Its about these moments…

“Travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on deep and permanent, in the idea of living.” ~ Mariam Beard

Its photos like these that drive my passion for scrapbooking even deeper. This moment was so profound for me and it makes me so thankful that I have scrapbooking to help me document and record this moment.

My entire life I have always been interested and curious about Buddhism. It has been a life long dream of mine to sit down and just chat to monks about their views on life. I have been lucky enough to travel all over Asia and have been able to visit many amazing temples. However, all past attempts to chat to the monks had been unsuccessful due to language barriers or the strictness of the sect… some cannot even look at women.

While in Cambodia visiting Angkor Wat, Luke and I wondered off the beaten path through the jungle to find a toilet or a private tree… when we came across this small village in full on festival mode all around a small Buddhist temple. While shyly observing on the outskirts trying not to make the locals uncomfortable, a monk approached us and introduced himself in perfect English! then proceeded to shake my hand!! I was so shocked! Here was a monk not only talking to me in English but shaking my hand! He proceeded to take us through the festivities explaining the celebration and introducing us to the villagers. He then took us into a locked temple and told us the entire story of Buddha and Buddhist history in Cambodia! He was ecstatic when I asked him to teach me to pray to Buddha and I was ecstatic that he wanted to teach me.

Those quiet moments of Buddist prayer in the empty temple… emptiness anywhere in Asia is rare!… will forever remain in my heart and fill me with emotion every time I think of it. I do not consider myself a religious person. I was not raised with any religious influence and I think because of this the culture of religion fascinates me immensely.

So the whole reason I am telling is this story is because I created this layout this week with Cosmo Crickets fab Circa 1934 paper that came in my Studio Calico kit.  I was excited to see how closely the tiled floor of the temple matched the patterned paper…and the colours worked great to!

Also a fun coincidence Studio Calico has brought in the great new Epiphany epoxy button maker into their store! I had the opportunity to play with this at CHA and loved it! Funny I made my buttons with the Circa 1934 paper! This layout was meant to be I guess ha ha…

I used Studio Calico’s fantastic Sunday Sketch for my inspiration for this one… and was inspired to try something new… a horizontal 8.5×11 page!?!? What?? plus this is quickly becoming my first ever 2 page LO as I have plans to make a page just for the journaling with the same orientation!… maybe a whole album in that orientation?? now I am just getting crazy he he he… or am I?