the Cosmo girl in me has awakened

Finally I'm inspired to write another blog post. It's about my new favorite magazine - Cosmo!

To tell the truth, when I first heard that there will be an Armenian Cosmopolitan, i wasn't very optimistic about that... and I couldn't even imagine that I will be buying its every issue and participating in Cosmo events with such an enthusiasm. The cosmo girl in me has been awakened :) I don't remember myself buying any beauty or women's magazines. So far, the only magazine I've been buying with this periodicity was the "Хакер" when I was a teenager :)

There have been very different responses to Cosmo's appearance in the Armenian market. Many friends of mine have been mocking the articles, titles and just the fact that "those terms" sound so funny in Armenian. But is there any other way? I imagine how difficult it is for the writers and editors to translate and adapt the materials and just to find out how those things are called in Armenian! One of the biggest impacts of Cosmo in our society will be for us to finally get used to Armenian language terms for things. I didn't know Armenian equivalents for most of cosmetics items and even names of clothing (դիմափոշի for румяна, ստվերաներկ for тень, բոկոտիկ for босоножка, երանգաքսուք for тональный крем etc).

So here I'm gonna tell you why I <3 Cosmo so much :)

• It's very professionally done. From content to the design and layout (printing quality too :))). I really enjoy browsing its pages.
• Contrary to other beauty magazines we have in the market (which are brought from Russia), the content in Armenian Cosmo is actually targeted on us! You see the ad and you know that you can buy it here in the boutiques.
• The fashion and beauty columns are informative, useful and with items that are accessible for us. You can see professional photo shoots with clothing that is hand picked from our boutiques by their fashion editor with prices indicated and stylists advice on how to combine the items.
• They have a good social media strategy and a very professional website (kudos to Shushan!;).
• They succeeded in finding their target "audience" and their first months showed us how much this magazine was demanded by Armenian young women. I'm not surprised that Cosmo is actually the largest circulation Armenian magazine in our market.
• I'm really proud for knowing some people from the Cosmo staff personally and that's how I'm not surprised how they get such a great thing done every month :))
• You can find useful gifts in some issues! I bought two copies of an issue that had a really cute and quality passport cover from women'secret inside. My mom started to read Cosmo after that :))))
• They organize really cool events !!! :)

Last month Cosmo organized a "Tropic Party" in Vahakni and I went there with my cousin and met looots of friends. They had invited some beauty salons and cosmetics brands to showcase their products, had some contests and many surprises. Imagine, opportunity to have a free professional make-up (got lucky to have it!), hairdo (mine was amazing! my sister didn't recognize me at first when she saw me like that :)), free cosmopolitan cocktail (of course), great music and gifts, gifts...

me having a professional makeup (probably just 3rd time in my life :D)

here i learned about this hair gadget which makes awesome hair :))

so this was my look

me and my sister :) my hairdo consists of "broken waves" (yup, just learned the name)

this pic was featured in the September issue, I'm on it!! :D

Here's Cosmo's photo report on the party: part 1, part 2, part 3.

After the tropic party, we learned that there will be a shopping night in Yerevan, for the first time!!! They managed to get more than 80 boutiques and companies participating and actually organized a real shopping festival for Yerevan citizens.  I promised myself that I won't do any shopping before that date (financial issues, nothing else :D), but had to break my promise since I had to be a gorgeous maid of honor on my friends' wedding before the shopping night :))) [and you know, i couldn't recycle an old dress and even shoes on that wedding!]

With my shopaholics image known to the whole world, I unwillingly became a walking advertisement for the Cosmo shopping night :D I've been getting few questions on what it is and how it's gonna be held, every day. Calls, FB messages, in person... well, somehow i was really informed :) Hey Cosmo, I guess you owe me here :D

It so happened that had very limited finances [the shopping for wedding was... costly, to say the least :D]. As a true shopaholic, I already knew what's up in the boutiques, so the shopping night was planned to be just 'walking around, fitting stuff' kinda activity. And it so happened that at first, I got to be strolling from boutique to boutique with my awesome male friend :D very nice experience, I must say [well, it became a little awkward in the Etam lingerie boutique, but hey, there were few other guys in there too! :D]. Actually, in this case, I got lucky to know a guy who appreciates shopping in general and was really patient with me :)) 

late night shopping with Ani

After that I got the chance to visit the Burberry store for the first time (memorable thing, huh) and watched my friend Ani buy a beautiful new dress with a nice discount from there :))

So how was it? as my friend Gaspar noted, there wasn't so much stir and boom during the Museum night in any year :D The central streets were flooded with groups of girls, all dressed up, with full shopping bags. Some stores organized banquets and DJs playing.. with all the stir, you could think that there have been clearance sales everywhere. In reality, there were 10-20% discounts, plus gifts, contests and a promise to be open till midnight. There were queues in front of many boutiques up to late night. I managed to do a small shopping and to have this cute star pendant from Mango as a memory from this day :)

Cosmo's photo report on the shopping night: part 1, part 2.

P.S. Shopaholics among you can check out this Foursquare list I made of boutiques where I shop for clothing and lingerie.

P.P.S. I'm not affiliated with Cosmopolitan Armenia in any way (except for the people i know who work for it) and this isn't meant to be an advertisement. I just want to show my support for this 'project' and will continue promoting the stuff i like in my blog :)

March 21. to remember

What a day!!!

March 21 - It was a memorable day. I did something that will remind me of this day all of my entire life. I made an artificial scar - a tattoo in the form of a shooting star :) Don't ask me why permanent, why on that particular place, why star... i just don't know it. I've been guided by some unknown force. Today, i've been looking  it and feeling that it was something that had to be there sooner or later. Something was giving me a hint, guiding through all those diverse reactions and inner pros and cons discussions. I had that exact image in my mind !!!!!! it should be right there and right that picture!

Spring officially starts today in all calendars. It was a sunny, warm and nice-in-all-means day. I managed to meet all of my closest friends, my most recent bziks (random, on the street!) and saw a potential bzik in one guy i knew for already years now.

Besides, i started the day out of home. Having lots of fun at Yves Larock's party!

thank you, spring.

March 8 and spring. partying in Yerevan.

Last year these days I was in Rotterdam. March 8 is the International Women's Day and is widely celebrated in Armenia but not in Netherlands. It's not even yet spring there. In Armenia March 8 is the holiday that celebrates also the coming of spring. Lots of flowers, people and action :) City is like waking up after the winter and the streets are crowded, people are happy, all dressed up, happy couples having a walk and all the cafes and restaurants are fully booked up.

Flowers at a Rotterdam market

Last year it was Saturday and as usual I was alone. It was a good occasion to dress up :) I like to dress up. I had taken some stylish stuff there hoping that I'll have the occasion to wear it. After 6 weeks of staying there i didn't have any and despite the fact i was going to celebrate that spring holiday all alone, i decided to get dressed properly as if i was home :) Luckily it was sunny (which was not usual then) and i went out to walk in the city. I walked to the large shopping district at the heart of the city and was happily spending my time :)
Since the beginning of my walk i was noticing people looking at me with unusual interest (unusual for Dutch but not Armenians :) I was thinking that they were maybe trying to recognize a celebrity in me since they usually don't dress up like that and walk :) I spent the day fine... though it wasn't the way i would like to celebrate spring :)

This year i did it my way ;)
Together with my 3 friends, we got dressed up and went partying At first we went to the newly opened glamorous cafe Segafredo Zanetti. I love the interior there and the coffee is great! The service is excellent too and at our arrival all of us got free coffee cocktails with mint . They were non-alcoholic and amazingly tasty !
But we had some dancing plans for the night and we took cosmopolitan cocktails (as our beloved heroes usually do in one very famous TV-series/film ;) and desserts.

 

Panna cotta and cosmopolitan

It was still 9 and we went out to walk in the streets of downtown... We decided to check the music and ambience in Kami and Cheers clubs.. but it was too early for partying and we didn't stay anywhere and went to our usual place- Square One for a beer

The good mood was guaranteed and after the SQ1 we went directly to Kami club. The party has already started and it was cool! I haven't been to clubs this year yet and the 'opening' was quite promising ))))))) I met lots of my friends there and had a lot of fun! In fact I got home 3AM and my feet needed contrast showers and couple of days to rest and recover after 4-5 hours of dancing in fancy but not very comfortable high heels.



And by the way, you may send me hundreds of links to Wikipedia and other pages, but i won't change my belief ! The spring starts March 1 and not 21 !!!!!!! (at least for me)