We’d been warned about the baboons. In Pringle Bay, South Africa, the charming village where we shared a vacation villa with our good friends David and Della, there are signs on the road declaring, “Do Not Feed the Baboons!” At the Harold Porter Botanical Gardens in nearby Betty’s Bay, where we had a lovely hike, there were more specific instructions, “If approached by a baboon do not stare or smile at them!” Ok. No smiling, no staring. No problem.
I didn’t imagine I’d need to put these directives into practice. Stan and I had finished a walk on the rugged coastline when he dropped me at Simply Coffee for a cappuccino. I was sitting in their quaint courtyard enjoying my coffee over a copy of Cape Wine. Surprisingly, I looked up to see a very large baboon sauntering towards me. Panic. No, don’t panic, simply no staring, no smiling and the baboon will bugger off. I looked down pretending not to notice the hairy primate getting closer. It wasn’t working. I could see him out of the corner of my eye galloping at me on all fours. He had his eye on my coffee!
I jumped up, ran into the coffee shop and squealed. The owner (a tall South African male nearly as hairy as the baboon) ran out into the courtyard, yelling at the creature. I followed and could see the baboon sitting on top of the table where I had been relaxing, pawing the foam in my cappuccino! Then, gasp; I noticed I had left my camera sitting right next to the coffee he was pawing! “My camera!” I peeped.
The coffee shop owner continued to bellow and stomp and ran rather bravely right at the scary baboon. I’ll call him Harry, since we’ve now shared a coffee. Apparently the South African didn’t buy into the “no staring” rule. Looking only slightly annoyed, Harry, using his opposable thumbs, grabbed the container holding all of the little sugar packets, jumped onto the courtyard wall, then onto the corrugated tin roof. The angry owner (guess he buys a lot of sugar), still screaming and staring, but definitely not smiling was pounding the roof, Harry was jumping and quite a racket ensued. I was just happy my camera and my life had been spared!
This ruckus carried on for what seemed like forever. The coffee guy chased the baboon around like something out of a Three Stooges film. Finally (whew) Harry scampered onto the roof of an adjacent building and ran off to OD on sugar. The irritated coffee guy grabbed his ladder and climbed up onto the roof to retrieve his empty sugar container. My God. That was definitely a bit more excitement than I required first thing in the morning.
Apparently I had met the “Mayor of Pringle Bay,” a male baboon who travels alone. He knows women are afraid of him; therefore he is not afraid of women. People women that is. I was told he would have jumped right up on my table, stared me in the face, and swiped the sugar even if I had bravely sat there and smiled at him. Theoretically, he wouldn’t have attacked me but who’s gonna wait around to test that theory?
I politely thanked the brave coffee guy for saving me, asked for fresh cappuccino and resumed reading my wine magazine, feeling a bit more like Meryl Streep’s character in Out of Africa, then a little ole gal from Iowa.
