Since the Amrita Setu bridge was built some peculiar visitors have been frequenting the ashram. Earlier this year we had one monkey who crossed over in the hope of, well we don’t quite know what. He was a fairly mischievous one and was known to bare his teeth at people coming from the café and forcing them to surrender their veggie burgers etc. One morning he even jumped on the veggie choppers table sending them into a panic and then happily devouring the veggies. Oh yes, and he took a dump in one devotees shoes; quite accurately too that was and from a good height.

Recently we’ve had a relative of his for a visit who is somewhat better behaved. He was also hanging around the café for a little while but soon gave up and didn’t seriously try to waylay anybody.

One day when I was doing japa on the roof, feeling a bit bored and missing her terribly I confess, when Amma provided me with a funny and touching scene to dispel the boredom and inspire. A cat was sleeping on the roof of the hall when our monkey friend happened to come along. The monkey became curious about the fuzzball and started poking him very gently and touching his head. At first the cat just stretched dreamily until it opened its eyes and saw the monkey gazing down upon him. The cat bolted for his life leaving the monkey looking genuinely bewildered with an expression on his face which said more or less: “What did I do?” The monkey did not give up however and followed the cat finding him at a distance from the first encounter. They stood suspiciously face to face for some time until something interesting happened; the cat it seems determined that the monkey was no foe but a friend and lay down in front of him. The monkey stood over him for sometime and then started gently stroking the cat. The cat relaxed and fell asleep. This was a really touching scene. One could give a spiritual commentary on it but I leave that to the reader.

What a nature documentary provided by Amma. Here in Amritapuri nothing is as it seems.

Vishwanath
22 June 2007