by Jessica Z.

It all started when I was twelve years old. I'll never forget the monkeys that started it all.

It was November 22, 2002, The day after my twelfth birthday when my mother (Vickie) Grandmother (Theda)

and my little sister (Lauren) were all down town (Salem OR).

You see, for my birthday I received a hundred dollar gift card for Nordstrom's. At the time I had no idea I was

going to spend it all on monkeys.

I ended up getting a pair of monkey earrings with little imitation diamonds for the eyes, a light blue tee shirt with

a head portrait of a monkey, and another one just like it only pink. They both said "Paul Frank is your friend" under

 the monkey. I also bought a hooded sweatshirt, a pair of blue pants and toe socks all with monkeys on them.

But I think one of my favorite things I purchased was little stuffed gorilla.

When we got home, it was about 5:00, one of my best friends (Katie) was outside playing one on one with her

 younger brother Kelly. She put the ball down and ran over to see what I got.

I invited her to go shopping with us but her dad said she had to stay and practice basketball. So I just showed

 her all my stuff.

"I didn't know you collected monkeys," Katie said. "Me neither," I replied, "till today." About then her dad called

her in for dinner.

"See you at school" we both said and she went in.

The next day she told me that she was going shopping to get her friend a birthday present and that her

 dad said I could spend the night Friday night (2days away) and then we could go shopping the next morning.

 I thought this would be just awesome.

When I got home I immeditly asked my Mom if I could.

"Please, Please, Please" I begged. Usually it never works but today to my surprise it did.

The next day at school I told Katie the good news. We were talking about it all day. The stores we wanted to go to and

what we were going to do Friday night at her house. "I'm going to get my stuff together tonight that way you don't have to

wait so long," I told her.''

We said goodbye to each other and went in for the night.

As we were walking home the next day we were talking about all the places we wanted to go to like... Deb, Claires,

Toy Box, Pacific Sun, Exit, Bath n Body Works, Fuel, and many many more. We were home in two minutes it seemed like.

 I'll be right back I told Katie, and ran into the house, grabbed my suitcase, dropped off my backpack and when I went

 to tell my mom bye she had a surprise for me. "What is it?" I asked. "Look on top of you TV" she said. L went to my room

looked on my TV and sure enough their was a surprise another pair of monkey socks and a monkey blanket. I grabbed

them stuffed them into my suit case ran up to my mom told her thanks and goodbye.

"What took you so long? I thought you packed last night?" Katie asked me. I told her what happened and she

 thought that was cool.

The next day we were at the mall eating a pretzel when I asked "Who's birthday? A friend in Silverton?"

"Sort of she likes monkeys so I think that I'm going to get her something monkeyish."

"Cool," I replied.

As we were in claires I looked back to see if I could see Katie and she got something I didn't see or ask about. I couldn't find anything so we left. We kept shopping as we were in Exit i went to try on a monkey shirt. It was really cute. The only thing was

 I didn't have $20.00, after all we were shopping all day. I was looking around and noticed Katie buying something, again

 I didn't pay any attention to what she was buying.

After a full day's shopping and spending all our money we were getting pretty tired. So we went home and when we got

home Katie put all the things she bought in boxes and brought them out and asked if I wanted to wrap them.

"Of course," I said. So we sat there and wrapped them.

While I was packing my stuff up to go home, Katie brought me those presents that earlier wrapped.

"What's this for?" I asked.

"It's a late birthday present for you," she said.

"Thank you," I replied.

I opened them right away. The first thing I opened up was the cutest monkey key chain. The last one was a monkey

shirt that I wanted at Exit.

"Thank you very much! I think I am officially collecting money's. We both giggled. She walked me across the street and

 I put my stuff inside and immediately showed my mom what Katie had got me. She thought they were really nice.

Katie and I were best friends though the rest of middle school, high school, and even through college we were friends

and roommates.

Through out the years I continued to collect monkeys for all kinds from baboons to gibbons. Anything monkey I had it.

For Christmas 2004 my grandmother bought me a sewing machine and 2 monkey kits. I made the monkeys perfectly.

Katie and I took business classes in college. We had big plans and wanted them to come true. We wanted to own and

manage an all monkey zoo!

Finally, after about 7 years of planning our dream came true. Construction started. We opened April 21, 2028 with

42 kinds of monkeys.

Our first day was a huge success. We made $4,500 dollars. I was President and Katie was Vice President of our zoo.

"MONKEY MANIA".

Please e-mail any comments to Jessica