Monkey Mother

Monkey Mother
Rooftop Restaurant
Varanasi, India
July 2015

I sit in a rooftop restaurant above the Ganges River.  The restaurant is enclosed, caged in, to keep the wild monkeys out.  A monkey colony lives next door in a magnificent, ancient tree.  There must be 30 or 40 of them. While they are cute, they are a nuisance to themselves and us. They are constantly looking for anything and everything.  They are marauders.  Some of the kitchen staff chase them while others feed them. So these monkeys take their chances with all of us in hopes that we just may be the feeders.

A mother sits near me on the other side of the cage. She chirps at me to get my attention. She sticks her hand out which I ignore.  A small, small baby sticks to her like Velcro.  This little baby sucks on the mother’s breast and stares at me.  The mother paces the ledge in frustration with my indifference.  Finally, she surrenders.  She pulls the baby off of her and drops down to a lower ledge.  She leaves this baby behind and I am so astonished by this abandonment.  And then suddenly, one long, hairy hand pops up from below and swiftly snatches the baby into thin air.  Instantly, they vanish from my sight.



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