Monkeys, Monkeys everywhere.

After visiting the hot springs, we headed to the monkey park on the other side of town.

I'm not really sure what I was expecting, but I was not quite expecting immediately coming upon monkeys running free.





We happened upon the first monkey here.

Here am I with the monkey.

Aka standing as far away from the monkey, while staying in the picture. Believe me, it felt like I was a LOT closer to the monkey.

Here he is sitting with some people walking by.

There was some sort of signal that the monkeys would be receiving food soon after we entered the park, so they went running up the stairs, as seen to the left.

 They came towards the signal in droves.

 The monkeys roamed freely, looking at us, grooming each other, hugging each other..


Sitting exactly like the humans in front of them.

It was surreal.

It is extremely difficult to explain how terrifying and awesome it was at the same time.



The sign at the beginning of the park had warnings, which included "Do not make eye contact or the monkeys will view it as a threat and attack!"

Naturally, I couldn't stop making eye contact with the monkeys and then panicking.

They would walk right by you and look at you.

They'd walk right in front of your feet. It was just...weird.

 There were a lot of babies, which were adorable.

 The babies were sooooo cute.

They would play and wrestle and jump and just sit around hugging and looking adorable.

 Other people were equally terrified of the monkeys. The woman on the left of this picture saw me saying, "ELAINE IT'S WALKING RIGHT AT ME!" and laughed while also looking terrified, but she calmed down.

Another woman was posing for a picture and looked like she was about to cry.

 Sometimes they got very involved in their grooming, so they lifted their arms and looked off in the distance.

 Then laid down afterwards.

 Some monkeys stood at the bell, which someone rang at one point.

 Here's the pathway.

Here were some babies playing and looking cute.

 Then, this guy fed the monkeys.

And it was madness. Absolute madness.

They were eating the food. And eating. And fighting and baring their teeth over the food. And running at our feet towards the food.





 And here's another video of the monkeys running wild.

 More babies.

 I bet they were huddling due to the fights ensuing over food.

 This baby was most definitely making direct eye contact.

 Here's my shoe and a monkey nearby.

Where the monkeys roamed.

There was a group of teenagers who were antagonizing the monkeys, which then stalked him across the park. The keepers had to chase the monkeys off to prevent an attack.

We then exited the park.

A monkey was sitting right next to the exit. I'm not entirely sure how they kept the monkeys contained and from making a mad dash out of the park, since there didn't seem to be a fence keeping them in.

After the monkey park, we took the train back to Kumamoto and got a delicious meal.

We got to Kumamoto about 10 and had a late dinner. We were exhausted from walking about 10 miles that day, according to Elaine's pedometer.

We had some jellyfish, which you can see to the left here.

And some gyoza/mandu/dumplings.

 Salad.

 Asparagus.

 Shrimp with spicy mayonnaise.

And chicken.

 Here are some pictures of our train.

We also continued our dramatic reaction to the bedbugs at Elaine's house.

We know plastic bags can't kill bed bugs, but we put our things in plastic bags just in case there was a stray bed bug until we could de-bug out stuff. I was wearing Elaine's pants, jacket and sweater in case my clothes were infested.

Speaking of infested, I still can't stop thinking about the episode of "Infested" I watched about bed bugs.

I will never stop being itchy.