BOMBCHELL.com - Atlanta's Sexiest Geek

Ayo & Illy's beach party

2011-12-31T13:05:00.002-05:00

wow it's New Year's Eve.

A lot has happened this year, so many crazy experiences: I checked out loads of cities in the States, switched continents, first time on a private jet, somehow remained single (don't know why people still get shocked when I say I've never had a boyfriend), lost maybe 10 lbs, graduated with an MBA & marketing concentration (hate school so much can't believe it's finally over), learned photography, met a lot of great people, met even more fake people but I'm most grateful for my health, safety, and loved ones.

In regards to blogging the best part is that shockingly my readers have remained the coolest ever. I tell my friends I'm blessed to have nice readers. A lot of bloggers have readers that leave the horrible comments, or go on websites insulting them, but the people that read mine happen to be witty & cool, and everyone I've bumped into that reads my blog seems awesome and encouraging. So I really believe I'm blessed and lucky to have subscribers & readers that are positive.

I wish everyone a safe New Year's Eve, and a blessed Year in 2012, with life, great moments, clarity, love, contentment, success, and barely any sorrow. ((hugs))

NOW on the beach party (Ikare beach, Lagos, Nigeria):

A while ago my friend MJ invited me to Ayo & Illy's beach party. It's a private beach and we had to use a boat to get there. not bad right? I'd been to one before, the boats move so fast I just pray my life vest works, and nothing bad happens. This time I boat just stopped! bwahahahahaha silver lining was that it was in the afternoon not at night, and i was with people vs alone. I had a blast, took loads of pictures, made fun friends.

I'm really glad i took pictures, cause many of you can see how pretty & fun Nigeria can be.

Bag: LV Neverfull Steven Strauss bag, Bikini: Pour Moi? (I bought it from figleaves.com a long time ago cause they carry large sizes with underwire -- super cheap now with certain colors). Tunic: "borrowed" mum's shirt, I should return it, Glasses: Prada (bought from sunglass hut in Atlanta)

Tobi: One of my roomies in NYSC camp. See... you make friends in camp.

So after cam whoring, we got picked up and met everyone else at the boat club. Lagos reminds me a lot of Miami, except in miami ma butt was falling off jet ski's or barely went to the beach. Here's filled with water, I've really missed it, Atl was land locked. The coolest thing on the island is how some people's apartment or houses overlook water, the view's magnificent, I'm always blown away. Dear heaven please let me make enough money to purchase a great place with a view one day. Some people also have their own freaking jetty's or docks etc.

LOL geez lagos life is like that VH1 show "lifestyle of the rich & famous." It's so crazy and different that sometimes i'm like this is soooo not real or normal, but it becomes normal.

I've told yall I wanna have a great job and be able to shop buy as many over priced labels at the mall BUT feel like i'm shopping in Walmart: Now that would be great. Or randomly get bored and get a PJ to go on a trip with friends.

My Closest guy friend in Nigeria: MJ!! lol Justin u've been replaced. (can you believe we went to primary sch together?)

I told you our boat stopped!! Look at the pic above, we were moving gently towards the shift behind MJ. I looked very calm but just like the movie: blair witch project my ass decided to document it, incase it went south lol.

yup then we headed towards this boat too.

they came to help, and couldn't figure it out then so left

doesnt Sonya look like a bit like MJ.

Some people got picked up by the birthday boy in this boat

Then we saw the boat below & kept waving!!! they thought we were saying "hi" and waved back. then we waved even more frantically.

Super super lucky! he picked us up and took us to the beach. Poor guy he just bought his boat that day. Amen for that!!!!

he was super nice & dropped us off (it was probably 30mins out of his way), if I ever bump into him again, I'll get him all the Smirnoff shots he can drink. Cause I lost my manners, and should have invited him to the party. (but in my heart I was like...... um if I show up with him to a party where I don't really know people, they'll think that's my man, and since I wasn't close to the celebrants I didn't know what the right etiquette was... felt horrible I didnt... though he would have probably declined... then of cause when I got to the beach house everyone was like Yall should have invited him!!!!)

the three pictures below, are of those that were in my 2nd boat

So we get there and there's music, food, pool, beach, friends, everything.

Tracy & Mj. Isnt see gorgeous.

they had burgers, hot dog, chicken, everything.

One of the birthday boy's Ayo. I love him for not throwing me in the pool, cause he jokinly threatened. ("prevention is better than cure" so I stayed away from the pool section)

some kids were dancing outside the fence.

they were cute, and good dancers so we gave them a few bucks, well in naira.

the other birthday boy Illy. I'm sure I'm probably butchering the right way to spell his name.

Can you believe I lived in the South 10 yrs!! and never went on these, or went mudding, lol guess I'm not really country. Finally went on one in Nigeria. they call them something weird or british. I thought they were called ATV's right?

They had a cooler of Rose! I was like NICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love my sweet drinks! Coffee Patron, Bailey's, Rose. Dear Moscato please get imported to Nigeria, because many Nigerians from the States miss you.

Maki, my sis Sheila, Dami, and Tobi.

SEXY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Gomez

smh I laugh so goofy! like almost all the pics have me laughing goofy. I have a pic from 10 yrs ago in high school, same pose I swear. I was walking w friends and this guy caught us in his camera from the balcony.

Dami's so gorgeous! I LOVE LOVE LOVE this picture. I put it on my bb and wanted to pretend it was me.

this is the zoom in of the picture above no one's drowning for those who noticed it.

*sigh* I should have not wasted my gym membership.

No benefit of winter weight, it's basically summer all yr round, I need to behave myself so I can strut in a bikini, without a coverup or tunic. Gosh trust me if i do, you guys will start begging, in fact paying me to stop going to the beach, every outfit i have will be a crop top.

Me & My sis Sheila :)

I heard the waters in Nigeria are pretty violent, hence no one with sense should play with these waters, cause you can get swept off quickly.

So I'm not sure if there'll be a next time this close to this beach. I heard the other side is safer.

lol see how these goofballs above look like a couple.

DONT hate on my Titanic pose, It was windy!!!!

this picture is waaaaaaaaay better than this other one i took, gosh that one looked so depressing, people said it looked like an ad Feed The Children. They are such happy and adorable kids.

infact, here's the picture. this was after they were dancing. you get a little sad here sometimes when you think of the big disparity in wealth in the country and how much more the government or community can be doing. Anyways.... back to the fun.

Maki!!!!

"The Family" lol Tobi & I crashed their fun

Wonder what happens when you sneak of to party, and also take pics. Your ass can get left behind!!! (some one said I should stop cursing in '12, hmm..... )

it was a close one!! everyone was at the dock or whatever you call it, not one missed call. MJ!!!!!!!! ehn!!! so no looking out lol.

And we're off, time to go home. I think the rules are no one can be on the water after 6pm.

We made it to land, no boat drama etc. Thank you Jesus, and it was a pretty lovely and smooth ride.

From here, some of us went out for drinks, shisha (omg remember my ATL send off dinner, I'm much better at shisha/ hookah now, next yr might be a pro lol) etc, and once I got home i slept like a baby.

This was probably one of my best days in 2011, though my morning started with some hiccups & emotions it ended up being such a great.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures, writing, and felt like you were here in Lagos. Wishing everyone a beautiful new year.

(I used my Sony A33 camera, 50mm f1.4 lens, Shot in Manual mode, RAW, then edited the lighting, size, added the logo, and converted to JPEG in Adobe LightRoom)

Love Bombchell

Camp Diaries: Day 1 Stress, 31 Roommates, Tips & Tricks to survive

2011-12-22T21:22:00.000-05:00

CAMP DIARIES

Camp Day 1: June 15^th aka “The worst day of my life” or “Longest day ever.”

These are quotes you would keep hearing from everyone Day 1. All I can say to future campers is goodluck. You will hate this day. You will be stressed, frustrated, irritated, it will take you ALL day to register. I got there about 11am, and by 9pm I was still in the process, kits and meal tickets were finished and would be restocked at 7am the next morning.

Day 1 was horrible!!! You will feel like a headless fucking chicken. You’ll never know when the whole process will be finished. The lines are mad long. Don’t forget the camp has about 2500 people, and most will be there Day 1, some Day 2, and very few smart people Day 3 to register instead.

After abuja went conservative to camp

by the end of this day my dress shirt was torn!

& we're off! little did i know what awaited me

Step 1: Accomodation: *whew* got a room (i heard some people got halls or no room): we are 32 in it. GEEEEEEZ my boarding school was 4 people, we were 2 in college, and by my masters I went from home, and now 32!!!! Packed like sardines, with a shitty foam (and I’m paranoid about a bedbug story that I heard) (sorry I keep interchanging between past and present, I’m currently writing this blogpost during camp but I know I’ll probably post it in the future and not now .... ps: better not take ur computer there if you have brains, esp since the electricity is non existent and it'll prob get stolen)

MY ROOM!!!!!!!!

a clearer less sexy picture. lol had to retake so all my undressed roomies could run for cover.

My bed wasnt made yet, so took a picture of a random one.

Step 2 – probably step 10 or 20 cause freaking everything has several annoying steps and forms to fill: Registration: budget about 3-7 hours of frustration and anger, filling documents, submitting them, standing in line, begging to cut the line, hustling to cut the line, sneakingly getting documents, filling it wrongly cause you did it the wrong way and now have to beg for new documents.

Day 1 and probably all the way to the 21^st & last day of camp, and all CD weeks till the year is over: Accepting, and eating, 3 huge humble pies, not slices the whole pie! The amount of pie eaten will probably be reduced as the days go by, but remember you are a youth corper and will be treated like crap, so it is in your best interest to remember that you are not better than anyone!!! Youth corpers are all possible friends!! Trust me, I let bout 5 people in line, and kept refusing this one guy cause people were getting mad at me (considering they let me in line), by the end of the night he was in my platoon, and I was using his stapler which saved me (N20.00, and he was helping me arrange my documents correctly, and is now my bb contact). So just remember you dare not be rude to any staff or army person cause they can make your life hell, when they make you seat on the conrete floor for what seems futile to listen to bla bla: just seat, and bitch with people around you. If you make a mistake the answer is ALWAYS: Sorry Ma/ Sorry Sir (repeated constantly) with a pleading face till they rectify or give you what you need. If they tell you that you are getting on their nerves, or to leave em alone: Again Sorry Ma/ Sorry Sir.

Through the stress of the day, I couldn’t be bothered and was too stressed to reply any messages to friends on social networks. Your only friends become the people there at camp that have an idea what the next step is, or can help you out.

Exeat (Permission to leave the camp): You cannot leave camp unless you are given permission. Remember you can’t just vex and leave, this is a government mandated programme for University graduates, and you need it before you can work for almost every company in the country. Eitherways when you’re in, there’s no coming out without an official permission.

Pregnant women cannot stay in camp, and have to apply for an exeat, I saw a visibly pregnant woman begging to stay (WTF), but most wanted to leave, and all have to leave. I saw new mothers with their babies and few husbands applying for exeats and being given exeats. Also people with certain medical conditions are allowed to apply for exeats. Different reasons to apply for an exeat, some permissions are given, some are probably not given, but everyone I know that applied was given.

SO HINT HINT: Apply for an exeat early on, just incase you get sick in the future during camp, or probably want to go to a fashion show, or get a letter request letter from a company you would prefer to work with for your nysc.

Anyways that’s it, it feels like hell on earth during Day 1, and you can’t wait to crash on a bed, or shower, and you’re thirsty, and can’t stop talking about the crazyness of the whole thing. Then you sleep and wake up, and day 1 doesn’t seem that bad, you just remember you were super stressed, but you remember cool stuff like bumping into old friends, becoming friends with people seating beside you, struggling or hustling to get in line, and you forget that you spent a whole day on your feet, stressed out. No wonder a years later all my friends have completed it say: camp is stress, but you can have fun and you’ll make friends (they forget the details). Certain people get married or date people they meet in camp, I've heard so many cute stories that you get a bit excited about the possibilities of camp: I swear during Day 1 (yesterday) I kept saying “WTF!!!! Why would you even care to meet anyone to date here, this is fucking hell and that’s desperate” or jokingly saying in my head “I’m a celebrity get me out of here!!!” a la the tv show, the stress gets to you. You become fully razzified & hood after 2 hours there.

Tip: take a bunch of change: you can pay to charge your phone, to buy water, or paper, or a pen, or to staple your papers, or to buy food, or drinks (lol they sell beer, Smirnoff etc in Mami Market lol though alcohol isn’t allowed haha). You can even buy your to stay list like a bucket, there’s a tailor, cobbler, etc but probably more expensive. SUPER DUPER DEODORANT to battle the annoying freaking heat! (if yours is during raining season bwahahahahahaha I wonder how you’ll register with rain etc, might be better sha, at least it’s better than sweat). Get an exeat!

Friends there: Shout out to kemka & mj (I love u guys sooo much & I’m not a diva). Omg Naz: geez omg I put him through sooooooo much that day. whew we only have 20 days to go, and a year of work lol.

Friends made for the day/ bumped into: I have no idea if we’ll be friends Day 2 or in a year, but you sure made my day better.

How to fix a shredding silk dress

2011-12-16T18:33:00.000-05:00

Sue me it feels like silk, though the ingredients are probably something else. Eitherways my dress is super sensitive and got destroyed by my gorgeous bag (well my mum's gorgeous gold bag that I borrowed).

I wanted to cry by the end of the night!! It was my first time wearing this dress, I barely walked around or cam whored, and it decided to get ruined!!! Geez c'mon!! It's freaking Karen Millen dress I'd expect more (it's like my Bebe Upgrade, u know), I have a Cache dress that looks very identical. (Don't ask, while shopping to move to Lagos, I don't know how I bought two very identical dresses). Eitherways this dress was the more expensive one, so I need to find a way to revive it! I actually tried to sell of the Cache twin, but didn't work, so I'm glad to have an extra.

Ejeme (Jini designer from MMR post) suggested I try to shave it with a shaving stick, and after constantly seeing that DSTV style tip where they shave a shredding fuzzy pink sweater with a shaving stick, I was game.

I couldn't breeze through the shaving with the stick, it made it worse, I had to gently go section by section, with my hand inside holding the dress, and shave side to side, to prevent much scuffs or scratches.

The results were quite nice.

(not perfect, you can see scuffs & some lines)

but doable

I'll prob try rewearing it somewhere, maybe somewhere dark! or get there when everyone's drunk lol.

I didn't take any pictures when I wore em, but I got this one via bbm/ cell phone :) here's a glimpse of the awesome night. I had a blast, they had an artist perform, tons of food, okay so i dealt with a tiny awkward scene but everything else was freaking awesome lol.

Sis Sheila, Ejeme, Me, Carmen (lol we were all looking a diff cameras) You can see the gorgeous bag

Hope everyone's having an awesome week/ weekend. I have about 3-4 events going on tomorrow at the same time, not sure how I'll share myself, but it's great that i get to knock out a bunch of events with one dress and don't appear like "I'm repeating" clothes lol.

Our Abuja Drama aka NYSC Registration

2011-12-13T06:51:00.000-05:00

Registration for NYSC:

Students that attend Nigerian Universities have all registered for NYSC, because they did it in school. So for International Students that studied abroad, we all had to go to Abuja to register.

I’d never been to Abuja, heard it's clean, neat, expensive, etc. They forgot to tell me it is extremely conservative, and in a state of anger or maybe tears you’ll can call it beyond backwards. Well unless you’re dressed in a hijab you’ll probably be fine.

So there’s a list on the website on possible dates to register for the 3 or four batches that go on a year. I went with my girl Carmen to Abuja. Tickets were interesting bout N32K or N52k (N16K =$100) round trip. You have to take a huge list of documents from secondary school exams WAEC, NECA, kinda like taking your SAT scores, college transcripts, college diploma etc.

Tip: don’t go the last week, go a month before time if possible so you only have to spend 1-2 hours. Make necessary amount of copies of your documents (or important listed sections like “date of last entry into country”), Dress like you’re going to work. Make sure you have everything on the list from the official NYSC website because it changes.

Here’s a pdf of the list my batch c 2011 had to have for foreign trained students. (click for larger size)

THE DRAMA:

So after our flight, we had arranged to have a “car hire” to take us to the NYSC office, about 1hr away from the airport. We get there, and these men at the gate and one lady start yelling at us, and screaming, then one guy pushed us. They said how can we be dressed like this. They refused to tell us what was wrong with our outfits, and told us to leave and come back when we were dressed appropriately. My dress was fully covered, not tight, no cleavage, yet they yelled, apparently the length was bad. Carmen on the other hand apparently her blonde hair didn’t help but nothing to do about it, they probably also got upset by her half tattoo sleeve, and she had on a playsuit with the back open.

Decided to take a retake a picture of my exact "whorish outfit" that i wore , and as you can see it proves how i have little home training. *eye roll* and should be ashamed of myself. Took it few minutes ago.

I guess it's short, but next time they should say there's a dress code, I dont think all the insult was necessary.

The full outfit.

Dress gift from Nels that i got by Charlie Jade, Shoes flats that I need to freaking replace by Tory Burch (they've seem much better days). Hmmm I'm not sure bout the lipstick, in the picture it makes my lips look bigger.

I did hit the gym today. Day 1 again

I swear if we weren’t together after being attacked by about 7 yelling people insulting us we would have cried. One psycho man was passing by and saw us and kept yelling and calling us prostitutes, and yelling how could we leave the house dressed like that. It was insane!!!!!!!! We saw my father that morning in our outfits, we saw carmen’s uncle in our outfits, we flew in our outfits, and no one batted a lash. I NEVER knew place in Nigeria was that backwards, it reminded me of going to the freaking village, but this is the Federal Capital!! I wanted to yell back at the horrible man, but Carmen was like i need to shut it before they stone us *OMG wtf!! Twilight zone!!* They made us go stand away from the building and wait for our car to return, while everyone stared and snickered.

Luckily we had friends in the city. I changed into jeans, and a men’s long sleeve shirt & Carmen ended up with a long dress, and a BLAZER in the freaking heat! Poor girl because she needed to cover the back of the dress because it was open. Don’t forget she didn’t have to register, she was just accompanying me. She was visiting from England. The whole experience put her off, hopefully she’ll still try and register next yr. SOmeone should have warned me, so now I'm warning you!! especially if you live outside Abuja, it might be a wasted trip if you are not dressed appropriately. They sent someone for having a rumpled shirt! c'mon!! there's barely electricity.

PS: Bumped into my little sister's friend who basically dealt with the same and had to adjust her outfit.

I went cookoo insulting Abuja and calling it backwards on my bbm. Horrible experience. Friends kept telling me Abuja isn’t that bad, conservative yeah, lots of women in hijabs everywhere: yeah, very muslim: yeah…. But it’s a nice city and supposedly those guys are an outlier, especially since a lot of people treat corpers like shit. The workers inside the building were quite nice I'll have to admit, and some say the security is being extreme because they just got a new Director General that month. We had a bit of fun in the city with friend, left the next day back to lagos. When we got back to my state we were soooooo happy to see people dressed like us, no stares, no awkwardness of feeling like a whore or being called one, because we weren’t dressed like nuns.

I hope not to move to Abuja, but….. I might, I’ll try not to, but if it’s in relation to a great job prospect, I will have to “woman up!” and pack my stuff to Abuja and hope there isn't a a huge disparity in how women and men are treated there.

Regular Blogging Resumes. Your Nigerian Cheat Sheet/ Reference page

2011-12-09T12:29:00.000-05:00

let the blogging commence! I do read all the comments that are posted (even emails, tweets, and fb), and I've noticed a few people asking about NYSC. Especially those planning to move to/ back to Nigeria. So I've decided to blog about it since I'm going to be doing it for a year but before i fully start blogging:

This post is kind of like a background, to put everyone on the same page, kinda like a dictionary/ reference, so when I talk about NYSC or currency, or certain things in Nigeria or about myself you won't be too lost, and im kinda tired of converting currencies for each item i talk about, remember before i always had to convert to dollars, well now in my head i use cheats, and you could too.. Perhaps in the future I'll add more slangs, stuff or whatever but for now. It's Currency, NYSC, my timeline (where I grew up, where I've lived etc).

So in the future if there's some word, slang, or whatever you need help with, try googling it, or use urbandictionary.com which I've used in the past for mostly american slang, but it has a lot of stuff from various cultures, and if all that fails lol Ask me! & I'd be happy to reply you, and if it's frequently asked I'll add it here.

CURRENCY:

we use Naira (as to dollars, or pounds) and we use Kobo (as to cents & pennies, however i admit i haven't seen any kobo since i've been back, the lowest note I've seen is like N5 or N10, though you'll end up carrying around N200 or most N1000 notes. yup we have 1000 naira note, not that many places use check/ savings card machines, but Atm's work great 24hrs!)

So when I say N# i mean Naira. (signis actually: ₦; code: NGN, but I'll be using most just N)

TODAY'S RATE: xe.com

Okay so easy conversion (rough estimate I use in my head)
$1 = N160 (always check the daily exchange rate before big transactions )
$10 = N1600 (to be honest I skip/ forget this one this one)
$100 = N16,000 (you'll mostly see 15k stuff, just think almost $100 bucks)
$1000 = N160,000 (N160K, i barely use this)
N100K = $600 (NOW this a staple!! You memorize this!! it makes stuff much easier)
N1 mil = $6000 (*Sigh* that's okay... I'll aim for you to be a monthly/ weekly staple one day lol)

well almost everything in this country starts at freaking N15k (N for Naira, K for thousand, like saying 1g, or 1k, so 15k, or N15K is 15,000 naira). Like you go to a store you'll be lucky if you see clothes or things that start are 15k (When I do shop in Nigeria I refuse to pay over 15k, psh aint got a job yet "trick," and for a whole year my excuse is "I'm a corper!!!!!" the best nigerian excuse ever, c'mon govt pays us corpers about 20k monthly, and the company can match that/ minimum wage, or pay higher a month). Either ways items here are like double or triple the same item abroad, might just give up 80% of my normal shopping for 2012.

So for example you can buy a N1500 will be phone recharge credit card (we just say credit), and it might last you an hr or two on the phone, and most fees like at the dentist, or hiring someone to cook for an event, or buying some cool item will prob cost 15k give or take 5k.

Welcome to Nigeria. I'm still bitiching about internet being 15K-35K a month for limited vs unlimited internet. GEEZ can someone find an internet company thats great and affordable to move to Nigeria, I switch companies every few months (well I use mums or brothers, or dads, but still, it's a mix of cost and speed. and I hate the time constraints of free only from midnight to 5am) and i'm a corper i can't pay for internet!

What's funny is now I've been here 5 months, and I see a price in dollars, when I convert it to naira i say OMGH that's sooooo cheap!!!!! lol. SAD. when I moved back I converted everything to dollars, and went HELL NO thats expensive. Im a confused puppy, give me a few more months and a job lol.

NYSC

NYSC : National Youth Service Corp, is something all Nigerian college graduates have to do for a year before we can legally work in most companies in the country, well except you own it. You can see it as a sort of internship, you get placed in a job for a year, a lot of times within a field you studied or can gain from, you get at least minimum wage, lots of experience, you might get accommodation etc. Basically it's mandatory, and many companies won't hire you unless you've finished this.

My explanation: cool way to get job right out of school, shitty pay, but it's hair money, recharge phone card, and eating out a few times. With a hideous uniform that needs improvement, lots of rules, but it's a great way to get a job and into the corporate world unlike other places where people graduate and can't find jobs, so great experience. This way they know almost everyone is entry level and might have never worked in their lives, and your not discriminated against.

NYSC has several stages, but trust me in your head it's gonna be: Step 1: Sign up, Step 2: Three weeks camp : the worst part people dread (think of it as bootcamp), people have fun stories, some have horror stories: 3: the 1 year job (everyone prays for a good company that will give awesome experience, or will retain them).

Now the crazy part: you can get posted anywhere in the country for your camp or for your 1 year service, previously foreign trained students could pick Abuja or Lagos, but they decided to scratch that. Imagine the horror when I found out.

So we call it Youth Service, and we're called Corpers (stupid nickname everyone will call you Corper Shawn (I don't think it's bad) and you salute, or give them a bad stare, or Otondo (which prob means stupid or idiot, i'm not sure)).

NYSC Official Website check for the yrly facebook page on official site, NYSC Facebook page, NYSC Wikipedia

MY TIME LINE

So i was born in London (let's skip that, doesn't count, basically just a safer hospital, they don't give citizenships like the US)

Lived in Nigeria from 0-16yrs old (Lived in Lagos, 6 years boarding school in a diff state, and i'm originally from Anambra state: I'm Igbo (or some would say "from the East")).

- typical year in boarding school (age 10-16) was mid term breaks in Lagos, life in school, christmas and easters in the village (in Anambra State), and summers abroad.

From 16 - 26: Lived in Georgia (Conyers, Covington, Waleska, and last 5 years Atlanta... most people in GA say Atlanta cause that's the most recognizable city in GA)

- Started my blog 3 yrs ago in 2008, while i lived in Atlanta

June 29th 2011: Moved from Atlanta to Lagos. (Here's Week 1 & Week 2 of being back, you can view my archives on the right)

I'm not on holiday, it's a permanent move as far I can see, but i understand life changes and depending on my job, or future etc etc prince charming, things might change.

THE END

*whew* now that that's done, my regular style of blogging can resume :) Heaven help all those that read it all, I'm passing out cold water to those that finished the marathon read. *sniff* *sniff* I'm really touched!! *sniff* that you don't read my blog for solely pictures, though even if you did thanks for saying i'm hot (*sigh* that's ok if it's solely for entertainment I do have blonde moments lol).

Some Coming up next posts:

-How Carmen & I got Harassed & PUSHED in Abuja and basically called whores cause of how we dressed

-Day 1 of Camp (might as well call camp a free tanning session)

-1004 View of lagos

-Party at the beach

Hello Stranger, I've been a been bad girlfriend

2011-11-29T12:54:00.000-05:00

Awww ATL!!!!! Old pic I never posted from Jan 9th 2010

Hi Everyone!!

I know I've been a bit M.I.A. okay, okay I admit, I've been really really m.i.a. If not that I still tweet sparingly, and reply emails, while occasionally stopping by people's blogs, and the once in three weeks facebook comments I'm sure most readers would be worried sick (hmmm lame excuses, but I attempted :).

I love everyone in that reads my blog, and i really feel awful like a really bad girlfriend that went on spring break without telling her boyfriend. Especially since I've been worried when bloggers I like drop off the face of the earth with no explanation.

So I sincerely apologize to everyone that reads my blog be it sparingly or constantly.

I wish I could say it's cause I've been jet setting & parting in St. Tropez etc, but truth is my life's been pretty mundane. I sleep, wakeup, eat, eat some more, feel bad about the N100k i paid for just 3 month gym membership, that's being wasted ($600, *sigh* I know, stupidity, which i could lapse into again), then I watch random tv like like aljazeera, food network, Keeping up Appearances (old funny brit show on DSTV) etc. & Party on weekends & watch Revenge, Vamp Diaries & Secret Circle at night (online). (OMG i just saw 1 episode of Tamara Ecclestone $$ Dollar Girl: great way to torture yourself especially if you know what a budget is. I LOVE IT! Thorstein Veblen would be proud!)

That's pretty much all I've done, it hasn't been that crazy or exciting, and I didn't want to post tons of blogs without heart. So good news, life is very slowly getting exciting. but I must admit, I'm happy, life is fine, I'm not stressed, I'm chilling, I'm meeting a lot of fun and some really interesting characters. Lagos is pretty cool, and apart from GPS & friends I haven't missed Atlanta that much, I've kinda just accepted I'm here and I'm going to make the best of it, can you believe I've been here exactly 5 months!!!! NICE! geez I still feel like a newbie/ tourist.

I hope everyone's doing well, and I haven't quit blogging :)

If your subscribed you'll be notified the next time I post, or you can add me on twitter or facebook.

Till then take care. & feel free to hit me up before then *big kisses*

How's the weather? lol it's pretty warm here *docking from those throwing stilettos* :p

Love Bombchell.

Carmen, House Party, Shoes, Wind & Gutters.

2011-09-06T11:48:00.000-04:00

My friend Carmen came to visit from London: woot woot. Female friends are rare in Lagos so I'm excited to have a girl to hang with.

Sometimes i joke we're blonde & blonder, dear heaven this night was straight out of a movie. I secretly wonder if my life is scripted. In fact my weekend was filled with made for TV moments.

Close up on Carmen: Isn't she stunning!!! She's so funny love her to bits.

We were going to a cocktail/ house party on Banana Island. So to be safe I picked a formal looking dress that was also sexy aka short. I assumed the party would be indoors: WRONG. Geez we were outside, the wind was blowing, I had to stop standing or accept my new profession as a flasher. The party later moved inside and all was well with the world, i could dance, stand, and move around.

Me: look closer on the bottom right of my dress, gosh the wind wasn't my friend

I redid my hair in Nigeria: not bad huh *yea yea i know looks exactly the same as last week* BUT it only cost me about $25,/ N4000.--- Compared to ATL i can do my hair every week, they take out your extensions, wash it, relax your hair, wash, sew, etc OMG!!!! CRAZY. Finally something cheap in the city.

LOVE her shoes!

My cousin Arinze came with us to the party: woot woot! I think this is the first time he's on my blog. LOL readers keep tryna snatch up my brothers, well now here's my cousin lol.

So after the house party Carmen, My brother Chuka (not seen in the picture), and I were about to head off and party in the club with all our friends. On my way into the car i stepped in a gutter!!! A FREAKING GUTTER!!! My new shoes, My whole right leg, up to my knees!!! I was sooooo repulsed I asked them to drop me off at home.

Poor shoes def didn't see that shit coming when I took this picture earlier in the night

luckily or unfortunately only my feet/ shoes were covered in black (I'm still telling myself it's grime and mud, but i can't help but think of pee and other gross stuff). The good news is my shoes currently look normal, and I don't seem to have developed any scary disease on my leg: AMEN!

well that's all folks, I hope i won't be a Marni (ala "You Again" (2010) ) this week, cause all week I felt I was channeling her.

Here's Marni & my fave scenes for those who haven't seen it, so you can get my cookie analogy

that's all folks :)

Everywhere that ive been The only thing I see is Is.... Beautiful people

2011-08-29T12:17:00.001-04:00

so that's Chuka, I'm actually older than him!! Ladies you can stalk him here @CChuka lol

Friday I went to a club in Lekki with my brother. It was pretty cool, normally it’s a men’s club, age 40+, and members only, but this event was open. It was mellow, but I had a great time, especially since I haven’t really been out in a while. Well I had fun this weekend, met some really cool people (it seems like everyone is gorgeous in Lagos!!! I almost wanna burst out in a Chris Brown song. Ok maybe not technically everyone but A LOT OF PEOPLE)

Everywhere that I’ve been
The only thing I see is
Is beautiful people
Beautiful people
Beautiful people
...

Don’t you know, don’t you know
Beautiful, don’t you know, know, know?
...

Your beauty's deep inside.
Inside you.
Don't let 'em bring you down, no!...

There's me!

club hopped, partied with old friends. Had a blast (Don’t worry I’ll soon start doing a few nightlife pictures)

not sure how i feel about this picture

got the Dress from Cache a few years ago, the belt also from Cache this year.

a bit blurry but you can make it out

Bracelet: I can't remember.

Shoes: Borrowed without permission from my sis, Sheila's shoes rack: their from Bakers (she has too many glittered gold shoes, i doubt she'd notice)

Hair: I curled it with a curling iron, Then: i used bendy rollers to hold the curls in place while i did my makeup so the curls wouldn't get lose.

Some people tell me that my skin is great, please don’t be deceived by lighting or my photoshopping. I have crappy skin, don’t worry: my skin takes no offense to reading this insult cause it’s true. I’ve probably tried everything except Accutane, and maybe if I start drinking the recommended amount of water rather than 2 bottles a day, and stop eating groundnuts it might help. Either ways my skin is tryna fuck with my bride price!!!! Lol. It really really sucks. My skin has so many issues, which made me overly conscious, like I’d never see anyone without wearing powder to hide my acne spots (which I have even when I’m not breaking out). I could be running late to class but I’d stop to put on powder: hey…. It’s all about priorities. Now I’ve reached a point where I’m like oh well “F” it, if someone meets me and I have acne, they don’t care, and it’s more me that’s conscious about breaking out than them, so now when I breakout I’m like “Stupid acne, you can’t screw me over, cause I’m a bad chick in person & I can destroy you in pictures.”

I know some still don’t believe, and this picture below will demystify my hotness, but oh well. Remember my skin had issues in December, Tumini’s birthday, well now I didn’t realize how bad it was till I took this closeup. It’s much worse than December but, Oh well it’ll clear in a few days, then come back after, it’s a cycle that has been going on for a decade *shrugs*

Dear heaven i love these lashes! the brand is Darkness.

Saturday was amazing, went to a club opening, hung out with some friends from high school, and partied my ass off. I kept itching to bring my camera but had to behave myself, ick. I'm going to have to fix my small camera asap so i can take pictures or carry my big camera everywhere even if i feel awkward.

okay gotta run :)
Love Bombchell

What Have I been up to? 2nd month in Lagos

2011-08-20T03:41:00.001-04:00

This week i started interning with a nice ad agency here in Lagos (mon - thurs). What's cool about this apart from the experience, and that i work with some extremely talented people is that the office is close to my aunts house. Since it's pretty close to my aunt's house she sends her cook to my office with a home cooked lunch to me. Sweet Right!

Took this on Tuesday, then i had about 5 mins to look civil and see Horrible Bosses. --- that shirt is my "home" shirt. I wear it every single time i'm home. lol ask everyone who skypes me. it's like my hoodie.

This week i saw Horrible Bosses on Tuesday & Captain America (in 3d) on Thursday, both at the Palms Genesis Cinema. I admit i liked both movies though i found out a lot of people didn't like them. LOL not even the atlantic ocean can mess with my love for movies, and the cinemas here are pretty up to date, AMEN!!! I give the 3d experience a "B" OR "B-", didn't get a headache thankfully but some parts could have been less blurred/ double/ you know the 3d thingie that the glasses make 1, well i could still see 2 in certain scenes. Regular movies are N1500, 3D IS N2500 and omg wednesday is super cheap about N700, cant remember but get ready for a crowd. (N160 = $1)

I went to a lovely mexican restaurant, bottles with a friend from Nursery school. Nice food, expensive though. Apparently a lot of businesses don't have names outside them. Seriously there's no name, i think it has something to do with extra tax from the government. I wonder how my friends find out about new places. (I'll go again with my camera)

With photography I've met and heard about a couple of really good & experienced photographers here. I'm considering working with some, interning with one (fri - sat), second shooting, shadowing, etc. I'm still not sure which photographer I'll end up with, but i hope it's settled by next week, I would love to increase my photography skills, and retouching too.

contributing writer: i wrote an feature for a bi-weekly magazine that's based in Africa. I can't wait for it to come out, it'll be my first print, and hopefully I can scan it and show it to you guys.

well that's that. gotta run or I'll be late for some walk that my church is doing and i refuse to drive. OMG i need to tell you about how people drive in Lagos. It shouldn't be called driving.

Love Bombchell
(yea... i know: not much pics in this post)

What Is Your Genotype?

2011-08-12T23:08:00.002-04:00

Different places different issues.

As a kid I was sick a lot (well allergies, cold, i guess i still get them but it was bad then) so I generally assumed i was AS (because based on my genetic makeup I was either AA or AS), no biggie life went on. Then in boarding school I found out I was AA and was quite shocked because I'd always assumed i was AS. Now in adulthood my mother has no idea where i pulled my results from, and i don't remember exactly where i got the epiphany that i was AA, so while in the hospital today I checked my file, and there was no genotype listed. SO.... I went to the lab & took the test. Ugh I had to get the injection in my wrist cause they couldn't find my vien OUCH! it still hurts. Results will be in tomorrow, I'm going to the beach so I'll pick it up some other time, it's not that serious right now for me (but it's a serious issue).

yup I look like crap, not cause of the blood test but because i'm currently about to change into my pj's and sleep

So when someone here asks you "What's your genotype?" you might be puzzled and wonder if you're on a gameshow or if it's a science quiz. Funny enough most people that live in Nigeria, or West Africa are used to this question, and normally know the answer.

When people ask this, they are normally referring to your hemoglobin, (i know.... i see confused faces) basically they want to know if you have a sickle cell trait. Are you AA/AS/SS? This is a lecture from primary school that i definitely remember. (genotype could be whatever genetic makeup, but here these are the traits they are referring to)

What is Sickle Cell?

Sickle cell disease (also called sickle cell anemia) is an inherited blood disorder that affects red blood cells. The sickle cell gene causes the body to produce abnormal hemoglobin. In sickle cell disease, the hemoglobin clumps together, which causes red blood cells to become stiff and develop a C-shaped (“sickle”) form. These sickled red blood cells can block blood vessels, reducing blood flow in many parts of the body. This process results in tissue and organ damage.

- Lifespan.org

I'll explain in a quick Legally Blonde way.
AA is normal and good
SS isn't good, it's sickle cell anemia. (has the sickle cell disease)
AS is a result of parents that are AA + AS or parents with AA + SS. get it? (does not have the disease but is a carrier)

So a lot of people who want to have kids (and single people who want to get married) take this highly into consideration. A high population of people here and have the AS hemoglobin , and it's very important to know because if an AS & AS get married chances for an SS child are 25%, AS child 50% and AA child 25%. The main thing to know is that Sickle Cell Disease is a red blood disease that can be prevented, and that's why people care and make it a big deal. (ps: it's not just an African problem "It is the most common genetic disease in the U.S. An estimated 70,000-80,000 Americans have sickle cell disease." - SSCDA)

So most people who are AS are advised to marry AA to be safe or not have children because of the risk of having an SS child. You can imagine how complicated it gets with dating and child bearing. People fall in love that are AS and have to make serious decisions.

ps: those with AS are more resistant to malaria, so they have an advantage.

- If you are born in the United States they normally test you as a child.
- I was born in England and i guess they didn't
- Times might have changed and maybe now it's normal for all babies globally to be tested, i have no clue, so if you're preggers i guess you might wanna ask your Dr.

Image from http://www.sicklecellnwla.org/gallery.html

As a kid i remember the lifespan for those that were SS was quite short, I just read here in the National Heart & Blood Institute that with treatment now some live up to their 40's, 50's or more which is great news.

For more info checkout NHLBI and here for Kids or WHO for some figures.

Again: What is Sickle Cell Disease? (this has the gory parts)

Sickle cell disease is a serious blood disorder that causes acute pain, severe anemia, infections, and vascular blockages that can lead to widespread organ damage and death. It is a genetic disease, the most common inherited blood disorder in the United States, where it occurs most often in African-Americans and Hispanics. Until the past few decades, most people with SCD did not live beyond young adulthood, but advances in treatment have improved and lengthened the lives of patients who have access to good medical care.

-Duke Medicine

I admit if i happen to be AS I'll be a bit bummed since for almost a decade i thought I was AA, but oh well... life goes on. I'll just hope real hard that whoever I fall for happens to be AA. You know what I'll have to be proactive & nip it in the bud by asking the guy "What's your genotype?" definitely before, or on date No 5. at the latest.

.
..
.....
.......
.....
...
.

6.14 AM EDIT:

I just read ChicestGeek's comment (please read the comment section for more people accounts, and share yours)

*sigh* there's more. SS is one type of sickle cell disease, there's the possibility that also that someone could be AC and AD, just like you can be AS (A person with AC or AD still has 25% percent chance of having a sickle cell child C child or sickle cell D child )

image from sickle cell disease foundation california

Remember carrier's are advised to not mix. So if you are AS, AC, AD, or any trait that isn't AA be very careful and check your partner.

diagram to help:

what happens when an AC carrier & AS carrier mix: 25% chance of a child with Sickle Cell

Image from Univ of Iowa's Children's Hospital

DIY Feature: the wrap top sexy dress.

2011-08-04T07:21:00.001-04:00

I love some DIY's (Do it Yourself) especially the ones that are executed properly. I hardly ever do D.I.Y's I dunno maybe I'm lazy, don't want to buy the equipment, procrastination, fear it won't turn out right... Well regardless of my reason for not doing D.I.Y's I don't think you readers should suffer and not enjoy these various creative efforts that other people have done, and maybe it'll inspire you.

So i've decided to feature some D.I.Y's that I've enjoyed.

You should see the back!!! omg it makes it super sexy.

i'll call this the wrap top sexy dress, cuz you wrap the top, and it matches your skirt to form a dress. It's really nice, but to those with big boobs and those who can't go braless, we'll just have to admire from afar...

or maybe.... we could just tie it super tight and pray it doesnt budge, i remember something about duct tape in college when i decided to wear my pink scarf as a top, or a pink halter, thank heavens my memory is fuzzy, but i slightly remember after a night of crazy dancing, that duct tape wasnt as strong, so dont be deceived by that green Versace dress that J-lo wore to the 2000 Grammy's (then again her boobs aren't huge, so maybe if you have big boobs envy this style from afar.)

by
A Pair & a Space
An Aussie girl living in Hong Kong via London.
http://apair-andaspare.blogspot.com/

SO here's 1 option:

her full blog post can be found here and how she made the belt here

2nd option:

1. Place the strip of fabric over your shoulder.

2. Tuck one end of the fabric into the maxi skirt.

3.Twist and tighten the fabric over your shoulder, making sure to cover your breast properly.

4. Still twisting, bring the fabric around behind your back.

5. Bring the fabric across the front covering your other breast.

6. Bring the fabric around tightly behind your back again.

7. Keep wrapping tightly until you have run out of fabric. When this happens tuck the end into the wrapped fabric and stitch down.

Voila! You're done!

Made this collage so you could see all the sides & the back that I love so much.

here's her full post on this tutorial.

gosh it's such a sexy dress! I'm considering trying to modify it as a bikini coverup but we'll see. Hope you enjoyed this.

If you have any lovely D.I.Y's do share in the comment section or email me & I'd love to see it if you try this D.I.Y.

Love Bombchell.

watch TV SHOW: Single Ladies overseas (season 1, Episodes 1, 2, 3, 4 etc)

2011-08-01T04:24:00.006-04:00

Ok so I'm obsessed with watching Vh1's Single ladies. I loved it when I was in Atlanta, and I still love it now. but now every time i watch it I *sigh* cause it makes me miss Atlanta a little. I hope people realize it's fiction and this isn't exactly how Atlanta is. Then again yall are allowed to think so because heaven knows i thought Sex & the City portrayed NYC well since i had never been. LOL so now everyone probably imagines ATL has an abundance of sexy wealthy chocolate men with gorgeous women who are a bit too "progressive" sleeping around-wise. ok well the sexy women part is ACCURATE, Atl chicks are hot, yall know it ;)

If you are in the U.S you can easily watch it online via the vh1 website or catch it on TV Mondays at 9pm/8c on VH1. but if you are abroad it's a bit tricky due to your location vh1 won't let you watch it. bummmer:

to watch episodes 1 -10 on my blog: had to break the post because it made my blog slow to load. click below to continue:

thanks to Mr Yardie for all the videos & for alternates if these videos stop working go here to letmewatchthis and there'll be a ton of links to stream videos.

so here's Ep 1 "Two Hour Premiere"

Episode 2 "Cry Me a River"

(alternate episode 2 video players)

ep 3. "Indecent Proposal"

(alternates episode 3 vids)

i added alternative video streams because though megavideo is the fastest so far, after watching 72mins they kinda time you out, so you can use a different stream like potluck

ep 4. "Confidence Games"

f

(alternate ep 4 vids)

wonder what happened to Lauren london's charcter since episode 1, she was in a lot of the promos before it aired

hello new intern

ps: hope you've noticed you can click the bottom right to make it fullscreen :)

ep 5. "That's What Friends are For"

(alternates)

ep 6. "Old Dogs, New Tricks"

(alternates)

My fave characters: Malcolm & Keisha. I always love the fucked up relationships lol

*sigh* Malcolm breathes swag doesn't he!?

ep 7. "Take Me to the Next Phase"

(alternates)

not even a single cell in my body misses Daryll

ep 8: ‘Lost Without You’

(alternates)

ep 9. "Can't Hide Love"

(alternates)

ep 10. "Everything Ain't What It Seems"

ep 11. Season Finale: Is This The End:

Links to watch 11 are HERE, HERE and HERE:

if your too busy here's vh1's episode summaries.

(alternates)

hope this helped & kept you entertained & hopefully no one tries to shut down my blog for putting these up o_o lol.

WOW what a great show, can't wait for the new season!

Churrasco with the family (Brazilian Steakhouse in Lagos)

2011-07-29T02:43:00.001-04:00

ME: top & shorts: MANGO in NYC, Belt: Amanda's closet (sis), bag: mum's closet (not much has changed lol)

so sexy!!!! lol All diva'd out.

Ejeme "Jini" (for those who asked her collection isn't available yet online she's working on her website)

Sheila drove :) ---- OMG i have to find a way to show u guy how people drive in this city: Its like Wacky Racers!!!!

Here in Lagos we went to Churrasco for lunch, it's a lovely Brazilian steakhouse (for those in the states its quite similar to Fogo de Chao). It wasn't just an ordinary Sunday lunch, my aunt took us there to celebrate my mum's birthday (we actually celebrated friday, but it's a special day so we had to do it twice). I was quite excited to check it out because I had heard about it.

Churrasco
Bar, Salad Bar Brazilian BBQ, Churrascaria, Restaurant
1c, Ozumba Mbadiwe Road
Victoria Island, Lagos
Tel: 01-760 7171, 07063037776.
www.thelagoonrestaurant.com

another section of the Lagoon restaurant (Churrasco is part of it), nice view of the lagoon

It's a Churrascaria, apparently that means Brazilian steakhouse. The location is pretty cool, you can look out and see the lagoon, people on their jet ski's, the staff is really friendly, it's pretty clean, I had a fun time, and the food rocks. Oh yea as if i were a tourist, I took a ton of pictures. How I see it: better to take it with family than on a date, right?? I'd rather embarrass my brother than get stared at on a date. That's one thing i'm having a problem with, "when is it okay to bring my camera?"

My brother charles, who's escaped my blog cause he moved out of Atlanta

Salad Bar

You can see a bit of the grilling through the window

The Bar

Anyways back to food: You could get meat, or mixed (which was seafood & meat), there's no option of just seafood. Obviously I picked mixed lol. They had about 16 different types of meat (I didn't count, just asked the waiter). There were a bunch of nice meats (Im not a meat guru after a while i can't really tell you the difference), but omg the prawns were great!!! The prawns in this country are so huge it's great!!!! The lobster was nice, I wasn't too fond of the garlicky sauce but i still enjoyed it.

OMG!!! their Chapman is great!! (I don't know what goes into a Chapman or why chapman varies from restaurant to restarant, but it was nice! oh yea it's non alcoholic) would make a great daiquiri with some alcohol.

spicy meat

I made the waiter drop like 3 at a time on my plate. (I used that red sauce with almost everything)

The cool thing about being in Nigeria compared to abroad is that I'm not a raw meat, or medium rare person, and abroad it's all the rage, so whenever i asked for well done, i tended to get "almost burnt" but here there's a lot of people like me so I never got burnt meat, yay :) Whatever, I can hear all you medium rare fanatics shaking your heads saying I'm losing the quality & taste, I'm not eating it right bla blah lol tomato, tomato, same thing, well done meat tastes great to me, hence it's called "Well done!" lol.

I'll probably call the restaurant to get the exact price for those interested in checking it out.
I know our bill was about ₦130,000, we were a party of about maybe 14 people . It's a fixed price, and buffet style.
edit:

Cost: ₦6,500 for meat, & ₦8,500 for mixed (sea food & meat) this includes the salad bar, and excludes drinks

Ejeme & my sis are such goofballs! Love this picture! - Mancini took it - wish I could take credit lol

my little cousins are so adorable!

bumped into Amaka (haven't seen her since this old post in 2009)! it's crazy how you bump into people in Lagos.

Mancini (finally I grabbed a pic) & Amanda

dueces! that's about it (rode out with Amanda, then we bumped into more friends)

Hope you enjoyed the post!!

Really sorry I've been MIA on the net and haven't been able to reply twits or facebook messages, but... I now have a charger (which from here we drove to pick it up), YAY i can now blog, I got a surge protector so hopefully everything will be fine.

I know a lot of people haven't seen Nigeria & have crazy images about it, which some parts might be true, but through my blog I hope you get to see another view, we have cars :), we have roads, I can still watch vh1's Single Ladies & HBO's Trueblood via the net (don't ask how, lol same way those in the UK do it). My point is though there might be a ton of crap, there's also a lot of good, and Lagos is as normal as other metropolitan cities can be :)

Love Bombchell

In case I check out Ghana sometime this summer, would love to hear recommendations of places to check out from those who've been :)

Chocolat Royal for Breakfast

2011-07-25T04:37:00.000-04:00

Heaven Help me i'm gonna be a fattie!!

Chocolat Royal is a pastries, ice cream place here in Lagos. After church we decided to stop by and buy a bunch of goodies. I went in with the intention of buying about 3 chocolate filled croissants, and left with this.

Potato, Potato, Cookies or Biscuit.

each pastry was about N300-400 (roughly about $1.70 - $3, so pretty normal). It looked prettier than it tasted, It was ok.... I ended up adding a 4th, the chocolate croissant which i preferred to the almond (ick). So next time I might stick with my original choice of croissants, maybe a donut, and ice crream.

yea yea... quite unhealthy, i know, but I'm proud i didn't add any icecream. I probably would have added it but they only allow me to taste just 2 out of the many options that they had. Crazy huh?? How am i to pick a flavor by sight alone? I only do that with novels. so I saved myself some calories and N200 a scoop.

Chocolat Royal
267A Etim Iyang Crescent,
Victoria Island,
Lagos, Nigeria.
http://www.royalteas.com.ng/
+234 1 2714157

I wish I could say after this i had a healthy lunch but it was quite the opposite. Anyways can't wait to watch the HBO True Blood Episode from last night!! poor Jason!

How i dyed my extensions & curled my hair

2011-07-21T11:59:00.001-04:00

*whew* I still don't have a charger. Yup Im being cheap I can't justify buying a N35,000 apple charger (about $200) when it's worth about $87ish (under N15k)!!! So since all my friends with mac laptops decided to go on holiday, I've been computerless.

This post is thanks to Lola's charger! & this week Bawo's bringing me a charger from the States, yay! I swear i wont be a happy camper if the current in Nigeria messes with my charger again. Oh well let me not front, I'll pay that 35k, this way if it messes up a third time, I'll walk right into the store and act-a-fool.

so back to the post :) How i dyed my hair.

I had dark brown hair, and really dark off black extensions that I wanted to dye. I got Nneka's help 'cause she's an experienced hair guru, and I've never dyed extensions. My goal was blonde brown, but i got dark brown/light brown, which is fine. So here's what I did.

the new extension bundles i got & added in were super dark, a color 1b

& yea I got this particular extensions from sheizadiva@hotmail.com

It is processed Indian hair!!! (I didn't buy virgin hair, I'm too lazy to be bothered with maintaining virgin hair). This is proof that processed hair can dye, it just takes forever, and the lady at Sally's scared me saying adding bleach, color etc would mess it up. Well it didn't!! i bought good hair, so thankfully it came out great (and the fact that my sis, and cousins have dyed their hair in the past made me less nervous)

You can probably also dye hair from the store from brands like Bohyme or Velvet, but you might as well just buy it colored, I had to color mine cuz I got it natural color.

went to Sally's beauty supply & did russian roulette.

I mixed the blondes together and dyed the hair then put in a plastic bag.

Then I dyed the browns then put in a plastic bag.

then after all that hard work I realized i forgot to dye a whole bundle of very dark extensions!!!!

so I said "F it" and bought a kit from target, it has all the instructions, so you don't need to buy a developer etc, I already had already bought the bulk of it, and i was in between moving.

no matter what color the rest came out, I figured this would blend in. (got courage & sprinkled in some bleach)

And that was it, then I went to Nneka to sew it in & layer it.

she does hair in Atlanta, makeup, bridal parties, lol so hit her up.

ps: now I'm in Lagos, if you have any recommendations on a good hair salon/ stylist, PLS let me know. thanks.

PART B:

HOW I CURL MY HAIR:

A lot of people have asked how I curl my hair, So i'll give a general one.

Bendy Rollers!! Bendy rollers are great, cheap, easy & quick. & you don't need electricity to use them. I grab 4-8 depending on my mood, and roll, then bend and put it in a bonnet, and sleep. So once I wake up, my hair is in curls.

flexible/ bendy rollers come in different sizes, colors, lengths & brands - i use whatever bends -- make sure they work, Ive had friends get shitty packs that refused to bend, so they had to return it. but most work.

i normally buy the purple ones

To be specific last brand I bought:
Annie: Sof Twist Rollers, 5pcs, 3/4" diameter, for $5.99

I normally part my hair into about 4-8 and roll them neatly (no hair product, spritz or anything, just air and bendy rollers.) then i put em in a silk bonnet and sleep. This is a NEPA resistant style, so you'll be fine with or without electricity.

However this night was different. I had partied super late the night before and didn't bother rolling my hair & It had to air out, smelled of smoke. I refused to go to the salon knowing i'd be partying the night of MMR and it'd smell of smoke again. Gosh I hate that people can smoke in clubs here, you leave smelling gross. So... Honestly I rolled my haphazardly 2 hours before the event.

proof you don't need to be a genius to get decent hair

I swear i take the sexiest pictures ever lol :)

considering it was just 2hrs, the curls weren't as strong, so I used a curling iron to add 4 curls to the front, and that was it!

Someone asked if i dyed my real hair, Nope, I couldn't. sadly my real hair breaks off if i dye or rinse it so I'm stuck with what i've got, and we know how my hair loved to break. I'm still waiting on the center part of my hair to grow back. OOh and my hair is natural so i have to flat iron it sparingly, however, I think I'm tired, and will perm it tomorrow.

so that's how I did my hair for the event, and later than night... with all the humidity... it still looked okay:

i didn't blog about other people in the event, but she (bella naija) did so you can check out her post on the red carpet here

Hope this helped someone else a bit!!! And wasn't too confusing.
Love Bombchell.

ps: Nigeria's still fine, partied my ass off last weekend with fam & new friends, probably gonna start slightly working next week.

Lagos Week 2 & Music Meets Runway Personal Pictures

2011-07-11T16:20:00.006-04:00

OMG this week has been super great. I said I wouldn't complain again, and I tried to put out a lot positivity & I got it back: NICE! oh by the way, my mum claims I probably "forgot" I grew up on an island.... yea If I were my mum I'd hope so too.

Anyways onto this week! I ate a lot of Shawama (it's my lovely version of a quesidilla or pizza, with probably as much cardiac arrest, I've eaten it 3-4 a week, and I sometimes choose my last nightclub to hop to based on if they sell food), and not as much Suya as I hoped.

Brace yourself. This is going to be a super.... LONG post. words & pictures, so grab a drink, save this page (Ctrl + D), and keep coming back, unless your bored at work, or love me, then *high five*

I've been hanging out with a lot of old friends; and friends that I've made via technology so I feel like i've known them forever. Lagos definitely feels small. It's only been 2 weeks, but for almost every new person I've met there's one to zero degrees of separation between them an and old friend. E.G. meet a new person, they've dated an old person, meet another new person, and they schooled with an old person.

Fun Stuff:

- There's so... much opportunity it's insane, and I'm just praying it becomes real.... don't want to talk about it or jinx it.

- I've been getting a lot of photography opportunities here, and I really hope they become a reality.

- Went to an awesome house party on Friday, live band and everything (my lovely friend told me it was karaoke & I believed him for 5 mins), then club hopped & partied till 5 am

Pictures in this post are from Saturday aka july 9th,
The show has had a lot of media attention over here & overseas.

I'll give you the run down of the hoopla.

A show called Music Meets Runway was to be held Sat July 9th, it would feature 10 designers, 10 musical artists, on 1 runway, which it did. Genius right!! it's similar to Rip the Runway, or Fashion Rocks, but this is Nigerian designers, and Nigerian Artists, and Awesomeness, it's basically a fashion show & musical concert in one..

I couldn't recognize any of the musicians names, but the day of the concert I actually knew over half the songs, see... promoting various nightclubs in Atlanta came in handy. Anyways the hoopla started with people expecting Fabulous, Trey Songz & Ciara, who later weren't expected anymore. But the huge hoopla came from the Female host: Miss Amber Rose.

Amber has enough drama going on, so I won't bother stating her stuff, you can google it. But anyways Amber was the host and about a few days before the show she tweeted she had nothing to do with it, there was back and forth, media outrage, random gossip, mean gossip about the company Le Reve. Crazy shit basically. Luckily there was damage control, Amber tweeted again explaining that false management worked with Le Reve Events, and she went on a radio show in Nigeria and cleared it up.

Anyways long story the show was definitely going to go on with or without Amber, the 10 designers, 10 musicians, and that 1 fabulous runway wasn't going to go anywhere. A new female host was put in, and the show was fabulous!!!!! My heart goes out to the lady that owns Le Reve Events, she's such a sweetheart, I really like her, and this show was HUGE, so much work and talent, and dealing with all this drama on her first show must have been hard.

Ok... ok... picture time.

But before that OMG I told you Nigeria's expensive. I'm about to take Mancini & Fola's advice and stop converting to dollars. Get it? If i don't convert to dollars, I'm not sure of the value, and that way it won't hurt!

Event price:.......................................................... xe.com today's rate of 1=152.47 (though people says its 150 or 158)
₦5,000 for regular admission (balcony) .............. $32.79
₦10,000 regular................................................... $65.59
₦20,000 VIP........................................................ $131.17
₦350,000 Tables (can fit 10)................................$2,295.53 ........ there were 80 tables

Now enjoy pictures!!!

Ladies Getting Ready. (all extensions by Sheizadiva@hotmail.com then dyed or natural)

Sis Amanda & friend Friend Ejeme/ designer Jini)

Mandy, Me, & Ejeme

What I wore

Jini - located in Lagos (+234-807 0829 698) (jiniiil@yahoo.com)

Me. Me. Me!!

Now More of me

heeeeeey Gorgeous! (@GorgeousMandy)

Jini Rocks!

Hey Sexy!!! @SheizAdiva

lol told my sis that I should wear my shoes while she wears hers, so people will know we both have it... and she looked at me crazy! lol whatever, y'all know you thought it.

Love my girls!

Who remembers my lil Bro! Mancini (both on holiday here with me)

Heeeey Nnamdi

My darling Zina on holiday here (outfit by Jini)

Love this!

Don't blame us for taking so many pictures, blame digital camera's for that capability ;) I combined a lot of pictures to make them less. We actually made it on time .... well it started nigerian time, 9ish lol instead of 6.

Musician & Male host: Banky W.

Hosts: Banky W. & Toulz

our table.. well Spice TV had a table, so we sat on the next one.

Gifs/ Animated pictures of some shows

gif 2: Design by Obsidian & Artist: Wiz kid, our justin bieber.

ok I had to make a VIDEO because this was this guys first performance ever, and they were so hype!!! loved it. Also took a vid from Naeto C.

more pics:

Love this pic of WizKid

middle Chizoba (OMG everyone's grown up!!!!)

Jacket also by Jini

I realize Jini's outfits are allover this post!!! lol guess we all love it.

my girl Lola! (LolavitaHair.com)

Ladies lost their minds. heeeey,he was the only shirtless guy, I screamed too.

Naeto C.

Saturday: After the awesome show, we hung out then club hopped, had an amazing weekend.

GUESS WHAT!!! Do you know my battery died!!!!!! I HAD TO GET ALL GHETTO and charge it at a Samsung Station once i got there!!! Samsung was the main sponsor, and a big shout out to them, cause if not for them, yall wouldn't get to see any pictures of the show.'

Congrats to the Organizer; Le Reve Events!! memorize that name :)
Congrats to all the designers: my faves collections were Obsidian, Tsemaye Binitie, Babuhska, Virgos Lounge & the last guy (don't get me wrong, they were cool, but i could see myself wearing this, so no one fight me!)

Performances: They all rocked! Loved it all. I admit when Sasha performed I kept thinking & hoping she'd say "I only go back when i do the moonwalk, K'mon, do the moon walk" lol

Sunday
*GASP*
before i forget. It rained sooo.... much on Sunday, I was more than tempted to skip mass. I kinda slept thru 6.30 am mass, then slept through 9am when sheila and charles went. PS: my little brother Mancini went to 6.30am mass *SIDE EYE!!! cuz I saw him at the club 4am, even danced with him!!*

So the rain never stopped! And Amanda & i definitely had to go to church or my mum would believe we're pagans.

~~check out my cell phone pictures.(decided I have enough pics, lol)~~

A lot of ladies have asked me bout my hair, how I colored it, & how I curl it, I promise.... the next post is just about that.

Guys
Dear Heaven there has been so much eye candy. I keep telling myself, think business, focus on photography, writing, working etc cause we know.... when bombchell falls... I'm like a kid in a candy store, so I just look, blush or act like i can't see them, and look away thinking of all the gorgeous calories i can't have.

Hope you all enjoyed this post :)
lol ~~Lagos~~ Bombchell ~~in Africa~~ <----- get it, now yall can stop with the jokes, lol.

for more pics/ individual pics CLICK HERE

last edit: I use my Sony A33 (i switched between 2 lenses (a) 50mm 1.4, which i shot the video without flash, and (b)24-70 Sony Carl Zeiss lens)

Lagos: Week 1

2011-07-07T02:16:00.001-04:00

This has been my past week:

though i've been mostly bored.com a lot has happened.

Everyone keeps asking me "how I'm doing?" "How is Lagos?" etc etc and the easiest answer I've come up with is "I'm adjusting."

I honestly thought I'd come back after almost a decade and adjust easily, well I visited 6 years ago. Hmm it's so.... not the case. It's a huge adjustment. Customer service sucks. Prices are freaking expensive. For the money here, I could probably live in Soho. Better stuff, for this price!

For example:
- Looking for a gym: $ dollar equivalents. $100- $400 a month
- Went to an orthodontist here: ortho $100 consultation, $100 dentist consultation & $100 xrays. (basically paid $300 for a consult)
(trust me you dont want to see the rest of the bill for the future)

Fun Stuff:
- Been hanging with friends & family that I haven't seen in ages! Luckily Ive maintained friendships since nursery & primary school, and made some more along the way. social networks & blackberry messenger rock with keeping in contact!

- It's raining season!! so it's barely hot (we have 2 seasons: Raining & Dry). I can say it's not worse than the Atlanta heat that I dealt with before traveling.

Blonde Stuff: I didn't know I grew up on an Island (it sounds soo weird to say I live on an island, I must look into it cause it doesn't seem real)
- I live on an island, it doesn't really look like one, so...... i kinda never knew it was an island until this week until this week. Its complicated. Okay I live in Lagos, it's a city in Nigeria. I lived somewhere (apparently the mainland), then at age 9, I moved elsewhere (apparently the island), at 10 I went to boarding school in a different state for 6 years (visited for breaks). And somehow over the years, It never clicked!!! I don't know how, It just didn't.

I swear it's like they just made it an island last week, everyone tells me "OMG Michelle what did you think the bridge was for??" My reply "Bridges exist without islands! How would i have known" Blame the map not me, it didn't look like an island. Oh well people thought the world was flat for a long time. I only just realized because this week a lot people kept saying stuff like "I'm coming to the Island" "I work on the Mainland" so I asked, and I got an answer.

I know, I should be ashamed to write all this, but I honestly had no clue, and it feels insane.

Crazy Moment
People in this city can party!!!! Gosh went out on Saturday and partied into the morning. Since it was raining season, there was a huge puddle/ flood outside the club so... imagine NY where people are always ready to hustle, here in Lagos there were men there with umbrella's helping ladies (and perhaps other guys if they wish) by carrying you across so you don't mess up your shoes etc lol and you tip them afterwards. NICE!!!!

Bad Moment
My computer!! My darling MacBook Pro got messed up!!!! It used to vibrate when plugged in which is weird because most computers are dual voltage. Then 2 days ago it stopped charging, and shocked me 3 times when i tried to charge it!! Yea my friends say I need to wear rubber slippers.

Def learning a lot, it's pretty interesting, and that's a bit of what has happened to me Week 1.

Love Bombchell (comp battery dies in 30 mins, smh)
(shirt: H &M, gif animation made with GifFun for mac)

Good Wolf vs Bad Wolf

2011-06-30T06:40:00.003-04:00

this image was originally made for the popular 10 ways to get revenge post, bad bombchell! but it kinda fits this post :)

hmm so Bad Bombchell vs Good Bombchell, and by bad I don't mean Naughty... I mean just downright bad.

Today while reading Jess's blog i read the coolest story: It's a popular Native American (Cherokee) story, "Good Wolf vs Bad Wolf."

omg I always considered myself a good person. I remember when I told my friends "I'm a good person, I don't drink & drive!" and they burst out laughing. Really I don't drink and drive, I don't think it's good, so I don't do it. This story made me question myself, and what wolf I am. I'm not saying people who drink & drive do are bad people necessarily because I've let drunk people or worse drive me (aka because i didn't drive lol), but it's reckless. As i see it, I do normal stuff, I'm more nice than I'm mean, I say 75% nice, 25% bitch, not too bad, right? I have my issues, but they can't be that bad because some people have serious issues!!!

Ever heard of that bad wolf, good wolf story? If you haven't, well here you go..

"One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, "My son, the battle is between 2 wolves.
One is Evil. It is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.
The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith."
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, "Which wolf wins?"
The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed." "

when i first read this I was like, OMG i'm more of a bad wolf, cause the good wolf definitely sounds like a mythical creature in comparison.

let's see how I stand:

Bad Wolf

anger: check
envy: not really, kinda sorta, but not really, okay fine I envy some people's blogs! well just 3, see so... not really, but I get a ping of jealousy when I see a novelist thats under 25 like the "ps: i love you" lady. (however I've never been envious of a photographer, just in awe of the great ones)... ok I'm tired of justifying my envy
sorrow:greatefully no
regret: not really
greed: nope
arrogance: sure guys I've liked have been slightly arrogant. I might be warped enough to find it slightly sexy. I need help!!! lol
self-pity: why not
guilt: I don't know, kinda. isn't that natural, oh well I blame Catholicsm!! catholic guilt & cultural guilt is definitely fun, not! maybe they should add "blame" as a trait of the bad wolf.
resentment: slightly
inferiority: nope
lies: def not, unless maybe you count omission, or being good with words, I call it "HR." *sigh* this makes me sound like I'm lying, but i really truly try to avoid lying, so I hate when people downright ask me a hard question because they know I'll answer truthfully. I'm sure my mum loves this.
false pride: hmmmm, how do you know it's false?
superiority: hmmm
ego: Yup!

Good Wolf

joy: huh
peace: a dream
love: sure
hope: sure,
serenity: do people really exist who have this???
humility: i'll work on it
kindness: yes! finally something
benevolence: intention
empathy: sure
generosity: I don't know, maybe not enough, yea def not enough
truth: yup (go back to lies)
compassion: yea
faith:: hmmm, slowly but surely

It's definitely time for me to feed my good wolf!! you know what, the first time I read this story I thought most of my attributes were with the bad wolf, and barely any were with the good wolf, but now I see i'm a bit of both.

From reading jess's blog, I realized or it reinforced my forgotten belief that we have a dialectic relationship within ourselves. It's a tug of war, of so many choices, and we are the end result. Watching the Arrangement Bureau on the plane made me remember we all have free will, we just don't choose to exercise it but many of us act as if we have no choices. Sure some choices are less favorable than others, or require more patience, but it's still a choice. And i can say I am who I am today because of the people i've been around; friends, family, professors, school, the things i have chosen to eat, experiences that have occurred, and decisons I have made. (huh?? did someone ask for my major in college? it was Sociology. did you just say now it all makes sense? lol)

You know what? this wolf isn't too bad :) but I could definitely do better, and so can you. A little at a time, a little a day, and who know we might become that mythical good wolf or better.

-signed Bombchell Oprah ---- Mark & LaaLaa yall asked her so you better read lol.
.
.
.
.
.
.
I always joke that admiting you have a problem is the first step, but after admitting it I never do anything about it. I'm lazy (i still haven't decided if I want to do anything about that, I don't think I want to *hides face*), I procrastinate (dear heaven this needs to change, i keep getting into horrible situations), and anger (remember this post).

Well last week I decided to take a step (I know 6 months - years later but it's a step!!!)
I bought a book on anger & procrastination!! * insert bbm happy dance*

step 3 will be to read it

step 4 is to practice what I learn.

lets just enjoy step 2 for now. So.... what wolf are you feeding? and remember from Today you can consciously decide what wolf to food or how much food to give either.

and just incase you are like me, filling this might change your mind of which wolf you think you feed. You can also add your copied & pasted version into the comment section

Bad Wolf
anger:
envy:
sorrow:
regret:
greed:
arrogance:
self-pity:
guilt:
resentment:
inferiority:
lies:
false pride:
superiority:
ego:

Good Wolf
joy:
peace:
love:
hope:
serenity:
humility:
kindness:
benevolence:
empathy:
generosity:
truth:
compassion:
faith:

Bombchell's Last Weekend in Atlanta. (Going Away Dinner @ Divan)

2011-06-28T18:23:00.002-04:00

Yay! Made it safe to Lagos today! It was an 11 hour direct flight from Atlanta, GA to Lagos, Nigeria. I left around midnight so I mostly slept, I also watched Adjustment Bureau & Most of Harry Potter Deathly Hallows part 1 (ooh flew Delta).

My brother & Sister will be at work tomorrow so I might be bored out of my mind. I only have 2 luggages as of now, I have about 3 more than I'll need to fly here. Hope i don't run out of clothes. And our inverter needs to be fixed!! ARGH.... ok let me back up, and explain the whole inverter thing.

So in Nigeria, we use NEPA for electricity, kinda like i used GA Power in Atlanta. However NEPA's for the whole country, and doesn't provide constant power aka a lot of times there's no electricity. So when NEPA takes light, most people use generators, it's pretty standard but i think it can expensive with diesel or something... i dunno, but it's expensive to run. So apparently, now people use interverters (I'm not even sure of the spelling), but it charges when there's a big power supply like NEPA, so it canpower up little stuff like fans etc when there's no light (that's my rough knowledge, if i'm wrong someone will correct in the comments).

My point is, tomorrow will NOT be a fun there if i have no light! lol. Anyways back to Friday, 3 days ago :)

here are the pictures from my going away get together

Gorgoeus Buki!! @BukiBaby love this picture, gonna miss watching chick flicks with you! & I love love love your hair cut!

I've known Buki for a long time, almost since I moved to Atlanta, she's friends with Nneka's older sister. We have a bunch of mutual friends & just started getting close, then i decided to "up & leave."

Meron!!! my oldest friend in the states!!

I met Meron at Oxford of Emory, when i was 16 and we attended college together. Love this chick to pieces. (People sometimes ask me how to meet friends, and in this case we rekindled. We never quarreled we just lost touch, and found ourselves later).

Her hair looks great right?? i'll show you what she did earlier in the day before she came. Sorry luv don't kill me, oh well you can't catch me 'til Dec:

& me & my brown hair!!

some ladies have asked about my hair. It's extensions, dark brown, I dyed it. Nneka sells hair, but i bought this (Indian hair extensions) from SheizAdiva (my sis & cousins brand). You can email them to order at sheizadiva@hotmail.com because i mixed used and new pieces.

Guess what this is?

It's my clutch!!! big deal cuz I barely carry bags, got it from DSW for under $30

We Went to DIVAN in buckhead, where you can smoke hookah, we're mostly newbies so it was a fun experience.

Divan
3125 Piedmont Road
Atlanta, GA 30305
(404) 467-4297
www.divanatlanta.com
Open Mon-Thu 7pm-12pm; Fri-Sat 7pm-2am; Sun 7pm-11pm

ps: their kinda anal about time so if you make an appointment for a large party, make sure they are there within 20mins. i kinda lied to my friends and told them an earlier time, smh some were still late!! lmao.

It was getting dark so kept doing camera tests for the right light

camera test 2

you must test!!

*TEAR DROPS!!!!!* M & N, what shall we do!!!????

My gorgeous cousin Nneka

NK & BUKI!

Cynthia (@therealbuchi) & Nneka (@OnyeGucci) are sisters. Funny thing you don't see Cynthia much on my blog, but if you go back 3 years ago you'll find her in my first posts. :( gonna miss you!!

and just incase someone asks: Nneka is wearing the extensions she sells, and so in Cynthia (she dyed hers)

My cousin Adaora flew in from LA. (total jet setter!!! she was just in Ethiopia & bout to be in London, I need to hide in her suitcase)

Me & Nneka

My dear friend Onuwa. We're like Tom & Jerry it's silly, but we mean well. Really great guy & def glad I'm friends with him. ps: I better see you in 6 weeks

remember i told yall my braces have barely helped!! PS: The refund i told you about came in. amen!!

LMAO!!!!!! I love this picture!!!!!!!

SOSA!!!!!!!!!!! came in from Alabama *sigh* waaaaaaaaaaay too many memories. At my bachelorette party she'll def have all the stories! Love you girl. Amen for bbm.

MY BUDDY JUSTIN!!!! we've known each other since 04 he says. but we' became friends later. LOVE YOU BABE. def miss you, you better come on SKYPE (>_<) and you really really should visit :) oh yeah ladies he was in my Hot guy Friends list.

to my friends from dinner :( I miss everyone!!! and love yall soooo much!! glad yall came out to dinner, had a lot of fun & better visit soon!!!

to everyone that commented in the last post: Thanks for all the well wishes it really means a lot to me, because i was nervous about the trip. Guess we'll see what Lagos has to offer. Time to meet old friends & make some new ones.

Where's the food porn!! you say!? HERE IT IS :)

Buki's food

Meron's food

Shish Kebab's on right & left

Adaora's food

YUP everyone else got shish kebabs

It felt like i had a birthday party :)

Jet lagged!
bombchell.

I'm Moving out of Atlanta to.... (quick video)

2011-06-26T09:20:00.002-04:00

edit: some people have a problem with the music that's normally on the top right of my blog, so I decided to remove it, so people can watch videos easily (& people have always had a love/hate relationship with it lol)

1st video: 2009: live video on my first trip to miami
2nd video: 2010: goofy video about silly moment, i confess I was on the master cleanse and that's why i was in that predicament.

i've been promising to make another video ever since, so I decided, why not make another one? As awkward as videos are I decided to personally answer a question that I've been getting since I've been talking about moving, but have not really said where I'm moving to.

It's a quick video under 5 mins. I just got done with my dinner & I already miss everyone. This video answers where I'm moving to, and the few others I get. Enjoy.

Entering Shopping Rehab (Top 4 Shoes & Some Sales in the city)

2011-06-23T21:07:00.003-04:00

So i've been shopping for shoes. Ya'll will be so proud of me. I can't believe i went from the girl with 1 black heeled shoes, to the girl with about 4 different black heeled shoes in one month.

I'm moving so I'm doing about 1 year's worth of shopping, my bank almost cried when I left MAC cosmetics, I spent over $200 there. I've been telling Nelysia & Nneka that I feel so.... sick from all this shopping. Nneka claims the cure will come when i wear all the new clothes, shoes etc.

I think I've bought enough shoes to last me 2-3 years. You don't understand, I've rocked my black Tory Burch flats so.... much that the sole is insanely worn out, I asked about resoling it today (YES i can be that cheap), they said it starts at $80, HECK NO!! i'd rather kill these shoes with 3 more months, and buy em for $195 next year. I'm really glad I'm moving out the country, because after this one month of constant shopping, any more time and i think I will become a shopaholic. Dear shopaholics i'm even starting to recognize products that look similar, and say stuff like "Omg I saw this shoe at DSW yesterday," or "Michael Kors has a similar product," and even "you can get this same Bakers sandals at Shoeland for $20." Yes i definitely need rehab. So i've declared today My last shopping day. So Nneka please stop welcoming me to the dark side!! I rebuke it.

I've probably bought about 16- 20 shoes in the past month. Here's my top 4 from today & yesterday since i promised Nneka & Lynda.

Mini Shoe Haul

I call em my Pink Dorothy Shoes (ala wizard of Oz) -- got em yesterday from DSW for under $100. name: Steve Madden

yesterday from DSW. name: Madden Girl about $45

OMG MY FAVE!!!! got em today from Jedal at Phipps Plaza $99 (I secretly don't want to say the price, cause they look more expensive, but i love yall). oh name: Psh

Got these from DSW. SE Boutique by Sam Edelman Group

Randoms to help Shopaholics. *SALES*

- Zara is having a sale starting tomorrow (according to Nneka, and she knows her stuff).

- Jedal is at Phipps plaza, and doing buy 1 get 1 FREE!!!! some shoes are 200-500 but if you look hard you'll see some for $99, and say hi to Yarill / @Toych3st for me. (OMG he is soooo cool, he showed me a picture wearing some badass red & black heeless shoes!!!!!! )

- Karen Millen has some dresses for 70% off. (down stairs lenox mall) (got a dress for $100, it was $350 before)

GUYS!!! FOR YOU:::
- Express is having a great sale!! MEN: $15 & up shirts
& Ladies they have jeans buy 1 get one 1/2 off, and dresses on sale

- Victoria Secret is having their semi annual sale

- Shoeland (where shoes are from $15 - $35) if you buy 10 ask for a discount (10%), all year.

- Bath & Body Works is having buy 1 get the other 50% off.

- DSW & Nordstrom Rack : Are right by each other and have great deals! (up to size 11 shoes)

as you can tell from this list my credit card is having an eating disorder right now, fat today skinny tomorrow, then fat again, and the cycle continues.

omg i can't wait to watch Bad Teacher with Cameron Diaz!!! ugh I have to start packing, it's sooooo much i don't even know where to start.

A-Z of my horrible experience with Family Orthodontics of Georgia (aka wefixyoursmile.com) / Damon braces

2011-06-22T01:01:00.003-04:00

I hate bad customer service, i really detest it. Sadly the horrible rotten apples that work in customer service tarnish the name for most people that work there, and keep the stereotype going. Sometimes I have an experience so bad that I get so angry and i can't believe it's real.

Well this is a shitty experience. and worst $5000 i ever spent, and how i'm fighting to get my refund before i leave the country.

I feel bad because the doctors I've dealt with have been really nice, their assistants were nice, but... the other people have been soo... bad, rude and frustrating that it has made my whole experience a nightmare. Here's the A-Z of my experience. so buyers beware.

A) while looking for braces, I chose Damon Braces solely from internet research, it seemed clear or tiny (which if you have seen my blog pictures know it def isnt clear and it is VERY visible) and it claimed to be faster which hasn't been the case.

from Damon Braces cite (well guess what it's definitely metal below & visible when i smile)

i swear i must be wearing a different brand of braces, cause my metals are def visible as you've seen

B) I picked the Dr that was closest to Buckhead because i hate driving and sometimes get anxious when i drive. My friends and family know i barely go past 10 miles, and hate even being a passenger. I hate driving far.

C) This organization is called Family Orthodontics about 2.3 miles away.

D) Though advertised as close by, I was told that the closer location would not be completed for a few months, this ended up being about 6 months later.

So i was stuck at the Roswell location
E) It looked like a children's dentistry place, with gorgeous murals, and cartoons playing on TV screens, video games everywhere, it's definitely better than a chuck e cheese. But I was assured that they treated adults (its both children's dentistry and a some orthodontics).

F) I was shown damon braces, and had also seen the videos on their site. During my consultation the braces seemed clear. The Reality: after i paid the middle top 8 are clear and the bottom, and top sides are metal. and i had seen a strictly demonstrationional model or whatever they call it.

yup! that's what I got :)

G) ACTUALLY on day 1, even though i paid $500 extra for clear brackets they made a mistake and gave me all metal brackets because the lady forgot to write it in the chart. I then had to sit down and wait for them to take it out, and put the right ones in, torture.

h) I left confused about the metal brackets on my bottom jaw, because i was shown a clear model on both top and bottom jaw. but it was too late to go anywhere i had paid in full.

I) Knowing that I would be might be moving out of the country in a year i asked about the refund before I got my braces and was told i would be refunded for services that weren't done.

J) One appointment i went there, and the power was out, I'm not sure why, so I was taken by the window and the assistant didn't put my wires in correctly which i realized after i had left.

k) Since they have 3 orthodontics and so many locations, certain dr's are assigned to certain locations, which they operate from only once a week.

l) I week i was schedules for an appointment i tried to change the date to no avail because i had a huge exam. Guess what the morning of my appointment, due to the weather they didn't show up, nor did they have the courtesy to call me and cancel. t

j) Customer service sent me a target gift card (of about $25 or 40) to apologize for the various inconveniences i had dealt with.

k) a dentist told me i had a lot of cavaties and an orthodotist should have never put braces on me without checking, my dr. looked and said i was fine, and made the dentist seem like a quack. life went on

l) last year I asked for a tally of my possible refund to me emailed, and no one ever gave it to me.

At the new closer location
m) This year when the location close to me finally opened i switched to that location, and didn't miss the far drive

n) This year I went to the dentist again and he told me i had cavities. I told my new orthodontist who informed me that normal procedure they made sure you get checked out before you can wear braces, and he called the lady who works in children's dentistry to check on me, and guess what she said my teeth are in really bad shape, and i definitely need to have get it taken care of, and the braces would make it worse.

o) well it's been almost a year since Ive had braces, and my new orthodontist informed me that my teeth are moving so slowly that braces might not work for me.

p) moving forward, I'll be leaving the country soon, can I please have my refund. sure no problem, you can pick it up on your last appointment right before you have to leave the country.

q) for 2 months I've been asking the company Damon braces to give me a list of their international dr which was listed last year when i decided to get Damon braces, but thanks to a website redesign international dr's are no longer listed.

r) on appointment day, can i please get my check? oh wow they have no idea what I'm talking about and haven't tallied my check!!!! This is a month later!!! and no check!!! So they tally it up, it's supposedly only about $1000 left. fine give me my check. no they'll mail it to me. problem it might not get here soon enough.

s) A week later, I call, what's going on with my check. I'm transferred to Traci who tells me she has heard about my nasty attitude and she has heard the story about me leaving the country but i have only 2 choices. to drive all the way to Woodstock, (41minutes!!!) to get my check, or she can mail it to me. Great it's been a week and this bitch hasn't mailed it. So I ask if she can expedite it or when the check will get here and she informs me that she is not the mailman.

t) Obviously I'm very pissed. Not only will i have to find a new Dr overseas (they finally gave me a lady's name overseas), and pay a new dr, but worst of all the bitches don't want to give me my refund!!!

u) The customer service is so horrible. I feel like bitch slapping the receptionist at the Sandy Springs location that looks like she 18 and has zero manners, I always wonder how she got that job.

v) Before you pay 5 thousand dollars in full for braces, make sure it's not with this company, or at least go in prepared to deal with a bitch at the front desk, a fat cow called desiree (office manager), another bitch behind the phone called tracy that probably has no life and refuses to give you back your money, which she probably cheated you off in the calculations.

w) If you did read all, and even if you didn't summary. Be careful about choosing companies based of the internet. be careful about refund policies. be careful about this company especially if you want an orthodonitc refund.

x) Again I feel bad because the dr's and their assistants are nice. And in my last rant about horrible companies & customer service, someone mentioned to me that it is unfair when I do not put the company's name so people can be warned.

Y) ~~Animal Farm~~,
~~Where the most bitches hibernate~~
Family Orthodontics (about 6 locations, I've only dealt with 3)

2230 Towne Lake Parkway
Building 1100, Suite 100
Woodstock, GA 30189

Phone: 678.445.9191
wefixyoursmile.com

yeah right, its open just once a week in my location for a few hrs.

Z) so if any of you do feel sorry for me in anyway, and have any ideas of how I can collect my refund, $1,000 might be nothing to you but thats a lot! Please contact them via Twitter, Facebook, or on their site, and tell them to improve their customer service & please give me my refund before i leave the country! (oh well, Guess i'll probably have to road trip to see the fat pig and get my refund & records)

more random B.S about Damon clear which maybe the name is deceiving and i should have paid more attention, so please dont be as silly as me, do more research or better yet save yourself the hassle and get traditional braces, or traditional clear braces, and you won't need a specialized dr.

Anyways that's my lovely rant.

edit 10.33am: I called that I was going to pick it up like some of you suggested, and guess what Tracy claims she mailed it out yesterday, but has no tracking number because she sent it out in regular mail. so there goes my check and my records.

edit Mon: i finally got my check! amen!

Pinkberry with O & the butler

2011-06-16T18:51:00.002-04:00

so right before i ran to NY, I met up with one of my friend's O. He's pretty cool but more camera shy than my other friends. Before I move i'm trying to catch up with most of my friends. I feel like my life is hectic now, I'm trying to cancel gym membership, training membership, netflix, see doctors, get necessary shot or pills to prevent malaria if need, othodontist, take exam, write paper, pack, ship or fly clothes, etc. my brain is everywhere, but tomorrow me & my sister are taking my little cousins to the water park.

So back to last week's hangout.

So that's The butler.

That's me: I always feel goofy when someone else takes my picture

I normally get original & all yogurt chips but this time i was adventurous.

I got salted caramel yogurt, which fit it's description with yogurt chips and some caramel sauce for an extra 0.50 cents

he got watermelon & something i think pineapples,crackers and something

The staff is really nice

so this Pinkberry is located beside CVS where the Marble Slab used to be!!!!!

remember my post from marble slab with my friend Fola, well it was years ago. (feb 2009 to be exact)
the post is here:
few pics for memories:

Memories!!! oh Marble I'll try not to miss you or cheat on you a lot with Pinkberry.

LOL i'm such a fattie. Icecream or Yogurt Im happy provided it's sweet. circa 2009

so if you're in Buckhead looking for the new pinkberry location (well it opened in March)

Pinkberry (Buckhead)
3637 Peachtree Rd NE
Atlanta, GA 30319
Neighborhood: Buckhead
(404) 949-0459
www.pinkberry.com

Maybe GA is getting healthier or the creamery went broke :(

so back to the future, or well considering it was last week I guess the past.

Technically he's not in the picture right???? lol & it's a cool shot of his yogurt. so he agreed to these.

well so far that's what's up with me. went shoe shopping today, I feel like i'm starting from scratch building a work closet, I'm probably going to be the girl at work with one brown shoe and one black shoe, not that I mind.

I also just found out that my aunt's birthday will be in Ghana, now that I'm moving should be easy to go. I'm super excited because I've never been to Ghana, nor did i ever think I'd ever go. So once i heard my mum say "birthday".... "wanna go"... didn't think twice!! I said YES!

Laters luvs :) hope everyone's having a tolerable week.
Bombchell.

My NYC Trip with Nneka in pictures & words.

2011-06-14T12:34:00.004-04:00

Huge thanks to all those who commented on my blog, or via twitter telling me where to go in NYC since its my first time. Went clubbing at Club Rebel on friday till bout 6am (interesting club: they served wine with a plastic cup & straws, $armin was laughing at me via bbm, then my cellphone got stolen, then some guy who brought us shots of patron spilled it on me *sigh*).

Friday Night: blackberry pics are horrible: Got my dress from Express. Nneka got her's made

On Saturday our cab guy invited us to come to his apartment, HECK NO! such guts!! this trip has been crazy. Didn't get to shop on Saturday because it was raining, so just hungout with friends in Washington Heights and tried Domincan food, then had chinese for dinner, and watched random movies while drinking some wine called Sweet Bitch, I'm sure my trainer must be proud. It cost $22 to washington heights, and $22 back by cab, and they announce the price before they drive.

Saturday: Nneka. SHIRT & SKIRT from Zara. NECKLACE: Macys

Dont i look super excited!

whoever Anonymous was, she knew her shit! We stayed in our friends condo in the Bronx. OMG the Bronx is sooooo freaking far.

OMG look from left end: Pelham Bay park, now look to the right end After Astor Place, Beeckam or something. Count the stops.

Sunday was we had to take a $7 cab to Pelham Bay Park station, then like anonymous said pay $2.25 for 1 ride to wherever we needed to shop. We decided to tackle Soho. I'm a bit sad i didn't get to check out the chicken cupcakes $armin talked about or meetup with EtherealPrey for the apple bbq at Madison Park since my phone was gone & the rain.

ME: getting ready to eat some kebobs. OMG for some reason pictures look better there. i think cuz of the overcast that day
Top: Bebe, Shorts: H&M, Bag: Louis, Belt: some cheap one that came with an outfit.

My gorgeous cousin Nneka: who's a makeup & Hair stylist in Atlanta

Top: H&M, Skirt: Urban outfitters, Bag: Gucci, Belt: thrift Store, Watch: Michael Kors

got these earings in Black too. originally he said $20, then gave me 2 for $30

People all over NY have actually been super nice, cause heaven knows we would have been soooooo LOST! We didn't understand how to get to the train station, how use the metro card thing, nor which way to go, where to direct the cab, and when we were in soho where on earth the shops were, how to find back the train to go home, etc. A lot of people here have google maps on their phones and busted it out to help us.

Being in a city without a cell phone is hard!!!! I was in front of topshop waiting on my cousin Nneka to get out of Zara for 30 mins - 1hour, and was hoping she wasn't looking for me at another store, or maybe she was inside topshop. My brain lighted up, and i got a total stranger to send my cousin a tweet telling her where i was. Apparently the line at Zara was long, and she didn't even get the tweet until she met up with me and i told her to check it.

Twitter to the rescue

Can't believe we spent all afternoon & evening shopping within 2 blocks!!! Bought stuff at Mango, Mystique boutique had great stuff, (but then i realized later that a store called Necessary across from Topshop had the same stuff, but even WAY MORE stuff, I skipped the jewelry shops because i had already shopped wholesale on Buford Highway in Atlanta, didn't buy any clothes from Topshop but I got these killer shoes!!)

Can you believe NY doesn't tax clothes!! (edit: whoops they brought it back, thanks for the comments, lol i didnt look at my receipt ((hides face))

I bought these from Topshop/ Topman. went on sale from $160 to $90 (toe cleavage is still an odd concept but these shoes are BAD!!)

So after all the shopping, we were looking for a good Jamaican restaurant but couldn't find one, so we heard good stuff about this Mexican Restaurant called Dos Caminos that was right by us. it would have been a 2-5minute walk, but it ended up being $5.90 cab ride! because he missed making a right, and decided to go around every block.

Dos Caminos was GREAT!!!!!! the lighting was to dim for my camera to capture without flash. You should definitely try it out. It was like the regular mexican restaurants I go to, it felt like boughie mexican food, cuisine! it was great & they also have Quesadillas that you can order though not on the menu.

Kinda blurry: teak Brisket Enchilladas

NYC is interesting, people's stereotypes about the different areas range from who you ask. I could write all the crazies/ differences i noticed between here and Atlanta. Totally different, we felt like we should have bought those tourist books that internationals get lol. but if i write all the differences and crazies i noticed, this post would be a novel / National Geographic and you'd sleep off.

had a blast. now I'm back in ATL. glad i took my camera, hope you enjoyed the post. I have a HUGE trip coming up soon, when I'll be switching comments, hope your ready for the ride.

Love Bombchell. & an A+ to all those who read the post & an E for effort to those who just looked at pictures ;)

bout to check out Soho (Photobooth with Nneka)

2011-06-12T12:49:00.001-04:00

Literally just took this silly picture a min ago.

It rained yesterday, but we're getting ready to go shop, check out Soho, the Puerto Rican festival i think, find some food in this city (had snickers ice cream for breakfast smh).

then got nneka to join me

Laters Luvs.