Look you guys, I just can't. Like...I can't. American voters actually voted for the guy who said "you won't have to vote again" if he wins. I bet if you asked, most of them would say they oppose fascism, but they sure didn't vote that way.
And I just can't take that, because fascism -- and this may come as a surprise to many more than it should -- is bad. You don't even have to like socialism to believe that. If you think fascism is good, this is not the blog for you. If you think Trump is not one stripe of fascist, kindly never speak to me again. He bears all the hallmarks.
It's already affecting Taiwan. TaiwanPlus reporter Louise Watt called Trump a "convicted felon", and her report was first removed, then altered. But that Trump is a convicted felon is a matter of fact, not opinion. She was not editorializing -- he is a convicted felon, by a court of law. Period.
I get that Taiwan wants to be friendly to just about anyone in its quest to uphold its own sovereignty and TaiwanPlus is technically a government news outlet. However, if we can't even speak the truth here, if the news is too scared to state a fact, then what's even worth fighting for? I don't just mean in Taiwan, I mean at all, for anything?
I can't take all this, I just can't. I have nothing in my heart for it. Only blackness remains. I'm willing to go scorched earth on this, but every cell that isn't numb and unforgiving is pained at taking such a hard stance. So before I completely lose it, let's talk about T-beauty.
A lot of these types of articles recommend 5, maybe 10 products. They curate. But y'know what? Screw curation. I'm so utterly devastated by watching President Rapist actually win the election that I'm not gonna do that. I'm gonna go full-bore, window to the wall, the world can bite me on this. I'll probably never write about T-beauty again, either because I won't feel like it, or the resource wars will be upon us and we'll all be making soap from ashes and chemistry equipment scavenged from Tianshui Street.
Phew. So.
T-beauty -- like K-beauty but with a T. Not Korea, but Taiwan. My interest in T-beauty arose from a desire to not rely on Western products unavailable in Taiwan; all that shipping and shoving things that leak and break in suitcases was simply not sustainable. Of course, many international beauty brands are available in Taiwan, but the cheap ones like Dove don't work that well for me, and I'm not a Duty Free bitch; I'm not gonna pay through the nose for something called "Face Caviar" (gross) from a brand called La Prairie, which is apparently Swiss. And as we all know, Switzerland is famed for its expanse of prairie.
High-quality products conceived and produced in Taiwan at reasonable prices, from the more artisanal brands found in places like Eslite and Hayashi to affordable options at drugstores, were a good alternative to explore.
Besides, most (and possibly soon all) of the United States no longer thinks my body is my own, but I still do, and I would like to maintain good skincare whilst telling fascists to eat shit and possibly throwing Molotovs at them (we'll see how things evolve -- I am open to all anti-fascist possibilities). I realize I'm not exactly sticking it to the man -- after all, the incoming regime is fine with beauty care, when they're not shaming us for spending time and money on it. We're just ornamental to them. Trump certainly thinks of us as mobile sex ports unfortunately burdened with sentience, and so do many of his minions. I do enjoy it for myself, though.
There are a lot of great articles recommending different products, but they can't guarantee that those products will work on my fickle skin and hair. I haven't found a big difference in how products popular in Asia affect my skin, but my hair is notably different from the local norm.
I do have my favorites, though, and I've divided these recommendations based on where they're used on the body, or at least where I use them.
Hair
My hair is fine but very wavy; it will even curl in the right conditions. It's thinned out a lot since COVID, and while I don't heat-style it at all, I do color it. It's impossible to comb without conditioner. My face tends toward oily but my scalp dries out easily. I leave two full days between each hair wash, and try for three if I think I'll make it without an itchy scalp. Here's what works for me:
Shampoo
I like most of Cha Tzu Tang's shampoos, with the exception of the Incense Cedar Leaf Purifying Shampoo, which feels amazing on the first use, then dries out my scalp after every subsequent wash. My current favorite is the Mulberry Repairing Shampoo, but I've had good luck with their Mallow Volumizing Shampoo as well.
Another long-time favorite is Yuan. While long-term use of their signature Alpinia Speciosa "Head Water" can sometimes lead to drying, it always results in lots of shine.
For color-treated hair, there's really only one good option: Greenvines' Know More Color Vibrancy Shampoo. In general I find many of Greenvines' face products to be a bit too heavy for my oily skin, but their hair and body care is fantastic.
Conditioner
Good conditioner is especially hard to source, and it even took me awhile to find a salon that uses it without question or protest. Or worse, let their assistants who do all the work just neglect it without telling me, and then wonder why I'm crying as they rip out my already thin hair trying to comb it. Horrible memories.
Conditioner, then, was once a product that I exclusively brought over from the US. But I doubt I'll be visiting at all in the next four years, if not longer, because the latest wave of "your body my choice" nonsense on the back of President Rapist's victory has me genuinely worried about encounters with misogynists who don't understand consent and feel entitled to women's bodies. You know, like the president-elect does.
As someone who has been sexually assaulted -- not raped, but it could have turned into that if things had gone differently -- this also raises my hackles in a PTSD sort of way. I cannot fathom spending even one minute in a country where most of my fellow voting citizens knew perfectly well that Donald Trump is a convicted rapist, but voted for him anyway. Which means on some level, they think it is okay to be a rapist. Which means they think rape is okay. Which means they think what almost happened to me was okay. It's okay that the President of the United States has, to all public knowledge, actually done worse, and to many women. More than twenty, at last count.
Or they think all those women are lying, which means they're misogynists who still don't respect women or their bodies.
Anyway, I can't get over this. I cannot forgive and cannot speak to anyone who thinks rape is acceptable, so I guess I'm buying my conditioner in Taiwan.
Both Cha Tzu Tang's Marigold Hair Conditioner, which is a solid basic option, and Rosskastanie Revitalizing Conditioner work for me. Yuan has a few options, but their Hair Treatment -- the more expensive one in the white tube -- is amazing. Worth every penny. Ginger Acre (also called Ginger Ginger or 薑心比心) offers a lighter Orange & Ginger conditioner that I like when all the moisture I pour into my hair feels like too much, and it needs a rest while still being conditioned.
Of course, all of these brands offer other products -- Greenvines has a detangling conditioner I'm interested in testing, for example -- but I can only talk about what I've actually tried and liked.
Leave-in Treatments
There are a few Taiwanese options for products you leave in hair, but I've only really tried one: Yuan's Lemon Hair Cream. It doesn't really add moisture, which is good when I'm a day away from a wash. You'd think as a cream that it would be heavy, but it's not -- it creates texture in the hair and adds quite a lot of shine, without the weight.
I have so many leave-in products to work through that it might be awhile before I get to these, but I'm curious about Greenvines' Recharging Leave-In Treatment, as well as their various scalp and hair oils.
Another option that's worked for me is just basic drugstore pure aloe gel. Some of these are Korean, some are Taiwanese, so I can't recommend a specific brand. But any inexpensive aloe gel, rubbed into wet hair, will add an oil-free, grease-free moisture boost that my hair loves.
Otherwise, I have to admit I still use non-Taiwanese leave-in products -- mostly Parkjun Labs' Protein LPP Oil from Korea, and Lucido-L hair holding cream from Japan, which feels like Elmer's Glue but is water soluble and actually holds my waves in place.
Face
Despite being in my forties (yeah, I know) I still have a very oily face. I'm not very wrinkly but I still get big, ugly zits. Taipei's humid, subtropical climate is said to keep people looking young -- I don't know if that's true, but I can say that my face never feels dry here. While most Taiwanese seem to be looking for moisture in their face care products, I look for clarity.
You know where you won't find clarity? A country where the majority of voters chose a felon for president. A few think he was wrongly convicted or "they" are "out to get him". But this is real life, get your conspiracy theory asses back to Ancient Aliens and leave the adults alone. Many, however, are perfectly aware that he did in fact commit all of those crimes, and still voted for him.
We've had felons in the White House before -- Nixon famously, but probably others as well. Somehow this bothers me less than the rape. Of course it's bad, and of course I wouldn't vote for a felon, but a lot of Americans might be numb to this. I mean, considering how common these sorts of crimes are whether by the wealthy.
Ah, the wealthy, whom people admire for no good reason, it's not like they're particularly smart. Have you met rich people? I have. Jesus Donkeycuck Christ. Honestly though, if you want to find crime, you don't even have to look at the billionaires. Check out the American government abroad.
I can't do anything to wash this stain away from the country of my birth, but I can wash my face.
Face Wash
Yuan has many facial cleansing gels, but to be honest my favorite product for this purpose is actually their soap. While I find the mugwort soap a bit too drying -- it works beautifully for a day or two, then my face actually gets oilier -- their gromwell & roselle soap, mung bean & job's tears soap and yellow sage soap have all worked. I only use a cleanser in the morning along with one of those vibrating exfoliant machines that sounds like a sex toy; in the evenings I wash with just warm water, dried with a soft towel.
I've heard people say that Yuan soaps are drying, and that can be true. But that's what my face needs -- I've tried to fight grease with moisture and it doesn't work. Your mileage may vary.
I don't vary my face washing much, so I don't have a wide range of products to recommend. It's taken me a long time to get my post-wash face care routine down though, so I have a lot more to say.
Morning Skincare
Most face lotions, including Taiwanese ones, are too heavy for me. If you have dry skin they may work for you, however. I've narrowed it down to one toner, and one serum -- although the serum is optional if I'm feeling especially greasy.
Toners that have worked for me include 23.5N's Oriental Beauty Tea Balancing Toner and Naruko's Green Tea Shine Control Toner. Despite the Japanese name, Naruko is a Taiwanese drugstore brand. A student of mine once commented that it's popular with and targeted at Taiwanese female college students, both in terms of the focus on treating oily skin and the low price point. 23.5N's Bamboo Ultra Hydrating and Yuan's Wild Mugwort toners are also lovely, though I prefer the long-term results of the Oriental Beauty Tea product.
If I'm traveling in the US, I carry a travel bottle of Greenvines' Know More Awakening Toner. It's too thick for Taiwan's climate (yes, I know, I find even a toner too thick!) but perfect for, say, winter in New England.
Not that I'll be experiencing an American winter anytime soon. Unless of course we mean nuclear winter, because Trump's comfort with autocrats around the world -- especially Putin, but others too -- make me genuinely afraid that his idiocy and predilection for both chaos and control will lead to World War III.
And people chose that. They chose it. How can I look my fellow citizens in the face again?
If I've got a zit, which I usually do, I dab on some Naruko Triple Effect Blemish Clear Serum. It really does reduce redness and inflammation in pimples, and I find they disappear more quickly.
If I want to add a serum after that, there's really only one good option: 23.5N's Rice Soothing Active Essence. Anything heavier than this and I get real zitty, real fast.
I do use an eye cream, because I'm old. Naruko's basic eye cream is great and available at Watson's. Honestly, the skin around the eyes needs a lot less special care than marketers have led us to believe. If I want to be ~*~fancy~*~, 23.5N's Red Pearl Barley Whitening Eye Gel is a good choice.
This is the only "whitening" product I'll use, because if you've met me, you know that not only do I not need to my skin to be any whiter (nobody does, honestly), but also I do not think it's possible. I could already get my makeup at the mortician's if I wore makeup. Which I don't, because if I have this strong a reaction to just toner, you can imagine how makeup makes my skin feel (like I've been hit by a clown wielding a well-frosted buttercream cake. And yes, I foiled your "cream pie" jokes. I win).
In fact, the presence of whitening products in so much Taiwanese skincare, which are wholly unnecessary because skin of every color is beautiful, creates a challenge for the Westerner who just doesn't want it. I've inadvertently bought products that have bleached my colorful towels or caused my face to turn tingly, red and blotchy.
Speaking of whitening, I'm terrified of Trump's rhetoric on immigrants. This is where I feel especially disheartened. Want to point out that immigrants are not only good for the economy but also commit fewer crimes than natural-born citizens? Get ready for a racist backlash based on lots of fear about a non-existent "migrant crisis" of criminals, fraudulent voters, job-stealers and dole-bludgers -- and zero evidence.
Oh yeah, and as an Armenian-American, you can imagine how deeply the phrase "mass deportations" labeled as "necessary" for "national security" makes me feel that this world truly is full of horrors beyond our comprehension. Have we learned nothing from history?
Apparently not, and we're going to learn even less, because we're also about to start defunding education.
Evening Skincare
If I've made it to the evening without Xanax, which I usually don't these days, I might have the energy for some evening skincare. I usually use Naruko's Green Tea Shine Control Clear Night Jelly, but a fancier option with great results is 23.5N's Bamboo Ultra Hydrating or Oriental Beauty Tea Balancing gel masks, used in very small quantities. I imagine the Rice Soothing Active Gel Mask is fantastic as well, as I like that entire product line.
If I really need to calm down about the fact that more than one cabinet pick is bogged down by sexual misconduct allegations -- one famously being an accused pedophile -- I might do a mask. Yuan has great masks, with my preference being the Wild Mugwort Soothing Black Mask. You can never go wrong with 23.5N masks, with my favorite being the Rice Soothing Active Feather Masks. I also like MyBeautyDiary Witch Hazel Oil Control masks and both Naruko's Tea Tree, Narcissus Repairing and Magnolia Firming masks. Forest Beauty masks are affordable and smell amazing. I'm especially fond of their tea series, most notably the Alishan Green Tea firming mask.
I have less to say about evening skin care than morning, so I'll mention Yuan's Hinoki toothpaste here. I wouldn't have thought to try a fancy toothpaste with an unusual flavor and scent, but I was given a tube and liked it. Will I spend my own money on it? Perhaps!
I can't say it helps me wash the taste of burgeoning worldwide fascism out of my mouth. Nothing can keep me from despairing that despite our efforts, the dictators and wannabe-dictators are winning.
Body Care
It's unclear to what extent Trump will be influenced by mustelified man-child Elon Musk, who "thinks he understands China well" but clearly doesn't, as he believes "Taiwan is an integral part of China". It isn't and arguably never has been, not even under the Qing, which controlled only the western third of Taiwan for most of its reign, and treated it like a colony and 'defensive hedge', not an integral part of anything). But, it will certainly be to an extent.
Perhaps his choice of Marco Rubio for secretary of state will counter that -- Rubio is famously pro-Taiwan, which raises questions of why all the worst people in American politics, except Trump, seem to support this country. I still haven't really come to terms with that, and never will.
But Rubio is also a misogynist fuckpig who thinks women have no bodily autonomy, so even without delving into the other foreign-policy implications of this choice, as a woman he makes my entire body do the AOL "Goodbye" sound.
Regardless, if the Trump team signals to Russia that it can conquer Ukraine unopposed, and to Israel that it can "finish the job" of annexing chunks of Palestine and committing atrocity after atrocity against Palestinians, I don't know that Rubio alone will be enough to still China's hand.
So, if we're going to be in the trenches lobbing Molotovs at the PLA as it marches on Taipei, we're going to want to be clean and well-moisturized.
Unfortunately, I am a boring person who doesn't have a particularly varied routine, but I'm a big fan of Cha Tzu Tang's Taiwan Incense Cedar Leaf Body Wash. The scent might be a bit strong for some, but I love it -- it's too bad the shampoo doesn't quite work for me. For something lighter, try Cha Tzu Tang's Lotus Leaf Moisturizing Body Wash. I find Yuan soap a little too drying for the rest of my skin, but their body washes are quite nice. I love citrus, so lemon is my preferred scent.
I don't really like keeping so many bottles around, though, so I often opt for bar soap. For non-drying options, I find Dachun Soap is easily the best. My favorites among their offerings are Classic Tea Soap and Taiwan Native Red Quinoa Soap.
When we're in bomb shelters sharing rations, we'll want to be moisturized. It's hard for me to recommend a specific body lotion as most T-beauty brands offer them, and they're about equally good in my estimation. My favorite scents are typically from Cha Tzu Tang and Ginger Acre.
There's also Greenvines' Auscentic moisturizing body oil, which absorbs quickly -- no grease -- and smells amazing. I'm a fan of their Awakening Grace scent, but it's expensive, so I've only bought it once. Someday I may try the Auscentic body washes as well.
If I'm not wearing perfume, I like Naruko's Green Tea Body Spray. It's great for controlling the acne that I get in...places. Honestly, don't ask.
If I am wearing perfume, I generally don't prefer anything too sweet or feminine. Dachun's East Fame, Pseven's Aged Tea and Ruby, and Take a Snooze's #14 Earl are among my favorite Taiwanese scents. 23.5N has a range of aromatic oils, with Summer Solstice being my favorite. Yuan has a few as well, and they're all good.
And if I'm taking a bath, I usually add salts. While I usually make my own blend of Epsom salts and essential oil or buy Japanese bath salts from Tokyu Hands, Yuan's Repose aromatic bath salts are also fantastic.
Hand and Foot Care
We're going to want to keep our hands clean during the resource wars, both metaphorically as our (elected!) leaders sell us out to the highest bidder, and also literally. How is the world going to look health-wise after RFK guts the FDA while demonizing vaccines? How many more epidemics will be unleashed? Who knows, but wash those hands. I keep Cha Tzu Tang handwash in my kitchen -- I can't find the lavender one I have now on their page, but they're all good -- and Yuan handwash in the bathroom.
I did try bar soap for this purpose to cut down on bottle consumption, but I found it made me not want to wash my hands. That's no good, so I just got the bottles.
Because I'm white, I probably won't be marched to a death camp by either China (in Taiwan), Israel (in Palestine) or the US (on its own soil). But who knows, so it's good to stay moisturized. Also, dry hands and feet can lead to micro-cracks and cuts that can let bacteria in, and you won't want that in the coming years.
So, Cha Tzu Tang's Lotus Leaf moisturizer is perfect for hands. I find Yuan's lotions a bit heavy for hands, but their Rose Hand Cream is just right for suffering feet.
But whatever.
I want to believe that fascism can be fought and defeated, that this "enemy from within" stuff, calling centrist (dare I say mildly conservative) liberals 'radical socialists', was from history textbooks, not current speeches.
We kinda-sorta stopped it once, no? These days, though, it feels like kudzu. Fighting it seems to stimulate its growth; anyone who's battled hate against a particular group will be familiar with this dynamic. As a woman who cares about gender equality, it reminds me of young men turning misogynist in larger numbers in response to improvements in women's rights and status in society.
Truly, I have no idea how we're going to stop Stupid Chaos Mussolini. Those who voted for him seem to want to 'unite' and be friendly again; I can't do that. I can't even offer forgiveness, let alone kindness or friendship. I suppose someone's got to talk to the people who aren't exactly fascists but still made excuses to vote for one -- who knowingly chose a rapist.
I can't be that person, though. They're either going to have to fix their own shit, or we're going to have to fix this whole thing the same way we had to handle it about 85 years ago. Think it can't happen again? That's what they thought in the early 1930s, too.
