Yesterday was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. We visited Wat Pa Luangta Bua Yannasampanno Forest Monastery, also known as the Tiger Temple. What began as caring for an injured boar, led to the monastery welcoming all sorts of local animals. In 1999, they accepted a tiger cub which was saved from being stuffed. Since then, several tigers that have been intercepted from poachers have been brought for sanctuary. Today the temple houses many full-grown tigers and they are bred for eventual reentry into the wild. In the afternoons, the tigers are let out of their enclosures for their “exercise time.” Their collars were attached to chains several meters long, so they didn’t look to be getting much exercise, but they sat around for all the tourists. The place was definitely a tourist trap with high prices and lots of special things you could pay extra for. Nonetheless, its not everyday that you get to touch tigers, so we stood in an incredibly long line for our turn to get near the tigers and take some photos. The tigers have several-meter long chains and all tourists are guided around the area as only one person is allowed around near a tiger at a time. I was still quite a bit anxious about being next, much less touching tigers many times my size and weight. They were pretty docile though, which probably accounts for the rumor on the backpacker circuit that the animals are doped (the monastery says they have been brought up by humans since they were kittens, so they’re used to human contact). I did hear there was once an “incident” between a tiger and a water buffalo at the monastery though. Some of the tigers were enormous and touching them was intimidating. Their thin and short coat of fur wasn’t at all what I was expecting.

As we were leaving, Joylani and I decided to explore a bit more and discovered a couple staff members letting about a dozen tourists play with two eight-week-old tiger cubs. Right after we got there, they closed off the area as nobody is allowed in any open areas while the grown tigers are walked back to their enclosures. So it was just us and few others to play with the cubs. For twenty or thirty minutes, we sat in a circle and let the cubs walk around. We were told not to keep the cubs and let them walk where they want, which worked out for us, because they walked to Joylani’s lap and loved it there. They stayed with her, not wanting to leave. One did bite my hand, which didn’t really hurt since their jaws aren’t all that strong yet. The other licked my knee for a few minutes, between gnawing it and trying to get its jaws around it. So I guess besides seeing tigers, I can joke that I’ve been bit by one too now In all seriousness, seeing and touching the tigers was a real highlight.

what you don’t see in the other pics is the five million volunteers escorting us…