Monkey….Monkeys…and More Monkeys!

So after my 5:00 pm Spoken English classes, the students always stay afterwards to tell me different stories about what’s going on in their lives. The boys were super excited early this week because Molly, one of my best friends from Stanford, was visiting me for a few days and I brought her to class last Monday. Even after class ended, the students continued asking both of us questions (in English of course!) about how we know each other and where we both live in the US.

Boys of my Spoken English class chit-chatting with me after-class

After a while, Molly left for our house and I was left amongst the herd of hyper 9th graders all talking to me at once. I suddenly caught a glimpse of two monkeys sitting on the roof of one edge of KHS. A few of the boys ran to get Molly as more and more monkeys came to join the ones sitting on the roof. Molly and I started screaming in excitement much to the amusement of all the 9th graders. Then the monkeys got tired of sitting on the roof and decided to climb down and run out of the school.

Naturally, the boys, Molly and I decided to follow them. As we all ran out of school passing the utterly confused watchman, we ran down a little path that leads to the Tapi River located right behind Kadod high school. As we looked to the left, we captured a glimpse of a few monkeys now sitting on a ledge of the roof of a nearby house. Unfortunately, the boys started yelling at them so they ran away once again in fear. Then one of the boys decided that he had to go purchase biscuits. He had the brilliant idea of enticing the monkeys with delicious Parle-G biscuits (a favorite of mine as well as that of the monkeys, or so I was told…). Unfortunately, right as Amir arrived with the biscuits, the monkeys ran away. So what did a bunch of rowdy 9th graders and their English teacher do? Chase after them once more of course!

The boys decided that the monkeys must now be near the roof of the Kadod library which is right down the path from the high school. After multiple times of trying to scare me to death and almost succeeding at that, the boys finally got me to go up the stairs of the Kadod library, a dusty room filled with Gujarati books and up to date newspapers in Gujarati, Hindi and English, to see the monkeys up close. As I slowly walked up with 2 boys holding my hands and others following closely behind me as if protecting me from any type of attack, a monkey sprinted up until it was about 2 feet away from us. We all shrieked and ran down the stairs into a safer place.

Some of the marvelous monkeys!

After some time, we got enough courage to walk up the stairs once again. This time, the kind librarian was standing at the top of the stairs with a stick, making sure the monkeys didn’t run into the library. The boys and I then darted up the stairs sprinting into the library. As I turned around, looking out onto the roof of the nearby building, I saw a family of about 7 monkeys playing around, scratching each other and relaxing amongst the falling electric wires. They were literally about 5 feet from where we were standing. The boys and I then, after being instructed by the Kadod librarian, went up yet another set of stairs onto the roof of the library and stared at the breathtaking views of the Tapi River and Kadod.

The gorgeous Tapi River, located right behind KHS!

After taking some pictures, we almost got attacked by another monkey and went screaming down two flights of stairs, running onto the rocky terrain outside Kadod HS.

An adventure I will truly never forget!

Vanisha