I found a troop of monkeys just inside the north gate of Angkor Thom, and pulled my rental bicycle over to the side of the road to watch them. A big monkey was scooping out a coconut, three youngsters were tumbling around, and a few others were just hanging out. While my back was turned, one of them got the drop on me.

Paying me absolutely no mind, he proceeded to rifle through the contents of my bike basket. First he pulled out the bike lock, and for a few moments I thought that he would scamper off with it, leaving me to explain a missing bike lock to my hostel. But he dropped it shortly in favor of my freebie Siem Reap/Angkor map, which he opened, ripped in half, and took a bite of. During this snack I managed to retrieve the half of the map that was dropped, maybe the less tasty half, and the bike lock. The last thing in the basket was an Eyewitness Travel Guide. It was either too heavy or unwieldy to manage removing completely, or he simply wasn’t interested, but a folded-up map of Vietnam fell out and caught his attention. Maybe he just likes maps. I like maps too. Or perhaps the novelty of unfolding something holds a unique attraction for those of a curious nature; is there something inside? He ignored all the other bits of paper, various ticket stubs and a 1000 riel banknote, that fell out of the book.

Which way to the Bayon?

Having exhausted things in the basket to play with, destroy, or eat, he chewed on one of the bike handgrips, and then just settled down on the handlebars. 

As fascinating as this close-up encounter was, I was a little concerned over the unpredictable nature of monkeys and my general lack of knowledge about their behavior, aside from the obvious naughtiness. There existed the possibility of becoming a sidebar mention in a newspaper if I made a wrong move. I even shooed away one of the babies who wandered over, adorably cute as he was. Call me overly-cautious. I had no clue what to do about the individual on the handlebars, so I just took a bunch of pictures until he decided to move on.