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Monkeys in the Jungle

At last! An answer to that nagging question you've all been wondering about - How did Ed Brassard get those funny little monkeys to pose with the North Bay Mortgage PEN for his contest entry?

Submitted by Ed Brassard of Belfair, WA and winner of the 2005 Great PEN Contest for "Most Unusual Location."

I discovered these monkeys in northern Cambodia, not far from the Viet Nam and Thailand border. On the approach to the ancient city of Angkor, I found an abundance of monkeys both in the trees and on the ground.

I must have spent close to an hour trying to get the perfect shot. I had no food to entice them - just one Mike Boyle PEN. Approaching a group of eight or nine (monkeys), I cautiously handed them The PEN. They gave me a smile, but then suddenly turned around and looked right at me showing their fangs. Maybe they were mad that I gave them a PEN instead of a green banana.

Most people don't get that close to monkeys, and these monkeys really did have fangs. I waited patiently until they dropped the PEN and then I retrieved it.

Elsewhere on my Southeast Asian trip, I enticed elephants in both Phuket, Thailand and Phnom Pehn, Cambodia to pick up a Mike Boyle PEN. Later, near Saigon, I carried one PEN through the Cu Chi tunnels, where were used by the Viet Cong during the war.

But in the end, nothing could compare with those monkeys in the jungle!

- Ed Brassard