We were just finishing our morning walk through the Angkor Wat forest trails when I saw her—BB Luna, the smallest baby monkey of the group, sitting quietly under a shady fig tree. At first glance, she seemed like any other baby: soft brown fur, tiny fingers, and the innocent eyes of a soul too new to understand cruelty.
But then something caught the light. Something wrong.
Something that didn’t belong in a forest.
In her hand… wedged painfully between her fingers and her head… was a cigarette butt. Dried and stained, it looked as though someone had flicked it aside without a thought—yet it had found its way into a heartbreaking position. Lodged right where Luna’s soft skin met her temple and fingers, it pressed against her as she rubbed her face in confusion and discomfort.
She wasn’t crying. Not out loud. But her eyes were screaming.
I’ve watched baby monkeys play, tumble, and even fight. But this wasn’t like that. BB Luna wasn’t being mischievous or silly—she was trying to figure out what this strange object was… why it wouldn’t come off… why it hurt.
Her little fingers tugged and pulled, but it stayed stuck. The way her head tilted and her other hand reached up — gently, as if pleading — it looked like she was trying to ask, “Can someone help me?”
She looked so sad.
And not in a way that animals typically do.
It was human. It was deep.
Luna’s mother was nearby, but distracted. The troop had just moved into a new area and the adults were foraging and fending off a rival band. The mothers—normally attentive—had their hands full. And little Luna was left alone with this piece of trash.
That’s when it hit me.
This wasn’t just a monkey with something stuck. This was the face of what we leave behind. Luna wasn’t playing with a leaf. She wasn’t snacking on fruit. She was trying to survive human carelessness.
I walked closer, slowly, not wanting to startle her. But she flinched—not from me, but because as she moved, the cigarette rubbed deeper into her soft skin. I could see a tiny raw spot where it had started to irritate her head.
She looked up at me…
And it felt like she was begging me to fix it.
I dropped to my knees and reached out carefully, letting her smell my hand first. My heart was pounding. Would she trust me? Could I even help? Her tiny fingers were trembling.
Then, in one precious moment of stillness, she stopped moving.
I gently pulled the cigarette free.
It was lodged deeper than I expected, but with a little care, it came loose. Luna immediately rubbed her head and let out a low chirp—almost like a baby’s whimper. Her fingers curled, and she rested her tiny hand on my wrist for just a second… then ran to her mama.
She didn’t look back. But I did.
At that crushed little cigarette on the ground.
It was a reminder that even one careless act—flicking a cigarette in a sacred forest—can hurt the innocent. This wasn’t Luna’s fault. She’s just a baby. A real, breathing soul learning about the world in the only way she knows how: by touching it, feeling it… trusting it.
But the world isn’t always kind to the smallest.
Not when people don’t care where their trash goes.
Since that day, I’ve seen BB Luna more often. She’s recovering. She plays with the other babies now, but every once in a while, I see her pause. She rubs her little head. She remembers.
And I remember too.
Not just the cigarette.
But those eyes.
Eyes that made me promise to share her story.