Chicago Chillin'

It is officially 2017! This is my first post of the year, yes I know it's already 19 days into the new year but better late than never right? The most popular saying since the new year: new year, new me. I hope this happens to me, for the better of course. I'm about to start my second semester at NYU as a graduate student as well as interning 3 days a week so I'm hoping I can juggle both to really build up my resume as I pursue my master's. I can't wait to see what's in store for me this year and I hope it's a great year for me and you!

This year has already been pretty good for me. Rang in the new year with my close loved ones with no concrete plans but ended up having a great time, got a 3.94 GPA (so close yet so far to a 4.0), scored an internship at a well-known designer's corporate office as a press intern, and went on a trip with my best friend -- which is where these photos come in. 

I really wanted to have a mini getaway with just wendy, just wendy and me. We were initially planning to go to Boston, but having been there together already and due to pretty inexpensive flights we decided on: CHICAGO. Wendy had never been and I've been but when I was 12, which was a decade ago (o m g a decade) so I have almost no memory of it except that I don't like deep-dish pizza. We had such a great time in Chicago that we keep wanting to go back. Minus the cold everything was awesome. When we felt the crisp, cold air of Chicago, we realized NYC cold ain't shit.. we would stand outside for maybe 15 seconds and already feel our exposed body parts starting to get numb. It's no joke in Chicago. On our first night, during a trip to Walgreens it was 4 degrees but felt like -7.. insane. Which is why I wore AT LEAST 4 layers every day. 

I love being able to explore a new city. One that is quite similar to NYC in terms of a lot of skyscrapers and a lot of shopping; Chicago's Magnificent Mile is comparable to our 5th Ave. BUT it's a lot nicer walking through Chicago streets because there are about 19387598x more people walking the streets of NYC. We were contemplating on whether or not to rent a car but we found out that Uber is pretty inexpensive there, so we opted to just uber/lyft-ing around. Getting to try restaurants in a different city is so exciting to me. A few places I would recommend:

• Honey Butter Fried Chicken: BOMB fried chicken. I got the Original Fried Chicken Sandwich "The O.G" and O m G it was so good. The chicken was flavorful, tender, and juicy, the sauce was delicious.. just TRY IT. Wendy ordered the 2-piece honey butter fried chicken, which had 1 piece of white meat and 1 piece of dark meat and came with a side of butter that you're supposed to spread on the chicken. First we tried the white meat one, so obviously it was a bit dry so I thought it was eh. But then the second one was dark meat and MM yes, dark meat is the way to go. Also super juicy and tender and with the butter.. well MO BUTTA MO BETTA (hi5 if you know who says this.) We also got a side of the pimento mac n' cheese, it was interesting but it wasn't really up my alley. I don't remember if we ordered cornbread or if it was given but it was whatever, just tasted like any ol' cornbread.
• Mortar & Pestle: Alaskan King Crab Benedict. Delicious. I don't believe we have anything like this in NYC; I know we have lump crab at Sarabeth's but it doesn't compare to the alaskan king crab. I love king crab and I love benedict so it was so good. Chicago also does their eggs really well. All four of our poached eggs were perfectly poached, which is a must in this dish. The price was also very affordable considering the ingredient used - $17! I can imagine it being about $25 if it were elsewhere. We also ordered the fruity pebble funnel cake to share and it was good as well! Not much of a fruity pebble taste though if you ask me, but you can never go wrong with funnel cake.
• RPM: This was a random spot we yelped since the place we initially wanted to go was booked for the night. We learned that in Chicago it's important to call before going to a restaurant, so we did and they told us the next table available would be 11PM but we could sit at the bar. We just agreed since we were hungry and wanted Italian. When we arrived, expecting to sit at the bar, we actually got a bar table which was pretty much our own little hightop table. We didn't mind at all! We ordered the Maine lobster ravioli, the spicy crab squid ink spaghetti, with a side of broccolini because us Chinese girls need our veggies. EVERYTHING WAS SO GOOD! It was so good that we ordered 2 spicy crab squid ink pastas to go, hehe. I recommend this place if you're in Chicago! It's right off of Magnificent Mile so quite convenient if you're in the area. 

There are a few places that we went to that were recommended to us or had a lot of reviews but we didn't find that spectacular. 

• Wildberry: A brunch spot that supposedly gets really busy on the weekends. We got super lucky only having to wait about 5 minutes on a Friday at around 1:30. They're one of those restaurants that close at 2:30 then open later again. The one perk was that it was pretty inexpensive for the amount of food that they give you. It's a lot. But the food itself was okay. Wendy got some kind of mexican skillet and I got the benedict with chorizo. Both were okay. Maybe we didn't order the right items.
• The Purple Pig: If you ain't a meat, or PORK lover, this is not the place for you. This is supposed to be a tapas/small plates restaurant but holy pig the portions were HUGE. Each 'tapa' resembled a regular entree dish size. Our waitress told us to order 2 each and we could barely finish 2.. I LOVE salty food, but the food was pretty salty. I'm also not a food critic, but in my opinion things were a little over-seasoned. The dishes seemed to have too many flavors going on in one dish, to the point where it was quite overwhelming. 

I could go into more detail but don't want to make this a crazy long review but if you have any questions you can drop a comment or email me! 

I seriously had such a great time with just my bestie ^_^ I can't wait until our next vacation together! We need to make this an annual thing before we get married and have kids!! 

#NYFW

As you know, New York Fashion Week was this month.  Being a part of the fashion industry means it's a very exciting time.  We get to see all the runway shows and new collections, we get to get inspiration from street style shots, and we get to dress ourselves up even more than usual.  Ever since I've been interested in fashion, I've always wanted to both work a fashion show and attend a fashion show. Well, this year I got to do BOTH and they were both such great first experiences for me.

Back in my first year of college, when I was still at FIT, my friends and I went out to fashion week at Soho where there were all types of little events and freebies to collect. It wasn't much of an experience, but that was my first ever fashion week-related 'event.' Years following, I didn't have time to attend fashion week events because of conflicting class schedules and whatnot but I still always followed the shows via blogs and Vogue. I've always loved seeking inspiration from Instagram and online publications to see what the upcoming trends are in runway AND on the streets. 

This year, I am now officially done with undergrad and I've moved on to grad school back in Manhattan at NYU. I also managed to get a PR internship at Prabal Gurung just in time for fashion week. I was super ecstatic about it because like I said previously I've always wanted to work fashion week.  Unfortunately, I'm no longer an intern at Prabal because it just wasn't for me and I already have a lot on my plate as a first semester grad student. However, Prabal Gurung is such a nice guy, and I'm so blessed to have gotten the experience to work with him even if it was only for such a short amount of time.  Getting to work backstage for him and seeing all the chaos that goes on behind-the-scenes was not something everyone gets to do. I'm glad my experience was for such a great well-known designer like Prabal Gurung. His collection was also GORGEOUS so if you haven't checked it out you definitely should! I now have a Prabal Gurung backstage pass as my souvenir for working fashion week and it's hanging in my room :)

The following day, one of my friends, Lucy @lucysiyu on Instagram, had an extra spot at a fashion show so I jumped on the opportunity and she took me as her +1.  It wasn't Chanel or Marchesa or anything but hey I'm still so thankful for her taking me to experience my first show ever.  It was #nolchashows and there were a number of designers whose collections I got to see so it was like a few fashion shows all at once.  It was such an interesting experience and I would gladly do it again, haha. The outfit above is what I decided to wear to the show. I've really been loving midi-length things. I used to think it was such an awkward length for me since I'm so short but they've been really appealing to me. So when I saw this top at Primark I knew I had to get it because it's such a versatile piece; I can wear it as a shirt-dress, as an open-shirt, or the way I wore it in the photos above. I wasn't even planning on wearing it this way until I actually started styling it. I loved how it flowed when I was walking because it showed a bit of leg every time I took a step with the wind blowing in my favor. Who remembers when the assymetrical skort was in? It's been about a year or two since I wore mine so I decided to bring them out. Don't you love finding old stuff in your closet that you haven't worn in a while and it ends up making a really cute outfit with your new clothes? I know I love it! My slippers are from Nine West, but from the outlet so I got two of the same pairs (one in white and one in black) for an amazing deal of 2 for $27 which is a steal! I love how simple they are yet they still add such a sophisticated look. Yes, you're not seeing wrong, I am carrying a new céline, it's actually my mom's but we all know I'm going to be wearing it more than she will hehe. #célinegirl

frenchie

"Oui oui," some guy working at a car wash called at me. "All you need is a baguette (beret)," silly Evelyn said, even though it works both ways.  This outfit was not intended to make me appear as a Parisian lady or a Venetian gondola driver, but it kind-of just happened.

The title of this post is inspired by a few things: 1. my outfit resembles that of a "french outfit" 2. I absolutely adore frenchies and on a more serious note 3. the tragedies that France has been facing. 

As many of you should have heard, the other day Nice, France was attacked leaving a significant amount of people dead.  I'm not one to bring up these tragedies, especially in a blog post like this but it's so heartbreaking to see how disgusting our world has become.  There's so much unnecessary violence that results in innocent people getting injured or losing their lives. It's sad to see this happening around us. Pray for all those countries in need.

On a brighter note, I've seriously been obsessed with french bulldogs lately. I want one so badly but that'll have to wait until I'm living on my own since my dad is against the idea of having a pup in the house. I'm already set on getting a frenchie as my first pup and I already have the name ready, so my future husband better let me do all the name-giving.  I've been stressing about post-grad responsibilities and I think having a frenchie next to me would have alleviate a good chunk of that stress ^_^.