singapore//penang

Who is El Cheapo and what does she do?

10 Aug
El Cheapo inherited a BCBCMaxAzria frock, her most expensive hand-me-down so far. And she actually likes it too!

1 Jul
El Cheapo struck again after months and months of disappearance! This time she ate a half-sliced cherry from a fruit box in a wastepaper basket, and also wore clothes handed down by her colleague.

5 Dec
El Cheapo’s cheapskate wedding inspired by a Marc Jacobs ad here.

20 Oct
Actually, yesterday El Cheapo dropped a grape in the sink and didn’t bother to pick it up ’cause the sink was full of used plates and tuna. Now she understands …

14 Oct
El Cheapo struck gold again at M&S! 6 Scotch pancakes, two for £1, 6 teacakes, two for £1. Who wants to buy Hovis or Tesco’s when M&S is doing deals like that?? M&S also have cheaper extra virgin olive oil, butter and soft cheese compared to stores like Lidl. El Cheapo has discovered smart shopping in posh supermarkets.

8 Oct
El Cheapo thinks about buying new clothes but stops herself here.

12 Sept
Read El Cheapo’s cheapskate adventure at the Manchester Art Gallery here.

1 Sept
Yesterday El Cheapo spent 45 minutes in TKMaxx looking for bargain soap bars and hand creams, but in the end she came out with nothing. El Cheapo deliberated over Tilly Parker’s shampoo (£8) but then went into Arndale’s Bodycare, where she found AUSSIE’S volume shampoo for £2.50 and Baylis & Harding’s sweet mandarin and grapefruit hand lotion for £1.50!!

28 August
El Cheapo has a few tips to share:
1. Pour coke down toilet bowl for shiny effect
2. Put baking soda in your shoes to get rid of smell
3. Put one tablet of aspirin in the washing machine to whiten clothes

26 August
Today El Cheapo saw her colleague throw away a Tesco banana because it was slightly bruised. El Cheapo’s colleague only eats perfectly smooth bananas. She was screaming inside, but didn’t have the guts to pick the banana out from the bin.

24 August
El Cheapo bought Terminator 2: Judgement Day from Tesco for £3 because she really wants to watch Edward Furlong again. El Cheapo only buys DVDs that are £3 and below, except for Good Will Hunting, which she bought for £5 because she was going to write an essay about it. Incidentally, she failed that essay, with a score of 38% and unsuccessfully appealed for it to be remarked.

20 August
El Cheapo has come back with a bargain buy – two skirts that are so huge El Cheapo is going to turn them into dresses. Except they reek of cigarettes, and all the softener in the world could not extinguish the smell.

16 August
Today El Cheapo wore her light green Paul and Joe Sister tee to work. She got it free from last month’s ELLE magazine. £3.80 for a glossy and a free blouse? Yes! El Cheapo likes the frilly blouse so much she wore it to work twice this week.

30 July
El Cheapo wonders if it’s possible to follow fashion without buying any new items of clothing. Is it possible to look good without money? When El Cheapo saw the movie 21, she thought it wasn’t possible. Jim Sturgess put on the Gucci white suit, and everything looked good.

29 July
Today El Cheapo found a grape in the office sink and ate it. Muahahah. Will she die from food poisoning? Muahahaha.

28 July
El Cheapo made her own diary for the next academic year, because she is too skint to buy a brand new one.

13 July
El Cheapo spots a used Colgate toothpaste in the bin. It has been thrown away by her flatmate, but El Cheapo picks it up and squeezes the tube flat out. She realises she is able to squeeze another 5 uses of toothpastes.

12 July
El Cheapo strikes gold again! This time, it’s a bagful of hand-me-downs by MNG, Forever21, Levi’s and GAP. Thank you El Shaddai!

9 July
El Cheapo is having a farewell dinner with her friends and they are served Tesco’s Chocolatino ice-cream. After dessert, El Cheapo washes out the ice-cream tub and lays it aside for an unforeseen miscellaneous use. Just then, El Cheapo’s friend decides she wants to take away the chicken soup, and guess what she uses!

7 July
El Cheapo is listening to Q magazine’s free (!) CD ‘Born in the USA’ and is enjoying the first track ‘Factory’ by Band of Horses.

6 July
El Cheapo has finished work at the local bakery and is taking away food to feed her friends, but unfortunately they were not at home. So El Cheapo ate them all herself.

~*~

Who is El Cheapo and what does she do?

El Cheapo is a cheapskate who likes freebies. Little things in life make her happy, like the free magazines ShortList and Stylist.

El Cheapo is the daughter of El Shaddai. Most things are given to her by El Shaddai.

When El Cheapo was younger, she read her grandfather’s back issues of TIME and Newsweek because she couldn’t afford the subscription fees.

El Cheapo eats expired food, because she believes use-by dates are corporate hoaxes.

El Cheapo would love to work in a fashion magazine, where they are bribed with goodies all the time.

El Cheapo doesn’t have coasters in her house. She uses Stylist magazine to buffer the pot of hot noodles straight from the hob to the dinner table. Eventually though, when she is a proper working adult living in a family home with her husband, she would buy a set of matching leather coasters.

El Cheapo also writes her to-do lists on the back of bank envelopes. Somehow, she prefers them to A4 paper, because the envelopes are thicker and A5 in size.

El Cheapo is one cheapskate who can stop mass production and save the planet.

El Cheapo likes: ‘Waste Not Want Not’ by Patrik Jaros and Günter Beer, the book that teaches you how to make use of your leftover food.