tsurara

I went driving with my boyfriend around Kankakei, a beautiful gorge on my island famous for autumn leaves.



Of course, when we got there it started raining and high winds picked up and blew off most of the leaves before our eyes while clouds obscured the midday sun making every picture we took look like it was taken at dusk through grey pantyhose ~_~; We climbed a few hills, slid back down them, got a handful of decent pictures and an awful lot of crappy ones... Not content to accept our hand in fate, we got in the car and trekked up the mountain. On the way, something ran out in front of our car.

"What the hell was THAT?!"

"A monkey"

"Are you serious?!"

"You've never seen a monkey?"



I hadn't... so we started watching the side of the road for more. No luck... then we turned a bend where a man in a truck had stopped and was blocking off the road. My boyfriend pointed out three monkeys (two females and a baby) on the rock overhang and pulled over to let me take a picture. We rolled down the window and I aimed my camera... meanwhile, we had been surrounded by about 30 MORE monkeys. I snapped a picture only to have a hand shoot up, slap the glass and the other grab my camera and try to yank it away O_o;

It was a big male monkey with some seriously crazy eyes. We wrestled over the camera for a bit (I actually had to manually pry his fingers off the strap).

Too late, I was warned: "Watch out for the monkeys. The wild ones are dangerous. They'll take anything that isn't nailed down."

Apparently Japanese people can't resist anything remotely cute and in spite of the signs posted all over the mountain warning them to not feed the monkeys: nearly all of them do. As a result, our furry evolutionary brothers have decided that everything belonging to everyone in the mountains now rightfully belongs to them. They steal pieces of cars, jewelry, childrens' lunches, canteens, cameras, watches, and anything else you aren't watching. My boyfriend lives in the valley between the biggest two mountains and says the people on the island actually HATE the monkeys and had killed most of them at one point: because they got SO crazy that they were stealing laundry, vegetables from gardens, oranges from orchards, and doing a lot of damage in general.

Generally speaking: the Japanese don't value nature a great deal unless it is controlled, sculpted, and tamed for their enjoyment. It's one of the worse points of the country. But for once, I suppose I can really see their point.

Still, it's not the monkeys' fault. It's the stupid tourists!

Public service announcement time:

DON'T FEED WILDLIFE! You'll end up with crazy animals who have no fear of humans. The old saying "a fed bear is a dead bear" -- is apparently it's not species exclusive.

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Evol

hahaha how awesomely tramatic. can't say I've heard of anyone being attacked by a roving gang of klepto monkeys. hope the day wasn't a total loss. although personally that experience would have made the trek worth it.

Shinku no kage

.....m, monkeys!? *remembers childhood* Uagh, even in a so called "controlled" enviroment they can be dangerous. I still remember my 2nd grade field trip to a zoo in Nagasaki. They had a huge monkey cage...or should I rather call it a monkey area/zone. Anyways, you have to walk THROUGH the cage, if you didnt than you'd have to make a U turn back to the entrance to get to the rest of the zoo.

...I still wont forget (unless my memory has become hazy and altered in the last decade or so...) what happened. Bunch of those little bastards started gathering on my teacher's shoulders (she's a big woman. lol) and the next thing we know...."Aaaaaahhhhh!!!" one of the little things bit her and the kids of the class ran off in fear through the rest of the cage. (T^T)

Than I remember a few years back I saw a special on TV about monkeys breaking into houses and stealing food, etc. To add they also attacked people on streets and made their ways through stores on a rampage...*sigh* Good thing I never lived in such an area.

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aceman67

Its pretty much the same in most National parks here in North America. When my family went through Yellowstone, there were huge signs that say:

"Do not approach, feed or interact with any of the wild life. You are entering THEIR domain, YOU are the visitors." in 4 or 5 languages, including Japanese.

I even saw one Japanese man with his obnoxiously large and expensive camera run up to a buffalo only to be chased off, he was lucky it didn't gore him.

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Hassun

Macaques are serious monkey business.



But in the end, remember that they are more scared of you than you should be scared of them. You have superior power.

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Legend

It's too bad, even in the third picture when both parties are smiling it's still a no-no.

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Arukih

LOOOL that was good! sorry about wht happened but im dying laughing about it!!

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