On our second day of our photo tour in Siem Reap, our group met up at 4:30 in the morning to get the prime spots for taking sunrise photos in Angkor Wat.
We were the first ones there (at 4:45 am)!
That morning was very cloudy and overcast but there was a fleeting moment when the clouds parted a bit to give us beautiful light.
Jesley (a fellow photo tour participant) and I met this boy and his grandmother while our photo group was waiting for sunset at the South Gate of Angkor Thom.
That afternoon, I used a phrase that I learned just the day before from our guide, Chet. The phrase was “proh sanghaa”. It means “handome boy”.
Check out Jesley’s photo of the same boy on her blog.
In early March, my sister and I joined a four-day photo tour of the Angkor temples in Siem Reap, Cambodia.
This woman is a 75-year old Buddhist nun whom we met at the Preah Khan Temple. She is such a lovely lady with the most beautiful smile and very expressive face that you can’t help but feel good interacting with her. She graciously allowed us to take photos of her around the temple.
After we have taken her photos, she gave each of us a blessing by tying a white string bracelet around our wrists (right wrist for the males and left for the females), whispering prayers as she blew on our heads and the hands with the bracelet, whipping our hands away with a “whoo!” and lastly, giving us her infectious smile.
I will never forget her.
Yesterday was a great sunny 76 degrees here in Chicago.
A great day for the St. Patrick’s Day celebrations! Jet-lagged though I am since I just came back from Southeast Asia, I just had to get out there and enjoy the day and people-watch.
To kick off the day’s festivities, thousands of people (and some leprechauns) gathered by the Chicago River to watch Chicago’s annual tradition of dyeing the river a bright, festive emerald green.
Below are some photos I took of the event.
I took these photos from the car as we are driving to Bagac, Bataan to visit Las Casas Filipinas.
These vistas remind me of our family road trips to my dad’s home province of Batangas (in Southern Luzon). I am sad to say that most of the landscapes of rice fields, and untouched distant mountains we used to see on our way to Batangas has been replaced with gas stations, restaurants and walls to new subdivisions. But it’s progress. And progress is good, right?
I am not sure. I know I was not happy with what I saw.
Maybe I’m just being nostalgic.
