You, me and the orangutans

I laugh to myself trying to describe the orangutans hair color. Brown or reddish. And I remember a book I once read speaking of the natives description to the early British settlers who came to the island of Borneo - red haired like the orangutans. But coming back to the orangutans of Sabah, I can't help but think about their similarity to us humans.

32 teeth. I open my mouth to count mine, and decide that I have about the same numbers minus of course those wisdom teeth whose wisdom I can very much do without. I'm sure that like us, these teeth help with their speech to communicate among themselves.

'What else?', I think. 'Our hands!'.The same hands with 10 fingers. The thumbs opposable. Of course our feet unlike theirs aren't engineered for climbing and swinging from trees to trees and that their hands can extend to as long as seven feet and are one and one half longer than their legs. I can't help but think of this as an advantage for them and us left with a disadvantage. And if you're thinking about their nails, orangutans nails are pretty much like yours and mine. No claws, but beware of scratching.

One more thing. Don't be fooled at how cute these small tail free creatures are. Between you and me, even if they aren't as strong as gorillas, they're seven times stronger than a human. So consider yourself warned.