Plastic Surgeries at Korea-My tiny first step in realizing my dream

This is my first post to document my plastic surgery trip this coming December in Seoul. 

My impression of plastic surgery was that it was exclusive to celebrities and the elites. Being insecure is part of the phase most of us will go through during our adolescence, i was not spared as well. It doesn't help that i was best friend with the 'popular girls' in school. I will look at my friends enviously and wonder why can't i look like them. I will often gawked at how some celebrities can become so much prettier suddenly. Of course, people will attribute their magazine-perfect-face to the professional team behind them, make-up artist, hairstylist, photoshop etc but in all honesty there is only  so much make up can do. 

Frankly, the thought of undergoing cosmetic surgeries myself had never really crossed my mind until two years ago when i started working and realized how superficial people are. I realized that being intelligent, hardworking and slogging day in and day out is not enough to make you climb the career ladder. I looked around me only to find good looking people having things easier, bosses tend to overlook and forgive good looking people when they commit mistakes, colleagues offer help to them readily. I am not ugly but i am definitely not one of the good looking people. I was beginning to accept the fact that this is how i will be marginalized for the rest of my life until i research about cosmetic surgeries. 

I started becoming interested in the types of procedures and going to China, USA, Singapore, UK, Hong Kong, Taiwan forums etc to know more about it. All my life, i wanted to be a natural beauty and am proud that i  am natural then it dawned on me, yes i was natural but i wasn't a beauty so basically i have nothing to be proud of, hahaha. How many wonders in the world are really natural? Pyramids and Great Wall of China are all man made but they remained something that Egypt and China are proud of, not because it's natural. The people are proud of it because of how much work was put into it to make it into a beautiful master piece. 

 After one year of researching, i decided that its time to do something about my life. I bought an air ticket and submitted my resignation last year and flew to Taiwan alone for my rhinoplasty and chin implant.

To cut the story short, i only ended up doing rhinoplasty and not chin implant because somehow i don't trust the doctor opinion. Appearance of my nose improved but it still wasn't what i anticipated. I am now eight month post op and doctor had asked me to wait one to two years to see the final result. I know that i have to wait for two years before knowing what my final nose will look like.

After my rhinoplasty, my appearance improved but still something is lacking. MY FACE SHAPE. I am tall and people had asked why i wasn't a model. The answer is obvious but people just want me to say it out loud in their face that "I WASN'T PRETTY ENOUGH!!" Have you seen model with an asymmetrical face and a big face? Hence my main purpose for this trip was to fix my face shape and hopefully a better contoured and smaller face. I might do epicanthoplasty to make my eyes longer if time and budget allow.

I begin to email taiwanese doctors, thailand doctors and korean doctors. All have differing views on what i should do.After much thinking i set my mind on going to Korea. Korea is the epitome of cosmetics surgery. A lot of surgeries techniques especially in regards to facial contouring are pioneered by korean doctors.

If you look at the recent k-pop wave and try to know what makes k-pop famous, you realized it's not only the well synchronized dance movement that makes it unique but how all the idols are good looking,their face are harmonized, with well defined tip and high nose bridge, nice eyes and face shape the size of my fist.

Actually i have two ideal face shape, one is the V-shaped and one is the timeless classic U-shaped. 

For u shaped i love yoona face shape a lot.

For V-shaped, there are a lot that i liked.

But pony the ulzzang has a very nice V-shaped face.

There are many clinics in Korea, if you go to apgujeong you will see lines and lines of clinics there. You will be spoil for choices and at the same time it can posed a danger to potential customer. Iit will be harder for us to differentiate the good ones from the bad ones.

Therefore, its better to go there for a face to face consultation with the doctor before deciding which clinic you want your surgery to be conducted. Sometimes it's very critical that you and the doctor have a common understanding and a certain chemistry to ensure that the surgery goes smoothly.  For foreigners, having a good translator is vital, you want to bond with the translator as well to ensure that what you have in mind is not lost in transit. 

As plastic surgery in Korea is a booming industry, the large influx of patients might compromise on the quality of the operation and the after-care. This is a big No-No, a clinic who really wants the best for the patient should be able to juggle between profit and quality work and not treating patient as a product and just churn them out after they milk enough money from them. 

For me these are the points i look for before deciding on a clinic

1.  The moment i stepped into clinic, i will see how the patients look like. Pretty and satisfied patients warrant a tick while angry patients will get a cross. Of course, most might be swollen but i will chat with the foreign patients to know more about the clinic itself.
2. The amount of time the doctor is willing to spend during consultation. If they seems like they are rushing for time and can't wait to get the consultation over and done with. Then the red siren in your mind should automatically goes off. A doctor who is not even willing to spend time to walk through on how the operation will be conducted, eased the worries and concerns of patient and listen to what the patient wants is not the doctor you want to put your faith in. What makes you think he will do what you want when you are unconscious when he don't even bother about you when you are awake. 
3. The quality of aftercare. You don't want a clinic who ignore you while you are in pain and wants you out asap to free out the space for potential new customers. You don't want a clinic who ignores your post op concern and dismiss you when you approach them.

 I bought my air ticket to Seoul today which is the first step to realizing my dream and also buying an air ticket is sort of like sealing the deal, to ensure i will not procrastinate. I spent nearly a thousand dollar on just the air ticket so this trip better be worth it!

                                                        Korea, here i come!

I will keep blogging about my thoughts from now all the way to my surgery and also the recovery process and of course share some pictures after my surgery.