Thailand & Cambodia: Day 7

CAMBODIA

This day was a dream come true for me. I finally got to experience a moment that I've thought about so many times for so many years. We started off at 5:30am and went to watch the sunrise over Angkor Wat. It was magic!

See, you can tell it was 5:30am!

My beautiful husband who always wanted to use the good camera, because like he always said, "gifted photography runs in my family". We took hundreds of pictures here, it was incredible.

There were gorgeous water lilies all over the pool in front of the temple. I love water lilies.

In this series of photos, I am basically going to let you watch the sunrise and experience it us...

We felt so lucky to be there.

We also shared this moment with lots of other people who were as lucky as us.

This is Mitchy being artistic, these two images above and below are just the reflection in the water.

My lilies, once again.

This sweet little boy was working at the restaurant that we ate breakfast at. He was much more stunning in person. He had such a beautiful face and such a sweetness and goodness about him. This look and goodness is very typical of the people of Cambodia. This is why I instantly fell in love with the people there. They radiate beauty from within and without. They were so kind and humble and I fell hard.

After breakfast, we went and explored other temples around Siem Reap with our friend Chuun. This was the entrance into one of the temples, I know...it's like it isn't even real!

I feel so incredibly blessed to be married to the greatest person I know, and that we both love to explore different cultures around the world and that he works so hard to make it happen for me. I'm grateful everyday.

Just about every inch of each temple was beautifully hand-carved, depicting important Cambodian cultural and religious stories.

In different areas of the temples there were little Buddah's that we were asked to light incense near.

The Smiling Face.

Chuun had me lean up and kiss the air and the picture turned out like this...the face was actually really high up and really far from where I was standing. Then he asked Mitch if he wanted to do it too..."No Thanks Chuun!"

Isn't she so beautiful! I took so many pictures of the children because I thought they were all so unique and beautiful.

We bought some of this fruit, it was good and refreshing but didn't have much flavor, but it sure is a gorgeous looking fruit.

We bought the fruit from her mom...love her eyes.

Local artists.

Chuun explaining some incredibly elaborate story about the history of the temple or of Cambodian politics or something. He was brilliant.

This temple is Ta Prohm. It was pretty spectacular. Overgrown roots basically took over the temple, broke it apart first and now they are holding it together.

Look at those roots, they are really shocking in person.

Then we ate lunch...food still not so great, but the fruit shakes everywhere we went were so good! That was one of my favorite things from Cambodia and Thailand, at every meal we got fresh fruit shakes. I could really use one of those about now!

By the way, if you can't tell, I am taking you step by step through our day.

Later in the afternoon, we returned to Angkor Wat, to explore the inside of the temple. But we wanted to avoid the crowds of people that would go there right after the sun rose. And I am so glad we did because when we were there, we pretty much had the whole temple to ourself and it was magnificent!

Well, I put these photos in the wrong order, they are backwards, but I thought they were so moving. These young monks worshipping in their temple. Chuun said that many boys choose this life but often times, their parents choose it for them because then it will guarantee that they, the parents, will make it to heaven. Interesting, huh?

Here we are in the Room of Echoes. If any of you watch the Amazing Race, you'll know what I am talking about. (It's our favorite show) But a few season's ago, one person on each team had to run through the whole temple and search for this tiny room. In this room, you are suppose to pound on your chest three times and there is a huge echo in the tiny room. And we did, and there was. But, we also tried to yell and there was absolutely no echo at all, and we pounded on other parts of ourselves, and no echo...just your chest. It was really amazing.

After finishing exploring the temples, we went around to this area of town where there were numerous I guess shacks or shops where painters lived and sold their art. We walked around and choose this oil painting. Can't wait to put it up.

This is just one of the little shops, but I was in shopping mode so I didn't take any photos, but I wish Mitch had taken more, because there were a few different shops that had the most striking paintings ever, and I would have loved to buy them but they were just way too big for our house. They were like Hotel size. They were huge but I couldn't stop looking at them! Wish I had a photo!

Anyway, one thing about these artists really touched me. I asked Chuun where they learned to paint and he said that most likely all of the artists were orphans, because while living in certain orphanages, the children are taught oil painting classes so that when they grow up they will have a skill and a way to make a life for themselves. Isn't that moving? Have I mentioned that I love the people here?