You want a picture with me?!!!!

When my sister Hannah and I traveled together last year, we constantly tried to get cool pictures of monks. Perhaps the coolest picture we ended up taking was this one of the novice (a monk in training) who scammed us in Luang Prabang:

There's just something about monks that make you want to take pictures of them. However, it's weird to ask them to take pictures so one has to try and take snap shots of them in the background (or while walking without a flash if you're Hannah).

While riding motorbikes, Huyen and I went to the world's largest teak bridge.
(PICTURE: That's the bridge in the background.)

We quickly lost interest in the bridge though when we caught site of a bunch of monks ahead of us. Quickly I told Huyen to pretend like she was posing so I could zoom over her shoulder at the monks. After a few seconds of doing this the monks started to look at us. Clearly they were on to our game. We tried to play it cool as if we really just wanted weird posing shots on a wooden bridge. They didn't buy it and they started to walk up to us.
(PICTURE: My fake pose to get the monks in a shot.)

(PICTURE: Huyen's typical Vietnamese girl pose. I think she was trying to get the monks in the shot too.)

I was all prepared for the monks to come up to us and say, "No pictures please" when one bashfully asked, "Can we take a picture of you?"

"You want a picture of us," I asked confusedly.

The monk nodded yes. I tried to bottle my excitement but could hardly contain myself. After they took their picture of us I asked if I could have one too. They agreed and walla...I've got pictures with monks!!! Be jealous, Hannah!: