Hanuman Monkeys

Upon my arrival to India, I centralized all of my fear around monkeys. Indeed, death is quite literally around every corner there but I thought if I could avoid the monkeys I could just maybe come out of my journey unscathed.

The monkeys seemed like a more pressing and controllable danger. I knew I could not fend off gropes from Indian men on the street but I felt pretty certain I could bludgeon an attacking monkey with my large metal water bottle.

My fear was well warranted. I had been in this new country for less than 24 hours when the owner of the hotel I would go on to live at shared monkey horror story after horror story with me. He felt it was his duty to familiarize me with the very real danger as he sat across from me in his air-conditioned office.

Lower lip stuffed with tobacco, he recounted a particularly traumatizing story of a man who was gathering sticks in the jungle when he happened upon a large family of Macaques. Unpleased by the man’s presence the group of monkeys proceeded to pelt him to death with large rocks.

He also recalled a story of a man whose leg was broken by a monkey and another man who was pushed off a cliff.

These stories shook the faith I had in the lethal ability of my water bottle.

Soon I was encountering monkeys every day. I would start my day sipping coffee on my balcony until I heard the familiar scurryings of monkeys on the roof. Then, I would run like a rat back into my room locking the door behind me.

TBC