The Temple of Tigers in Kanchanaburi (กาญจนบุรี), Thailand
In 1999, the inhabitants of a little village in the province of Kanchanaburi, Thailand, found in the forest two baby tigers whose parents had been killed by poachers. Not knowing what to do with them they took them to the Theravada Buddhist temple Wat Pha Luang where they were house and cared for by the monks. Since then many orphaned baby tigers have been taken there and raised by the monks. The tigers are tame and used to eating only cooked meat in order to avoid developing a taste for blood. They are treated like members of the temple family. Currently in 2012 there is said to be around 100 tigers there!
It is a communal place considered a sanctuary for animals and a preservation center. The temple is open to tourists. The employees keep the tigers under control and are at the ready to intervene if they become agitated. Visitor are invited to leave a donation if they wish to be photographed with the tigers. It is perhaps the only place in the world where it is possible to pet free tigers.
To be fair, and not to paint an overly rosy unrealistic picture, there have been some reports of maltreatment and abuse from visitors, as well as the possibility of illegal animal trading involvement. It has also been criticized as doing this primarily for self promotion and to make money from tourists. Since I’ve never been there myself, I can’t judge, however the idea and the pictures are beautiful and can only pray that they are treated with respect, and that the monks follow the Dharma in their practice with the tigers.
Please share and reblog if you like, and we can send our love to tigers, big cats and animals alike all round the world.
Much <3
- cosmiKcosmiK
Credit:
- Text taken and tweaked from a Forward e-mail I received, so source of the writing is unknown. Although most of this information can be found online, i.e. Wikipedia.
- Pictures are also taken from the Internet
