QUEEN of the DESERT or Ugly Leaf

Like fellow blogger ,Don ,at My Thai Friend ,I love all the varietys of flowers we can enjoy here in Thailand without much effort.By the way Don congratulations on # 200 and hope you continue for 200 more . A friend gave me this ugly leaf as we left his house and said "stick this in a pot ." I almost threw it out the window , but said "what the heck I'll give it a try." I put it in a clay pot and set it on a shelve in our gazbo, and forgot it . Well to my surprise other leaves begin to grow , just as ugly as the first , a pot full of ugly long leaves. I watered it every once in a while and one nite right before turning in about 1 :am ,I looked out the window and there was the most beautiful flower , only one, I had ever seen , and to top it off it smelled like heaven. I woke Ciejay and we went outside and adored it for almost a hour , I could'nt wait to show my sister- in-law. But much to my disapointment it had closed up and dried up and fell off the next morning, Luckly we had taken a picture of it, so I sent it to a friend of mine in Oregon ,who knows everything there is to know about flowers. she sent back a e-mail with pictures she had researched , and she called it the "Queen of the Desert,"it states that it is found mostly in the desert and that it blooms only once a year at midnite and only for only one night . Well this year I waited and waited,then one day I saw little buds and watched them get bigger and bigger, and this time there was three,about 2 weeks I looked out as I was doing every nite at midnite and there they were ,three of the most beautiful flowers again . and what a show they put on as you can see by the pictures. I woke up Ciejay and we adored them for a hour and also took lots of pictures this time to send to friends and family. We can hardly wait till next year.

Has anyone else seen or have this flower and do I have the name right ? Did you enjoy it as much as we did ? And do you look foward to it's ,once a year midnite appearance. Also if you would like a leaf to start you own ,come on over to Wang Pho and we'll be glad to share one of the ugly leaves with you .

Malcolm