleaching, I chose bleaching powder with an assumption that it will make the most significant result. And for the companion of it, I bought 40 vol. developer. It is the strongest one. Perhaps it will do good for virgin hair, but beware for uneven color.

So the process began. I mixed the bleaching powder with the developer. There was no precise measure. I just made sure the cream looks like the one I look on youtube.

Let me explain my hair condition first.

I have thin hair. Not only that, but every single hair looks really thin, light, and fragile. But it's actually not, it's light but not fragile. I don't have severe hair loss. I have very smooth hair that people call it 'baby hair'. I'm proud of how smooth my hair is, but it also brings trouble because wind can easily mess my hair. It always looks tangled. However, when people touch my hair, they can be surprised that their fingers can make it through the tip and it feels really smooth. This, what I called baby hair, also affects the dyeing and bleaching process. It can easily absorb any substances without causing too much damage. Glad I have this kind of hair.

Therefore I think it's important to know what kind of hair we have before deciding to bleach it by ourselves. The results vary, though we can try to predict how it will turn out. For example, my sister's hair is in the opposite condition with my hair. She has deep black hair, thick, and a bit dry. The bleach didn't do well on her. The risk of having uneven hair color might be bigger on this type of hair.

This is the before picture of my hair. I've bleached it once at the salon. The maximum result was like this, reddish brown color.

If you wonder dafuq with that ugly black roots, yeah it was the longest black roots I've ever had. I had tried to touch it up by dyeing with Freshlight Hair Dye, but nothing happened. Freshlight only gave a slight of reddish brown color but not light enough to cover my black root. You can see clearly there are three layers of color, from light reddish brown, to dark reddish brown, to black. That's why I decided to bleach my hair again.

The process continued. Once the bleaching had evenly spread to all over my hair, I left it for about 45 minutes. My hair became really dry, and tangled, until I felt there was no way to untangle it.

After that, I rinsed my hair, poured so much conditioner, and dried it. This is the result.

Yohooo, orange headed! Very bright! Such a shocking orange!

My roots was brighter than the tips. I did my roots first because from my experience in dyeing hair, roots will absorb dye really fast. But still, this uneven color was unavoidable.

I really hate that orange tone I've got after bleaching. It can damage everyone's eyes. Fortunately, I was prepared for it. That's why I also bought Fresh Light hair dye in ash color, because I know bleach + light brown only make the orange tone worse. So make it safe! Choose ash color for eye safety!

The orange tone then changed to yellow. However, under the sunlight, it still looked so orange.

A week later, I decided to dye it again with Ash. This time, I chose the foam color because the color will be absorbed fast and can resemble the result chart.

At first, I worried the result would turn out to be too dark. My bleaching process would be in vain. But after rinsing and drying, it turned out good. It looks more blonde now than orange, and there's also ashy tone. For the first time in my life, I have ashy toned hair color. I was so touched.

The red tone still looks obvious, especially on the outer part of my hair. I don't know why it happened, but overall, the color is even and I'm proud of myself (and my sister who has helped) that I can bleach my hair at home, without going to salon.

Now how about my hair condition after bleaching it with 40 vol. developer?!

In the first week, it made my hair really dry. It used to be so oily if I hadn't washed it for three days, but this time, on the 4th day not washing it (ewh!), it was still okay. I gave it hair mask and vitamins regularly. Days after, the natural oil has returned. Now I need to wash it every two days. My hair is still smooth and still can be called baby hair. However, the tip can be messier than ever because it's dryer than it used to.

Now almost a month after the bleaching process, the hair dye fades really quickly, well~ typical foam hair dye. My hair is back to reddish orange blonde. But it's still calmer than the right after bleaching color. That one could hurt my eyes. LOL! I think after this, I want to try white hair color like Manic Panic Virgin Snow. I'm serious!

And for you who wants to try something with your hair color, I would like to say 'Good luck!'.

2 comments

, by anggielian

Beauty

EOS Blytheye Blue

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, by anggielian

artsy makeup

Koichi ‘Theatrical Blue-Black' Makeup

These past months, I've been really attracted to a visual kei band named Mejibray. I admit that the first time I saw Mejibray, I liked MiA, the guitarist, and I found out that his skill is also amaaaazzzziiinnnngg. Then I dug more about this band, searching their songs, the MVs, lyrics, and meanings, also knowing more about their members, until I became obsessed with their pink-haired bassist, Koichi. So, let's say like this: I'm in love with MiA, but with Koichi, I'm obsessed.

Why? Because he has face like this!!

I will be obsessed with someone who's beautiful, and Koichi is too beautiful.

Mejibray celebrate their third anniversary this year. They will release their new single 'Theatrical blue-black' on September 24. They already released the teaser. You can see how pretty Koichi is...MiA too, of course, and Meto the drummer is so weird yet cute, and Tsuzuku the vocalist is as charismatic as always.

Way before this, it just came in my mind that I thought someday I really wish to create the look of Koichi. So when he released his concept look for 'Theatrical Blue-Black', I instantly thought it's the time. Later on, I learned the details of his makeup, especially the eye-make, and then I gathered materials, watched tutorials from youtube, practiced it, until finally, I can show you the result.

What do you think? The eye-make is still lame though. It's not as jet black as his. I don't use any gel liner on this.

The step-by-step how to do Koichi's eye makeup:

Besides eye makeup, thing that needs to be focused on is shading technique. People who used to do cosplay or visual kei makeup must be familiar with this kind of really dramatic shading. The point is to create illusion of extra small and pointy nose. Even though my nose is not pointy at all, it will change with such an effort.

The red line shown below is the area that need to be filled in with the shade. I use brown eyeshadow.

The difference is obvious. The reason why I love makeup is because I can do magic with just few strokes of brush.

Back to Koichi, I remembered he had one look in which he wore devil's horns and a hoodie. I think it was during their 'Sadisgate' era.

I also want to imitate him this time. Please bear the sighting of my ugly black roots.

If anyone wonders how I get the eye patch and the horns, I made it by my self, following this tutorial: eye patch and devil horns.

When taking selfies, I usually have some favorites. This time it turned out to be this one below, because my expression looks like Koichi (or at least in my mind). However, the background is not so nice, my messy wardrobe. Errr~ so blurrrr it.

5 comments

, by anggielian

Blora

Mudik 2014

Here, in Indonesia, there's a yearly ritual on Lebaran Days, called Mudik. It means going back to hometown to be with family to celebrate Idul Fitri. I've been used to do Mudik since I was a kid. My Mom lived in Central Java before moving to Jakarta. That's why many relatives of hers live there.

I used to see Mudik as an adventure. We always go by car, so it will take more than 12 hours to arrive in a small city where my Grandma and aunts live. That city's name is Blora. I remember I would get excited when Lebaran was near, though I always got sick in every trip. Since I was a kid, my tummy had been so weak so I would got nausea (not carsickness) or diarrhea because of the long trip, and the bad wind entered my body, my tummy. We called it masuk angin, literally wind enters. LOL! But I was still excited.

This year, when my Mom told me that she had a plan for us to go Mudik again, I felt less excited than me in my childhood. Anxiety approached me. I don't know exactly since when, but I cannot fall asleep in a car while it's moving. My eyes will widely open, and I would become fully aware of my Dad's driving style. Not that I'm super paranoid our car will crash, but...how the hell I can sleep in that condition. I just can't.

And, like I've been uttering so much lately, I'm AMAZED about how much people live in Jakarta, this small city, until it's able to create super duper long queue of vehicles, not only everyday in Jakarta, but also every year in whole Java. Truly AMAZING!

Normally, it would take 12-14 hours to go from Jakarta to Blora. But when we go at a wrong time, we can spend more than 24 hours in the streets.

It's a torture to me. 24 hours without sleep, 24 hours without proper internet connection, 24 hours without some things...well~ meaningful...to do. It's torture!

This year, we were trapped in a really bad congestion for many hours...again. I even swore to myself that I won't do this Mudik by car anymore. I won't. When people said that traffic jam is a part of tradition, I won't accept it. I won't. This TRADITION is getting worse, and worse, and worse every year.

Indeed, there're some benefits in doing Mudik by car. I can see beautiful nature surrounds me, like paddy field.

And, sometimes, I can catch a sight of beautiful sunset, sunrise, rainbow, stars, clouds, or many more beautiful things. I also can stop everywhere I want, to buy my favorite telor asin Brebes or to eat my favorite Soto Ayam at Semarang.

But surely, it doesn't replace the energy I've lost and the time I've wasted. Also, this trip by car has reduced the amount of quality time we spend with family in Blora. I remember I used to stay for two weeks in Blora. Now, we are like: we need to go by this day, and go back to Jakarta by this day to prevent the congestion, therefore we don't spend too much time in the streets and go back to Jakarta on time to be back to our routines. But it's still unavoidable. The proof: we were still trapped in traffic jam this year. So every year, my memory of Mudik is only about going back and forth, Jakarta-Blora-Jakarta. That's all.

Thus I think I want to make some post to preserve the memory of my Mudik trip this year, before I cannot remember what exactly has happened except the traffic jam at Comal, Indramayu, and Pamanukan.

I didn't do much though. I spent my holidays reading manga and eating, oh and also smiling to someones I don't know. Most of the people that visit my Grandma's house or whom I visited during Lebaran are strangers to me, but they're like 'Oh, you've grown up!' or 'Wow you're tall!'.

We were eating out a lot, like on the second day in Blora, my Aunt suggested us to go to eat fish at a lakeside restaurant. The sight there was pretty and calming, wasn't it?

And the food was good. The grilled fish were great. Most importantly, it's really cheap comparing to any fish dish sold in Jakarta.

If we're not eating out, many foods were served on the table. My aunt would buy jajanan pasar. It was my favorite menu for breakfast, gooey and sweet, best mated with a cup of black coffee. However it won't satisfy my Lebaran's appetite because several hours later, I would have some rice with meat for pre-lunch, and have lunch at 3, and went out to eat at night. If we summarize my holiday in one word, it's all about eating.