My trip

Well since I have been back now a few days and finally I think I am over the jetlag... pretty much back to my regular schedule or sorts. Early to bed, early to rise... This morning though I was up at 3AM... not because I was still on Cambodia time but because my 16 year old son was up and gaming... "I can't sleep" says he. Me: "Well you woke me up so now I am disconnecting you..." You see he is my night owl and also is homeschooling again so his normal time for getting up is 10AM now that he is being homeschooled... We are adjusting that by an hour starting next week. Rome wasn't built in a day and getting me and my son back to a working schedule is taking a few days. Since returning I have been fighting to stay awake so to get back on Maine time what better way then stay on my feet and tear the house apart. So I have been doing a mid-winter clean. I have been moving all my books, whether they be for pleasure reading or research books down to the front room in the old barn. When I bought this house back in 2007 there were two rooms attached to the main house. The back room was finished, but no basement. Just like a camp, all open underneath. The front room was dirt floor and you could see gaps in the wall. It was a typical, shed/barn. Well my cousin Will and I turned it into another room with the help of a carpenter friend of his. It's still open under but we have a lot more insulation there and in the walls. It's still a 3 season rooms though. I am hoping to get a pellet stove for next winter season so then I can have it for four seasons. So the majority of my books are out there, now all I need is to build a desk/counter to fit me. and lots of shelves for books. I want the wall in front of me with some kind of cork material or something that I can pin things up that I have that help me with the story line as I write. Also with moving all my books helps me to organize all my books for writing the second book in The Kings of Angkor series. There is a ton of info that I have been finding with moving this mountain of books. It dawned on me that I am missing a book so today, hunt for that book. What brought it to mind was the photos that I was uploading to my facebook page. Just arriving at Angkor Wat you realize very quickly at the amazing size, the overwhelming size, scope of this truly beautiful temple. It is to this day the largest religious structure in the world. It's not because of Angkor Wat proper as I call it but because of all the temples in the temple complex and park. When shown from space from NASA cameras and you put NYC/ Manhattan in the middle, it even dwarfs that city. That might seem hard to imagine but it's true. National Geographic did a piece on it. I will have to find it again. Well anyway within minutes of arriving at Angkor Wat on the first afternoon I could have spent hours in just the protective wall that surrounds the temple. I apologized to my daughter Meg for taking so long BUT I was in awe of what I was seeing. Then get me to the main temple that Suryavarman II built and oh my word. I started to find Apsaras all over the place. Here is a link to the book of mine that is missing. This young French woman was able to draw and record these wonderful Apsaras in the various forms. Since being there you can see some are simular but you also find that many were like stoping for just a moment from their duties to pose. You see the playfulness in their faces and the way they pose with one another. Like others I firmly believe these women were real and were part of vibrant life that existed at Angkor Wat. http://www.devata.org/2009/02/review-costumes-and-ornaments-after-the-devata-of-angkor-wat-by-sappho-marchal/ So if you say as you look at my photos that are on my regular facebook page under Mary Carver, oh, no not another one of those Apsaras... you would have to been in my shoes(sandals) and to arrive there and to be able to finally see these girls that I have read, studied and dreamed about for the last few years. I was on a quest to record as many as I could find. There were specific things I was looking for and wanted to see while there. Angkor Wat, the Bayon which was built by Jayavarman VII and Preah Khan which is part of Angkor Thom. The Bayon is part of Angkor Thom also and Preah Khan was another temple that was part of that complex. It was built by Jayavarman VII as a temple dedicated to his father, a former King. I visited his stupa where his ashes were at one point. BUT the most important place at Preah Khan for me was to visit Jayavarman's queens, little shrines built in honor of the women who were sisters and married to Jayavarman VII. Who helped him rule the vast empire of ancient Cambodia.