Panthera Tigris

Well, yesterday was quite an adventure.

Me, Amanda, Jolynn, and Lindsey went to Subic Zoobic Adventures for the day (we started out at 9 am and didnt get back until 4 PM, long day) and had dinner at Texas Joes (no apostrophe key on this computer, sorry!).

We met up at Mini Stop and took off for Subic, which is about an hour and a half away. Jolynn emerged as the clear leader, having been in girl scouts, she whipped out a map and ULTRA powered bug spray (it was 95% DEET- she advised us to wash it off or else it would give us nightmares if we left it on too long---eek.) and helped the shy, 20ish driver steer us around Subic. (He almost got a ticket for being an *obstruction* for trying to find the turnoff at one point- but he got out of it, and we got him dinner later, which after ordering the cheapest, smallest thing on the menu, he ate, blushing dusky rose the whole time.)

We loitered in the broiling sun, once arriving, watching babies torture the *For sale* guinea pigs, hamsters, and teddy bear hamsters, for quite a while, waiting for the other members of our party, Nick and his bestie, a local called Anthony, Anthonys wife and their three children under 5. Great.

Nick is Lindseys ex, so Ill gloss over the details of my scathing observations of him (suffice to say my own taste in men is, shall we say, checkered), but he brings Chris Farley, minus the genial mania, to mind. He had a habit, that, had I had less burning hatred for the way he used and abused my girl, might have been amusing, of lowering himself mentally to the level of the 5 year old boy in the party and having a rolicking, beer- fumed good time. His shouts of pidgen Tagalog and inarticulate screams rent the stifling air at regular intervals and we couldnt lose him. Oh, anything for my girls, but STILL!

We were corralled into a holding area (one of many that we would wait in, swinging our legs and chatting, me miserably noting the total lack of cute guys to replace the recently departed) to take pictures with one of only two artic tigers in the Phil, both of whom were sleepy and had the empty, long suffering stare of zoo animals.

Thus began my mental war. On one hand, the zoo is only way that most people can see these guys, and honestly, anything to get away from the trudgery of daily life over here. On the other, it is pure torture for me to see the thousand yard stare of these animals. Maybe Im giving these 600 pound killing machines (which they are, and you REALLY feel their immense wildness and unsurpassed, ancient power up close) too much sympathy, but it really, really hurts.

Anyway, we went to the *Bird Thrill* area, which was, uh, okay. We toddled through several other areas, missing the serpetarium (sorry mike!) but hitting *Rodent World*, which was pretty cool. It was so hot that I reached what I call maximum saturation level and just spent the rest of the day dreaming about wind/ pool/ daiquiris.

We shuffled between the tram, which had leather (!!!) seats and smelled vaguely of the locker room aura of thousands of sweaty people crammed into the seats, and various attractions that would have been way cooler without some rug rats head nudging my knee and some arthritic grandpa stumping along in front of me.

One of the awesome parts was the breeding grounds, which are open. Pot bellied pigs share with ostriches, and this is the verbatim from the tour guide: *This is our breeding ground. We require you to stay in the tram since some of our ostriches are quite aggressive.*

They are so otherwordly, with their amazing ugly faces held as high as the head of a crowned beauty queen, and that Vegas showgirl plume of feathers around them, waving in the wind created by the tram. They stared angrily at us, as we whizzed by clicking photos, they were only thing scarier than the Tigers.

The tigers.

The highlight of the trip was the Tiger Safari, where you get in a caged Jeepney and buy a raw chicken to feed the tigers, who roam wild and have learned that the Jeepney means food.

They leap up to the window were an underpaid teenage kid opens the window and calls *Hey, Daddy*, and feeds the tiger with his BARE HANDS COVERED IN CHICKEN GUTS. The kid whistles and throws some chicken on the roof and as easily as you would hop onto the kerb this beast jumps on the ROOF of the jeepney and rides it down the hills, eating chicken, swaying gracefully with the movement of the Jeepney, the king of all he surveys. Everything every written about the power, majesty, and glory of these animals is visible in these moments. The first time you see a live tiger five feet away from you leap cinematically onto the roof of a World War II Jeepney is one that robs you of adjectives, and the feeling when you realize that your rickety Jeepney is next is one that is akin to only one feeling Ive ever had- a kind of torpor in which you are both inside and outside your body, seeing and feeling everything, but as if in a dream.

Being here has changed the way I experience things a bit- it has made me MORE jaded (as when I was eating the breakfast buffet at Mango Park Hotel in Cebu with Ives and thinking a bit languidly how many millions of these damn things Ive been to, and suddenly realizing that this was probably a really unusual event for him) and less jaded, as when I saw the New Years fireworks from my balcony and felt like the luckiest cat in the Phil.

Anyway, the upshot is that when I saw the face of the Tiger leaning down to look at us through the scarred Plexi glass of the jeepney roof I was again blessed with an emotion that Ive never felt, and still cant describe- a kind of juvenile innocent fear, mixed with pity for the animal and its handlers, awe, thankfulness... and more, too many more to name.

Awesome, in the true meaning of the word.