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Group Writing: Playing with Tigers
Have you ever had a moment when you realized that you made a decision to do something incredibly stupid and wondered if you had gone temporarily insane?
I didn’t think I was the only one.
And yet, in the moment, it was too good an opportunity to pass up.
We were on a trip in Thailand and on a whim, our tour guide (who had also become our friend) suggested we take a side trip that hadn’t been on our agenda. We were intrigued so, of course, we agreed to go.
The side trip was to the Tiger Temple, a refuge for tigers managed by a group of Thai monks. The refuge was created when a Thai came to the temple with a tiger cub that he had captured in the forest; he realized that the larger the tiger became, the more unmanageable and dangerous it would be. He was reluctant to abandon it in the wild (possibly thinking it had lost its natural instinct to hunt for food) and left it with the monks. It didn’t take long for the word to get out to other foolish Thais who had also adopted tigers that they had a place to take their cubs-becoming-adult tigers.
And the monks took each one in.
Over time the temple adopted many tigers, who also bred and had more cubs. (There’s no wild creature more adorable than a tiger cub.)
On the day we arrived at the temple, we had an opportunity to meet privately with the abbot of the temple. After a brief chat, he invited us to visit the tigers, which were in large cages. He explained that they took the animals regularly on leashes into an uninhabited area nearby, removed the leashes and the tigers were able to roam freely. The monks had developed such a rapport with the tigers that they could pet and scratch the animals and they responded to their instructions.
As we approached the cages, the abbot told us that he could bring out two cats, one for my husband and one for me. He would temporarily put each one on a heavy chain which he wrapped around two trees, and we would be able to pet them.
Pet them?
Of course, my husband jumped at the chance, while I consented a bit reluctantly. The abbot asked us to stand nearby as he connected each tiger to a chain, and then asked each of us to approach the tiger from behind; the tiger would hear but not see us. If the tiger turned to look at us, the abbot would gently push his head forward so that it wouldn’t mistake us for dessert. Then the abbot told us we could pet the tiger.
So I did.
The hair was coarse to the touch. Underneath my hand, I could feel the incredible strength of the tiger emanating from his body. I continued to stand there, mesmerized by the markings of the beast and the unbelievable power of the moment. Finally, I stepped aside and away. The tiger meanwhile had tried to get a look at me a couple of times, but each time the abbot calmly moved the tiger’s head forward.
I will never forget that magical and foolish moment.
Would I do it again if I had the opportunity? . . .
I also just remembered that I had an elephant step on me once. A story for another time . . .
[Eventually, swindlers tried to take over the management of the Temple and pushed the abbot aside, creating a tourist attraction. After their actions were discovered by the authorities, including abuse of the tigers, the temple was closed down and the tigers distributed to facilities where they could be properly cared for.]
Published in Group Writing
Awwww! Perfectly paired psychopathy! { Hi @neutralobserver ! }
Of course they are. The only difference is that if tigers were the size of housecats, we’d be the size of rabbits. If we were 50′ giants, we could think of tigers as cute and non-threatening as we do housecats.
There are Savannah cats, which can be the size of medium-sized dogs, but their breeding included domestic cats.
Its not the size of the cat, its the capacity to domesticate (though size likely contributed to the domestication of their wild ancestors).
Arahant is both right and wrong; big cats and domestic cats raised in a similar environment exhibit markedly similar behaviors, but domestic cats are (generally speaking) restrained in exhibiting feline aggression against vulnerable humans, such as infants or toddlers, as well as broadly sensing how far they can go without seriously hurting humans. Wild cats will always be at risk of exhibiting violent episodes of anger or panic towards humans, even the ones they love, and will tend to overestimate our resilience when being playful.
I’ll grant you they are generally considered ‘half-domesticated’, largely because they originally domesticated themselves. The (adorable) abominations known as ragdoll cats could probably be considered fully domesticated, however.
The doofus sitting behind Mike on that Jet Blue flight probably would have preferred a tiger.
When I saw that it was in Thailand I thought about several “trainers” there with crocodiles. There are a number of Youtube links on this.
https://youtu.be/E4MsfHDXXTQ
I’m glad he was able to walk away.
I wouldn’t doubt it if there are a few that didn’t walk away…
And these folks are becoming more common every year.
I doubt it. They have always been with us.
I’d rather be with a cheetah (this one’s Jazz). If they’re frightened they respond with the flight rather than the fight response.
Many years ago when I lived in Seattle, I was doing a laundry at a laundromat when a guy walked by outside with a baby cougar on a leash. I couldn’t keep from going out to see the cat. It was beautiful. I petted it and had exactly the same allergic reaction to it that I had experienced for years to domestic house cats. My eye swelled up, my breathing became difficult, and I was miserable. Apparently, all cats share a kind of dander that my immune system finds anathema. I have always wanted to have close contact with a lion or a tiger, but I suspect that reaction would be the same.
A friend of mine who I taught with lived in the suburban town of Issaquah, east of Seattle raised cougar from a cub, and had it as a pet for many years. One day she, as was her wont, she went into its cage. The cat attacked her and nearly killed her. There has never been an explanation for the event other than that one should never expect a wild animal to act like a breed of animals that have been domesticated for thousands of years. A wild animal is unpredictable and should never be assumed to be “safe.”
The cougar is the largest of the small cats. It is more closely related to the feline human owners than to tigers and lions. I have not been around the “big” cats enough to test my allergies.
You should have seen my shredded arms when I carried the grumpy cat of a family friend across a neighborhood the size of a football field.
Not a strict vegetarian, but there are other leaders who care a lot about animals:
URL
We have no information that Putin has poisoned any disobedient dogs.
It’s less troublesome than having do-gooders decide how we may allocate our resources.
One common nickname for cats around here is “Stubentiger”, i.e. “tigers of the living room.”
Correct. Extensive training and caution are required to keep big cats safely. Lamentably, even the best-trained and experienced keepers of big cats can slip up leading to disaster, i.e. what happened to Roy Horn.
They may have always been with us, but now they’re out and about with their dog in the shopping cart at Vons or Home Goods. Or on the plane.
Trail cams keep picking them up in Illinois.
Yeah, I remember this one from university. . .oh, wait. Never mind.
There was a little restaurant at the mouth of the small canyon where our college dorms were located. A friend and I were going there once when we noticed a car parked near the door. The only thing remarkable was who – or what – was sitting calmly in the front seat – a mountain lion (cougar/catamount / Felis concolor). We approached the person we figured was the driver, and he confirmed that it was his car, and the cat belonged to him. Or, as we know, he belonged to the cat. The man said his friend was “just a big house cat,” very intelligent. For instance, he said that when he got out of the car, he had told his passenger to move to the back seat. We turned around, and sure enough, the cat was now sitting in the back.
The man said he takes his friend on walks every day, on a heavy leash. The only issue is when a dog crosses their path. Now, cougars hate dogs. I didn’t get whether the cougar tried to go after the dog, or he tried to run away.
For all the time I lived, worked and hiked in the woods, I’ve only seen one cougar in the wild. I reckon more than that saw me.
News of a zookeeper with long experience with tigers being attacked and killed by one occasionally surfaces. One fellow experienced with these cats said that the proper way to think of tigers is that they never regard humans as anything other than a meat meal. You never know when they’ll turn on you. Stepping into a cage with them is fraught with risk.
The only tiger I am willing to play with is Tiger Woods. In golf. Because he could teach me so much. And it would be fun to watch him get frustrated at my ineptitude.
And the Ancient Egyptians are all dead now. Must have been eaten by Cheetahs.
Why would anyone ever do that?
Highly doubtful. Cheetahs are so neurotic they need emotional support dogs.
Seriously.
https://www.unilad.co.uk/animals/the-reason-cheetahs-need-emotional-support-dogs
My kids with a leopard cub, taken a couple of decades ago.
“We used to have three kids. . .”