Green Ginger Tea

I like light, herbal teas best. Rose tea, spearmint tea (peppermint is too strong for my liking), white tea, I'm all for it. My friend, Erica, is very generous with her tea collection and I love love love sampling from her collection.

Today she told me about green ginger tea. Most ginger-y drinks are too strong for me, so this green ginger tea made me nervous. But ginger is just so freakin healthy... sometimes you just have to suck it up. (Or, I guess, gulp it down.)


Why should you drink this tea?

Here are the benefits of ginger tea:

• Ginger soothes the stomach and helps ease nausea
• Heated ginger is an anti-inflammatory, and green tea improves blood flow--perfect for relieving muscle soreness and cramps
• Green tea lowers cholesterol, and helps maintain heart health and stabilize blood sugar
• Theanine in green tea can lower anxiety

Plus, the ginger-y taste in this tea isn't very strong at all! Perfect.

Here are the stats for preparation:

Happy sipping!

Iris Van Herpen & 3D Printed Dresses

I recently learned about Iris Van Herpen, a Dutch fashion designer who started her own label in 2007. She interned for Alexander McQueen before starting her own line, and her 3D printed dresses were one of TIME's 50 best inventions of 2011:

Escapism Dress by Iris van herpen ©Victoria and Albert Museum, London

I watched her Spring 2012 show in Paris and my jaw was on the floor the entire time. This collection is inspired by the work of Canadian architect and artist Philip Beesley, who works around the idea of Hylozoism--the ancient belief that all matter is in some sense alive.

This is my favorite dress from the show:

(photos via femour)

Its structure reminds me of gothic cathedrals (especially the details around the bust) and its color--what makes it hylozoic, I think--reminds of tree bark. So. Freakin. Cool.

Here's another one I liked from the show, it's more literal and just as impressive:

(photos via mkpress)

Van Herpen says this about her work:

"In all my work I try to make clear that fashion is an artistic expression, showing and wearing art, and not just a functional and devoid of content or commercial tool... I intend to show that fashion can certainly have an added value to the world, that it can be timeless and that its consumption can be less important then its beginning."

- Iris Van Herpen

Watch the whole show here:

I Need to Talk About this Yoga Class

I've taken a few yoga classes before, most of them at my alma mater, and really like them for the same reasons I like guided meditations--it's much, much easier when someone is talking you through it, and, honestly, I'm a thousand percent more likely to actually do it this way.

I've never been able to do yoga alone. Sometimes I watch youtube videos of instructors, but I usually need to go to a physical class if I'm actually going to practice.

I had a bizarre experience in a yoga class this week.

The instructor was moving much faster than any other whose class I've attended. He was narrating the poses he wanted us to do next, but he usually forgot to narrate the breathing...

(You can see where this is going.)

I forgot to breathe.

I went to a class with an actual instructor. And I forgot to breathe.

90% of yoga is breathing. Vinyasa literally means controlled breathing.

And I didn't do it.

It didn't hit me until after the class that if my instructor was moving at a faster pace than I felt comfortable, I should have just slowed down. I wasn't breathing deeply or regularly because I was so focused on haphazardly trying to keep up with the power-yoga routine happening in front of me. I could have gotten an injury.

So, please, if you're in a yoga class and you feel like you're not breathing deeply, slow down. If you ever feel uncomfortable, tense, sore, or just need a break, go into childs pose for as long as you need:

(img via pain free living)

He did spray us all with lavender oil afterwards, which was a nice touch.

How to Be Poison Ivy (Happy Halloween!)

IT'S ALMOST HALLOWEEN! Are you as excited as I am??

This year, I'm dressing up as my favorite Batman villain--Poison Ivy! I'm keeping my makeup down to 5 products that won't melt off my face while I dance away late into the night:

Here I am in the entire poison ivy costume, along with a runaway train and Zelda Fitzgerald <3

Y: The Last Man (Vol. 1), by Brian K. Vaughan, Pia Guerra, and Jose Marzan Jr.

A global plague instantaneously wipes out every creature with a y-chromosome--except Yorick and his pet monkey, Ampersand. What happens when every single patriarchal society evaporates in a matter of seconds? Vaughan, Guerra, and Marzan present their ideas in a compelling, well-paced story that took me about an hour to finish. (It totally reads like a Gillian Flynn novel.)

Stephen King says it's the best graphic novel he's ever read. Can you resist?

Sailor Twain is still my favorite graphic novel of all time, but Y:TLM is a very, very good read. That's all I can say without giving away any spoilers, so... don't go on unless you've read it!

**SPOILERS AHEAD!**

Still here? Great!

The book implicitly and explicitly talks about gender issues. You've got literal facts on page 39, and lots of exposition about it between characters. In fact, I kept turning to Mr. and asking him if this book was written by a woman. I was surprised that it wasn't.

But it seems that many people thought it was anti-feminist.

While browsing this book's Goodreads page after finishing, I noticed that a lot of people felt that it was an extremely chauvinistic and/or an anti-feminist story. One of the most common reasons is best articulated in this review:

"In a world where all men are dead except for one, and the death of that one man will mean the end of humanity, VIOLENT CULTS OF FEMINISTS SPRING UP TO TRY AND HUNT DOWN MEN AND MALE SYMPATHIZERS. What is the motive here? There sure isn't one written into the plot, other than the one speech about social inequality between the sexes--and how the only way to escape this inequality is to KILL ALL MEN. " - Michael

But the Amazons are only a small percentage of everyone we see. I never got the impression that they represent an average woman, let alone all women. Sure, they become the main antagonists, but don't ignore sensible, good-hearted Agent 355. Don't ignore world-famous, intelligent Dr. Mann. Don't ignore the Secretary of Agriculture President working to keep the government from being taken over by radical fringe groups. Is it unreasonable to expect radical fringe groups to exist? Do they need a reasonable motive? Consider this: would you feel strange reading a story in which, say, all but one non-white people died, and the KKK went after the lone dark-skinned person?

The second most popular criticism was along the lines of this:

"I'm fine with the Amazonian self-mutilators (I can buy an angry, post-apocalyptic group of violent women). I am willing to suspend my disbelief that Yorick and his monkey make it through the manpocalypse as the only surviving Y chromosomes... But what I won't believe, what I won't buy, where I won't suspend by disbelief, where I am not fine is with the idea that Yorick would ever, EVER, be allowed to wander around the winter of homo sapienism with one body guard, risking his testicles for some stupid, pointless, selfish, idiotic search for the love of his life and his sister. His sperm, and Ampersand's, would be the most important substances known to womankind (not because he is a man but because of sheer practicality). He would be protected whether he liked it or not. He would be imprisoned. His sperm would be used to impregnate. It would be used to find an immunity for future boys. It would be used for the survival of homo sapiens. Period. " - Brad

Several reviewers said that the story itself is unrealistic because in a realistic story, Yorick would be enslaved and, um, harvested. But...

...they explain it...

Yorick isn't supposed to go looking for Beth. He's supposed to find Dr. Mann so they can find a vaccine for the mysterious plague, so that he can help repopulate the world. If there is no vaccine, who's to say that any male babies would survive? And when the White House is attacked, what's the first thing Mrs. Brown does to her son? She locks him up in a top-secret safety shelter.

Overall, my favorite part of the first volume is the relationship between Yorick and Hero.

And my second favorite part is Ampersand:

Have you read the series? What did you think? I'd love to read your thoughts below!

The (Scientific) Benefits of Oil Pulling

Oil pulling involves taking about a tablespoon of sesame, sunflower, or coconut oil and swishing it around your mouth for 5-20 minutes. Most people recommend doing it at least 4-5 times a week. You spit out the oil afterwards (into the trash, not your sink!) along with the toxins that were pulled from your body.

Huh.

I first read about oil pulling last year, and brushed it off as another "Western people try to be Indian" fad. Don't get me wrong, I'm not accusing anyone of cultural appropriation here, I just get a little nervous when the same writer tells me that oil pulling clears out toxins and that holding a stone will balance my aura.

It's because I'm Indian. I'm Indian and I've never heard of some of these things from Indian people, and I get weirded out when Western people believe them because someone told them it's Ayurvedic.

Obviously, this doesn't apply to everything. Yoga? Awesome. Turmeric? It's good for you. Tea? It'll calm you down. Meditation? Yes. I believe that these things are healthy because Indian people still do them after thousands of years.

And then my mom told me that she used to do oil pulling.

Damn it. Fine, I'll look into it.

Dr. Sanda Moldovan, a nutritionist and professor at UCLA's dental school, was interviewed in an article by Tracy Moore. Here's an excerpt:

"In a nutshell, Moldovan told me by phone, the friction created by oil pulling has a soap-like effect on your mouth. It doesn't matter what type of oil it is, sesame is just what would've been cheap and widely available in the original communities who used it. Either way, it's a great method for helping reduce gingivitis. The reason, she said, is that oil pulling does reduce bacteria in the mouth — at least one study has shown it significantly reduces the strep mutans bacteria in plaque and saliva that causes cavities." (Read Moore's entire article here)

Essentially, oil pulling is a good substitute for mouthwash, but not for brushing your teeth.

That said...

Oil Pulling Helps me with Anxiety:

I do oil pulling (I oil pull?) while I meditate. I don't know if toxins are getting flushed from my system, but I do know that focusing on swishing oil around my mouth for 20 minutes makes meditating much, much easier. My thoughts bounce around while I meditate (and generally in life), and oil pulling acts as a sort of body scan--something physical to think about instead of "stillness" which is still really hard for me to do. Meditating in silence is hard. Quieting anxious thoughts is hard. Guided meditations and oil pulling, in combination, has worked best for me. Breathing exercises haven't been helpful for me because I just forget that I'm doing them. Doing something physical and, honestly, feeling something strange in my mouth is enough of a frame shift that it helps me quiet anxious thoughts.

Heads up: I tried oil pulling during a panic attack once, and it was a terrible idea. Breathing exercises are what you need there so, please don't reach for a jar of coconut oil if you experience a panic attack.

Click here for more ideas to help you feel less anxious..

Get Ready With Me: Afternoon Coffee

Light, rosy makeup for an afternoon at a cafe--a makeup tutorial for Indian skin tones. If you know Japanese, please skip ahead to 9:10! I could use your help!

Here are the products I used:

1. Angled Eyeshadow Brush // Ulta // $12

2. Smokin Rose Eyeshadow Duo // Max Factor // $4

3. Lash Expander Mascara // Shiseido (Majolica Majorca) // $20

4. Flawless Face Brush // Bare Minerals // $28

5. Nude Lipstick ("Kinda Sexy") // MAC // $16

6. Medium Tan Face Powder (SPF 15) // Bare Minerals // $27

7. Lush Solid Perfume: I have no idea! If you know Japanese, please help me out!

Thanks for watching!

Namaste! (Get it? Because it means "hello" AND "goodbye"?)

Hi guys!

You might have noticed that this blog is no longer sowheresthemanual.blogspot.com, and is now grishmapolitan.blogspot.com

I figured I'd explain why I went with the name-change.

I started this blog while I was recovering from depression and anxiety, which is something I've briefly alluded to but never explicitly written about (I will someday, I promise, I just don't really know how to talk about it yet.) The name sowheresthemanual came from my realization that there's no prescription for happiness, and that it's something we must figure out as we go.

The core of my blog is still and always will be about living a happy, beautiful, meaningful life. But I don't want this space to exist separately from my other voices on the internet. So, I changed the url to grishmapolitan (thanks, Doug!) because... well... that's what I name everything else.

Speaking of which, you can also find me at other corners of the internet. Click on over if you'd like!

 

Medicine Cabinets for Minimalists

I'm almost done unpacking into my new apartment (almost a month later... but for a good reason! More on that soon.) But today I wanted to share what's in my medicine cabinet. 

I'm the daughter of anxious parents, so I've grown up with medicine cabinets that are stuffed full. My parents even put extras of medicine in other bags around their closet. Predictably, my own medicine cabinet was a well-equipped first-aid kit. That, and about a billion little bottles of lotion, chapstick, lip gloss, etc. etc.

I noticed that a lot of my medicine expired before I ever used it. Partly because I don't get sick very often, partly because I don't really like taking medicine. So, I began downsizing. 

I only keep pain-relievers, cold medicine, a thermometer, and some band-aids. I figure that I can buy everything else as needed. I've also dedicated the top shelf for travel-sized containers (so that they're easy to toss into a bag for quick packing.) One lotion. One lip balm. Replace as needed.

This might still look cluttered to some of you super minimalists, but here are my current essentials:

And here are some top picks:

1. Highbrow Tweezers//Sephora//$12 

I've used these for over five years and absolutely love them. The tips are angled sideways as well as inwards, so they hurt less than other tweezers I've tried. I wipe the tips with a small dab of hand sanitizer to disinfect them before use. 

2. Smith's Rosebud Salve//American Apparel//$4: 

I use them for chapped lips, dry areas, and--yes--cleaning.

3. Eucalyptus Spearmint Lotion//Bath and Body Works//$12: 

I don't use this as body lotion because it has a very strong smell, but I dab a little bit on my temples before a bath or when I'm trying to relax--it's really soothing.

4. Make Your Own Bandages//Urban Outfitters: 

Comes with 20 pastel bandaids, 3 markers, and makes wounds just a little less terrible. I wasn't able to find these online (I got these at a store in Boston a few years ago) but if you find these at a store please let me know in the comments below!