#A lot of the youths in singapore at least probably sleep late because of how much work teachers like to assign

[my-name-is-daniel-yes]

[asntmc5recap]

EPISODE 4: The Girl Who Learnt She Was Flawsome (Part I)

(Ps: I know this is a bit late, but I’ve been very busy these past few days. So, apologies, darlings.)

Another week, another episode. But first thing first...

...Singapore’s humid weather causes Cindy’s bang to continue to grow. Next week we won’t be able to tell her apart from Cousin It. Seriously, the hell is going on up there?

Anyway, DRAMAAAA. I tried to predict what they will be fighting about this week and I’m waay off. Apparently, Tu wanted the girls to sleep earlier because she needed to focus on her health and the competition, and apparently, Clara likes to talk at night and she’s super loud.

Clara, her soul filled with the youth spirit, can’t accept that she need to cease her young-people activities by 10. (Seriously, what kind of people in their 20s sleep at 10? I work full time and the earliest I can go to sleep is 12. You guys have one challenge and one photoshoot every week. So party until the morning, goddammit.)

So a fight ensued. Tu started to raise her voice. Clara, obviously never had anyone raised their voice at her before, started to get pissy, and then cue the finger-pointing and name-calling. The most laughable part is when Tu asked Clara to act less like a girl and more like a woman and she was all like “It’s my body,” and shit. This is then followed by one of the weirdest insult in Next Top Model history:

Uh, k.

Overall, the fight seems super-forced and it was quite painful to watch. Honestly, I blame Tu. Clara can be annoying, but she’s an airhead. I kinda expect Tu to be the more matured one between the two, yet she lashed out first. Was it scripted? Were they manipulated by the producers? Seemed like it. But I feel like Tu is more likely to be approached to start all the drama. Clara’s disgruntlement seemed genuine. She’d probably be painted as the “bitch” this season, but the sad thing is, she won’t even know it. Gal’s clueless.

CHALLENGE

The next morning, the girls got an unexpected wake up call from Andrea Chong, who went around the house taking photos of them waking up. They were given 30 minutes to get prepared before they gather downstairs to be briefed about their next challenge.

So, Anndrea Chong, who have a quarter million social media followers or something, told them that they’ll be doing a #wokeuplikethis challenge, where they take a selfie pretending they wake up all fabulous with their hair and makeup done, and instead of crusty eye, they’ll have mascara.

Some girls had a lot of fun. Dorothy was enjoying the challenge a bit too much, while Nametha and Shikin claimed that they aren’t really fans of taking selfie. The twins were confident that they can nail this challenge because social media is their thing. Layla on the other hand, struggle with both the challenge and working with her teammates since she is the quiet one. Selfie probably isn’t her thing anyway.

So congratz Valerie on winning the challenge.

This is indeed, a very nice picture. I think the filter really makes it. And special mention to Alicia, who took this smokin’ hot picture:

While Valerie’s doesn’t look model-ish, Alicia’s wasn’t... relatable? Let’s look at it this way: If she was a famous person, and she posted this picture with that stupid hashtag, how do you think the public would react? Unless she had one hell of a party last night, she ended up sleeping on the front porch and suffered from a bitching hangover the next day.

Layla got the lowest challenge score, but she couldn’t be bothered less about it. Of course, her picture was very... Layla.

It isn’t a bad picture at all. I’d go as far as saying that it does fit the brief (although it barely missed the mark there). This is the problem that I have with social media, to be honest. They claim that it’s all about “being yourself” when in truth, it’s about being the kind of person that people would like to see. This picture reflects Layla perfectly as a person ( kinda shy and introverted) but her followers, as they claimed, wouldn’t wanna see that. They wanna see Layla the bubbly girl, who takes selfies with silly facial expression. What I wish is they’d embrace the different personalities that these girls have, although it might seem a tad unconventional. What’s wrong with a model who enjoy her time alone, or a model who values her privacy? These social media challenges are have very little to do about “being yourself” and more to do with showing people what they want to see.

And for that, I couldn’t care less about it.

PHOTOSHOOT CHALLENGE

For their photoshoot, they remained in the same group that they were in for the challenge. The theme was “Model on the Move” and they were asked to portray urban women on the move. Their pictures were taken by Yu Tsai himself.

First, let’s assess the outfit.

Tu got the worst outfit, in my opinion. Rompers are bad on their own, but a shapeless, pastel-coloured with ruffles? It’s amazing how she managed to work it. Alicia’s was meh, but Cindy’s looked fun.

This group got the best dresses (Nametha, especially), so I guess all those facial(?) accessories were to balance everything out?

Shikin got the fiercest look, which suits her to a T. Again with the shapelessness with Dorothy’s outfit (I think that’s a suit) and Layla’s was blah. I can see her working it but, yeah, Layla being Layla. Should’ve given her something more chic and simple that wouldn’t take that much effort to work (like what she wore last week).

This group got the easiest. Seriously, though, other contestants had to deal with challenging garments and over-the-top accessories, and Maureen got an LBD? It might seem a little biased on whoever manage their wardrobe’s side, but I think it serves more as a disadvantage for her. Veronika at least got some killer accessories on her.

What I don’t get the most is how the wardrobe seems to be disconnected with the theme and brief. I get that they’re trying to be all high-fashion and all but there’s nothing wrong with having a chic photoshoot every once in a while. Why not put them in fabulous jacket, daywear or killer suits instead of prepping them up to look all exotic and stuff. I feel like if they’d made this a Maybelline challenge, it would’ve made more sense. Just sayin’.

Well, photos coming up in the next post.