Fragrance

What The Hell I’ve Been Up To?

Posted on by Hanan.

Greetings from the dead! This site has been radio silent for the past few months, in fact for most of 2017 and I do apologise for that. I thought before I got back to the swing of things, I should probably update you on what has been going on lately in my life and why I decided to rise back from the grave to bring you a random blog post.

1. Freelance life has been kicking my ass.

As you already know, I have been a freelance writer for a while now. Now that I think about it, it has been more than a year! I feel like I stepped into a weird vortex where time is just zooming past me at hyper-speed. I can’t believe that it has been that long.

Lately, things have been revving up and I barely have time to write anything for leisure, seeing as most of my time is taken up by writing content for other people. Also, I hate to admit it but once you start writing so much for other publications, the idea of writing on the weekends really bum you out.

2. Video editing is a new thing I’m into.

Which brings me to my second point. Because I don’t feel like writing much on the weekends, I have been exploring other means to express my creativity and passion for beauty products. Hence, I have been exploring video and photography. I started with vlogs, as you guys may have already known. And now I am moving towards more fragrance related content. I am such a huge lover of fragrances and I love the fragrance community on YouTube so much that I wanted to be a part of it. That was how I started putting out fragrance related content on my YouTube channel and the response from other content creators have been amazing. I felt so welcomed and it was a great feeling talking about things that you love with other people who are equally fanatic about it.

I’ll leave you with my most recent video. It’s a vlog combined with a house review of the local indie perfume company, Oo La Lab. You can check out my thoughts as well as have a peek into my life.

3. I took up school again.

Yep, I’m back in school. As weird as that sounds. However, since I am dead serious about improving my video editing and production skills, it was imperative to me that I take up lessons and really learn the skills I need properly. Hence, I’ve enrolled in part time courses to better my understand on photoshop and so on. So it has been pretty tough juggling work, school and a social life. Another lame but valid excuse as to why I haven’t been updating this page for a while.

4. Things might be changing…?

I might be changing the direction of this website. Of course, I will continue to produce beauty and lifestyle related content on this site. But with my job being affiliated with beauty related content, I think I might switch this up and make it more casual space where I just share bits of my life, be it beauty, clothes or fragrances in a more nonchalant and personal manner. I think it’s more authentic and true to my brand. Also, it will distance myself from future complications in case, I’m told that I can’t write about certain things anymore as I am representing certain companies or brands. It’ll be a positive change as the content here will be more genuine and something different from what’s provided by other official media outlets.

5. Follow me on other platforms too!

As I mentioned before, I have been delving deep into photography, particularly film photography. So my other social media handles have been updated all year round, on a more consistent basis than this one. I always love sharing random things on InstaStory and also share pictures I took on my Instagram page. So, you can see what I’m up to @thebroadwalk on Instagram. I definitely am always on that app, so feel free to connect with me there too.

So that’s about it. I am not dead! I am still here and I will be better about posting from now on as I learnt to manage my time better. I like using this platform to share my thoughts, feelings and opinions. Therefore, I will be keeping this handle and website for as long as I can afford it. You can check out my YouTube channel for more vlogs and fragrance related content and my Instagram for my photography.

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Thank you for being so patient! I have some FIRE topics to talk about and things to share so hang on tight. The Broadwalk is back, baby!

Budget Buys: Best Zara Fragrances

Posted on by Hanan.

This was a random video that I shot and edited in one night after watching one of my favourite fragrance Youtuber, Redolessence’s video on a Zara perfume that I loved and no one talked about. Ever since I have joined the “fraghead” community and started deepening my interest in all things to do with scents, I started expanding my perfume collection. I love switching my scents depending on my mood, the weather and my outfits. But as you can probably imagine, fragrance collecting can be a financially demanding hobby. It certainly burns holes in my wallet, purchasing designer and niche fragrances that cost well over $100 a bottle.

Enter Zara and their underrated collection of scents that serve as dupes for the more expensive originals or just plain good scents for a low, low price. I became obsessed with their surprisingly good perfume collection and started owning more than a few bottles. I think people tend to scoff at their scents, thinking that they are nothing more than faint body splashes, to synthetic smelling “wannabe” perfumes. In a blind sniff test though, I dare say you would think that their scents are easily designer level at the very least. Plus, they have unique offerings like fragrances that use notes of tobacco, oud and even tonka bean.

The thing is, their collection is so huge (and often easily discontinued) that you might not know where to even start. As with most cheapie fragrance houses, it’s all hit-or-miss. So I tend to approach it like a treasure hunt. And I’m happy to report some gems I’ve found in the midst of it all!

Here are my top 5 Zara fragrances that I think you should check out currently. Of course, Zara is always pumping out new clothes and fragrances, almost on a daily basis (as with most fast fashion houses). So this list might change in the future, but all these scents are SO SO good. You should get your nose on them ASAP!

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