Mena Natural White Pearl Cream Review

Okay, so this is a cheap product. Skip reading if you're a beauty product snob. I'm a product snob myself, so this review kind of breaks my heart and the reputation I was really meaning to keep. But for the sake of all things beauty, I'm now a product jologs! Wooooh!

This is what it looks like:

Mena. Reputation-breaker.

I guess by now you know why I bothered to write about this product. Yes, it does work wonders. It works. Perfectly. Gloriously. It delivers what products fifty times it worth promise to deliver but fail to. It works.

So how cheap is this exactly? $5 on Amazon.com. Less than a dollar here in the Philippines. I think I bought it for P30 to P40 at a local Mercury Drugstore two months ago. It's been sitting unnoticed in my makeup basket until I mustered enough courage to put it on my face last week. I was in the middle of another experiment: I was road testing my bottle ofKirkland Hair, Skin and Nails, which broke me out so horribly (6 cystic pimples on my chin and nose! Oh the horror! The horror!) and so I thought I'd be scared to test anything again. But because I felt so ugly, I thought I might as well try crazier products, there's nothing to lose anyway, my skin was bad as it was. Besides, I remember this actually once worked for me like years back, like an entire decade back. And back then, my skin had teenage acne, not very different from how it became after taking Kirkland Hair, Skin and Nails.

the Mena face

Here's a little background. Back in high school in the early 2000's, this was all the rage. Pond's had a successful campaign for their pearl cream because it was a period of paper-white-Chinita-worship. Everyone and everyone's boy crush had paper-white, glowing face, regardless of the color of their necks. It's ridiculous now, even then to untrained eyes, but back in the day, it was cool to look like a geisha. I was among the last few to hold out on trying the Chin Chun Su face. Even then, I considered it unclassy and cheap. What convinced me was the actual improvement on the skin of my pimple-faced classmates, and the immaculate perfection of the skin of older people who swore by Chin Chun Su/Mena. My younger sister who had good skin used Pond's pearl cream and her skin glowed, she looked like an angel. After holding out for possibly an entire year, I swallowed my pride and bought mena.

I remember it working but I do not remember exactly why I stopped using it. I think it coincided with the beginning of my obsessive research about beauty and beauty products. And I may have read from somewhere about parabens and about avoiding products that may clog pores. Also, it's most likely because I could not, for the life of me, accept that Mena worked. How can something so cheap that came in a cheap packaging and that smelled so horribly cheap work? The fad eventually died down and thank goodness, it's now rare to see floating white heads on morena bodies.

And now I'm back bashing it in spite of it working. Hah. K, fine, I'm a product jologs.

I swear this is how it looks when not applied with the lightest hand!

Let's first talk about its ingredients:

1. Beeswax - moisturizer, humectant, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, yep all good 
2. Alpha-tocopherol (Vitamin E) - antioxidant, yep.
3. Titanium Dioxide - whitener, lubricant, sunscreen. Commonly used in pressed powders. This is what gives UV products that dreaded white sheen seen in flash photography.
4. Lanolyn Anhydrous - purified waxy oil from sheep that has similar structure with human skin lipids. Used as an emollient (keeps skin moisturized). It's semi-occlusive, meaning it's breathable and protective.
5. Cetyl Alcohol - despite its name, is not an alcohol. It's actually a moisturizing, conditioning and softening agent. 
6. White Mineral Oil - like, #5 is actually a good product ingredient with a bad reputation. Moisturizes skin and assists in wound healing. Nope, it does not clog pores. Pure chismis.
7. Isopropyl Myristate - now this may just be the deal breaker to some as this is comedogenic (clogs pores). It is added to products to reduce the greasy feel, although wow, they should find a better ingredient if this does trigger acne. I have crazy oily skin, so I'm still waiting for mena to break me out (waiting talaga?) but so far, so good.
8. Glycerine - is a wonder ingredient. It's believed to help with wrinkles and acne scars. The rest of the 19 believed miraculous benefits may be found here. 
9. Stearic Acid - generally considered safe but may cause cancer in large doses, what doesn't cause cancer these days?!
10. Methyl Paraben - anti-fungal preservative that MAY CAUSE CANCER.
11. Propyl Paraben - anti-fungal, anti-microbial preservative that may also cause cancer.  
12. Perfume - okay so I have an issue with the smell of mena. It's strong. It's annoying. I'm not really hypersensitive when it comes to fragrances in cosmetics, although it's always best to do away with fragrances. I just do not like the smell of mena, you can smell it from like two feet away. 
13. Color Index No. 15985 - found nothing interesting or scary about this so
14. Glyceryl Monostearate - a generally safe, boring, commonly used cosmetic ingredient
15. Tea Tree Oil - is a popular antiseptic that is documented to kill many strains of bacteria, viruses and fungi. Commonly used in multitasking products like makeup for acne-prone skin.
16. Pearl Powder - the star of the show. The stuff comes from real pearls that are below jewelry grade, they're milled and mixed to cosmetics. Said to generally improve skin by treating acne, accelerating healing of wounds and regenerating collagen.
17. Kojic Acid - this thing can be super darn good when used sparingly. Since it's at the end of the product list, here's to hoping it won't irritate my skin in the long run, as it does in soap form when used in extended periods. This effectively lightens skin and has anti-fungal and antibacterial properties. Although, I blame some of my pimple scars on this so, consider yourself warned.

CURRENT OBSERVATIONS

~the good~

• The fine lines under my eyes are diminished like magic. I do not know how that happened. It's something I have been meaning to research on since aging is new to me, so I've never really done anything about my fine lines. I'm pleased with how this has worked so well on a problem I haven't set out on solving yet. The fine lines are still there, but like, plumped up and softened so they don't look so crepe paper-y. 
• The pores on my cheeks and nose are blurred. Not only while wearing mena, but because of using mena, even when I'm bare-faced, or even when I'm using my usual primer+foundation+powder combo, my pores are no longer a huge problem. They look and feel softened. It must be from all the emollients and humectants keeping my oily skin well-hydrated and balanced. I should have taken before and after photos. My pores are, I don't know, like the edges look plumped up and subdued, so they don't look as screaming as before. I'm in love with mena. I did not expect this much miraculous wonders from something so cheap. (How many times am I going to say that?)
• I look like a f*cking angel. I look like I have an invisible ring light following me wherever I go. Ever since becoming a losyang mom, I've forgotten how good it feels to look this nice. My skin looks milky white. and soft. and smooth. like a baby's soft squishy bum bum. 

~the bad~

• We are yet to see if this euphoria lasts long. I mean, there's a reason I stopped using mena in high school. I really wish I could remember. But another factor must be this:
• It feels so heavy. Even with the liiiiiiightest application, it still feels like I have petroleum jelly and baby oil and floor wax all over my face. It's fine at night when sleeping in an air-conditioned low-humidity room, but for daytime in the Philippine weather, it can be annoying.
• It smells so bad. My husband must hate it but just won't tell me. I smell like an old woman. Not a Chanel No. 5 woman who brunches. A woman who walis tingtings in her garden in the morning. I smell like that kind of old woman.

~the ugly~

• You know a mena user when you see one from ten feet away. I don't know if I should start pushing for the chin chun su/I slipped and fell on harina/geisha face to become a trend again or just embrace the exclusiveness of angel skin on my face and just my face only. I could of course, choose to apply mena on my neck and the rest of my body, but the weather, the weather just won't let me be that pretty. I am generally fair - paper white level when I haven't been to the beach for months, but my neck is just the wrong shade of yellow for some reason. It's darker than my chest. And my chest is pinkish white, while my arms are a lighter yellow than my neck.
• It's cheap.

FINAL VERDICT

It's rather unfair for me to be dishing out a verdict just over a week after using the product. So I promise to update this after a month and then maybe again after two months, if I do stay loyal to this product. Other contributing factors for why this product isn't breaking me out is 1) I'm not on my period and everything breaks me out when I'm on my period week 2) I'm taking antibiotics for my stomach issues. But, again, the reason I started using this product is because it had worked in the past, when I had horrible horrible teenage acne, and it worked for people I know, and especially well too for those who use it long-term. Now, do I recommend it? Yes, only if you have nothing coming up for the next two months as I know there are people who break out from pearl creams. But overall, if you're desperate for a cure for large screaming pores, fine lines and dullness, this is a good product to try. 

~ UPDATE ~

So... it's been two weeks since my final verdict. Here's my final final verdict: I now only use the cream at night, because, well, the Philippine weather is not cooperative and my husband doesn't seem to be digging the geisha look on me. I try to put it on as thinly as I could, but it still ends up looking weird. But so far, at least at this point, I think I'll continue using it. The glowing effect is still there, and my skin is generally better tbh. My pores are not as noticeable, thanks to the overall moisturization and plumping of the skin. Something triggered my eczema, which is also why I don't put the cream on during the day, I'm not blaming the cream, I don't think it's the culprit, but just to let my skin breathe, I decided to just use the cream at night. Do I still recommend it? YES! I, in fact, am planning to hoard a couple of boxes. I don't think I've seen my skin this nice in a long time. I promise to update should something ridiculous happen (doubt it) so, if this doesn't get updated, it only means I've stayed loyal to mena. 

~ FRESHER UPDATE ~

I accidentally deleted this post! Good thing google has a cached version. I'll take it as a nudge/a big fat slap in the face to get me to update this blog as often as I once promised I would. It's now July 25, but I republished this as June 16, the original publish date. Anyway, as for this product review, I have sad news for ya. I developed an allergic reaction of some sort to mena. I guess it was drying my skin too much from its kojic acid component. I had a similar reaction from using kojic acid soaps. They'd work for a while, and by a while I mean a couple of months, and then it won't anymore. Mena improved my skin so much that it's now clear, soft, smooth. And itchy. It's nothing serious, but I won't be using it anymore. I'm going to try either the pink version which has a different formulation, or Renow-D, a similar product. I'll post about it soon.