Thai monkeys won’t behave at banquet in their honor
By CHRIS HAWKE

(AP)

28 November 2005

As a party, it was a disaster: almost all the guests of honour were too frightened to make an appearance. Those who came ate and ran.

But the monkeys aren’t known for their good manners, to the delight of hundreds of tourists who converged in Lopburi for its 17th annual monkey banquet last week.

The party is thrown by local hotelier Yongyuth Kitwatananuson, who is thankful for the business the monkeys bring to his city, 112km north of Bangkok.

The long-tailed macaques are regarded as disciples of Chao Pho Prakarn, a four-armed deity whose likeness is enshrined in the heart of the town. With such status, they are given free rein – often to the despair of human residents.

They can be seen dropping peanut shells on street vendors from building ledges, relieving themselves on to curious onlookers off awnings and making merry on the electrical wires they use as footpaths as they roam the city.

A sign at a local park says, “Beware of monkeys snatching your purse.”

Even on their special day, they behaved badly. Three monkeys swarmed five teenage girls carrying bags of fruit to the temple, causing them to run into a telephone booth screaming.

When one of the monkeys clambered up the side of the booth, the girls screamed again and ran, leaving the monkeys to feast on the pavement.

Meanwhile, at least 1,000 human onlookers gathered to watch the monkeys eat three piles of fruit and vegetables beside the ancient temple where they live.

But by the time bleachers were erected, a sound system put into place and dances performed by vegetable-draped college students, Thai classical dancers and a troupe of ponies, there was hardly a macaque in sight.

The crowds and noise scared them all off – except for one or two dozen brave ones who stuffed themselves, leaving a terrible mess behind.