Life & Weight Loss (December 20th - 26th)

Christmas is finally here and I can't wait for it to be over lol.

Call me a grinch all you want but I do not like Christmas. There are some nice aspects about it but in general it completely sucks. Having worked in hospitality and customer service for 10+ years really leaves a mark on you because over this decade I noticed that the Christmas craziness starts earlier and earlier. I'm talking to the point that we're setting up table talkers and a designated Christmas table with flyers and stuff in JULY. No, just no. Of course it's nice to see beautiful lights and nicely decorated town centres but this year (2023) has been different. I don't know whether it's just my area but everywhere I went within Worcestershire, UK, the decorations have been pathetic. That's literally one of the only few things I enjoy during Christmas and it's been extremely disappointing. Couple weeks before Christmas I wanted to go to a Christmas market because I love me some good German sausage (lol) but I was shocked to find that even bigger towns around us (as in, 30-40 minute drive radius), had Christmas markets that only last 2-3 days over specific periods and some even finished in November! What happened to Christmas markets beaming during 2-3 weeks leading to Christmas? What a disappointment... And since we were working on Christmas Day this year, we decided to cancel Christmas altogether lol.

Week 7 weight loss progress

Day 1

+ 0.4 kg / + 0.4 kg weekly weight gain / -1.4 kg total weight loss

My viral TikTok video is getting even more popular

I genuinely thought that 700K or something will be the end but it clearly hasn't as I kept waking up to crazy numbers lol. My TikTok video was still blowing up. 

Loid Forger like my TikTok video 😂

Also I was happy to see that Loid Forger has liked my video. If you can't understand the reference then I can't help you. 🤣

Day 2

+ 0.2 kg / + 0.6 kg weekly weight gain / - 1.2 kg total weight loss

My viral TikTok video hits 1 million views

My viral TikTok video has hit 1 million views at this point but it was expected by the way it was going. My TikTok was blowing up every time I opened the app lol. It's good that I have my notifications disabled on all social media platforms, at least my phone wasn't going insane haha.

30 day weight chart

Weight wise I really wasn't happy what was going on. Even Happy Scale can't even hide the fact that the weight is going up and the green weight loss markings were slimming down. I haven't been the best at eating healthy but also I haven't been drinking much water so I'm trying my best to fix that. 

Day 3 

+ 0.1 kg / + 0.7 kg weekly weight gain / - 1.1 kg total weight loss

Lemon Posset for a private event

I didn't think I would but I actually have been enjoying working with my husband doing private chef events. Most of the main prep is done at home so I barely need to leave the house (apart from shopping for inventory) and I love being at home lol. I also get to have a go at making new things that I haven't made before. One of them being lemon posset dessert. It's basically lemon cream. I can't believe how incredibly easy it was to make it. I haven't made enough the first time as the event was for 11 people but I only managed to squeeze out 8. So I made another batches and you can see that even my pour improved the second time. In the photo above two columns on the right is the first batch and two columns on the left is the second batch. Improvement within 30 minutes or so lol.

I even made a TikTok video about making lemon posset.

Growing pea shoots for garnish

Day 4 

- 0.5 kg / + 0.2 kg weekly weight gain / - 1.6 kg total weight loss

Poke bowl lunch in between prep work

One of the few positive things about Christmas is that raw salmon gets a very reduced price at Morrisons. And salmon is one of my favourite fish due to incredible taste. I just can't get enough of it. Having lovely raw fish means time for poké bowl! Poké bowl is a Hawaiian rice bowl dish with raw marinated salmon. I think my favourite combination is salmon, kimchi and spring onions. I could eat that every day.

Not gonna lie, looking back, that bowl had a lot on it, probably not the best for my weight loss and I didn't weigh anything at all...

Making caramel hazelnuts

Another new thing that I've made was caramel hazelnuts. I was proper freaking out because I've never made caramel before and I've read some horror stories of people messing up caramel but it was actually pretty easy and I made it perfectly first time! There was only one problem... It was meant to harden but for whatever reason once it sort of hardened it started melting again. It didn't make sense because it was stored pretty cold. Our conservatory is just slightly warmer than outside. We stored half of them in the conservatory and half of them in the fridge. But the result was the same no matter the location. In the end I had to make fresh caramel hazelnuts on site which is not the best as clean up is a right pain. But at least it was solid when it arrived at the client's table. I never learnt what the reason behind this melting episode was lol. Anyway, I did make a TikTok video about my caramel hazelnuts. 

Day 5 

+ 1.3 kg / + 1.5 kg weekly weight gain / - 0.3 kg total weight loss

A little whisky on Christmas Eve morning lol

It was my husband's day off before the big Christmas event and the day was filled with prep work again. After we were mostly done we quickly popped to Morrisons to see if we can get any last minute pre-Christmas deals and we were not disappointed. Loads of meat was on sale! 

Raw Steak Tartare

Of course we grabbed the best looking bits and we had a feast of raw steak tartare. What a treat!!!

Great evening sorted: Delicious wine from Naked Wines and anime

Day 6

+ 0.4 kg / + 1.9 kg weekly weight gain / + 0.1 kg total weight gain

It was finally Christmas and we departed home around 11am for the big event. The whole thing took so long and by the time we left the client's house it was around 6.30pm. I was exhausted but we have planned a hangout with my friend who was spending Christmas by herself. Plus we had a ton of leftovers so no cooking needed! We may or may not have drank a bit too much that day and we may or may not have suffered from hangover on Boxing Day lol...

Day 7 

- 1.1 kg / + 0.8 kg weekly weight gain / - 1 kg total weight loss

Week 7 weight loss chart

Well, it's the end of Week 7 and the chart is looking very much disappointing. I blame the business Christmas season to be honest. Working loads and prepping and maybe indulging too much on alcohol. All you can do is just do your best and keep pushing. Let's go!

My Podcast: A Pint Of Rice | My IG: Lina B 🦭 | My TikTok: Lina

Byeee~

Lina (Rinatsu)

Life & Weight Loss (December 13th - 19th)

Well, week 5 was rubbish... Change in tactics?

I can't lie, the dedicated weighing and food input to MyFitnessPal has been getting a bit to me. While it does help me watch what I eat, it's also making me too fixated on it. It almost felt like a full time job, just constantly thinking about what my next meal should be and how many calories I've got left. It was affecting my mental health and not in a good way. So I had to make some changes. Do I want to count my calories for the rest of my life? Not really! Nothing has changed in terms of portion control. After many years of learning about nutrition at specialised institutions, doing my own research and testing out things on my own I understand the portion sizes and dietary requirements so whether I input data somewhere or not makes no difference. So I say bye-bye to MyFitnessPal for now while I work on something else. 

One of the great things I noticed is the accountability while writing this blog. Even if nobody reads this I still feel responsible. Mostly because I've been in the position of trying to find somebody's story, day to day life details when reaching certain goals. I like reading blogs for topics I'm interested in. I'm back to blogging after so many years and it feels really good to be creative in the writing area again. 

Another new thing is that in the past couple of weeks I've been pretty busy as my husband took on a new work opportunity as a private chef. He was originally planning to do it all by himself but after some deliberation and we realised that it would be very difficult for him to do it all by himself (confirmed after the first event) so I joined him in this venture as a manager / chef de partie / waitress / kitchen porter. 🤣 

So, my updates from now on will be general weight loss and life updates because I don't want the fight for weight loss to consume me too much and that to define me. I'll be sharing food photos/videos and interesting life updates.

Week 6: December 13th - December 19th

Day 1: 

- 0.4 kg / - 0.4 kg weekly loss / - 2.2 kg total loss

The craziest thing starter happening to me. Couple days before Week 6 of my weight loss started, my husband got inspired and decided to make a video for this dish he came up with. The dish is sort of like Hawaiian Poké Bowl / Japanese Donburi inspired Surf & Turf style rice bowl. It consisted of ribeye steak cooked blue/rare, salmon fillet and some veg on a bed of rice. I was responsible for all the filming. So after we ate and finished up the meal I made a quick silly video from all the footage I've got and uploaded it on TikTok. Since my husband started his private chef job he wanted a bigger social media presence so I've been uploading things here and there but nothing very consistent. I'm not also not very keen on TikTok. So when I uploaded this video I didn't think too much of it:

@rinatsuchan When professional chef only cares to make one photo op worthy dish. It progressively gets worse and worse. 🤣🤣 #cheflife #chefsoftiktok #chef #cookingathometiktoktv #cookingtiktok #cookingvideo #cookingvideos #cookingshow #cooking #professionalchef #privatechef ♬ Música de Comidas para Video - Carabina Sounds

If video isn't playing you can watch it here.

Pretty much immediately after I uploaded it, the views started climbing much MUCH quicker than before so I knew that something is different this time. 2 days after the upload we were looking at 303K views:

My TikTok video started going viral

I've been uploading all sorts of things throughout my life to social media. From nature photography, make up videos, to crafts and funny easy going stuff but I never had any video go viral like that so I had to grab this opportunity and do something about it. I started making videos about the food myself or my husband makes. Before this my phone only had fancy food photos every week weeks. Now it started to become every few days kind of occurrence lol. 

Homemade wontons with mushroom dashi. This is actually my husband's bowl as it looked better lol

 

Day 2: 

+ 1.1 / + 0.7 kg weekly gain / - 1.1 kg total loss

I had to get these tiny tools at The Range. As funny as they look, they've been very useful at our private events

Salmon poké bowl

I love fish. Or seafood. Either one. I think they're amazing. If I have to choose between meat or seafood I'll definitely choose seafood. The amount of flavour in seafood is actually insane. You can't get that just by eating steak. Don't come at me, it's the truth lol. I love sushi but it's a pain to make and eating out in UK can be very expensive so I love making a sort of deconstructed version of that. It could easily be called salmon donburi, as donburi stands for rice bowl with toppings. But we like to jazz it up a little bit and make a dish more similar to poké bowl, consisting of different veg and seasonings. It must be one of my favourite homemade foods.

Day 3: 

+ 0.6 kg / + 1.3  kg weekly gain / - 0.5 kg total loss

You know you live a good life when you know an Egg Man 😁

Day 4: 

- 1.1 kg / + 0.2 kg weekly gain / - 1.6 kg total loss

Thai inspired coconut curry with salmon

Day 5: 

0 kg / + 0.2 kg weekly gain / - 1.6 kg total loss

Pan-fried salmon with brandy cream sauce

Day 6: 

- 0.8 kg / - 0.6 kg weekly loss / - 2.4 kg total loss

His name is Murphy!

My friend recently got a puppy. I drove her to pick him up and he's the cutest. I feel like a proud auntie. He loves me so much and gives me so much attention. My heart is happy. 😁

Day 7: 

+ 0.6 kg / 0 kg weekly loss / - 1.8 kg total loss

Week 6 weight loss chart

Two sets on a row machine completed

It's the end of week 6 and I feel frustrated again as there has been no changes all week. Apart from usual jumping up and down, at the end of the day I'm at 0. To release my frustration I went to the gym and done a cardio workout. I absolutely hate cardio but I know that I really need it. The problem is that I'm easily distracted and I get super bored really quickly. So if I'm on a treadmill (I usually do an incline walk for a period of time), I watch a show on Netflix lol. My heart is weak af so to make it pump I went on a row machine for the last 5 minutes to really make myself sweat. Well, that was definitely achieved. 

Already at 702K views!

At this point my viral TikTok video has doubled up in views and my profile was blowing up with likes, comments and follows. The most shocking part would be waking up in the morning, checking TikTok after 8 hours and seeing crazy numbers lol.

Waking up to crazy numbers

Well, that definitely didn't stop there but I'll tell you more in my next blog post. It's been a rollercoaster week (just like my weight loss lol). And while I didn't achieve anything in the weight loss area I definitely had some interesting events throughout the week. Let's see what next week brings!

My Podcast: A Pint Of Rice | My IG: Lina B 🦭 | My TikTok: Lina

Byeee~

Lina (Rinatsu)

Adventures in Hong Kong! The Journey

If you're looking for recommendations on places to visit in Hong Kong or just want to see some cool stuff then the Hong Kong adventure posts are for you!~

When I re-started this blog a couple weeks ago, I did a thorough read through my old posts and confirmed my passion for adventure. Look, as a teenager and young adult I was full of drive to try new things, but either didn't have enough funds or time. After I moved to UK 10 years ago, I finally managed to visit a couple countries. I briefly visit Copenhagen, Denmark (which didn't leave the best impression on me...), and done a road trip across West of France. I'm not a person who is interested in travelling the world. I'll be honest, some countries I'm not interested at all. When I travel, I love to immerse myself in their culture, so if some country's culture is not my cup of tea I simply don't fancy going there. I don't think there's anything wrong with that as it's simply a preference. Social media has instilled this image in our heads that we MUST travel around the world, visit every country, just constantly be on the go. But in the real world, it's not quite that easy if you're not financially well off, or people simply do not have interest, as, let's be honest, it kinda sounds like a chore lol (as much as it is controversial to say lol).

My husband is originally from Hong Kong and he grew up there. So when we finally managed to travel to HK earlier this year, I was over the moon. We treated it as a honeymoon trip, even if it was 2 years late lol. I've got to meet some of his family, visit his favourite childhood locations and experience an amazing culture. 

Our favourite plushies always travel with us

It used to be so easy when we lived in Milton Keynes. London is just down the road and all airports are easily reachable. Over the years we moved around a couple of times for business and we're currently residing in Worcestershire. So nowadays Heathrow airport can be 2 hours + car drive away. 😩

I've never been on a long haul flight. My longest flight has always been UK - Lithuania / Lithuania - UK. Only 3.5 hours long! Barely any time to even get a drink! Not that I do anyway because purchasing anything on the plane is ridiculously expensive. 🙃

This wasn't our plane but it looked cool haha

Twelve hour flight sounds terrifying but free snacks, drinks (including alcohol) and 2 mealtimes really make up for it. Don't forget all the movies you can watch that haven't been placed on Netflix yet! 😂

A glass of Prosecco before takeoff

Ok, I can't say that everything was exactly perfect during the flight. We were located next to this makeshift wall that separated premium economy (where we were sitting) from business class and when the turbulence started, the separator broke and slammed down opening up the place. The turbulence was nothing like I've ever experienced before. It felt like we were falling down and I legit thought I was gonna die. The stewardess running around and trying to put the separator back up made everything look a lot worse because they couldn't stand properly and it looked like an emergency when it wasn't. My husband was asleep and everyone seemed chilled while I had streams of tears running down my face cos I was so scared lol. I could definitely tell that I was the only one there who has never experienced anything like this. 

One of the meals during the 12 hour flight

I've watched so many videos about plane food, I couldn't wait to try it myself. It wasn't bad but it wasn't great either. I have heard that they have to salt the food a lot more to make it have taste, because our taste buds get affected by high altitude but honestly it was way too much. the prawn and corn salad thing seen in the photo above was ridiculously salty. I could barely finish it. Was I correct at the saltiness level or are my taste buds that sensitive to salt? Who knows lol.

Betsy craft beer by Gweilo brewery

Twelve hours on the plane was so exhausting, I couldn't wait to get off. But once I started seeing the mountains through the windows, I couldn't hold my excitement! I kept looking around but people weren't looking through the windows at all, which was shocking. I wanted to sit by the window to see everything but I was sitting in the middle. People were wasting such a precious opportunity. I'm definitely sitting by the window next time we're going to HK! 

Meal 2 during UK - HK flight

Actually the meals were really filling. We flew using Cathay Pacific and it was really decent. Next time we'll be using Economy class so we'll see if the meals are still alright. I loved the little jam jars and chocolates. I couldn't' even finish them all as I'm not used to eating so many sweet things for my meals! 

Mountains surrounding the International Hong Kong Airport

Landing in Hong Kong was like a dream. I know it might sound silly but it truly felt unreal. I've never left Europe so finally fulfilling my dream and coming to Asia at age 31 was something else. I tried to keep my cool because I didn't want my excitement to come across as odd and have border security detain me. 🤣 Luckily it all went perfectly fine. I was really looking forward getting a stamp in my passport because I've only been to Schengen zone countries so I never needed any visa or stamp, but unfortunately they have changed their system recently and you only get a little piece of paper with your details printed, as well as the date when you have to legally leave if you only come as a tourist. Hong Kong has different rules for different countries, but generally your stay is limited to somewhere between 1 and 6 months. Hopefully next time we can cross into China too and I can finally get my stamp lol. 

International Hong Kong Airport exit towards taxi car park

Make sure to follow my blog as I'll be posting a lot more adventures from Hong Kong and really cool locations to visit!~

My Podcast: A Pint Of Rice | My IG: Lina B 🦭

Byeee~

Lina (Rinatsu)

Experiencing discrimination in the UK

We have a lot to catch up on, so why not start with something that happened most recently?

One of the reasons for coming back to blogging is my craving for creative work. For the past few months I had to abandon everything because my husband and I started a new business together. As we have worked in hospitality for many years, and been in higher up, management positions in the past, as well as having a drive for business (we also ran a business together in the past), we decided to have a go at running a pub. To save ourselves from too much risk we decided to get into a special "partnership" agreement with a massive PLC brewery (although it's not really a brewery anymore, more like a corporation that manages real estate), let's call it M (I'm not trying to hide anything, we haven't signed any NDAs, I simply don't want to mention any specific names for the sake of my own peace). 

We decided to take on a pub that was in desperate need of new management. It's an amazing 600 years old Grade II listed building and was in the most beautiful village we've ever seen. The village the pub was in was rated as the poshest village in the country by The Telegraph, and they were spot on. We thought it was a great location, and surely being in a posh place means lots of polite, well mannered people, that will help us create a great atmosphere for everyone. Well, we couldn't have been more wrong...

Let's get one thing out of the way - we've done so well. In the matter of almost 3 months we've managed to build the reputation back up, pretty much double the profits and create a great atmosphere for the visitors, as well as staff. But we were absolutely destroyed. Both mentally and physically. For almost 3 months straight we worked nonstop. Can you imagine working 3 months straight, doing 14-16 hour days with not a single day off? I can not only imagine it, but I've lived through it. It was hell. We simply couldn't find staff. We had plenty of young students and casual staff who wanted to work, but we couldn't find anybody who treated hospitality as a serious job. Oh, how the times have changed from when I worked as a simple waitress many years ago in a restaurant. Plentiful of staff - full time, part time, casual. Whatever you want! Oh, you're leaving? That's ok cos we'll have somebody else replacing you tomorrow lol. I'm not saying it's good, as there was a lot of competition for jobs before Brexit but now you don't even have the workforce at all. What is better? Definitely not this what we have now...

But the thing that hurt me the most was the mistreatment I've received from people...

I know my beer and I understand it. I'm not some top class expert in every single thing and I'm open to learning new things (which I do), but the fact that men wouldn't accept my word or wouldn't trust my recommendations, constantly talking over me was ridiculous. Mate, you do realise I'm the one who orders this beer, tries it, does the research, cleans the lines, looks after the cellar? I was the only one in the pub that had knowledge to do all of that and more. Your beer belly does not define your knowledge, or even intelligence, and yet here we are, dealing with the audacity...

It wasn't just the ignorant men that made my life living hell. Ever since Brexit happened in this country something changed. People became much more hostile. I'm fluent in English. I barely speak my first language on a day to day basis, as I do not have any Lithuanian family or friends around and I find it easier to express myself in English. Yes, I have an accent because I came to this country as an adult. I'll always have an accent and I'm okay with it. I don't feel the need to go to accent classes or whatever to change it because my pronunciation is great and everybody understands me. 🤷‍♀️ Well, that's not what some Brits think. You have an accent? You must be an idiot unintelligent person! The amount of times I've had people slow down their speech as soon as they heard my accent is actually insane. If don't speak a lot people don't even notice my accent! But no, those pesky "r" rolls, and undefined "v"s and "w"s means I'm dumb clueless, of course! 

"What made you come to Europe?" - I've lived in Europe all my life. "Do you like it here?" - It's okay. "Only ok???!!!". These are only some of the legitimate questions I've gotten. The "what made you come to Europe" actually made me speechless for a second lol.

Look, I get it, this might not sound like a lot because I'm retelling things that happened months ago. As always, my trauma response is to slowly delete the events from my memories so all I have left is the very uncomfortable and hurtful feeling, which will happen eventually lol. I wish these things were discussed more widely, that's why I need to share this. The British are always put on such a high pedestal, as such a perfect country yet the members of the society are often racist and xenophobic. It's not a perfect country - far from it, just look at the news. We're allowed to criticise the government but we should also be looking at the people. What happened? I've been here 10 years - that's a whole damn decade. I felt more at home when I had a stronger accent and worked rubbish jobs to survive in my early 20s. I'm now in my 30s, with an extensive CV and experience, yet I feel more out of place than I've ever been.

"Don't like it here? Why don't you leave??" - a common expression from a regular Brit. You know what, mate? It's a good shout, I might do in a few years, who knows where my life will take me. Don't get me wrong, I've met hundreds of amazing people throughout this decade. But this experience was like a concentrated version of all the hatred people have to offer, which really left a bad mark on my soul. I'll rise above it, as always, I just didn't deserve this experience, that's all. Nobody does and nobody will. 

But for the time being I'll stay here, in the UK, mind my own business, as usual, and see what life has got to offer because the country is not completely 💩 yet and there's still some nice people around. Peace. ✌️

My Podcast: A Pint Of Rice | My IG: Lina B 🦭

See you soon~

Lina (Rinatsu)

I'm...back?

 Oh, hi! It's been...8 years?? It almost feels weird yet somehow right..? How's it going, everyone?

Few days ago I started feeling nostalgia for certain things. I recently closed a business that I ran with my husband (yes, I'm married lol), which greatly affected me in a negative way and I've been struggling trying to find my creative bone again. I've been in hospitality industry for 10 years now and I sort of ended up hating it. Especially after running a hospitality business. That bloody k*lled me physically (almost) and mentally (definitely). I should probably write a separate blog post just about the experience I had with it because the story is a rollercoaster lol. I've met so many people through 10 years in hospitality and somehow all of them moved on with different things, yet I'm still here... It's because I am really good at it! Doesn't mean I enjoy it... You could sort of compare it to a useless skill to have. I guess it's not completely useless since it brings you money...but nothing to brag about really. It's inevitable that a creative soul will eventually burn out doing such repetitive and tedious jobs. 

So, it's been over a month since I've been out of this industry (at least for now) and I've been doing some soul searching. My husband suggested a career change (although I wouldn't even consider hospitality a career, especially the way hospitality workers are treated in Britain). So at the moment I'm going through some online studies. I have no idea where this will take me but I'm trying my best to work through mental issues and find myself again. 

In need of some cable management lol

So, all of this has made me remember something that I started almost 14 years ago. My blog! Omg isn't it just a great place to vent? Hahaha. Ok, not really the main purpose of it but yeah. What even is the main purpose of my blog, now that I think about it? I'm not even sure. Scrolling through the years of posts, I'm confused about it lol. From crafts, to movie "reviews", to make up "tutorials", to general life posts. Shall we call it lifestyle? Sure, let's go with that. Even though my life is a mess lol. 

Cute capsule treasures I got on my trip to Hong Kong, May 2023

So here I am, currently spending most of my days in front of the computer, as if it's mid-late 00s again lol. Let's see where this will take me, eh?

I'd say I'll update you all soon but I can't make promises. I'm not good with deadlines (yet). In the meantime, catch me on my other projects!

My Podcast: A Pint Of Rice | My IG: Lina B 🦭

Byeee~

Lina (Rinatsu)

I got rejected

Today I experienced the weirdest and most frustrating thing I've ever experienced during my job hunt.

Today I got rejected. Yesterday I had an interview for a waitress position in a French style cafe. I was accepted to the next stage and invited to come today to start training. I had a free evening so I decided to finally dye my hair. It's been a while and my roots were too frightening lol. I was aware that the copper dye I bought won't remove my burgundy colour, since it's too dark. My roots turned out really orange, causing a nice transition effect to dark red/burgundy. Kinda like inverted ombre lol!

This is how I looked yesterday after dyeing my hair:

Kinda dark, can't really see colours that well.

Aaaanyway, today I come for a training, joining the staff meeting and boom...
- You dyed your hair?
- Yes I did.
- It was darker yesterday.
- Yes it was.
- You can't work with hair this bright.

...okay. So it appears that the leisure centre this cafe is opening at, created some stupid rules about person's appearance. People can't have any face piercings, can't have any tattoos and can't have their hair dyed unnatural colours. They only allow shades of brown and blonde. I was told that if I dye my hair dark, they will hire me. I was in shock. I said I will think about it and went to do the induction course on the work laptop. After sitting for a while I went back to the manager and told her that I can't do this. I can't just dye my hair and it is sad that they judge a person because of the hair colour and doesn't consider person with colourful hair the same valuable staff member.

Seriously I was so shocked and angry and annoyed! Since when can you tell if a person is good or not just by looking at their hair colour??! You learn something new every day. What if the actual natural bright ginger would come to the interview? Would they ask to dye her/his hair dark too? Lol. Well, no thank you, I am not going to change myself to the way they want, so that I can work and hate how I look. This is just stupid.

All companies I have applied for talk about equal rights, asking so many questions about race, age, gender, etc all the time. I guess they should add *natural hair*(!!!) in their job description because this is the only discrimination since everyone's so equal lol...

I don't even consider my hair colour that crazy! My face isn't pierced, I only have 3 lobe piercings and had to grow my cartilage because it never fully healed for a few years and I don't have any tattoos. But this was my first time experiencing something like that... I'm speechless.

Yeah well, I'm not going to change my hair for sure... I look great.

Have you ever experienced anything like this? Tell me your story. ♥

P.S.: I don't hold any grudges towards that cafe. People are really friendly and great. The atmosphere is inviting. It's that stupid leisure centre's fault... Seriously what kind of stupidity just happened today...

Rinatsu~ | My Facebook page | My Twitter | My Instagram | My Etsy

First Impressions: Part II

Hey guess what? I finally decided I need to finish what I started lol. Here's my impressions blog Part II! If you want to read Part I click this link!

In this part I will continue posting random pictures (and by random I mean RANDOM) with stories from few months ago with impressions of UK since I came here. Enjoy!

I seriously love pound stores. So many goody goodies! Like this cereal for example. It has tiny marshmallows!! Could it be cuter?? The caption? Actually I dedicated this pic to my dear friend Lola, she hates marshmallows and I just can't help but think about her when I see them. xDD Sorry, I love you girl. (◍•ᴗ•◍)❤

I saw this poster in the VUE cinema, asdfghjkl; it was so cute! (I hate my old phone's camera) As many of you know this is the strawberry and piece of cake from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2. Why it's rating is so small??? I think I'll rewatch this movie today. It's just too brilliant. :'D

Talking about cinemas...did you know that you can watch some few months old animated movies in Cineworld Saturday/Sunday around 10am for £1.50??? Crazy!!! (＝⌒▽⌒＝)

Having fun with English language. Even though I know what they meant...IT'S JUST TOO FUNNY!!! I mean seriously, who of the people who created English language decided to call ghost, the one that haunts old houses the same as god's spirit lol. Oh by the way, it was closed. The ghost might ran away from it's zone... *coughs* sorry I'll stop now. (no offence towards anyone. this is purely my stupid joke, I am tolerant as long as your beliefs doesn't hurt other people)

Sunsets are beautiful wherever you are... ♥

I had a job in a press for a few months in New Duston, Northampton and it would usually end at this perfect sunset time. Sadly it wasn't a perfect time for bus catching so I would usually come late and had to wait half an hour for another one...

...but who cares when you've got pasta!!! Hahahaha.

Oh yeah, at the end of the summer I found out that I am a freak when it come to ice cream. Why there are so many different tastes??!! I NEED TO TASTE THEM ALL へ(゜∇、°)へ

Oh yeah we tried the famous Nando's restaurant. Wasn't bad at all! Especially the never ending glass of the drink of your choice lol. And I just had to take the infamous bathroom selfie. The window was just too big not to... *guilty* (〃▽〃)

No wonder there are so many overweight people. There are soooo many ready food only left to cook in an oven for like 20 minutes. It is tasty but it is full of bad fat.

After eating all those ready meals for few months we just started to prepare similar food almost from scratch. It's so much healthier! Yes, it takes more time but it is so much fun! More people should try that... Experimenting is awesome. ヾ(。◕ฺ∀◕ฺ)ノ

Pasta bake!!! Yummy~ OMG haven't baked this for so long... ♥

I finally bought new phone and started taking better quality pictures. （＾ｖ＾）

Lithuanians will understand this one looooool... (hint: it's a swear word) (ノ＞▽＜。)ノ

And here started the longing for home...

Found a whole shelf full of Lithuanian sweets for 1 pound. These are so good! ♥

Got a postcard from my sis. She knows how I love owls. Brought tears to my eyes.

And sent this music key friendship necklace to my best friend. Miss her so much... ♥

One of the most important impressions I wanted to mention from the start. It's so different from Lithuania. Whenever you look up to the sky you will always see a plane here or there or at least a trail. It really amazes me and makes me realise how small we are living in this big country.

Stay impressed. (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:・ﾟ✧

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