Monday, September 28, 2009

i LOVE mondays - Arts : indulging Henna Mehndi in Eid

may Peace be upon You

Salam AidilFitri to all and welcome back to another Fabulous Monday! I hope you had a good break for the Syawal season and had great fun with the festive mood but most importantly I also do hope that all of you are still LOVING your Mondays!

I really miss the Ramadhan season and am so looking forward of its arrival again. Hopefully I am able to see the next Ramadhan makes it debut in time to come. In the meantime, its live and breathe fabulously for the day.

This year, I have decided to Recycle and Reuse whatever attire that I can find in the wardrobe for Eid. I think its the best solution for the "vintage" theme. I thought it will be a good idea to echo the efforts for thinking Green and in these times of economic downtown its a very good reason to do it. Plus, its an easy solution.... you just need some simple highlight twist and your "old" canvas gets a new lift.

At the same time, it becomes this one thing that I decide to do this year which I fail to resist...(vanity happens to be my alter Ego) - indulging into body art for Eid.

There I was just a day before Eid and was doing my errands in Geylang Bazaar (doing the last chores Mama instruct me to do) before leaving to JB, (my version of what some say Balik Kampung..) I was suddenly lured into this booth that was draped with boudoir like curtains and glitter with pretty girls sitting in a row fiddling with something onto the customers hand.

That was the art of Mehndi. And as described in Wikipedia :

Mendhi (also Mehandi, Mehendi, etc.) is the application of Henna as a temporary form of skin decoration in South Asia, Southwest Asia, North Africa and the Horn of Africa, as well as by expatriate communities from these areas. Mehendi decorations became fashionable in the West in the late 1990s, where they are sometimes called henna tattoos. Henna is typically applied during special occasions like weddings and festivals. It is usually drawn on the palms and feet, where the color will be darkest because the skin contains higher levels of keratin which binds temporarily to lawsone, the colorant of henna. Henna was originally used as a form of decoration mainly for brides.

The term henna tattoo is inaccurate, because tattoos are defined as permanent surgical insertion of pigments underneath the skin, as opposed to pigments resting on the surface as is the case with mehndi.


Likely due to the desire for a "tattoo-black" appearance, many people have started adding the synthetic dye PPD to henna to give it a black color. PPD is extremely harmful to the skin and can cause severe allergic reactions resulting in permanent injury or death.[1]

Alata (Mahur) is a flower-based dye used to paint the feet of the brides in some regions of India. It is still used in Bengal.



Whilst the attire may be old, little thing like this does make a nice sutble statement of the whole esemble.....

I think this could be my next "obsession"..........


From your kawai designer - PearL

3 comments:

Shopaholic Mama said...

Welcome back!

Another way to give it a nice reddish colour to the henna is to apply axe oil or minyak kapak on the henna!

D wanted it so much, so FM bought a tube for $1 at bazaar Geylang. She applied it on pagi Raya & we gasped at what she drew on her hand - a flower + some smiley faces on her fingers! it turned out too comical!

Luckily it was very light & by now, it faded!

rasp said...

Salam, nice touch!

Harajuku PearL said...

Mama Ann - yeah, i ever heard of such tip, letak minyak masak lah, minyak zaiton lah...now got minyak kapak lagi..hehehehe

Rasp - thanks ya..

P