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In the beginning, all animals were equal. One would think that a balance of power would create peace amongst the animals of the jungle, but chaos reigned. In the hopes of easing the fighting, the gods gifted each species an attribute at which they would be the best. The tiger received the gifts of craftiness and stealth, making him a lethal hunter. He spent his days slipping silently through the underbrush, spying on his prey.
There came a day, soon after the last of the animals had received their gifts, that the tiger happened upon a son of man. The tiger knew the gods had given the humans the gifts of beauty and wisdom. He wondered at man's reason for entering the woods, where many animals could now kill him quite easily. Curious, he followed the human to the home of the gods. There, the tiger heard the man ask the gods for strength to match his beauty and wisdom.
The gods instructed the human to return the next day for his gift. Jealous, the tiger came back the next day and stole the gift of strength for his own. Pleased with his success at tricking the gods, the tiger intercepted the man on his way to the gods and bragged about his new strength. The tiger challenged the man to a fight, but as he was about to pounce, the puny human evaded him and escaped.
Upon reaching the gods' house, man found that they had indeed already given his gift away. However, the gods- hearing the man's story of his encounter in the woods and realizing the tiger tricked them- granted him the gift of skill instead. The gods also gifted the man with a bow and a single arrow. The tiger, having followed the human and eavesdropped once again, witnessed all of this and heard the gods instruct the man to fire the arrow if the tiger attacked, and it would find its mark and kill him. Now the tiger may not have the great wisdom of man, but he knew better than to challenge a weapon of the gods. The human returned home unchallenged.
A few years later, because of his stolen strength, the animals unanimously chose the tiger as their king. However, he was too self-absorbed and ignorant of the cultures of his people. While he was out walking one day, the tiger king decided to take a break from the heat. Slowly, he began to doze off. When the tiger awoke, he heard the most beautiful singing. Not recognizing the voice of the little bug performing on a leaf above him, the tiger assumed the song was coming from the monkeys playing in trees.
When he inquired after the identity of the singer, a young male monkey informed him that it was in fact his little sister singing. Overcome with joy, the tiger demanded to marry her. After much negotiation, the monkey tribe to whom his young bride belonged invited him to claim her a week later. Giddy with excitement, he counted down the days to the full moon that would mark his wedding night.
The tiger arrived at the home of his future in-laws and they led him to his bride. She was dressed in some of the finest clothes he had ever seen, but she would not respond to him. Her family insisted the young monkey had merely fallen asleep, but when he attempted to wake her, her head fell off! Her family attacked him then, insisting he had killed her on purpose. The tiger survived, but he was wounded in a way that would never truly heal.
As the years wore on, the tiger king grew weaker and weaker from his injuries following the monkey incident. He became unable to bring the results from his hunts back to fill the family stores as the physical exertion was just too much for his failing body. His sister, the cat, grew irate with him at his lack of providing. When she confronted him about the struggle of a royal family living like peasants, the tiger grew angry. It was not his fault the monkeys had attacked him over a simple underestimation of his strength!
Things were back to normal for a while, until he had some friends over. He asked his sister to light the hookah and the ungrateful feline had the audacity to tell him there was no fire! So he sent her to retrieve some from the humans. She took so long to return that the tiger's friends began to dismiss themselves. Angry that his sister had ruined his social gathering, he began walking to the human village to retrieve her. However, as the tiger king got closer, he began to weaken. His old injuries slowly revealed themselves- an aching knee... a sore shoulder... He began to feel a throbbing at the base of his spine, then a splitting headache. The Tiger lost feeling in his legs, he struggled to breathe, and then... he collapsed.
Author's Note: A lot of the Khasi Tales focused on a tiger king. I thought it would be fun to think of all the stories as being about the same tiger who has just had a very unfortunate life. "A Series of Unfortunate Events," anyone? I also adjusted the stories to be more from the Tiger's point of view.
**Disclaimer: I’ve never actually read "A Series of Unfortunate Events"
The first part of this story is based on "How the Tiger got his Strength." In the original tale, the tiger tricks the gods into giving him the gift of strength that they had promised to man. While man is on his way to claim his gift, the tiger stops him to brag about stealing it. The human escapes and the gods give him the gift of skill instead, but the story never mentions whether or not the tiger attacks him on his way home. I decided to have the tiger follow him to the house of the gods and eavesdrop again. This would allow the tiger to avoid the deadly arrow and survive to continue on as the same tiger in the remaining stories.
The second bit is based on "The Tiger and the Monkeys." A tiger hears a bug singing in the bushes above him and is tricked into believing it's a non-existent monkey doing the singing. He demands to marry the singer, and the monkey tribe builds a fake bride for him to claim. When he tried to "wake" his "bride," the head fell off and the monkeys claimed the tiger had killed her. Since this telling is still technically in third person perspective, the reader still knows that the true singer is a bug. However, the reader does not know much of the background plotting done by the monkeys. The injuries sustained by the tiger at the end of this story are ultimately the cause of the tiger's downfall in the last section.
In "How the Cat came to Live with Man," the tiger's little sister, the cat, is upset at his lack of providing for the family. While this story remains mostly unchanged in this version, alluding to the extensive severity of the tiger's injuries and ill health gained from the fight with the monkeys shed some light on the actual reasons for his shortcomings as a provider for his family other than just laziness, as the cat believes. I also altered the ending so that the tiger would pass away before finding his sister because abuse is not okay!
Bibliography:
How the Tiger got his Strength, Ms. K U Rafy
The Tiger and The Monkeys, Ms. K U Rafy
How the Cat Came to Live with Man, Ms. K U Rafy
Cover Photo: Wikipedia
Imbedded Photo: WikiMedia Commons
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