Slovakia haul

By far, the very best purchase I made in Slovakia was a big bottle of Dermacol Elixir Milky Cleanser from the Dermacol Studio. It's perfect for skin that is leaning towards dry, and was cheap as chips - $4 or so. When I bought it, the shop assistant popped in two sample sachets of other products, Elixir Serum (that page is only handy if you're fluent in Russian) and Elixir Make-up with algae. I liked the former, and absolutely loved the latter. I didn't try it out until the morning we left, at which point I texted our friend Adriana - who flew over with us but was staying on to visit family - and asked her to pick up a bottle of it for me. She did so immediately, it seems, clearly understanding the momentousness of finding a good foundation.

Another good purchase was the pleasant-smelling, seemingly effective Sebamed Day Cream for dry skin. It was something like $14 from a pharmacy in the Polus City Center, and so far it doesn't seem like a waste of money. Time will tell.

I was also pleased to pick up a bottle of Calvin Klein Euphoria, a scent that suits me very well. I am shameless in the mainstream nature of my approach to scent; I cannot abide stuff like Calvin Klein Escape for women, Clinique Happy, or Elizabeth Arden Sunflowers, but my favourite scents of the last decade have been Beautiful by Estée Lauder (which my grandmother and best friend also wore, a fact which does not have as much to do with my preference as one might imagine) and Prada's eponymous scent. I don't like it when I pass a woman who is wearing either of these, viewing her as a trespasser on sacred ground. Euphoria is another that I hope against hope will not be purchased by anyone else on earth, despite the huge publicity blitz and accompanying free samples that have been inserted into what seems like every magazine published in the last two months.

The shop assistant in the perfume store was also free and easy with the samples - something that shocked me after years in stingy Britain, where samples simply do not exist. One was A*men by Theirry Mugler, which is semi-interesting - chocolate-y and cinnamon-y, but too much like his Angel to be that remarkable. I wear the sample contentedly; I wouldn't shell out for the stuff. The other sample was Kenzo Pour Homme. I used to wear Kenzo Flower, but found it boring after a couple of days. This is similarly yawnworthy, with strong grapefruit scents (good) accompanied by cedar, musk, and other stuff that sounds like it would smell better than it does. After wearing it for a few hours, I asked Antoine what he thought. "Heavily chemical," he said, hitting the nail on the head. It owes a bit too much to the aforementioned Escape for women for my taste.

All in all, I spent much less money on cosmetics in Slovakia than I would have imagined. We're now gearing up for a Thanksgiving visit to the US in two weeks, and I know I can get good products there - with the directions and labels in English, no less - even more inexpensively than (for the most part) in Europe.

Oh, and there was only one purchase that instilled lust in my heart, and it was one I passed: a beautiful black fur handbag with leather strap, much like this Fiorelli one. It cost £40 (about $70), which isn't really a lot of money. But I'm in the "I don't need to buy beautiful things in order to appreciate them" mindset, and trying to stay there.

Comments

[Amy Alkon]

Didn't get to say so before, because I was very sick (bug going around), but I was very moved by how moved you were to be there, vis a vis the changes that have gone on there.

[Jackie Danicki]

Thank you, Amy - it is very kind of you (and Hillary) to say so. I feel very sheepish and embarrassed to write such things, so it helps to know not everyone is rolling their eyes and making mocking masturbatory gestures in my general direction!