Saturday, July 18, 2009

A fruit basket with a monkey inside.

I always wanted a monkey. What kid didn't? They were so cute and fun and human like.

Well, one day as my girlfriend pulled into the driveway from a trip down to the farm in Sukhothai, Thailand, she said she had something for me in the back of the car.

In the back of the car was a green plastic basket covered witha towel. When I lifted the towel, it was a monkey - a baby monkey.

The hunters in her small farming village had gone out to capture wild pigs by spreading rotten fruit on the ground and a troop of monkeys had come by to feast on the fruit. This baby had fallen from its Mother, and they captured it. It was to be eaten that night.

That may sound harsh, but this is a very rural farming village and they eat pretty much everything - including monkeys. So, she offered the hunter about $15 for the monkey and he accepted.

I now had the monkey I always wanted.

I named him George (of the Jungle) and I estimated he was mayb 3 or 4 months old. He was tiny and fragile. After some searching I found out he was a Pig Tailed Macaque and an Old World Monkey, very common in Thailand through India.

Did he bite? I was too scared to grab him at first, so I just sat with him for a few hours to watch him and see what he would do. He ate the fruit I handed him and he wasn't stressed at all.


A quick trip to the pet store I bought him a large dog cage and built him a little sleeping box, which he slept in as well as water bottle and small food bowl. He slept when it went dark and woke up with the sun and woke me up.

That day I bought a small kitten milk bottle and some baby formula to see if he would take milk. He loved it and I started feeding him at 7am and 5pm, and he knows when its getting close to that time.

I was pleased he was eating the fruits and vegetables, drinking milk and sleeping well. The next step was to find George a proper home, with other monkey friends.

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