By now, hundreds of news stories and social media posts have shared the story of Punch, a young monkey in the Ichikawa City Zoo in Japan. Abandoned by his mother, Punch was given a stuffed monkey to cope with because the other monkeys wouldn’t accept him either. As a freshman in college, I relate to Punch the monkey on a deep level. I wasn’t abandoned by my mother at birth, but coming to college is essentially that; it’s a forced separation from family, and my only hope was and is to find new people.
Punch has his stuffed IKEA monkey that he retreats to anytime his attempts at making new friends fail. When they beat him up and push him away, his monkey is there. If you’re anything like me and Punch, you also have your version of the monkey. For me, it’s — occasionally to the dismay and confusion of others — a 15-year-old Lotso Bear from “Toy Story 3”. Yes, I get it, he’s the villain or something, but that’s an article for another time. I was worried about having a stuffed bear in college. I feared the judgment from my new roommate, my new friends and all the people I might meet in college. Even writing this article puts anxiety deep into my stomach as I think about the people reading this knowing that I — an 18-year-old woman — still have a stuffed animal in college. But then I got here, and not only my roommate, but also my friends and my RA have one or more stuffed animals scattered across their rooms. People of all age groups and locations post about theirs on Fizz. The truth is, sometimes we need that little reminder of comfort, that non-judgmental presence that makes a new place feel like home.
Punch was beaten and rejected numerous times by the other bigger monkeys in the enclosure. He, like any of us, just wants to make friends and feel connections. Many of us can relate to this one. Remember those friends you made at The Rally? Welcome Weekend? The ones you thought would stick around all four years? Yeah, how’s that going? For most people, those first college friends come and go, and we feel disheartened when they do. We feel like we’re out of place, a loner in the enclosure, when all the other monkeys have friends. But honestly, we are all Punch. Even the person that you think has a ton of friends all the time is Punch. Everyone faces that rejection and that loneliness, at least once, but more often multiple times throughout the year. But luckily for Punch and us, the story doesn’t end there.
With time, Punch made a friend. The friend didn’t change who Punch is but adapted to Punch and his Ikea monkey mother; a recent video shows Punch and his friend cleaning bugs off the stuffed monkey together. When we find our people, the ones we clean bugs with, suddenly the world feels a lot less isolated.
As I go through college, I’m sure I will feel the loneliness Punch felt again. But for now, I can always remember that even that little monkey persevered and made friends. He was knocked down and thrown around, but he didn’t give up, so why should I? Why should any of us? But when we do feel those low points, at least we have our monkeys. Maybe not everyone has a stuffed animal — maybe it’s the photos on your wall, an extra comfy sweatshirt or sometimes just your dorm bed, but the point is, everyone has some point of comfort that they retreat to when the going gets tough. These objects remind us that we’re not alone. A stuffed monkey can’t beat you up and can’t push you away. Maybe we don’t have our mothers (or fathers or guardians) with us in college, but we can still find that comfort we crave.
