How to own your dream iPhone without sacrificing your baby

Lets not kid ourselves, with the recent free-falling of our ringgit, things have gotten mad expensive!

I guess we could cheer ourselves up about the influx of foreign tourists with solid purchasing power, hopefully they will be able to restore our current economic situation but what on earth am I talking about? I’m not an expert on currencies, I am no economist….I am just a Malaysian who wants the latest iPhone6s!

Be still my heart….

But it’s so expensive now that it’s almost inconceivable to fork out a lump sum to buy one. It is probably just me, but a whole month of a senior executive’s salary for a phone, even if it’s the greatest phone in the world does seem a bit excessive, even for the maddest of iPhone fan?

In walks U Mobile, like a boss.

Being absolutely in touch with the market’s sentiment, U Mobile has come up with a brilliant plan called the U MicroCredit.

What on earth is U MicroCredit and why should I know about it?

In a nutshell, U MicroCredit is a financing plan for anyone who wants to own a dream smartphone without having to sacrifice their firstborn.

U MicroCredit is divided into two plans:

(a) Full U MicroCredit

This plan is perfect for you if you don’t have much cash lying around. You could get your entire cost of owning your dream smartphone from as little as RM48 a month and you can choose to pay it all off within 12, 24, 30 or 36 months.

(b) Flexi U MicroCredit

If you’ve got some cash like a baller that you are, this is the better plan for you. You could pay off partial cost of your brand new smartphone and then, the rest of the cost in installments within 12, 24, 30 or 36 months via cash or credit card. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

What about the interest rate, you wonder?

At a flat rate of 1.2%. Super worth it, if you asked me!

C’mon, it’s not going to be that easy right? What else do I need to bring to apply?

Yes, it is that easy! Just make sure you have your MyKad, latest 3 months salary slips and 2 referees (ie: two gainfully employed buddies).

I’m bad with Maths. Can you tell me exactly how much I will be paying per month?

Sure. Assuming you’re getting a 16 GB iPhone6s, you would only need to pay RM48 monthly for 36 months.

Is that all? If I am on the U Mobile network, won’t I get even more perks for being the best customer ever?

Oh yes!!! U Mobile gives 25% savings to users even on the cheapest iPlan. Believe it or not, signing up for the i40 plan will still save you money than walking into an Apple store to just buy the iPhone!

YES! Let me rephrase…it is cheaper to sign up with U Mobile’s iPlan than actually buying the phone outright from Apple!

While iPhone6s recommended retail price is RM3199, if you’re on the i40 plan, the total cost of two years tenure is only RM3480, a difference of just RM281 but with the benefits of 1.5gb data + 40 minutes voice + 20 texts a month for two fabulous years!

If that’s not rewarding enough, I don’t know what is. Way to go U Mobile!

I am still not convinced. Give me an infographic!

Aye aye sir, madam..rightaway. 6 Valid Reasons Why You Should Own A Smartphone via U MicroCredit….

Okay you’ve piqued my interest, now where do I apply?

You can walk into any U Mobile Store or better, do it online at www.u.com.my

OMG, thank you for enlightening me!

You are welcome. Enjoy your brand new iPhone, and your baby!

How I am coping with not eating dairy.

Those who know me know that the bottom of my food pyramid is actually dairy. When I was living abroad at one time, my diet consisted of just blue cheese + grapes and muesli + milk for a whole year cause I didn’t have anyone to nag me.

I love everything dairy – real butter, full cream milk, whipping cream, whipped cream, clotted cream, all cheeses, ice cream, yogurt, as long as it’s dairy I will love it.

Often times, I tried to substitute milk in recipes with whipping cream because I crave for that milky aroma. When it works, it works like a dream but when it doesn’t…it’s really quite horrid. So, please, do not use whipping cream to make custard and do not pour it into tea. Sorry I have digressed.

Then I started breastfeeding Liam. He would puke after every feed, more often than not, projectile style. At first, I suspected it’s the chillies I had been eating, so I cut that out of my diet.

Still he was vomitting. It was always accompanied by a pained expression on his face, stretched-out back and he would also throw his arms and legs out a lot, all signs of pain :(

I think I kind of suspected dairy as the main culprit but I didn’t want to believe it. As a matter of fact, I had been eating an unusual amount of dairy shortly after giving birth to him.

A slice of red velvet cake almost daily, milk with my tea everyday, hot cocoa with whipped cream several times a week and the worst of it all, I was spraying whipped cream into my mouth multiple times a day because I LOVE IT.

Yeap, this scene in Mad Men was me. I hear you Betty Draper.

So yeah, it’s time to cut dairy out.

I mean I could always use soy milk and coconut milk to replace cow’s milk. Heck I’ve even used coconut cream as a substitute for whipped cream and as for butter…I’m using this amazing brand of margarine called Nuttelex. I swear it tastes better than our regular Lurpak!

Why Nuttelex? All the other cheaper local margarines have some kind of dairy derivatives in them. Nasty stuff.

I can’t believe it’s not butter.

Anyway, I could find replacements for most dairy except for ice cream. I thought of sorbet, but it’s just not the same is it?

I really, really missed ice cream :(

Then I remembered this appliance that I bought on a whim from a group buy site that’s been sitting collecting dusts in our cabinet.

It’s the Yonana! FYI, the one I got is an OEM model, but am pretty certain it’s the same exact machine.

The Yonana.

I’ve had it for more than a year but only took it out to play recently. All that was needed were two frozen bananas and some frozen strawberries. Thaw the fruits for about 5 minutes.

Then, put them through the machine. It came out slightly mushy at first…

And then the magic happened.

Perfectly cold, soft-serve ice cream minus the sugar, dairy and additives. The best damn soft-serve ice cream I have ever had!

So I think I can finally believe myself when I say I could do this dairy-free diet for a year more. Who knows, I might even stop eating dairy then.

Hmmmm, maybe not.

p/s: You can check out all my recipes with dairy here.

The most magical thing since running tap water….

…..is my Babyliss Pro Miracurl!

It is a haircurler made for uncoordinated, clumsy, accident-prone women and men, just like myself! Husband gifted it to me at Xmas, I guess obsessively showing him Youtube videos of Babyliss Miracurl got through to him :)

Babyliss Pro Miracurl

 

I have bought conventional hair curlers before, but could never master using it. I always ended up either burning myself or at the verge of burning my hair off.

Too scatterbrained to estimate how long I should leave the hair on the curler and all the turning and twisting of my wrist and hair without burning my face off….wow, how do people even do it!?

Anyone remember this girl?

Watch the video: https://youtu.be/TFgXtrdHsmA

 

In the end, I just opted to tie my hair up coz I didn’t know what else to do with my frizzy mop.

My default hairstyle pre-Babyliss.

 

Thank goodness, those days are now over, thanks to this nifty gadget with a weirdass name – Babyliss.

The best hair curler ever.

 

It has three time settings, three heat settings and three curl settings (left, right or alternate). I find the best setting for me is medium heat with 10 seconds….my curls could last for 2 full days regardless of sweat, cold and sleep.

All the settings on the Miracurl.

 

# – First, you need to do is get about an inch thick of hair, comb it out (I use my fingers only).

Grab about an inch of hair and smooth them out.

 

# – Then, slip the Babyliss Pro Miracurl over where you want your curls to start.

Put hair between the Miracurl where you want your curls to start.

 

# – Then you clamp the hair. It will begin to wind your hair in. No turning the device manually.

Clamp the hair.

 

# – After that, it will start to beep slowly and when it’s time to release your hair, it will beep quickly. Easy peasy.

Tada!

 

# – The trick for the curls to last long is to allow the curls to completely cool down before styling.

Right after…the curls are tight and I look like a Jewish man.

 

# – After hair cools down, run fingers through to loosen curls and style.

After hair cools down, run fingers through and style. More sexy, right????

 

This is not an advertorial, I just really love this gadget and want to share it with the world! It can be bought at Shins in Malaysia at about RM700 or slightly more. I know there are a lot of OEMs out there at the fraction of the price but I think better buy a legit brand like Babyliss lah…

If you’re not into spending that much money, you can check out my hair curling technique using socks here. Yeap, socks…as in the ones you wear on your feet.

Hubs also bought me a Babyliss hair dryer later on hehe. The motor is designed by Ferrari (not joking), will probably blog about it soon.