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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 18, 1971)
'■"’•> '■:" ■ 'A ' ' - Monkeys pick coconuts Attitude Change (Continued from page 1) for a few bananas a day KOTA BHARU, Malaysia <A>)_ Coconut-picking machines on this palmy coast run cheaply. A few bananas a day keep them oper ating for five years or more. Since coconuts grow high up long, skinny tree trunks—and it’s a lot of work to climb them—local Malays for centuries have found it easier to con monkeys into the job. The investment is a patient wait by the monkey trap, a few months of concentrated gorilla training and a daily light meal after the day’s crop is in. When the monkey finally fig ures out what’s going on and re bels, he is handed his pink slip and sold to a neighbor who likes curried monkey. More than a thousand mon keys—of a sort known as “berok” here—work for coconut growers in Kelantan and Trengganu states on Malaysia’s east coast. Farther south, Pahang state growers use baboons. It’s not a profession which breeds good manners, and en thralled tourists are warned to stay well clear. Malay farmers have been hospitalized or worse from bites by their own mon keys. Baboons are even nastier. ingful tugs. A good monkey can harvest a thousand coconuts in a morn ing’s work, earning for his mas ter perhaps $2. He rests only on Friday—the Moslem day of pray er. He usually lives among the stilts under a raised Malay kam- pong house. His master takes him to work perched on bicycle handle bars or led down the road like a dog on a walk. If the grove is upriver, the berok sits regally up front in a boat. For some, berok training and exploting is a detailed art. The better indoctrinated the moneky, the larger the gains. For others, like young Mamat Bin Yusof, the suggestion that anything unusual is involved earns the suggester a sympathetic stare. “What you do mean?” he asked a visitor. “I just climb up to that hill (indicating a nearby moun tain), trap a monkey and when he grows up, he picks coconuts...” As he spoke, he said a few words to his monkey with two sharp yanks on the cord. He calls his berok “Jambo” because, he says, “it’s a good monkey name.” Others converse in grunts and snorts as their beroks listen in rapt attention. Properly, a young berok learns to twist a coconut while sitting on the ground. Then he is taught to climb a short tree and pull off coconuts attached to it by the teacher. He later learns to pick out mature coconuts and drop them to the ground. And he is taught to leap directly to the next tree without wasting time coming down first. Several Kelantanese Malays run obedience-schools for a small consideration. where and American tourists are easy to spot. “American girls you can see a mile away,” Brocktrup explained. “They all have slicked-up hair and there’s no doubt about their walk being different.” Sanders overheard an American girl talking in a bus in Ireland. She told him her father was a former ROTC instructor at Texas A&M and she attended Sam Hous ton State. “It’s a small world,” he said. Other cadets reported on visits to old castles in Ireland, sailing aboard a 35-foot racer off the Irish coast, shark fishing in the English Channel, diving for lob sters in The Virgin Islands and a 30-minute hydrofoil trip between Holland and Sweden. The only rough time during the trip was on the way over. Seas ran about 20 feet in the North At lantic and the Clipper tilted to 30 degrees from one wave. One cadet is well known at the U. S. Navy fire-fighting school in Mayport, Fla., where the cadets spent their first week. A1 Leshinen of Pennsylvania wore his hat into the Officers' Club. His $13.60 round for club patrons is a record at the base. Page 8 THE BATTALION College Station, Texas Wednesday, August 18,1!1 DISCOUNT MEAL COUPON BOOKS For the first time, meal discount coupon books, espe cially designed for day students, will be sold at tk same low price to any member of the student body faculty and staff. Discount booklets may be purchasec at the MSC Cafeteria and the Department of Food Services office, Sbisa Hall, for immediate use. Beroks are trained to work at the end of a long thin cord attached round their necks. They are carefully trained to pluck a specific coconut and respond faithfully to commands trans mitted by the cord with mean- Ag Extension editor resigns J. W. Potts, news editor for the Texas Agricultural Extension Service for almost 23 years, is re turning to West Texas. His sign-off — jwp — has been affixed to thousands of stories dealing with developments in Texas and national agriculture and the people connected with them. His works have won many awards in national competition and have enjoyed national usage. His resignation is effective September 1. ijMg A monkey who has finished his day's picking chores refreshes himself with a scoop of water. Canoe holds his day’s work. (AP Photo) THE OFFICIAL Dallas Cowboy “Insiders” NEWSLETTER Read it evefy Friday in The Daily Eagle This is the official authorized Dallas Cowboy publication that sells by subscription for $6.00 a year, brought free to ijj; you each Friday only in the Daily Eagle. THE NEWSLETTER CONTAINS INFORMATION AND SCOUTING REPORTS ABOUT THE DALLAS COWBOYS AND THEIR UPCOMING OPPONENT FOR THE WEEK. IT FEATURES STORIES AND COMMENTS BY THE MOST RESPECTED SPORTS WRITERS AND PERSONALITIES, SUCH AS: SPORTS EDITOR FRANK GIFFORD sports announcer FRANK LUKSA ANDY ANDERSON KYLE ROTE EOOTf}AI_L ANALYST BLADKIE SHERROD sports editor ABC-TV FT. WORTH STAR TELEGRAM SPORTS EDITOR FT. WORTH PRESS NBC-TV DALLAS TIMES HERALD 1971 Texas A&M University Football Schedule Sept. 11 WICHITA STATE at College Station Sept. 18 LOUISIANA STATE at Baton Rouge Sept. 25 NEBRASKA at Lincoln Oct. 2 CINCINNATI at College Station Oct. 9 TEXAS TECH at Lubbock Oct. 16 TEXAS CHRISTIAN at Fort Worth Oct. 23 BAYLOR at College Station Oct. 30 ARKANSAS at Little Rock Nov. 6 SOUTHERN METHODIST at College Station 'Jl Welcome Back Fighting Texas A ggies I l Nov. 13 RICE at Houston Nov. 25 TEXAS at College Station 7:30 p. m. 7:30 p. m. 1:30 p. m. 7:30 p. m. 7:30 p. m. 2:00 p. m. 1:30 p. m. 7:30 p. m. 1:30 p. m. 2:00 p. m. 1:30 p. m. Since 1946 Member F.D.I.C. 'On the side of Texas A&M' COLLEGE STATION, TEXAS 77840 "We're counting on your experience and you can count on ours.’