Tag: campaign

  • Smile like you mean it!

    What's with the whole "vote for my smile" contest for femme magazine cover?

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    Come on! We already have enough voting to do with the municipality elections!

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    So femme and crest are doing a competition for best smile cover girl

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    so i thought.. why not show my smile for crest and femme?

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    my submission, which got rejected...
    I wish they had accepted my submission! Their moderator doesn’t seem to have any sense of humor at all…
    I hope the girls submitting their photos read the terms well!

    “8. By sending her photograph, a Participant assents to its free-of-charge publication at any time by the proprietor of the “mycrestsmile.com” domain.”

    If you want to know what I’m talking about, you can see the campaign site here.

    In other news, I’ve been hearing a lot of talk about another war happening in Lebanon soon… the thought of which brings out very ugly feelings in me. Here’s this song (&video) by Meen produced in 1 day only during the 2006 war. Hoping this is all only talk and Lebanon will keep on growing like it has been doing for the past 4 years. You can listen to the piano version of the song here.


  • For better & for worse

    Last week on my way to work, I bumped into the latest exotica campaign for mother's day. It showed a mother and daughter with huge ear, and the slogan was "For the good and the bar, thank you Mom". Oh my! Where have their chic visuals gone?

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    Then few meters later, another, except this time mother and daughter have oversized noses. "Hmm.. Are they seriously profiling certain physical traits as BAD?"

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    Class Setting. Lebanese Society 101. "In the look-obsessed country we live in, we often see scenarios as follows".

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    This campaign reinforces the complexes a lot of young girls have about how they look. Now, they might start blaming their mothers for genetic inheritance, instead of them understanding that a big nose -ear is actually, NOT, bad.

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    .If I want to associate their slogan with a visual, it would not be as funny. Billboard showing mother beating child.

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    Or... HIV positive mother and daughter

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    As you can see, there are far worse things a mother could give to her children than a big nose - ear. Things they, in fact, could never possibly thank her for. In all cases, I have one thing to say: Thank you Exotica for the good and the bad! ;) In the hope the next campaign will catch up!

    You might say I am overreacting. However, the reason I am, is because I believe huge billboards have great influence on the large amount of people who cross them daily. Big corporations should thus think twice before shouting such messages at us. And I do know that “it got people talking about it”, but wouldn’t it be better if it also, on the way, got through a more responsible message?

    Anyway, I just had to say what I think about this campaign, it’s been bothering me everyday when I pass by it. Now, back to music, here’s Sarah Vaughn’s Broken Hearted Melody. Have a wonderful day 🙂

  • Let's talk about colors…

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    To all of you who did post the colours & details of their bras, no offense 🙂 It did add some spice and fun to Facebook – which has been getting boring after Twitter and all that jazz… But in my humble opinion, the campaign did not in any way raise awareness about cancer, it only got people discussing bra colors in flirty ways in the comments section.

    Some interesting reads about the issue:

    • http://www.bigfishmag.com/extra/blog/8/

    • http://www.fakingnews.com/2010/01/thousands-of-voyeurs-spend-whole-day-thinking-about-bras/

    • http://dmhatingfemisfromhell.blogspot.com/2010/01/im-wearing-silky-leopard-print-pushup.html

    Enjoy, and before I leave you to your busy weeks, I’d like to dedicate a song by Lila Downs to you!

    Agua de rosas:

    Enjoy! 🙂

  • Quid Pro Quo

    Laila's Discussion with her granmother

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    *Nefrah mennik = you get married (translation for non arabic-speaking readers)

    I thought social pressure for marriage starts for women in their early 30’s. But guess what! From the moment girls are born, they are brought up to “hope” and “dream” of the day they will get married (most women I know dream of this day). Marriage & childbearing is still regarded as the most rewarding achievement in the life of a woman, while all the other “career-related” achievements are only secondary and should be avoided if the financial situation allows it. This clearly causes a lack of confidence and sense of failure to some of the women who are not married – which I find completely wrong! I’m glad Kolena Laila initiative is giving me the space to say what I think about all this!

    Other Lebanese “bloggeresses” for Kolena Laila.

    • Café Thawra “Fighting the right ennemy”

    • Identity Chef “The Lebanese Laila: 5 lessons in Marketing & Self Branding”

    • Independence05

    • Lara’s photograph

    • … (let me know if I missed someone! 🙂 )

    Now before I leave you back to your holidays (for the fortunate ones) and to your work (for the not-so-lucky ones like me!) here is a song from the soundtrack of a movie that I’ve been CRAVING to watch, but haven’t had 2 free hours in a row to do so. Walk The Line <3 The song is ‘It Ain’t Me Babe’ sang by Joaquim Phoenix & Reese Witherspoon for the movie … Enjoy, and have a great day 🙂

  • AIDS… in Lebanon?

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    Translation of Arabic sentences:

    “B3id el sharr: God forbid!

    Sayer bi zahi2 hal TV: TV is so boring lately

    Sketo Naji tole3 ma3o sida. la2to mnel philipiniyye: Rumour has it that Naji is HIV positive! He caught it from the domestic worker at his house.

    Lah ya 7aram ya Rosanne. Shou hal ossa!: Oh no! Poor Rosanne.. What a disaster!”

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    So, today is World Aids Day 2009. In Lebanon, sex and all its derivatives are still rather taboo subjects. Besides, the not-so-alarming numbers of HIV-positive people makes the issue not-so-alarming comparing to other political or social problems. However, why wait until it is spread like in some other countries? The increasing sex-tourism approach to Lebanon, combined with the very high lack of STD awareness in Lebanon (mainly due to non-secular school systems) AIDS is very vulnerable to spread, and to spread fast. Let us not forget to raise awareness about it everytime we get the chance.

    Other Lebanese bloggers on World Aids Day:

    • Café Thawra

    • Chantal

  • Joke-smoke night

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    2-misinterpretation

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  • Ain't no smoking 2nite!

    First, I am so sorry for posting so slowly lately 🙁 (Too much work and I’m late in all of it and doing my best to finish asap to tell you about it).

    That said, today I will show you the poster I illustrated for ‘Ain’t No Smoking 2nite‘ event that will take place in Gemmayze on October 28th in 35 pubs. The reason I was approached for the design of the poster is this anti-smoking in closed areas post. I hope this will become a regular thing and not just a one night event. Have a lovely week end 🙂

    no-smoking-campaign

  • Blowin' in the wind

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    Such a lovely song! Hope people will memorize the lyrics and use them to improve their roadly behaviors… On a side note, I’m still not figuring out how to add music to my wordpress, any advice is welcome.. trying smthg below, but its not working. anyway its bob dylan’s original beautiful song: blowin’ in the wind!

  • Elections, elections, elections…

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    4-bookstop-ads

     

     

     

     

     

    5-not-even-enough

     

     

     

     

     

    6-beer-ad-elections

     

     

     

     

     

    7-phone-ad-election

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

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    9-nba77-sawteh

     

    When I asked about the date of the elections, they told me in JUNE! If the elections pressure is already THAT strong mid april, I wonder what will happen the week before the elections–if we survive till then! All the billboards and unipoles are covered with elections, people talk about elections all the time, radio, TV, internet, everywhere! Its starting to get quite annoying… Please people just take the elections easy, and let’s not make a big fuss about them alright?