Tigers are my favourite animals. My favourite film to date is The Lion King; even though I am a nineteen year old I still find the film powerful and moving which may sound absurd to some but to me the film means a lot. From that film I developed a love for lions. Growing up as child, tigers in films were usually portrayed as the “evil” animal. For example in “The Jungle Book” everyone knows that the character of Shere Khan is the baddie who tries to kill all the humans.
However I very quickly became fascinated with Tigers; I would regularly beg my mum to take me to the library so I could take out big books just to look at the images of tigers as I thought they were stunningly beautiful. I’ve had various teddies, posters and photos and even now tigers are everywhere in my room from my calendar to some of my t-shirts. Being of Hindu – Punjabi descent, one of the Hindu goddesses I believe in is called Durga Ma and she sits on a tiger; something I found intriguing growing up. From my perspective tigers quickly went from being symbolised as evil to powerful and majestic.
However I very quickly became fascinated with Tigers; I would regularly beg my mum to take me to the library so I could take out big books just to look at the images of tigers as I thought they were stunningly beautiful. I’ve had various teddies, posters and photos and even now tigers are everywhere in my room from my calendar to some of my t-shirts. Being of Hindu – Punjabi descent, one of the Hindu goddesses I believe in is called Durga Ma and she sits on a tiger; something I found intriguing growing up. From my perspective tigers quickly went from being symbolised as evil to powerful and majestic.
I’ve always thought of adopting a tiger with the WWF (I am forever always seeing the adverts on TV and in magazines) however I have always been put off because I feel as if you don’t really know exactly where your money is going and how its helping tigers. Sure you get a nice cuddly tiger teddy (even though I’ve got plenty of them!) along with some posters to stick on your wall, but how do you really know what your money is being used for?
Anyways I’ve always wanted to do something to help protect the creatures as they are already endangered and quickly disappearing; if I am to ever have kids I’d like to think that I will be able to share my passion for tigers with them and still be physically be able to show them a tiger.
One of my dreams and things to do before I die is to actually see a tiger face to face and be able to touch it. There are many various tiger reserves in India and I used to go to the country every year so I did a bit of research but I couldn’t find a park where you could actually come into physical contact with the big cats. Then I stumbled upon a place in Thailand called “Tiger Temple”. At last I thought, this is where I am going to go!
The temple is run by monks and basically they live with fully grown tigers. It has quickly become a tourist attraction as you are able to pet the tigers, feed the cubs, and give them baths and many other activities. Obviously the more you pay, the more you can do. It opened in 1990 when an orphaned baby cub was given to the monks which soon died. However another two were then given and from then on more and more orphaned cubs were brought up by the monks. Imagine my excitement when I then found out that the town in which this tiger temple resides in is called Kanchanaburi.
KANCHAN aburi! I immediately decided that this is the place I would go to one day; either during a summer or when I finish my university degree (bearing in mind this was a year ago).
Now one of my best friends is going to Thailand this summer with her Dad, and I was telling her about the place and her Dad is actually taking her to the tiger temple. To say I’m jealous is simply an understatement! She told me this today (through BBM) and I was with my cousin at the time (who went travelling for two months in Thailand with her boyfriend around two years ago) and I mentioned it to my cousin. She then told me that they had actually been to Kanchanaburi and that they were going to go to the tiger temple, but people told them that the tigers were constantly drugged up and sometimes abused. They also met a girl who actually got bitten on the bottom by one of the tigers! Obviously this put both her and her boyfriend off from visiting and also gave me a lot of doubts. Today I’ve been doing some research and there’s actually a whole website dedicated to unveiling the truth about the tiger temple; there are videos, photos and comments from tourists all showing abuse and highlighting what my cousin was saying. Many of the photos show the animals being hit with large metal tools or big sticks, and there a few showing some tigers suffering from malnutrition.
Seeing all the different websites and articles not only made my stomach churn but also made me feel so angry. How could anyone mistreat such a beautiful creature and why? I suppose I had been quite naïve to think that the tigers would peacefully just roam around and not harm any of the tourists who would appear as strangers to them. Then again I simply believed that the tigers had been raised by the monks from birth when they were cubs meaning that they would have been used to human company and seen it as a norm. Clearly this is not the case.
I then started to wonder if this really was true, surely something would have been done? As far as I can tell the tiger temple is still very much up and running. The only way you can really find out is to go out there and see it for yourself. Therefore I told my best friend about it all and she is determined to find out what exactly is going on. Hopefully she will be able to find out something so watch this space! In the meantime im off to go sleep and hug my beloved teddy tiger.
Anyways I’ve always wanted to do something to help protect the creatures as they are already endangered and quickly disappearing; if I am to ever have kids I’d like to think that I will be able to share my passion for tigers with them and still be physically be able to show them a tiger.
One of my dreams and things to do before I die is to actually see a tiger face to face and be able to touch it. There are many various tiger reserves in India and I used to go to the country every year so I did a bit of research but I couldn’t find a park where you could actually come into physical contact with the big cats. Then I stumbled upon a place in Thailand called “Tiger Temple”. At last I thought, this is where I am going to go!
The temple is run by monks and basically they live with fully grown tigers. It has quickly become a tourist attraction as you are able to pet the tigers, feed the cubs, and give them baths and many other activities. Obviously the more you pay, the more you can do. It opened in 1990 when an orphaned baby cub was given to the monks which soon died. However another two were then given and from then on more and more orphaned cubs were brought up by the monks. Imagine my excitement when I then found out that the town in which this tiger temple resides in is called Kanchanaburi.
KANCHAN aburi! I immediately decided that this is the place I would go to one day; either during a summer or when I finish my university degree (bearing in mind this was a year ago).
Now one of my best friends is going to Thailand this summer with her Dad, and I was telling her about the place and her Dad is actually taking her to the tiger temple. To say I’m jealous is simply an understatement! She told me this today (through BBM) and I was with my cousin at the time (who went travelling for two months in Thailand with her boyfriend around two years ago) and I mentioned it to my cousin. She then told me that they had actually been to Kanchanaburi and that they were going to go to the tiger temple, but people told them that the tigers were constantly drugged up and sometimes abused. They also met a girl who actually got bitten on the bottom by one of the tigers! Obviously this put both her and her boyfriend off from visiting and also gave me a lot of doubts. Today I’ve been doing some research and there’s actually a whole website dedicated to unveiling the truth about the tiger temple; there are videos, photos and comments from tourists all showing abuse and highlighting what my cousin was saying. Many of the photos show the animals being hit with large metal tools or big sticks, and there a few showing some tigers suffering from malnutrition.
Seeing all the different websites and articles not only made my stomach churn but also made me feel so angry. How could anyone mistreat such a beautiful creature and why? I suppose I had been quite naïve to think that the tigers would peacefully just roam around and not harm any of the tourists who would appear as strangers to them. Then again I simply believed that the tigers had been raised by the monks from birth when they were cubs meaning that they would have been used to human company and seen it as a norm. Clearly this is not the case.
I then started to wonder if this really was true, surely something would have been done? As far as I can tell the tiger temple is still very much up and running. The only way you can really find out is to go out there and see it for yourself. Therefore I told my best friend about it all and she is determined to find out what exactly is going on. Hopefully she will be able to find out something so watch this space! In the meantime im off to go sleep and hug my beloved teddy tiger.
No comments:
Post a Comment