A baboon: their eyes are smaller than their nostrils

Occasionally a big male would wake the echoes of the mountains with his tremendous voice'

It is difficult to take yourself seriously in the presence of a baboon, but I have tried. The university I attended is at the foot of Cape Town's Table Mountain and every now and then a chacma baboon or several would clamber down to our world.

There they were: on the avenue that bisected the campus, where a highly evolved professor parked his vintage sports car. Where film students arranged themselves on windowsills. There were people trying to take themselves seriously all over the place. It was like every university. Only here, we had baboons.