I never imagined I’d see something so raw beneath the stones of Angkor Wat — the place where we humans walk softly, reverent of history. But that afternoon, deep under the canopy of the jungle surrounding the ancient temples, I witnessed a moment that cracked my heart.
A troop of wild monkeys — their fur mottled in the dappled light — was gathered on a moss‑covered low wall. Among them scuttled a tiny newborn, its fur still soft, eyes wide, clinging tightly to its mother. I felt warmth, the comfort of family. But moments later, that warmth turned cold.
The mother — older, her rib bones visible beneath thinning fur — began to shift. The baby, as newborns do, reached out, seeking the familiar comfort of nursing. But the mother recoiled. Then, with a sharp, reckless bite — and I could still hear its abrupt snap — she clamped her jaw around the baby’s body, in the wrong place. The infant shrieked — a sound so small and desperate that my throat ached. The mother shook her head as though brushing away a nuisance, and dropped the baby onto the ground.
The baby lay there for a trembling moment, tiny limbs splayed, fur matted with dust and pain. It let out a soft, mournful whimper — no longer a cry for milk, but for mercy. My chest tightened as the rest of the troop watched impassively: some grooming each other, some darting among vines, oblivious. To them, perhaps this was normal. But to me — a stranger to their world — it felt like a betrayal.
In that brutal moment, the bond between mother and child — the greatest gift evolution granted them — was severed. And I wondered: how does such a thing happen?
In studies of primate behavior, forced or abrupt weaning has been documented, where mothers reject or even act violently toward their infants when the infant is still dependent.
I thought of the baby’s fate then. Would it survive? Would the wound heal? Or would it fade into the undergrowth alone, lost without the only home it ever knew?
For minutes — it felt like hours — I stayed frozen. The jungle around me chattered with unusual silence. No bird call, no rustle. Just the low sob of a baby monkey, too young to walk, too young to understand what happened.
Finally, a female from the troop — not the mother — moved slowly toward the infant. Her posture was cautious. She crouched near the frightened creature and gently sniffed. I held my breath. For a heartbeat I dared hope this could be a second chance: allomaternal care, a rescue by the troop. In some primate species, such adoption happens when the mother rejects her infant.
But the second female hesitated, glanced around — then turned away. The baby whimpered again, and this time the forest swallowed the sound.
I walked away, haunted. I thought of how human mothers cradle their infants, soothe their fears, kiss their wounds. I thought of lullabies, warm blankets, scent of safety. And I cried, quietly, for that small monkey — ripped from comfort, innocence lost in a cruel moment of forced independence.
That night, as I sat by the lantern of my modest guesthouse near the temples, I could not forget the baby’s face: eyes wet, pleading, shocked.
If we, as visitors, believe in compassion — in the fragile cycle of life — let us remember him. Let us tell his story. Let us speak for him, because he cannot speak for himself.
Because sometimes, beneath the stones of ancient grandeur, there are quiet tragedies.
