Central Bali: Monkey Mania Along the Side of the Road

The monkeys were actually really friendly, for the most part
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During one of our tours of the countryside we came across a place known for having a group of monkeys (called a troop) along the side of the road.  Not only that, but someone has set up shop for tourists to stop by, buy some bananas and peanuts and feed them to the monkeys.  Now, I'm pretty sure that most animal experts will tell you that you shouldn't feed wild animals for various reasons, the main reason being that it causes the animals to EXPECT to be feed.  It was fun to watch, but I must admit that I felt a little guilty doing so.

Heather and our friend Nyoman really to feed (the monkeys, not themselves)
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Guilt feelings aside, we forked over a couple of dollars worth and started handing out food for our new monkey friends.  There was one monkey in particular (perhaps he'd be the alpha male) who was quite aggressive with the other monkeys.  He didn't want them stealing what he felt was rightfully his food.  We never felt in danger that the monkeys would attack us or anything, in fact, we literally had them eating out of the palms of our hands.  We did learn, however, that you can't turn your back on them with the food being within their reach.  Heather discovered this when she turned to literally just say, "What?" to me, and one monkey (the alpha one) grabbed the bag of peanuts that we were trying to feed the other monkeys with one at a time!  This was actually really funny, because for a few seconds there was a literal game of tug of war between this monkey and Heather over the bag of nuts.  The monkey won after Heather realized, "I'm fighting with a monkey here".  Talk about a greedy bugger!

This was actually really funny, because for a few seconds there was a literal game of tug of war between this monkey and Heather over the bag of nuts.

Hand feeding monkeys (please forgive us all you zoo keepers out there)
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Michael and Heather